First off, thank you to everyone who has purchased my first book, Coloring Outside the Lines. I’ve gotten quite a few requests to follow up my book launch with details and statistics and I think it’s about time I shared them.

As it turns out, 62% of you preferred to order the print version of Coloring Outside the Lines where 38% went digital. In the first 24 hours, 60% of the overall books were sold. The average size of a book order is 1.1.

The stats on the banner ad that you see on this site (and HermanWeb.us) delivered a 3.23% CTR in the first week of the book launch (just the banner, not counting other links).  In the month of March, the banner delivered a 2.00% CTR and in April, 1.5%.  The banner was never creatively refreshed.

I’m not surprised that 60% of the overall books were sold within the first 24 hours. The book business is similar to a hit driven business (video games, Hollywood, music) where upon release, most transactions are completed (be it opening weekend or CD release). I’m fairly certain there will be additional sales of the book every so often, but the 24 hours surrounding the launch was the big bang.

Note: I chose not to go with a big publisher for the release of this book as I wasn’t trying to set NY Times Bestseller records and I didn’t want to sign my life away to a publisher (having spent time in the music world, I know what a deal looks like). Had I gone with a big publisher, the hooplah surrounding the book launch and retail promotion would have been exponentially greater, but I’ve proven to myself that if you can create awareness and solve a need, a book can sell on its own and can generate revenue (not peanuts).

Thank you again for everyone who sent in their comments and thoughts - it’s certainly been a learning experience for me and the initial reactions from everyone have been awesome. Fee free to leave a comment or contact me if you want to speak further about the book.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 1st, 2008 at 4:37 pm and is filed under Darren Herman. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.