How Do You Achieve $100k In Ebook Sales?

This is from Stephanie Smith who works at The Hustle. Within 8 months of starting her product she sold over $100k in ebook sales.

The ebook? Doing Content Right has sold over 5k copies at...$129. With 99% positive rating. When you look at what is involved you can see that the focus is for you to buy the ebook:

• The website is focused on the ebook and it does a great job at doing this. Because regardless of how good your sales are if nothing is converting at the sales page then what is the point.
• The ebook is priced right. With he vast amount of content given $10 would seem odd. $49 wouldnt be bad. But Stephanie has placed herself as a premium content creator
• 270 pages in a variety of formats
• Recorded lessons
• Printable exercises
• A mini social network
• Quizzes (what would be better is a certificate to prove that you have completed the course/ quiz- adds more professionalism).
• Bonuses

The page is filled with bright colours and text. Everything is designed to give you information about the ebook. And if you are unsure there are testimonials littered through the page, which undoubtedly is a good sales page.

And one little clever idea? Stephanie has incorporated the sales page of Gumroad into the main sales page. So you do not jump from one page to another. 

So how did Stephanie do generate the first sales?

How did Stephanie identify customers to start her ebook sales?

Those that read the Daniel $230k in ebook sales case study will see this as very familiar. Stephanie started with a following, Twitter. Build the following and then started to funnel through that list. She gave content with the idea that it will filter out people who wanted more. So initially she started by building something people love and want to talk about. Stephanie has been online for years and has built a following with her writing.

• She validated demand early via a tweet asking people if they would pay for it. Many people will say they love the idea of the ebook or a product. But how many will actually put money down when asked to? Not many. The number of followers does not equal people who engage. 
• She sold pre-orders to get early momentum and buy-in. Again, this generates testimonials, word of mouth and ratings. It also helps with promotion- you can say how many people have already pre-ordered. No one likes being first, so pre-ordering reduces risk.
• Gumroad has an affiliate system, that was applied to the ebook. At $125 affiliates will try to sell it. At $10 they might not even bother reading the affiliate text
• Affiliates and people who want to spread your thoughts want help in doing so. Including shareable assets like infographics and highlightable/ shareable quotes help
• By offering different formats (e.g. MOBI) it reduces the friction that people might have with just a PDF. A clear first-page how-to, and video sessions for those short on time also help reduce friction
• Stephanie checked prices and experimented with increasing price and finding good price points and even discounts

Sales spikes and continuous sales?

It is OK to do promotions and you should especially at the start. But many people then stop. The problem with this- especially if your product is listed upon a chart is that these charts have dampners to calm down chart placements for new products.

Special promotions are required therefore to keep your product up in charts and in peoples minds. Some can be Thanksgiving, Anniversary etc. People will buy if they know the reason for a discount.

This is also reflected in Stephanies ebook sales process

• Obviously the official launch generated a big spike.
• Post-launch hype: people engaging around the same time (because pre-launch built anticipation) helped continue momentum. Trends also showcased the product around launch. 
• Black Friday promotions contributed to another spike. 
• Product Hunt launch was one of the biggest days; she added extra features (audio chapter, a bonus AMA, a 1:1 creator match) to make it more appealing. However to make Product Hunt work better was an audience to start with. Stephanies audience grew to a level where she could offer a product on Product Hunt and drive up that product through the charts. This then allowed more people to see it, buy it and keep in the charts for residual sales. It also generated more followers. 
• A large portion of revenue came from long-tail sales: even months after launch, many days still had sales. Only 9 out of 225 days had no sales, so ~96% of days had at least one sale.

The short version of Stephanies ebook sales journey?

Ebook sales is a journey. Building an audience that wants to know what you say and are interested in what you had to say is key. It is also AI insulating because you have access to audience rather than them search online for it.

But there has been some negatives on this journey. You can focus too much on launches and not recognise the long term goals or even the viability of a product for the long term. And one of the main ones that Stephanie saw? Not charging early enough and not charging enough.

Check out more ebook 101 selling articles here

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