Subscription Models and the Indie Author

There’s nothing like teaching a workshop on something to both clarify your thinking and beliefs, then inspire new insights on a topic. Here’s a little something I puzzled through while writing my workshop for RWA last year.

In indie publishing circles (and a lot of other marketing), you’ll often find people talking about sales funnels. The core idea here is moving COLD readers (who don’t know anything about you) through a funnel of information that WARMS them up (gets them excited about your work) and eventually gets them HOT enough to buy. It’s the kind of thing that you’ll find in 90% of indie seminars focused on making a living selling books, so it’s not particularly awe-inspiring or original.

But I was revising the slides for this portion of the workshop right before I sat down to write up my case study for a good reader funnel, then tackling the inevitable question of “do I put my books into Kindle Unlimited’s subscription service or go wide and sell from every retailer?” 

This is the perennial debate in indie circles, and communities have split because of it. Some folks swear by KU and build their entire business around it, while others recoil from the exclusivity requirements that mean if you’re in KU, then your ebooks are only in KU.

I’m very much in the latter camp, but I’m trying not to be prescriptive because there are folks whose lived experience and tactical approach will be better suited to KU than what I do. 

So I broke the debate down in terms of the larger pricing discussion and how price means different things when a reader is at a different point of the funnel.

• For an author where I’m a COLD reader and no nothing about the work, I’m going to be price sensitive. The risk of getting a book I won’t enjoy is weighed up against the cost of the book. Risk is high, reward is unknown.
• Once my interest has been WARMED up by samples, reviews, recommendations from friends, newsletter opening sequences, etc, then I’m willing to spend a little more money because the risk of getting a bad book is lower.
• For an author where I’m a HOT reader, I’m willing to pay a premium because I know I’m probably getting a book I want to read. Getting it cheap is a steal when it happens, but I’m generally there to pick up a book on release. 
• For an author where I’m a SUPER HOT reader, I’m willing to buy a hardcover or special edition. I’m definitely getting regularly priced paperbacks or ebooks on day one.

The appeal — and challenge — of subscription services is pretty clear when you break things down like this. They’re great at lowering the cost of entry for COLD readers, who can try a whole range of stuff at a low subscription cost. 

That’s great if you’re looking to bring people into a funnel, but once they’re warmed up and ready to be hot? Suddenly you’re making far less money per book across the length of your backlist, and need to find significantly more readers to make up for the shortfall. 

Which doesn’t make subscription models a bad thing, but does contextualise the trade-off you’re making. 

And, as I pointed out again and again int hat workshop, you’ve got a long time to court readers as an indie author. If you’re in a place where you can be patient, the lifetime value of those readers could well be higher than you’d get rushing to get them onboard now.

Of course, sometimes you can’t afford that tradeoff, and the dollars in the hand are worth more than the potential lifetime value if you take your time courting the reader. But given the choice, I err on the side of the slow burn, if only because I’ve seen just how long my books can earn me money.