ROI for Indie Authors: "What if I don't make back my investment?"

"If I'm going to invest all this money into my book, what happens if I don't sell any? What do I do if I don't make back my investment?"

I'm asked this every so often by self-publishing authors. At first, I didn't know what to tell them. I didn't have an answer. But now, I have more than an answer, more than a solution—I have a proactive plan that will help ensure you make back your investment and then some. Forever.

1. Invest in high quality. 

It's sad to me when a writer will invest money into low-quality design and editing. I have never, ever understood it. If you're going to spend money on an editor, on a formatter, on a cover designer, then why in the name of all things pure and holy would you hire it out to someone who thinks Internet Explorer is the only browser option? Why would you spend money on someone who is "just super good at grammar but has no real experience"? I do not get this.

Before we talk about ROI, we have to talk about good old-fashioned common sense. Invest wisely. Investing into low quality always results in low book sales.

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2. Price your book properly.

Pricing tends to freak out new authors. How do you know what to price your e-book for? Paperback? Hardcover? What about KDP Select vs. going wide? Numbers are the worst.

Let me make it simple for you because I thrive in simplicity:

—Price your e-book at 99￠ (if going wide) for launch week; or put it up for free using KDP Select for 90 days (exclusive).

—Determine down to the penny how much it will cost you to print and sell your paperback on Amazon (if printing with them).

—Promote your e-book on book promotional sites (like we talked about last time: Book Gorilla, The Fussy Librarian, Bargain Booksy, etc.) to get major visibility and sales, which then ups your rankings.

—Work your butt off to get as many sales as possible during launch week and after. Your goal is to get some accolades during this time (best-seller banner, hot new release, endorsements, reviews, etc.) so that when it's time to proceed to the next step, you have the credibility to do so.

—Say bye-bye to the low price of 99￠ and kick it up to $3.99 or $4.99 for your e-book. This depends on your genre, page count, and several other factors, so read this and this. Or listen to this.

3. Determine exactly how much it costs to self-publish your book.

ROI is useless if you don't know how much you spent. How much was editing, proofreading, formatting, design, ISBNs, marketing, printing, and everything else? Get that precise number.

Now it's time to make that amount back within a certain time frame (e.g., "I want to break even within 9 months of publishing"). But how in the blue blazes do you do that?

4. Go where your readers live.

I really need to spend some quality time on a blog post solely about genres. I think too many writers mess this one up, and it causes a lot of frustration down the road. To sell your book to readers, you must know where they hang out, so to speak.

If your book is a memoir about being an army wife, then LinkedIn isn't the place for you. Instead, your book should be featured on every single army wife blog and Facebook group you can possibly find.

If your book is a young adult romance novel, then I'm not going to recommend Facebook groups. Instead, you should have Instagram and YouTube reviewers plastering your book all over their feeds.

If your book is a children's picture book about eating healthy foods, then mommy bloggers and Pinterest are great places to start.

Here's the best part: Putting your book in front of your audience is free. It costs you only your time. That's it. If you can give up time to get your book where the people are, then your ROI will be through the roof. [CLICK TO TWEET]

5. Spend a little to make a lot.

Just because launch week is over doesn't mean you pull back on promotions. You still want to invest into book promotion newsletters because they net so many sales for such a low cost. But don't stop there. Amazon ads, Facebook ads, and BookBub ads are still invaluable to authors. I do not recommend tackling them, however, until you're very comfortable with marketing and have extra cash to spend. You'll want to hire someone to coach you or invest into a course to teach you how to advertise on these platforms.

6. Break even so you can make a profit.

If you need to earn back, say, $5,000 in 9 months, then you need to know exactly how many e-book sales you need to make and exactly how many Amazon paperback sales you need to make and exactly how many signed paperback sales from your website you need to make and so on. Get. Those. Numbers. Down. Now you have a goal to reach, so get people to buy your book by borrowing other people's platforms (blogs, podcasts, YouTube), telling your community (Facebook, Instagram, email newsletter), and promoting where ROI is big (book promotion newsletters, genre-specific websites, ads). 

The worst thing you could do is push your book like nobody's business on launch week, and then never do anything else to promote it. It's about the long game!

An expert editor, best-selling author, and book marketer, Shayla Raquel works one-on-one with authors and business owners every day. A lifelong lover of books, she has edited over 400 books and has launched several Amazon best sellers for her clients.

Her award-winning blog teaches new and established authors how to write, publish, and market their books.

She is the author of the Pre-Publishing Checklist, “The Rotting” (in Shivers in the Night), The Suicide Tree, and The 10 Commandments of Author Branding. In her not-so-free time, she acts as organizer for the Yukon Writers’ Society, volunteers at the Oklahoma County Jail, and obsesses over squirrels. She lives in Oklahoma with her dogs, Chanel, Wednesday, and Baker.