Thirty First Income Report October 2015 ($955.01)

Are you curious about a one-year delay? I explained it in my first income report.

I hustled in October 2015 like crazy.

I published two books that month, the introduction and 1st volume of my Six Simple Steps to Success series.
The introduction was very short, only 7,500 words, and I did the main bulk of pre-production in September. In the first week of October I published it on Draft2Digital and made it a free book. On the 11th I published it on Amazon.
Four days later I uploaded on Amazon Know Yourself Like Your Success Depends on It.

In the first two weeks I went through the usual pre-launch hustle: approving proofreader’s changes, figuring out the title, designing a cover, writing book description and so on.
The rest of the month I was busy organizing, paying and coordinating promos for both books.

Writing

At the beginning of the month I outlined the last book in the series and brainstormed on paper about another book which stayed in the idea phase. At the end of the month I started writing this last volume of the Six Simple Steps to Success series. I wrote a few thousand words.
In the meantime, I was involved with writing for The View From The Top Community forum (still to no avail I could pinpoint) and content for my blog.

Big sites failure

I continued writing for GoodMenProject. I submitted at least a couple of articles in October. But I didn’t gain much traction on that site and my enthusiasm faded. My editor was very busy and submission process was hectic.
In about October I finally accepted the fact that Huffington Post and Entrepreneur ignored my pitches. I stopped following their editors on Twitter.

Permafree strategy

I have a couple of permanently free books and that strategy didn’t bring me many advantages. I have no time for marketing, so I just launched them and left them on digital shelves. 10 months since launching Simplify Your Pursuit of Success it gets something like 5-10 downloads a day, sometimes as few as 2 in one day, and it only occasionally exceeds 15 downloads. The Fitness Expert Next Door launched in July 2013 has even less momentum, 2-8 copies downloaded a day.
I built my email list based on the Six Simple Steps to Success series up to 100 subscribers in 10 months. I wasn’t diligent enough to create a separate sign-up form for my permafree book, so I don’t know the exact performance of this strategy.
One thing is sure, it’s not much.
On the other hand a few of my most diehard fans found me via my free books. From time to time some opportunity arises because someone has read them. A few days ago I got an email from a guy who builds a free reading course and he asked me if he can include Simplify Your Pursuit of Success in the lead magnet package.
So, it’s not a get rich quick scheme, but it has its advantages.
And I love to give stuff away for free 😀

The Income Report Breakdown

Income:
Amazon royalties: €1170.76 ($1299.54)
German translation royalties: €15.29 ($16.97)

Total: $1316.51

Costs:
$82, proofreading for Simplify Your Pursuit of Success
$11, proofreading services Fiverr
$69, cover of Know Yourself Like Your Success Depends on It
$58, Aweber fee
$30, View From the Top Community fee
$10, Know Yourself Like Your Success Depends on It promo on eBookHabit
$15, Know Yourself Like Your Success Depends on It promo on ReadingDeals
$20, Know Yourself Like Your Success Depends on It promo on eReaderGirl
$12, Know Yourself Like Your Success Depends on It promo on The Fussy Librarian
$12, Simplify Your Pursuit of Success promo on JamesHMayfield.com
$10.5, Simplify Your Pursuit of Success promo on Bknights
$20, Simplify Your Pursuit of Success promo on eReaderGirl
$12, The Art of Persistence promo on The Fussy Librarian

Total: $361.5

Net Result: $955.01

Previous Income Report: September 2015