Indie authors have been cashing in on low-priced books for a long time. It makes sense; traditional publishers have been slow to come down on their prices, and readers who want to consume more titles naturally turned to the lower-priced options that spark their interest.
Lately, however, this has been changing. Publishers have finally begun selling directly to consumers. For decades they (like other producers) have not sold directly because they needed to support bookstores. Selling direct cut out the middleman, and bookstores would have suffered.
Then came the chain stores and Amazon. For a time, publishers didn’t suffer much because the bigger retailers were able to move more titles than the small shops.
Indie authors cashed in because there was an untapped market: readers who, because they read so much, needed lower prices in order to fuel their desires.
Now, however, ebooks in general and direct-to-reader sales are changing the sales landscape. Without the middleman, publishers can offer discounts more in line with the standard price points indie authors set for their books. And readers find that they can locate quality projects much more quickly using a traditional publisher than by sifting through unknown indie authors’ offerings.
My advice for indies is to keep your books in line with traditional price points. Go with $3.99 as a sale price for smaller sales, and save the $0.99 sale price for big moves or less frequent specials. Have a retail price between $6.99 and $9.99. This signals the quality in your book, and will help direct readers back to your titles.