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Truth: You’ve Got to Spend Money to Make Money
But how much money do you spend before changing tactics?
It’s become increasingly easy to be an indie-author/authorpreneur. The tools are many and diverse, and with little to no upfront costs, you can self-publish.
This is where the professional and the amateur show their colors. An amateur will do everything themselves, from editing to cover art, and put their work out there for no cost but their time. If all you care to do is get into print so you can see your work in the world, and making money off it doesn’t matter to you, why not?
A professional, however, knows that other eyes must look over your product. You’re only human, and you will miss typos, grammatical errors, and plot holes. While you can turn to friends and family to help, you recognize that professional work requires professionals. So, you spend money to hire your editor, proofreader, and cover artist.
These are relatively fixed costs in writing books. They are variable in that you can pay $200 – $2000 for a good editor, $200 – $2000 for cover art, and so on. But once you choose these people, the costs are fixed.
When it comes to spending money to make money, the challenge is frequently marketing and advertising.
There is no One True Way
I read a lot. Also, I listen to a couple of podcasts that involve authors and artists conversing about the craft, the work, and the business. While lots of methods are out there that are tried and true, with easily defined metrics, there’s never One True Way. Especially when it comes to marketing and advertising.
I took an online course that taught a well-researched method for advertising via Meta (Facebook and Instagram). The process they use is called click-testing. You create specific kinds of ads for a specific focus to generate “clicks” and see how they measure up. Each subsequent ad builds on the next, until you create a solid, theoretically strong advertisement to share with the world.
For the release of my latest novel, the comedy sci-fi adventure Jay and Char Save the Galaxy, I did this. I ran 3 advertisements on Meta for a little less than a month. According to the reports on Meta, the ads garnered almost 92,000 impressions and were clicked 2,400+ times. It cost me $775.
To make that back, I need to sell 226 copies of my book. That’s roughly 10 percent of the total number of clicks my ads received. That’s reasonable, no?
I’d love to report that’s what I got. Sadly, the number of sales thus far has amounted to approximately 1 percent of those clicks. Hence, though I applied the lessons from the course I took, it has not done for my sales what I desired it to do.
Part of this is because there is no One True Way of doing this. Another part is that I’m still a relative unknown, as far as indie-authors go, and am still growing/finding/developing my audience.
You’ve got to spend money to make money, but where’s the line?
How much money do you spend before changing tactics?
So far, my answer is “more than I used to.” Though I did some advertising for my last series, Savagespace, spending money on advertising is still a new tactic for me. Even after taking the course on click testing, I’m still learning what does and doesn’t work.
Also, because I’m writing stories that speak to me first, there’s no telling if they will appeal to others. Or maybe my blurbs need more work? Still learning, still experimenting, and cautiously taking steps to make this more profitable.
Likewise, I’ve changed editors and worked with different cover artists. I also recently did a massive revamp of my website.
Spending money to make money, and when to change tactics, is all about your personal pain threshold. How much money do you consider too much before it feels like you’re bleeding? That’s something only you can answer.
When you go pro, you will have to spend money to make money. Very few people can do everything, and there are things that you genuinely need to pay someone with that specialized skillset to do (editing and proofreading come to mind).
Knowing this, however, doesn’t answer the question or make it any easier.
Finding the sweet spot
The goal, when you spend money on ads and marketing, is to make money. Ideally, my $775 ad spend would garner a higher return on investment (ROI).
I’m a realist as an authorpreneur in that I’m not staking my career on becoming a best-seller. That would be truly amazing, but that’s not my main goal. My main goal is to make enough money from my books to keep going and write more books while paying the bills.
In a perfect world, the 92,000 impressions got a 10 percent click rate (9200 clicks), which then fed to 10 percent of those going to sales (920 books), earning me 4 times what I spent on advertising.
Yes, selling 1000 copies of any 1 book I’ve self-published, or a mix totaling 1000 of any combination of my books, would be an ideal starting point and a great ROI.
All I can do is keep trying and doing it. I believe in this business and my ability to get out there and grow my followers and readers. How much money do I spend before changing tactics? The answer is ongoing and variable.
One last note – I’m sharing all of this because I know I’m not alone. Others working to make a living from their art go through the same process. I know, for me, it helps to share the ups and downs of it, and money is definitely an up and down for professional creatives.
Thanks for reading. As I share my creative journey with you every week, please consider this: How are you inspired and empowered to be your own creator, whatever form that takes?
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