Pricing Your Fiction E-Book

You can more quickly establish the appropriate price range of a fiction e-book than a nonfiction e-book — but you can also quite easily obsess over where exactly within that range to place your e-book. One dollar higher or lower than the perfect price can make a big difference.

Though almost all fiction e-books are priced between $0.99 and $12.99, most best-selling books priced toward or above the upper end of this range are from big-name authors with the backing of large publishing houses.

Looking at other books in your genre

Different genres have different pricing. Take a look at a dozen of the most popular e-books within your own genre, on Amazon and other sites. Figure 11-5 shows the four most popular e-books in the Thrillers section of the Amazon Kindle store.

If you spot lots of books in your genre that are written by big-name authors (or produced by big-name publishers), price your e-book slightly lower. Readers who haven’t yet heard of you need extra incentive to buy yours.

In most genres, self-publishers agree that $2.99 to $4.99 is the right price point for a novel. (A novel is generally agreed to be a minimum of 40,000 words, and around 80,000 words is standard.) If you’ve written a shorter piece, price it below $2.99. Unless you’re already a well-known author, you’re unlikely to sell a 5,000-word short story for more than $0.99.

No magic formula exists for pricing your novel, and authors have different opinions about what works best. Consider these factors as you determine the price of your e-book:

Your personal price point for an impulse purchase: For example, you might stock your Kindle with dozens of $0.99 books or happily pay $4.99 or more for books that sound intriguing.

The amount that your existing readership considers a good price for novels: You can ask for their opinions on Twitter or Facebook, or encourage their comments on your blog.

The number of novels you plan to publish, such as a trilogy or a longer series: If you plan to publish several related novels, consider making the first novel cheaper than the others to help draw readers into the series.

Pricing your e-book lower than a standard paperback

You may feel that $2.99, or even $4.99, is far too little to charge for your e-book — after all, you’ve spent the past year (or longer) writing your novel. If a bargain-basement price seems to devalue your hard work, you may be tempted to accept the standard $9.99 or $12.99 retail price. After all, some mainstream e-books are priced highly.

Many traditional publishers are still trying to get a handle on e-book pricing, and it’s also a hot topic for readers and authors. Many readers feel (quite reasonably) that a digital version of a book should carry a lower price than its paperback version. After all, manufacturing and warehousing costs have decreased, and unsold copies are not an issue — a copy of an e-book is generated only when it’s purchased.

To encourage sales of your e-book, be willing to price it lower than a standard paperback. Your readers are buying online, so consider also the discounts that major e-retailers (such as Amazon) offer. When a paperback with the standard price of $14.99 goes on sale for $8.99, you’ll need to undercut the discounted price, not the RRP.

Ultimately, the unit price of your e-book is no measure of your worth as an author. The more significant figure is how much total profit you make. If you sell four times more books at $4.99 than at $9.99, for example, you’re putting twice as much money in your pocket.