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How to Price Your e-Book
You've written and compiled an e-book. Now you have to decide
how much to charge for it. Finding the right price is essential
to the success of your product. If you charge too little, people
will think it's of little value, and they won't purchase it, or
even it they do buy your book, you will have to sell thousands
of copies to get to the point where you can begin to see a
profit. If you price it too high when compared with your
competition, you will find yourself steadily lowering the price,
which will cause you all kinds of new problems in the future.
For example, if you sell your e-book at first for $39.99, and
later reduce it to $24.95, don't you think the people who bought
it for $39.99 are going to be upset?
Choosing the right price for your e-book is one of the most
critical parts of the marketing process. The first rule of
pricing e-books is to never underprice. Determine the highest
price your audience can afford, and then if you find your book
isn't selling, you can always reduce the price. Before you take
that step, make sure you are promoting your book like crazy on
the Internet and on websites. The price should be aimed at
bringing in profits, but you should never forget that price is
one of the factors that people use in judging the value of your
e-book - before they buy it. So always start with the highest
price, and then launch a mega-marketing campaign.
Pricing an e-book is particularly difficult because e-books are
a fairly new commodity. Since they are digital, the value of an
e-book is as confusing as the understanding of what digital
actually is to the average layperson. This means that we must
look at e-books in a different light in order to determine their
actual worth in this brave, new cyber world.
Let's look at the difference between a book in print and an
e-book. A printed book is an object you can hold in your hand,
store on your bookshelf, even hand down to the next generation.
It is priced on factors such as paper stock, design and
production costs, and marketing.
But the fact that unites e-books and print books is that they
are composed of ideas. It is the ideas in these books that have
the ability to change, or possibly transform, people's lives.
What do you think an idea is worth when evaluated against the
cost of paper and ink?
It is the IDEAS that are valuable! That is how you determine the
cost of your e-book.
What should I charge for my ideas?
There are all different formulas and methods for determining the
correct price for your e-book. Let's begin with honing in on
your ultimate goals.
Decide if your goal is to get wide distribution and maximum
exposure. This goal is aimed at drawing customers to your
business or service, or to establishing the credibility of your
reputation. If this is your main goal, you should aim to keep
your price on the low side. Some authors have even priced their
e-books at a profit loss to draw a high number of new customers.
The key is to find a price that maximizes your profits and the
number of books you sell.
This is an excellent pricing strategy if you are looking to
acquire long-term customers. Long-term customers are extremely
likely to buy from you again and again - as long as the first
e-book they buy is of exceptional quality and beneficial to the
customer.
However, if your book contains valuable - and more importantly
NEW information, references, or techniques - then you should aim
to price it on the high end.
After you figure out your goal, you must figure out what your
audience's need is for your e-book. For example, does
your book
solve a particular problem? If it does, and solves it in a way
that hasn't been written about in one hundred other e-books, you
will be able to achieve high sales at a high price. If your book
solves a problem or answers questions in a new and unique way,
you should price your book as high as you can go. You will
achieve larger profits this way, but bring in fewer customers.
Just make sure the question or problem that your book solves is
one that is important and relevant to the majority of your
market audience. If your ideas are not common knowledge, or you
are presenting a brand new technique, you will be able to sell
books at a high price. Just be prepared for your competition to
undercut you on price as soon as they hear about your book.
Keep in mind that the above pricing strategy is temporary.
Eventually, you will cease to sell books at this high price. So
figure out in advance how long you plan to offer your e-book at
this high price, and when that time is up, change your pricing
strategy.
If you want to see large profits over customer draw, aim for an
audience that is looking for easy solutions to their problems at
a low price. If your book is aimed at solving one particular
problem rather than general advice, then you can charge more.
Start at the highest price the market will bear to bring in the
largest profits, and plan to discount the book a number of times
throughout the year.
Marketing Strategies
The key that unlocks the sales potential of your e-book is to
find a single sentence that becomes your selling handle. This
sentence states what question or problem your book answers and
the benefits your e-book can provide. Then be sure to use that
sentence in every piece of sales and promotional material, and
every time anyone asks you about your e-book.
Besides promoting your books assiduously online, there are
several other strategies that can help you sell more books.
One is to give something away for free with your book, such as a
valuable bonus item. Or bundle several e-books under one price,
which lowers the price for each e-book if they were sold
separately.
An effective technique for figuring out a price is to send out a
survey to your current customers. If these customers have
already bought an e-book from you, ask for their opinion in
terms of price. Do this by creating a sales page for the new
book, but don't include a price on that page. Instead, add a
number of links to survey questions that ask pointed questions
to aid you in assigning a price to your e-book.
Another strategy is to test out prices by creating a number of
duplicate sales pages with different prices on each page. Make
sure your sales copy is exactly the same on every page, and
includes your selling-handle sentence. Then figure out for each
page the conversion ratio between visitors to your site and
sales of your book. This will tell you what your optimum price
is.
Ultimately, if you've written a book that solves a problem or
presents a new technique, your book will bring in both traffic
and profits. So be sure to write that selling-handle sentence
that sums up what problem your book solves and what the benefits
of your book will be to the customers who purchase it. And then
watch your market come to you!
About the author:
Matthew Tibble is passionate about helping businesses achieve
business success. With 10 years experience in sales and
marketing, he has developed an enlightened approach to business
combining proven philosophies with practical implementation. For
more details visit www.businessplanningmadeeasy.com
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