Going Direct
What is "direct"?
“Going direct” is the process of selling your books, art, etc. yourself. This is generally done through some sort of shop options – Etsy, TikTok Shop, your website, etc. It’s seen as a way to circumvent the low royalties paid out by KU, etc.
DID YOU KNOW that indie authors generally only make a dollar or two on each sale of their book through Amazon, B&N etc? Of course this depends on the length of their book and how they’ve priced it, but in general the royalty for an ebook is 70%, and $1-$4 for a physical book? As for Kindle Unlimited, authors are ONLY allowed to put their ebook on KU and nowhere else. This means they miss out on Apple, Nook, Kobo, etc sales. They typically get paid $0.004 a page read the first time it’s read. This means a 200 page book in KU will earn an author about $0.80.
This is a major reason authors go direct and sell themselves. They can buy their books in bulk for $3-$5, and sell them for a higher profit margin.
Why doesn’t everyone do it?
Well – it’s tough. Let’s look at some considerations…
Things to consider
UPFRONT COST
Unlike publishing on Amazon or other services, there is an upfront cost to selling direct. You need to buy your books, plus packaging equipment as a bare minimum.
Depending on how many books you buy, this means $200-$500 up front. Packing supplies varies depending on the size of book you’re shipping and how far.
You can get around this by doing pre-orders, which is a lot easier when you’re an established author.
SPACE
Those books, packing supplies, etc all take up A LOT of space. When On Stolen Tides first went viral on TikTok I ordered 100 copies. They came in 4 separate boxes, which weighed a ton, that had to be lugged to my office. I eventually gave up and put the boxes in the living room.
As I started selling books, I realized some came damaged. Torn pages inside, bent edges, etc. I then started to unload all my books and look them over to make sure there were no defects.
If you want to add art or stickers, this will also take up a lot of space. Many authors have shelving units they use to organize their stock – stickers, packaging equipment, the like.
TIME
Selling direct takes so. much. time. Time you could use to write more books, update your newsletter, play with your dog. You get the picture. If you’re selling a lot of books it feels like a part time job.
I’ll give you an example – almost all of my books come with printed art and stickers. I try to bulk print my art and stickers on days off, but that still takes a ton of time. I print my stickers, put them through my Cameo 4, and organize them. I print and organize my art. I hand write thank you notes to every person who buys. I sign every book.
This takes a lot of time and energy!
There’s also the time to take your books to the post office or FedEx or UPS or wherever you ship them from. “Just drop them in the box!” ALWAYS GET A RECEIPT. If I could impart one piece of wisdom it is to have a receipt of proof for EVERY book you ship. I cannot tell you how many times I’ve had a book not marked as having been shipped, and having proof I dropped it off saved me.
Oh – and you need to set up your shop. You can pay someone to do that, but it’s still a consideration.
OTHER COSTS
Aside from books, there are other costs involved with direct sales.
- Website cost, plus whatever program you use to collect payment, set up your shop, etc
- Printer – for labels and art – as well as the cost of printing supplies, ink, etc
- Shipping material
- Gas/EV charge to and from the post office
- A virtual mailbox or PO Box so your home address isn’t on return labels (I use iPostal1)
Getting Started
WHERE WILL YOU SELL?
Direct selling doesn’t have to mean TikTok Shop or Etsy, it can also mean your own website. There are some things to consider when deciding where you want to set up your shop.
1. Do you have enough of a following that you don’t need to rely on an algorithm to show your products to people? Or do you need an algorithm like TikTok or SEO like Etsy to have people find your product?
2. Are there limitations on shipping time or digital sales? Etsy allows for digital sales (ie – eBooks) but TikTok Shop does not. TikTok Shop also has a 2 day shipping policy on items that aren’t pre-orders.
3. Fees and taxes. Most providers require some type of fee (Paypal takes a percentage, as does TikTok shop and Etsy). Is that fee too much for you to turn a profit? Not all services or shops collect taxes, so you need to keep that in mind for sales tax and VAT as well (if shipping internationally).
Once you figure out what you can afford, what level of exposure you need and any limitations on the platform you can (theoretically) get started!
POD VS HOME SALES
There are some services that allow you to join with POD (print on demand – they handle the printing and shipping of your book for a cut) services. Bookvault is one, they integrate with Woocommerce, Shopify, Payhip and a few others. This is one way to bypass keeping stock. This also means there’s no incentive to buy from you vs. Amazon/B&N/etc because you can’t send art or sign the books. Some people don’t care, the larger payout vs. the major retailers is good enough for them. I’ve found that readers really like the extra touches from direct sales – but that’s not the same for everyone.
Otherwise, you’ll need to set up a place in your home or office to pack and ship. Some people use their garage, others get storage places or work spaces if their operation is big enough.
EQUIPMENT
In my resources guide I shared all of the exact products I use, so this will be a brief overview.
1. Label printer and labels
2. Bubble mailers or boxes to ship stock
3. Inkjet Printer if you plan on making your own art prints or stickers
4. Silhouette or Cricut if you plan on making your own stickers
5. Storage options to keep art, stickers, etc separate for orders
PRIVACY AND ADDRESS STUFF
You need a return address. If you’re not keen on people knowing where you live, you can get a PO Box. Some places don’t allow a PO box to be your address, so using something like iPostal1 to create a virtual address might be more ideal.
Also consider paying extra to keep website WHOIS data private, especially if you use a pen name and don’t want anyone to stumble on your identity.
Things I Wish I Did
I opened my TikTok shop late 2023. If I could go back in time to when I first started to sell, here’s some things I would change.
1. Funnel people to my website or newsletter. Either add a QR code in my thank you card that signs them up for a newsletter (in exchange for a free shipping coupon or something) or reader magnet or SOMETHING. Collecting e-mail addresses so I can update people on new books, discounts, etc would have been INVALUABLE. Especially when TikTok “was banned” for 12 whole hours – that was in the middle of one of my books going super viral. If I trained my readers to go to my website the “ban” would have been less scary.
2. Bundled earlier. Everyone always says “omnibus! Bundle!” as a word of advice to marketing as an indie author. I bundled series, but I never considered bundling similar books. On Stolen Tides and The Ashes of the Brothel are two very different stories (one is a romance, one is not). HOWEVER they both are WLW, so I created a “WLW” bundle. I gave a 10% discount if the bundle was purchased. This sky rocketed sales.
3. Sold art separate from books. Some readers probably just put my printed art/stickers right into the trash when they get it, which is so bad for the environment. Training readers that art is separate likely would have saved me a lot on business costs.
FAQ
1. Is it worth selling on TikTok/Etsy/Direct if you’re not selling custom/special editions?
Yes! I sold $3,000 worth of books on TikTok shop in 2 months and not a SINGLE one was special edition. They were the SAME books people could buy on Amazon – at a higher price! But they came signed, with goodies, and my genre is filled with readers who want to support indie authors away from Amazon. Your readers may not care about those things, you just need to know your market!
2. What’s the secret to TikTok?
Dude, who knows. I have A LOT to say about social media (that’s another blog post for another day). It’s something I love and am passionate about. I think there’s a ton of ways to work TikTok, Instagram, FB, Discord, Twitter, etc – it comes down to several things for me.
1 – Are you being your authentic self? People can tell when you’re not passionate about something, when you don’t enjoy something ,etc. Don’t try to be bubbly if you’re not. Don’t try to be funny if you’re not.
2. Is it sustainable? I’ve read some authors who have 5 accounts and post 8-10 videos a day. I simply could not, and I know a ton of tricks about bulk editing. Having a TikTok, Instagram, Twitter, FB group, Discord server that you run on your own is A LOT. I love tools like Repurpose.io, but at the end of the day you need to pick a platform that works for you and a workflow that is sustainable.
3. Experiment. Try different video styles, add your face, do slideshows. Mess around until you find what works best for you.
4. Repost. I tend to repost videos every 6-12 months. When TikTok added the “OnThisDay” feature I used it ALL THE TIME. The first On Stolen Tides video that went viral was a repost that had crickets the first time. It’s now sitting at 150k+. Plus – your content is only shown to like 7% of your followers or some stupid number like that.
My biggest piece of advice is to be consistent – whatever that means for you. Do you do live streams every Monday? Do you always post an income update on the first of the month? Well – stick with it. Algorithm’s reward consistency.