I've self-published one book, but I am interested in what people think is a reasonable price for an e-book? Of course we all like free books and with certain companies, for every 30 downloads you get paid the price of one. I'm prepared to pay $2.99 for a book unless it's a textbook or reference book, yet I see self-help books at $4.99 plus with about 30 pages in them. I imagine they price them high as Amazon have their commission structure based on how much you price your book. Articles say $1.99 books don't sell as well as $2.99 books and 99 cent books can go either way as people think it's not a risk or it can't be that good. What is you personal take on the pricing?
For me, it depends on why I am buying the book. I have paid $15 for a textbook in eBook format, and I am willing to pay $5-$10 for an eBook if it will help me professionally. If it is purely for enjoyment, I won't pay more than around $5, because for a little more money, I can own the physical copy of the book by using physical bookstores or eBay. Ultimately, the purpose for buying the book is the most important factor in my decision making when it comes to how much I am willing to spend.
I look at number of pages as a big part of my decision. If the book is short enough that it could have been done as a webpage or will take me less than an hour to read, I won't pay more than 99 cents regardless of the content. In my opinion, those short self-help books asking larger prices are authors looking to get rich quick and can't possibly have anything in them that's not already available free somewhere on the web. I expect things that I pay novel prices for to be novel length. If it's an actual textbook I need for a class, I'll pay any amount lower than I could get a used physical copy of the same book. If it's something I think might help me professionally, I might pay up to $10 IF it's long enough that I think it has a lot of useful information AND the reviews are really good AND I can look at the authors website to have a good idea of the direction it's going and whether that will be useful to me personally. For novels, if it's an author I don't know, I won't pay more than $1.99 unless they have short stories available on a website or some other way for me to judge their writing and editing ability. A sample of the ebook on amazon isn't enough for me because I want to see them start and FINISH a story to get an idea of their writing style. I've found many Indy authors that I like by them having a free or $0.99 first book to get readers hooked in the series. Once I'm hooked on an author and have tried one of their short stories and one of their novels, I'm perfectly willing to pay as much for a high quality Indy author as a traditionally published digital book. Some authors that I think tell a good story but aren't as engaging or high quality, I might continue to buy books in a lower price range, say under $2/book. I don't buy physical books EXCEPT places like flea markets or yardsales so that might skew my opinions. I'm working on switching entirely to digital in the near future.
This is really good feedback as yes, reading a sample is usually the foreword and the contents list. I like the idea of a short story online and may post some on my website with that in mind. I do thinks some books are overpriced and even for a novel by a well-known author should never be over $5 unless it is very long as there is cost involved with paper or printing. Thanks for your thoughts.!
It depends on my need. If I need the book badly, then I could pay huge a amounts for it (maybe up to 20 bucks). However, the amount would also depend on the availability of the book. What I do is I first search for the ebook at Google and some torrent sites. If they are available for free download in some other sites, why pay? Haha! Anyways, the most that I've paid for an eBook is $10. That's a book about making money online. How did that purchase go? Well, I regretted purchasing it right after I read the first few pages.
Well I would have to agree that purchasing an e-book would depend on how necessary it is or how valuable its existence is to the person who seeks to buy it. It doesn't really matter whether the author is known or not, if I take an interest, I'd be willing to pay more than the usual rate. I don't mind spending more than $10 to secure an e-book. Between regular books and e-books, however, I'm more in the habit of buying the former.
While there are costs involved for a physical book like printing, paper, and shipping, I think those should only be reflected in the cost of the physical book. The e-book should be a significantly lower price. I'll pay up to half the price of the hardcover release or up to about $6 for a book released only as a paperback. If I think a novel from a well known author from a major publishing house is overpriced, I'll probably torrent the book or sit in the library to read it. There are options and I use them. With an Indy author, the second is impossible and I feel that the first is unethical. In that case, depending on how badly I want the book, I might suck it up and buy it or I might wait a bit to see if the price goes down or if it becomes available in the prime lending library or see if it's available on one of the free-book-for-review type sites. In some ways, I believe Indy authors actually deserve to charge more because they do more than just what a normal editor does; They format and market and do more of the editing. Just starting out though, I don't think that's something you can get away with. You have to have a dedicated following.
I think studies have shown that books sell good at 5$ and 10$, because of the idea that the book would be better quality at those price than cheaper prices. I do not think self-published books would have the same impact, though. I'd say you deserve good money and not just "sell at the cheapest rate they will buy", though. I think a good cover and a good summary would help in people deciding what they want to buy, and maybe you could hold a blog/website so that people could see easily your writing style and how interested they'd be? I mean, with a blog you could get extra writing revenues from this too... I'd say 4.99$ would be a price I'd pay for encouraging a stranger with a story I want to read. I'd pay more for someone I know, probably, if I want to read it.
The subject matter of the book will determine how much I spend for it. If it is a book I need for work or to take a test I will spend much more than $10. If it is something someone wrote to express their thoughts on a subject it will not get a higher price than $10.
Last time I bought an IM ebook which cost $9 I was disappointed to find out that the book was not only 10 pages long but had nothing of value I'd use. Most of the self-help ebooks I've seen merely compile information you can, if you are willing to spend a little time researching, find on the web. For the convenience of having all I seek in some ebook I'd pay $0 .99 but I'd never go beyond that.
I've taken to buying more ebooks than traditional books for the convenience and storage. It all depends on what type of book it is, and the author for me. The genre that I tend to read can cost anything from 55 pence-6.99 GBP, with most going for 1.99GBP. I buy several ebooks a month, and the most I've paid is 4.99GBP. I doubt I'd go above that for the books I read, which are very light hearted.
I haven't paid a single dime for ebooks. I don't know if you're aware that you can pretty much any ebooks you want for free. I know it's not legit but i mean everybody nowadays download things online all the time without feeling guilty about it. But if you want to support the author you'd definitely be okay with spending a few bucks for their hardwork.
Personally it all matters about the author, the subject, and the reviews about a ebook that will determine my choice to buy or not buy. Also, some ebooks are ridiculously overcharged, which I set the threshold at $10 for 150-200 pages, $15 for 250-300 pages, so on and so forth - these are what I believe is fair to me and the author, and only includes newly published books. For older and reprint books, I only buy at the lowest price I can find since such books have already made the author(s) and publishers money.
