As a follow-up to my previous post, Don’t Bow Down to Amazon.com, maybe you’re wondering, “What’s the alternative? Isn’t Amazon the best way to sell my books from my website?” No way, and if you haven’t, first read my previous post for the 3 big reasons why.
Instead, I encourage you to consider selling books from your website and doing the fulfillment yourself. Now, I know you’re immediately thinking, “But that’s time-consuming and expensive! I’ll have to pay big bucks for a fancy website store and waste all my writing time shipping book orders.” Not anymore.
Today, you can use PayPal to handle e-commerce and all credit card sales directly from your website. Plus, you can setup a free online account with the U.S. Postal Service to buy postage, print professional mailing labels, order free shipping supplies, and ship packages – without ever leaving your house. Once you setup your system, most book orders can be completed in less than five minutes. It’s one of the best deals in the history of bookwriting!
With PayPal and the USPS.com, you don’t have to setup a separate merchant account or stand in long lines at the Post Office. Plus, you get credit card fraud protection and a virtual terminal from PayPal and free delivery confirmation from the USPS. And, all transactions are completed online.
Stop sending your website visitors to buy your books at Amazon.com. Otherwise, you’ll miss out on important profits, customer contact information, and marketing effectiveness. You don’t need Amazon to make it as an author – you can do it yourself.
Note: If you’re a fiction author, you’re probably reading this and crying out, “But my publisher will be mad, because if I sell books from my website or at events, then it won’t count towards my sales numbers!” Relax…if you’re helping to sell more books and grow your platform, your publisher won’t care about selling books from your website. They’ll be happy, because they know that you’re growing your platform, which means higher sales potential for your next book.
Some of you need to stop worrying about your publisher’s concerns and start worrying about making your writing career last longer. Remember, to publishers, it doesn’t matter where the book sales come from, as long as there are sales. And, a happy growing author makes a happy growing publisher. Without successful authors, publishers can’t exist.
Mark Goodyear says
Mary DeMuth sent me to your site. I’m seriously impressed! I love your indictment of Amazon.com. The list is definitely the secret to success.
If only I had a list…
If only I had something to sell a list…