Nathan Bransford - The Forums

Wait a minute . . . how are any of these sales numbers verified?

I don't doubt the gist of what Konrath is saying. But how do so many authors know their own books' sales figures?

I figured that was nigh impossible before BookScan. Does that mean BookScan's available to the public somewhere?

I remember seeing an article that Amazon was "sharing" BookScan information with its authors. But Amazon's forums for digital writers get posts by authors who seem angry and confused about not knowing what their sales are.

Anybody know what's going on?

siebendach wrote:Wait a minute . . . how are any of these sales numbers verified?

I don't doubt the gist of what Konrath is saying. But how do so many authors know their own books' sales figures?

I assume you mean the self-published books? Most of the copies sold are e-books available through places like Amazon and Barnes&Noble. The self-published author can log in at those sites and receive a report of all the ebooks they've sold during a specified period of time. Amanda Hocking's blog has screen shots of her sales reports, if you're curious about what they look like. She posted them because she didn't want people thinking she was making up her sales figures, as sensational as they were (something around 100,000 for December, if I recall correctly).

I assume - could be wrong - that POD books available through Amazon's CreateSpace would have the same reporting feature.

You're right, though, when it comes to traditionally published books. It's much harder for an author to try to track sales. They have to rely on their agent to keep the publisher honest.

siebendach wrote:But Amazon's forums for digital writers get posts by authors who seem angry and confused about not knowing what their sales are.

Anybody know what's going on?

Hmmm, nope, not sure about that. Maybe it takes awhile to learn how to use the tracking tools?

Joe has made $42,000 for himself so far in January.

Selling ebooks.

These numbers he puts up are crazy.