A Publisher's Conversation with Authors: Do You Know How Many of Your Books Have Really Sold?

(photo by  Frank Perez)

It is Tuesday. Time to tall turkey. Monday's madness is over, and Wednesday will take us over the hump, so Tuesday it is--for some serious discussion with authors. Tuesday talks mean to address authors in waiting and self-published authors who would like to go a more traditional route or who would at least like to take their steps with a publisher by their side.

Today's topic is about figuring out your book sales. Many authors try to figure out their sales based on some inaccurate thinking or assumptions. 

• Amazon posts a sales ranking. If you look at your ranking, it can appear that your book is selling more (the number is lower than it was a few minutes ago) or selling less (the number is higher than it was a few minutes ago). Actually, that number does not tell you anything about the number of books sold. A higher number could mean more books were sold, fewer books were sold, or no books were sold. The number is a relative one based on recency of purchase. Moreover, for any book with a ranking above 1 million, you can be pretty sure that the book is not selling. The same calculation is pretty much true for all online sellers that give a ranking.

• Book scan sales are included in Author Central at Amazon. These numbers can be way off for a whole slew of reasons. Rather than iterating a long list here, here is a really detailed explanation by another publisher.

 So, how do you you know how many books have sold? Ask your publisher!

• Publishers get periodic sales reports from distributors. These are accurate.
• There is often a delay in reporting by the distributor; so, the figures may not be current as of today, but the publisher can tell you what the delay period is.
• Please respect your publisher's time. Do not ask for a daily report. An occasional query, though, is generally welcomed.

Want to read more on this topic? Check out this Quora response.

Lesson for today's Tuesday talk: Your publisher is the best source--and generally the only source--for accurate information about book sales.
Occasionally asking about sales is a good thing. Having a conversation with your publisher about how well your book is selling and what you might do to help the publisher increase sales is a very good thing.

Read more posts about publishing HERE.

The Tuesday talks reflect real discussions between the management of MSI Press LLC and our own authors or those would-be authors who come through our doors but don't make the cut--yet. If you have a topic you would like addressed, leave the question in the comment section. Chances are, in our 18 years of publishing first-time and experiences authors, we have had a conversation with one of our authors that we can share with you.