Here at Ink Monster, we’re a very data-driven bunch. I suppose that’s a strange thing to say about people who are a) creative, b) semi-insane and c) monsters, but there you go.
This post is the first in a series on our awesome retailer partners. This week, it’s all about why we love iBooks.
A recent article by Mike Shazkin reported some interesting trends regarding independent writers and publishers like Ink Monster, such as:
Indie authors are facing falling revenues
Indie readers are often price-conscious
Indie readers are finding even more cost-effective ways to find books, which could account for this downturn (the article focuses on subscription services, but there could be more to the trend)
So, one question out there may be: as a writer or publisher, how do you find readers that are not price conscious?
And this, my friends, is why we love iBooks. Our data shows that iBooks readers care about content, timing and quality far more than price. In other words, iBooks readers are like the ladies who haul their cookies to Rodeo Drive for the trunk show, rather than wait for the Fashion Bug knock-off to go on sale a year later. Some related stats:
At Ink Monster, every iBooks reader is worth 4-5X the revenue of any other retail customer
iBooks represents almost 50% of our revenue, even though they are not #1 in terms of units moved
iBooks readers are 2X more likely to read-though all books in a series
Placement drives more sales with iBooks than promotion. Readers seem to treat the retailer as a curator of cool rather than a center for discounts
Full disclosure. At Ink Monster, we owe iBooks a big thank-you. They took a chance on a publisher with some good-sounding books and zero sales history. Their support led to our first sales breakthrough; everything else followed from that.
So, thank you iBooks! New to this retailer? You can find out more about them here.
More publishing blog posts:
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