Posting within a few days of each other, traditionally published novelist John Scalzi and indie author Joanna Penn both offered an inside look at their sources of income. While Scalzi only showed revenue from a single title (which was still revealing, even if a narrow slice) and Penn revealed all sources, the increased transparency offers some useful insights.
First, both stories illustrate the importance of diversity of income streams. Scalzi’s Lock In, before going to paperback, sold about 41,000 copies in audiobook format, compared to 24,000 ebook units and 22,500 hardcover units. Scalzi comments, “There’s money being left on the table if you can’t address all these sales channels.”
Penn’s six-figure income is a mix of book sales (50 percent), affiliate income (25 percent), online courses (12 percent), speaking (10 percent), and sponsorship (3 percent). Digging deeper into that book sales bucket, Penn reveals that ebooks make up 88 percent of her overall book income. Print comes in at 7 percent and audio at 5 percent. (Note that Penn’s nonfiction book sales–in the business and how-to categories—make up 41 percent of her overall book income.)
The other big takeaway from both authors is the importance of audio books. Penn says that a year ago, she had almost no audiobook income, but now she’s focused on growing that area, with ten books currently out in audio format. Scalzi commented that he’s starting to think about how his books sound as much as they read, given the audiobook growth. (Side note: As we were going to press, Scribd announced that, starting on Sept. 20, they will limit their subscribers to one audiobook per month; audiobooks were just added to their ebook subscription service in November 2014, so it clearly didn’t take long for an unlimited audiobook model to become unsustainable. Read more at Publishers Weekly.)
With the diversification of formats, Scalzi observed that BookScan becomes less reliable as a sales barometer. With Lock In, for instance, BookScan is not capturing the estimated two-thirds to three-quarters of sales that it’s usually believed to account for. However, author Nick Mamatas commented to Scalzi, “It’s not like corporate bookbuyers don’t know how BookScan works and fails to work.… The issue I’ve seen is people who don’t know how to read BookScan—fans, writers, assorted online morons—trying to understand the numbers.”
It’s interesting to compare and contrast the business models of each author—both of course valid and presumably working well. Penn’s growing business has resulted in her hiring her husband to focus on tech and admin so she can focus on product creation. And then you have Scalzi’s traditional publishing partnership—he’s had nothing but positive things to say about his current ten-year, $3.4 million book deal with Tor that covers his next thirteen books.
Jane Friedman has spent her entire career working in the publishing industry, with a focus on business reporting and author education. Established in 2015, her newsletter The Bottom Line provides nuanced market intelligence to thousands of authors and industry professionals; in 2023, she was named Publishing Commentator of the Year by Digital Book World.
Jane’s expertise regularly features in major media outlets such as The New York Times, The Atlantic, NPR, The Today Show, Wired, The Guardian, Fox News, and BBC. Her book, The Business of Being a Writer, Second Edition (The University of Chicago Press), is used as a classroom text by many writing and publishing degree programs. She reaches thousands through speaking engagements and workshops at diverse venues worldwide, including NYU’s Advanced Publishing Institute, Frankfurt Book Fair, and numerous MFA programs.
