Charge of The Light Brigade and E-Books Pricing

Quote of the Day: “Conformity is the jailer of freedom and the enemy of growth.” – John F. Kennedy, 35th president of the United States of America

The Writing Life

Writers are creative in placing words on the page one after another. The logical next step is publishing if you want your work to be read by the masses. This is when a writer become a publisher or an entrepreneur regardless of whether an indie writer or represented by a large publishing company. Today’s publishing world requires the author to have a huge stake in the promotion and sale of their books.

There are many aspects that play a role in the sale of a book. Here are a few of my thoughts about book production and promotions.

• Great writing and production of work
• Professional editing and formatting
• Outstanding professional book cover
• Marketing strategy – business plan
• Book Pricing

Book World

A good portion of the books in today’s market are priced according to the competition. The scale hasn’t moved in years. However, the price for producing and marketing has skyrocketed. From advertising on major social platforms and search engines, websites, apps, books reviews, to the basics for creating your book and marketing. For example, keywords used for advertising are sometimes greater than the overall pricing of one book.

I’m reminded of the poem: The Charge of the Light Brigade by Lord Alfred Tennyson. The poem tells the story of six-hundred men who followed their leader to certain death. A clip with dialog from the poem as seen in the movie, Blindside is below.

What I’ve Learned

We can continue to follow the leader into a certain death of writing careers or make changes.  Isn’t it about time pricing and selling books be measured by the costs to produce the product AND relative competition? How many businesses do you know would charge pennies for an item they’d spend several hundred/thousands of dollars to produce? The results would be a disaster and certain death for the business. There are lessons to be learned from The Charge of The Light Brigade. Treat your writing career as a business and use sound practices to measure your success.

Note: The e-book pricing suggested is created by a mathematical calculation, and research of comparable books in your genre. This is not an arbitrary number pulled out of the sky. Remember: Pricing is not set in stone; you can always change it as do most book marketers.

There’s fear involved in making any changes and I’m not immune. However, if you’re tired of feeding the beast, it’s time to make changes. Here are a few things I do to promote my books. Let me know what’s working for you.

• Provide FREE copies for book reviewers/bloggers
• Develop an advance readers group to be first reviewers
• Offer FREE books through sweepstakes on major social platforms and through booksellers
• Run ad campaign with reduced pricing/or FREE Days

To learn about my writing life, click here. I wish you tremendous success as you develop your creative business. Carolyn Bowen

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