How Much Money Have I Made Writing Self Published Books?

[@NancysFanciesDesign]

I turned 50 two months ago, but I still want to be YOU when I grow up!

[@taytricks33]

Lol

[@RawFitChris]

"The more my joy went down, the more mistakes I began to make" - Wow... truer words were never said! Thank you Sarra for sharing your honest and well earned experience with all of us. #2: Consistency. The key. You nailed it with these two vital puzzle pieces of success.

[@lissal.4355]

Wow! So great to see a self-published author succeeding. Hearing you talk about these things really makes me feel excited about what I'll accomplish in my own creative pursuits, both writing and non-writing ones!

[@Belindashomecooking]

Also thank you for not only inspiring me but also my 13 year old daughter. Since she's started writing (she has over 6000 words written in her first book) I've seen her confidence grow and she's really starting to bloom. So again I say thank you.

[@HeartBreathings]

Wow!! That's amazing!!!

[@UtahGmaw99]

That's great! she can do this!

[@jazzmineanderson6330]

She can do it!!! Get it girl!!

[@sophiathedandilioness]

Im late to this, but if you see it, please let your daughter know we are rooting for her, and we belive in her!

[@lunapond7652]

When I was in high school I was friends with someone who published a book! And she was a teenager! She should totally go for it if she wants to!

[@wizardman66]

I have self published four books now and while it has been a very enjoyable experience with many people enjoying the books, they have not generated the kind of exposure I want. I have learned a lot watching these videos and they are absolutely priceless. Thanks you for sharing your knowledge!

[@drewblanche]

Cool. It's always nice to see other writers talk about their writing success :)

[@HeartBreathings]

Thank you for watching!

[@Belindashomecooking]

I'm registered for both your Publish and Thrive Course and your HB90 Boot camp. I've self published one book and it went nowhere so now I'm trying again. Thank you for all your wonderful advice and for putting yourself out there and being willing to share everything you've done to make your career a success.

[@HeartBreathings]

So excited!!

[@BeccaCSmith]

You were giving me flashbacks to 2010 lol! Pubbit hahaha! But one million?!! Gah!! That’s AMAZING!!! I’ve been publishing as long as you, but never came near that number! So AWESOME!!! I LOVE THIS!!! So inspiring!!!! I love that dragonfly mug!!! And yesss!!! I hate it when people tell writers to write-to-trend!! Write what you love! Readers can tell when a novel is ‘empty.’ It comes off the page. Thank you so much for posting this!! A dose of reality for people who say Indie authors don’t make money!

[@HeartBreathings]

Thank you Becca!

[@shellystar]

So glad you checked this channel out Becca! I ❤ Sarra :-)

[@gregwatson5315]

Wow. That is no kidding impressive. I never thought a self-published author could make as much. Great tips.

[@colibrees92]

That is so awesome! You deserve all of the success you have for your amazing work! I am one of your Barnes and Noble buyers and it makes me so sad that BN is so far behind right now :( hopefully they begin to bounce back

[@thepeachyshow-letstalkmone496]

🙌

[@createdcreative3137]

This is so inspiring to hear and such good information! I am writing my very first novel (45,000 so far!) and your channel has helped me glean a lot of information! Thank you for sharing your inspiring story! It gives my little newbie writer heart hope.

[@FaultlessKing]

Created Creative update on your book?

[@mical7582]

That's all I kept hearing, that YA is hard to self publish. It was being discussed on big writing forums too.

[@613nodame]

Yes!! please tell me why not kindle unlimited as an indie writer? thanks for sharing your wealth of knowledge as a big hearted human being who happens to be a successful author!

[@jenniferevelynhayes]

Yesss! Another fabulous, inspiring video for those of us trying our best to figure this indie author thing out! Thank you, Sarra. It's so helpful to break it all down as you have here, and see how successfully building this career is possible. I'll say again -- and I'll be saying forever -- your Publish & Thrive course is one of the BEST investments I've ever made! Mind. Blown. Here's to a great year of the indie writer life for us all!

[@HeartBreathings]

Thank you Jennifer! You are so sweet!! I'm excited to see your first book out in the world!

[@CarlaCano]

Thank you for sharing. I am hoping to join your Publish and Thrive this year. I love how transparent you are and it gives others, like me, the motivation to live their writing dreams. Thank you for being so real!

[@FrooGalFun]

This was a really helpful video. Thank you. I am an Indian mostly blog writer who is considering self-publishing a few travel books and memoirs :)

[@kevingraves7431]

I would love to do this after I retire. 20-40k (after taxes) annually would be enough to keep my RV in fuel. :)

[@pamelahatheway4119]

Thank you Sarra. You are so encouraging.

[@MissHolliday3110]

I just subscribed! I appreciate your openness, about the ups and downs. I like it when people who are successful are real about the work involved to get there. I also like the advice about success and doing what you love.

[@j1jh002]

So helpful, and so inspiring. I’m definitely taking this information into consideration with my next book release. Thank you again, and God bless!

[@rayboydstun1626]

Congratulations! That's exciting and great. I wish I could make a living. (I wish my books sold well). I need it desperately.

[@dinahgt]

Exceptional! Thank you for your honesty. I love your bravery.

[@kelsyfish]

Thank you so much for sharing your story! It’s so inspirational, *especially* the fact that you feel like you’ve made mistakes along the way and still found so much happiness and success in the long term. ❤️

[@heathermacdonald6404]

Thanks for the info! Congratulations to you and yours on your baby! :) xx

[@briandougherty9624]

I love this video: your detail orientation, your candor, your (lovely) personality, your knowledge, and your ability to break down your ideas in ways that a 5-year-old can follow. Kudos! I learned so much. I'm your newest fan.

[@KillianWolf]

Thank you so much! This video is so inspiring. I've been bogged down by the whole "write to trend" speeches lately, it has had me questioning whether I wanted to keep on writing in YA. I am starting on Amazon Ads though, and it is a learning curve so it's nice to hear from someone who doesn't use AMS and is still successful (I do have two videos on my journey with AMS ads for those who are interested in that process). I'm still figuring out my social media marketing methods as I'm not making a big impact there yet.

[@williambianchi2006]

They say the best advertising for your last book is the release of your newest book. That seems to hold true with your experience. Seems like 60K word books might be a sweet spot to ensure frequent releases of new books, depending on genre and the size of the story itself.

[@shellystar]

What an amazing and inspiring journey! I'm so happy for you - I can see the joy in your face every time you talk about your writing. I want that feeling :-) I'm hoping to publish my first book this spring. It's a standalone romance, but my next book will be part of a series. Self-publishing sounds so interesting, but I don't have a full grasp of what I'm signing up for. I'm really excited to take your Publish and Thrive course so I can learn the ropes of self-publishing 😃

[@thepeachyshow-letstalkmone496]

🙌

[@marciawhite7448]

Very true, it's best to write about what you love. It's not all about money.

[@KelseyHubley]

You go girl !! You're so uplifting and inspiring 💜 I love watching your videos

[@sarahfenlonfalk]

Wow, Sarra! Congratulations! All of your hard work is paying off-amazing! Am I right that you publish in eBook format only, not print? That makes your numbers even more impressive in my opinion! Continued blessings and success to you in the next decade!

[@davidcox8838]

I just read a little of Beautiful Demons and can see the writing is very good. You have talent and this is why you have made a good living from writing.

[@philenealvarado5008]

Yes I'm interested in learning why you don't use kindle unlimited. Love your positive energy

[@melaniatolan8084]

As always, great video. Thank you for your transparency and sharing your journey.

[@stang6552]

I appreciate this info. Working on my first fantasy novel :). About to start the editing process.

[@TheresaOliverAuthor]

Fabulous advice! Thank you!

[@liamalone2707]

Thank you for sharing. I like the way you explain things as well. Big thanks xxx

[@OFFICIAL_TRACYLEE]

This is such helpful information, and it is so true - you have to do what you love doing-everything will eventually just flow from there.

[@MashDaddy49]

Lol thanks for renewing my hope a little bit. Was starting to dwindle these last few weeks. I knew self publishing was going to be hard but geez haha

[@OhMyGoals]

Congrats on your success, Sarra! So much hard work but what a payoff! Very happy for you💚💚💚 Erin

[@asmrdave980]

happy late birthday. you are beautiful. I'm working on publishing my first ebook.

[@novelty718]

I want to hear your opinions on everything on writing...please. This video was so informative. Thank you. I’m just starting out and I welcome all the help 😊 advice

[@SaraLubratt]

Love beautifully semetrical writing circles! That would be amazing if you published the last book on October 29!!

[@mrholmes8]

My brother made a book and published it and my 9 year old so has made many books in his own way with lots of art. People have told me I should make a book based on my life so one day I finally broke down and made a book on my life and condition, bipolar disorder. One day I would like to publish my book when I have the money to. My brother is editing it right now and I have made a lot of edits myself at the same time on separate pages so not to interfere with anything!

[@ShalondaMcFarland]

Very inspiring. Thank you for your transparency.

[@cassandrageorgesturges9065]

I never understood what Kindle Unlimited means. I would like to remove my books from unlimited. Thank you for such an informative video.

[@rlam6903]

Barnes & Noble was actually called *NOOK* the Pubit' name came years later. I know bcz in 2013 I uploaded the video " King Of Ebooks Kindle/ Nook success" saying congrats' to myself n 25 authors they helped us sell 365,000 downloads in 3 weeks. They no longer offer the promo services as their team just does their own now.

[@eugenia6356]

I want to self-publish on Amazon, but I'm nervous about the whole process, even though someone else I watched said it's pretty easy. Not to mention the editing and designing the book cover beforehand.

[@ronniemjackson9745]

Thank you for making your mistakes in order to help us. This was wounderfull! Thank you so much! I believe it may have been a part of your path.

[@Onez07]

I appreciate your content it has helped a lot. #Mentor #Inspired Thanks!

[@regionalskygirl]

So Inspired Right Now!!! 😎

[@RobinDeeter]

Congrats on all your success. You deserve it for all your hard work and perseverance. I wish I could make money by going wide, but every time I've tried, it's been disastrous. I'm the main breadwinner in our family, so losing several hundred dollars a month really hurts. The only way I make any decent money is when my books are in KU. So, I have to go where the money is for the time being. Anywho, you're such an inspiring person/author/mentor and you give me hope that if I just stick to it, I can achieve all my goals. Thanks for all you do.

[@thomasdubois4383]

I would like to see an editing cost video. On average we come across editing cost around .04 a word. This times 60k words is about 2400 a book. So you have an avg of $2500 on edits, how many books are you averaging into that figure? We are learning as we go and editing cost as well as quality has been our biggest hurdle hands down

[@dawnhill539]

Thank you for sharing!! This video was so informative

[@karentrinkaus117]

Please please make a video about KU vs wide

[@specialtwice4975]

Wanna know how to make more money from books you already published? Publish your books in French or Spanish. This of course is tricky because 1.) you need to find bilingual translators and make sure the writing is not grammatically incorrect or actually a whole novel about picking your nose. 2.) You probably should give credit to the translator by either putting it as a co-written work/translated. You as the main author, then Miss Jane Doe as the translator. Then I would probably even go a step further and give a share of whatever earnings I made from the translated version only and spilt profits 50/50, 60/40, 70/30 depending on what you would wanna do. Or if it's a professional then you may just have to pay them by the hour or something.

[@Charlotteapaige]

Wow!!! Do you live close to Fairhope, Alabama? This is amazing! I love how you believed in yourself from the beginning!

[@thepeachyshow-letstalkmone496]

🙌

[@baileykeith6650]

Thanks for the video! 🤓

[@danh3075]

I'm a member in 250 different fb free book, or 99 cent book groups. Some of them have more than 100 000 people in them, and you can post your book once per day for free.

[@DawnMontgomeryAuthor]

Thank you so much for sharing this. I know it had to be hard to do it, but it's so inspiring!!!

[@leaptaken]

I'd definitely want to hear more about Kindle Unlimited.

[@vondanewsome]

Thank you for sharing your story!!

[@sandstarrentertainment3165]

Thank you for sharing this!

[@specialtwice4975]

My favorite self published author Quinn loftis, you are good too btw, also seems to struggle with 35:00. She has been writing her werewolf series for years now and as much as I love the series and characters I think she should wrap it up soon. Currently she is writing a new series which I haven't read yet. (Haven't had time) But I think at some point in her writing career she was also going through this too. Personally I think 9-10 books is good for a really long series and then starting something brand new. Everyone is different though.

[@onestoproyalty3442]

Liking and Saving this video to reference later :D

[@willperez1107]

Thanks for sharing very inspirational Have you ever thought about audiobooks?

[@glenw3814]

I'd love to hear more about why you don't go exclusive with Kindle Unlimited.

[@SaadonAksah]

over a million! thats great! i havent sold one yet on smashwords 😂

[@mestimac]

I love your advice! There's so much out there thats well meant but ultimately not going to work for everyone. The danger of writing to the market is that you're likely to miss the wave. Or you're going to write so fast that it's going to be poor quality. Personally, I wouldn't read an author that put a book out every month. I'd just assume it was crap.

[@mestimac]

Okay, I want to qualify my comment because I feel like a jerk for that last sentence. I think it's definitely possible to draft a novel in a month. But, I'm sceptical about a novel going from concept to being published in that time without having quality control issues. I've read a lot of books, both self and traditionally published, that seem rushed. The concept may be good, but they lack the development that more time would give them. Many of them are very popular, though, so it might just be me.

[@pivotzotamou7653]

Hi Sarra Thank you for sharing your experiences with us. I appreciate it. Which self publishing company did you work with?

[@jamesconway3620]

Love your content, when you use all these platforms for publishing you use the same IBN number. Are you given a different IBN for each publisher?

[@mtolivesecurityshipping5455]

How hard is it to pick the proper categories and keywords for a vampire novel to rank better in searches?

[@theresaroberts8818]

ARE WRITERS ABLE TO SELL THEIR BOOKS ON MULTIPLE PLATFORMS AT THE SAME TIME (Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Apple)??? DOES THIS INFORMATION ALSO APPLY TO BOOKS OF POETRY???

[@patrickedwards1575]

Thanks for sharing this came in handy. Please how can i keep my stamina to write. I have a novel i have started writing but easily get unmoltivated to finish it. Though the stories are still in my head.

[@mattmallecoccio8378]

Sarra, I am exclusive to Amazon, but a friend of mine told me I don't need to be and I like the idea of Barnes and Noble Press. I need to spread myself a little thinner. How did you start to spread yourself to other formats

[@geraldbrefka1145]

I have put out my book THE FIRST HORSE PEOPLE, it's the complete history of the Sarmatian knights and Amazon women. They are the ancient grandfathers and grandmothers of the Poles Czechs and Ukrainians. We were the very first horse people and the Roman's got tired of us raiding them and forced us to be their cavalry. They took the sons very young to serve the Roman's army and the daughters were forced to be the warriors and defenders of the tribe. They didnt marry until the men eventually returned to the tribe, they had arranged marriages. They found their tombs 2yrs ago and have our DNA. The Roman's have busts of the Sarmatian faces 5000 years ago and my family looks like these guys 5000 years ago. I found out my last name means the eyebrow bridge of the Sarmatians. I will be going to the Polish festival in Chicago come September to promote my book. POLISH AMERICANS have no idea of this ancient history of theirs.

[@ppritchett4688]

I appreciate your words of wisdom. There were a number of take aways for me. One question, do you find that our first books are still selling well or do sales fall off over time? Thank you!

[@kimmiealexander9984]

I've just discovered your videos and immediately subscribed to all future videos! 💜 I was wondering do you use scrivener or any other program for writing?

[@outofthebox7]

When we say Kindel unlimited, don't you mean amazon? When you say sold in the US or UK, does that mean that buyers from around the world cannot buy your book? If not, why not? Also, how are books taxed? Thank you for your time.

[@niobserver1073]

Hey sarra (I'm sorry if i spelled it wrongly).Would you say you are the norm or above the norm with these numbers? And it was inspiring to watch especially because you didn't give up over time.I know some have given up. Thanks for sharing.

[@coversbymark1379]

I'm just starting to learn about this. I was thinking I would have to choose between Amazon, B&N, etc., but it sounds like an author can publish one book in all of those places. Am I understanding that correctly?

[@unknown-bv1sq]

who did your 3D mock up for your Beautiful Demons box set

[@cmbisschoff]

Hi, I want to self publish but I don't have the money get an editor or proofreader. Do you have any tips?

[@olorikaro]

Which newsletter ads do you use?

[@WyldPhoenixFyre]

Hi Sarra. I realize this video is a year old but I just discovered you and I'm so glad I did. One of the things I was curious about is how much you spend on taxes, roughly? I'm told that authors, whether traditionally or self published, are considered free lance workers and have to take care of their taxes on their own. I have only just started watching your videos so if you have this published in a different video then please just point me there. Otherwise, I'd just be interested to know how you handle that aspect of the money. Thank you!

[@joepall323]

When writing, do you actually type on a word processors or do you dictate into a recorder?

[@JH-kx1tm]

If you self publish you can publish anywhere? Or can you find yourself being exclusive to one business if your not careful?

[@freddielcortes7419]

I would like to know more about what you had to deal with.

[@traceymayhewauthor]

Another great video! I'd love to know your thoughts on kindle unlimited vs going wide!

[@sierra9713]

Are these gross numbers? Did you find the tax burden difficult in the beginning?

[@HeartBreathings]

Yes these are gross earnings with a discussion of what I spent on ads in there if I remember correctly. I didn't find the taxes difficult because I just put 30% of everything that comes in into a money market account and pretend it doesn't exist to me until I need to pay it out every quarter. So important to just put it away right away! Then at the end of the year, I will take anything left over and put it in my savings.

[@sierra9713]

@@HeartBreathings thank you! 🤗

[@princessmae3457]

Hi! I know you may not read this but at what age did you start writing? Im 21 years old and just started writing. Im afraid that i may be too late in honing my skills.

[@mothmos]

difficult not to focus on business side too much when u are in a spot when u need to earn :(

[@writeyournovelwithcristina2917]

I'd love to hear your opinion about selling on Amazon. 😍🙂💗

[@JaniceHylton]

I need to do better with my books.

[@eviebernal2913]

So if you break that down you made about 60,000 a year off your books? Since it was a decade that you were discussing?

[@princesscake70]

You are very important now!

[@hirrorstories]

yesss I was waiting for this video the whole day. Before watching do you think starting in 2013 golden age of self-publishing helped a lot?

[@HeartBreathings]

I actually started in 2010, but I think it helped in some ways and made it a lot more challenging in others! There was a lot less competition back then, but there were also literally zero tools. No formatting software, no ways to advertise, and no one to help guide you or show you how they did it. It was like the wild west, haha. I think the market has gotten a lot harder because of Kindle Unlimited, honestly, but there is still room for authors to have a great career no matter when they start!

[@hirrorstories]

Heart Breathings Thank you for your detailed answer🙌🏻

[@kjoniorcoach]

Why not kindle unlimited?

[@abhijeetkumar5142]

Don't you think it's strange that one writer gets 1 Million Sales and some others get only 1 sale a year. I have got only 5 sales in 5 years.

[@BishimDeja]

When you speak on Amazon, US and UK are these E books or hard copy?

[@HeartBreathings]

All ebooks. I haven't included paperback copies in these figures, because I didn't always have paperbacks available other than for book signings. I think at this point, I've sold 5,000 or so paperbacks? I don't have the exact number, but it hasn't been a focus for me in the past.

[@BishimDeja]

@@HeartBreathings how do you handle not having a clear mind? Kinda like writers block