In a recent email from author Emily Kimelman, she laid out a whole new model for self-publishing that I found especially intriguing, and I thought the Writer Unboxed community would as well.
Emily is the best-selling author of two series—the Sydney Rye mysteries and the Starstruck thrillers—as well as the Kiss Chronicles urban fantasy series under the name Emily Reed. Spending her early years in the Soviet Union (her father was a foreign correspondent for the Philadelphia Enquirer), she caught the wanderlust bug at a young age and has traveled the world from Mongolia to Costa Rica to Spain and beyond, and she often bases her books on her experiences abroad.
(Personal note: Emily is also my wife’s best friend, and they’ve been “sisters from different misters” since they met at age twelve while attending The Baldwin School in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania.)
I recently invited Emily to share her publishing experiences and her unique new venture with our readers.
Why did you originally decide to self-publish?
In 2005, I was in my twenties and coming up with my life plan.
I wanted to write mystery novels because I enjoyed reading them, and writing them seemed like the most fun way to make a living.
I researched how to support myself as an author and decided I’d write a stunningly good book, get an agent, then a publisher. Then they’d take it from there while I wrote in cafes around the world with my dog sleeping peacefully at my feet and my fingers clacking away on my keyboard.
I did write a stunningly good book (it took 5 years), and I did get an agent …but the rest didn’t fall into place until I became my own publisher.
I’m entrepreneurial by nature and watched the self-publishing market emerge from a shameful little corner of the internet into a powerful force traditional publishers were ignoring. So in 2011, when my agent still hadn’t sold my book, I figured I had nothing to lose by going indie.
How have you monetized your books – in particular, share with our readers “how it works” with Amazon.
Retailers like Amazon pay between 30-70% royalties depending on the cover price.
While self-publishing gives authors more control and higher royalties than traditional publishing, retailers don’t share any data—like who bought your books. You’re basically a wholesaler who is allowed to set the retail price.
Also, Amazon runs ads for other products—and books—on your titles’ pages which makes sending your readers there kind of a gamble—they can easily be distracted before clicking the buy button.
How did this part of your career go?
It went great! And I still sell my books on all major retailers.
The better I became at advertising and promoting myself, the more money I made. But I also started to understand how disadvantaged I was compared to others’ selling digital products online.
When you’re spending multi-five figures on ads, and not getting any data from your traffic, you’re paying to give Amazon a lot of customers.
The first month I grossed six figures and retailers kept 35%, I knew it was time to move toward direct sales.
BookFunnel, a delivery service for ebooks that indie authors use to send out ARC copies and reader magnets, integrated with Shopify and other sales platforms a few years ago. But until 2020, I felt the process was clunky for readers.
I believe a key to selling direct is giving readers a positive experience from start to finish. The tech has improved, and readers now have a lot more familiarity with BookFunnel.
Why did you switch from selling through Amazon and start selling directly from your website?
I’ve always dreamed of having my own bookstore, but it didn’t fit into my life plan of traveling the world clacking away on my computer…until now.
My business manager, Jamie Davis, and I were on a retreat in Miami over six years ago when we envisioned a different future for indie authors.
We dreamed of authors bypassing retailers and selling books directly to readers. In this new model, authors are the retailer so they know who is buying their books and can reach them again through email marketing, sending them to sales pages without anyone else’s ads displayed.
But that’s not even the best part. What got us really excited about selling direct was the possibility of affiliates. Authors paying each other a percentage of sales to reach new readers, creating additional income streams for everyone.
The fact is, all authors who write in the same genre share an audience, we just don’t actually “share” it right now. We pay Amazon and Facebook to reach the same readers who are on fellow authors’ newsletter lists.
We started selling my books direct to readers using Facebook ads to drive sales. In 2021, we started tests with affiliates. After a year of researching and testing we now have an official Emily Kimelman Author Affiliate Program for my books—which is so exciting!
Authors who write similar books to mine (gritty, character-driven mystery thrillers) can share my work with their audience and receive 30% of everything they sell. We use ThriveCart’s affiliate program, which splits the funds so no one has to trust me to do the math and send out payments—it’s automatic. BookFunnel delivers the books.
My current offer lets readers pay what they want for the first eight Sydney Rye Mysteries. Some people pay the minimum, some pay more. Each reader spends a different amount, and it averages out to $20 per order.
Part of the appeal of this offer is the novelty.
Eight books for whatever price you want is much more compelling than individual books and small box sets at a set price…we’ve extensively tested this with my books.
Because people pay for the books, and choose their own price, they now have some skin in the game and are more likely to read them rather than just adding to their TBR pile. The box set is one continuous reading experience, so they binge my books and show up in my Facebook group excited about the series.
This offer works on a lot of levels, which means both I and my affiliates make more money. There would be little incentive to be an affiliate for a $.99 offer since 30% off $.99 isn’t going to get anyone excited.
Readers love to read—that’s what makes them readers. So recommending books to our audiences is a great way to earn their trust and create community.
If we write in the same genre, then we already share an audience. I reach new readers every day via organic and paid traffic. I’d rather pay my fellow authors than buy ad space from Facebook or Amazon.
We just opened up applications and already have some awesome authors on board. It’s so exciting to be bringing this dream to life!
Links:
My website: https://emilykimelman.com
Learn more about my affiliate program and apply to join: https://emilykimelman.com/AffiliateForm
The page my affiliates send their readers too: https://read.emilykimelman.com/sr18aff
Do you have any questions for Emily concerning this new venture—or any other aspect of her publishing career?