First Sale

My first sale on Amazon! Since the book is under my control and with a new price, that is. Sometime this morning someone bought a copy. Here's to many more. The Year of the Ox (my year) transitioning into the Year of the Tiger (roar!). It looks like it's going to be a good one.

I've started placing ads, so we'll have to see how sales are affected by that.






Golden Ox Publishing

Year of the Ox

It's 2010 and it's the start of something new. It's the start of Golden Ox Publishing. I thought I'd try what many other blogger's have done before me and chronicle the start of this new venture. Where to start?

I've started a book publishing company - Golden Ox Publishing. I started it to publish my upcoming book, Deliver On Your Promises - Success Through Business Operations Excellence. I started it because I wasn't entirely happy with the publisher of my first book (The Small Manufacturer's Toolkit), a large, international publishing company. Yes, they were very good at some things, basically all the things involved with book production, but when it came to marketing and selling they fell woefully short. It's a good looking book, I have to say, but it was overpriced from the beginning and didn't sell well. Also, I learned one of the big secrets of publishing with the big companies. You, the author, is primarily responsible for marketing. Although they have all the knowledge and resources for marketing books, they are mostly reserved for the best sellers. As an unknown author in a niche subject, you get pretty much nil. Not completely, but it sure felt that way.

I kept telling my contacts at the publisher that the book was overpriced. I wrote it for a specific market, which I know pretty well, Small Manufacturing companies and the owners, managers, and others who work there. Priced at $79.95 originally, they were not going to sell in large quantities to this market. So totally ignoring my requests to lower the price, they actually raised it, to $93+. Can you believe that? I couldn't. I tried and tried to get them to lower the price, but to no avail, and sales were going nowhere. That meant that not only were the books not getting into the hands of the people who can really use it, I was not getting any royalty payments. I know the book is good, and useful, because I have gotten nothing but great feedback and reviews. The book had very positive reviews in three trade magazines; APICS - The Association for Operations Management, ASQ - The American Society for Quality, and IIE - The Institute for Industrial Engineers, who apparently have changed their name recently (I'll try to find copies and/or links and put them up on my website). And the feedback I've gotten from people who bought and read the book has been great.

Since I was getting nowhere with the publisher, I asked them if I could buy the rights back to the book and maybe the remaining inventory. Being a large buerachracy, there was a lot of back and forth with questions and offers and counteroffers, but I finally got it. I obtained the rights to the book (print version, not electronic) and bought all the remaining inventory. Now the fun begins.

I was planning on starting the publishing company to publish my next book, but it's starting now with my first book. I have the rights and I received the first couple of boxes of inventory. Now I have to market and sell and plan on what to do next. That's what this new thread of this blog will be all about. I'll lay out my plans and keep you up to date with my progress. Please feel free to let me know what you think. This is going to be what they call "a learning experience." And, of course, if you want to buy a copy just let me know (but as for now please check Amazon first). That will be the subject of another post...

Oh, and I will be lowering the price to a more appropriate and reasonable $39.95.

Save, Save, Save!

I suppose I'm like most authors of successful, but not best selling, books. I check my sales and ranking on Amazon.com regularly. I can always tell when a book is sold (note "a", meaning 1) because the book's ranking jumps from its usual 1.5 million position, up to 200,000 or so (once a couple sold at a time and I was up around 20,000 or so - woo hoo!).

My biggest jump in sales was when the price was discounted about 40% down to around $40 or $45. That was when I started paying more attention to the price of the book.

Personally, I think ("personally" and "I" are redundant, I know) the book is overpriced. I understand how the publisher priced it where it is, partly based on the expected market value and partly based on the cost to produce (small production run for a first time author), but I really think it would sell much better at a lower price.

The original price was $79.98. Sure it's a 400+ page book, but it's not a college text book (though it could and should be used college Operations Management courses), it's written for working people, specifically people who work at small manufacturing companies. I think it would sell like hotcakes at about $39.98. It has gotten nothing but good reviews, and everyone who's read it (OK, everyone who's commented to me) tells me it's great. It's even been translated into Russian. But people just aren't willing to pay that high a price.

But instead of lowering the price, I noticed that the price went up. From $79.98 it went up to $89.98. Huh? If it's not selling fast at $79 why would you increase the price to $89? But, then when the price was increased, Amazon discounted it down to around $71. I guess people just can't pass up a sale. Now I notice the price is $93.95 (on both Amazon and the publisher's website), and discounted 5% down to $89.22.

I've contacted my publisher asking about lowering the price, but I've gotten no response.

The worst part is that I can't even afford to buy my own book. Even at my discount I can't afford to buy them and sell them at a reasonable price. Maybe I should read a book about the publishing business and how to price a book... Maybe I can reinvest and buy some copies when I get my next royalty check.

Still, the book is very valuable and worth the investment if it's used as it's intended - to help improve your business and improve profitability. That's especially important in these tough economic times.

I do have a couple of copies left, so if you contact me I might sell you one at a better price.