The first part of this post is about why I’m selling my eBooks direct. Then I’ll explain why I chose to use Fourthwall as my bookstore. Please read whatever part interests you.

Why I am Selling My eBooks Direct

There are two main reasons:

My intuitionIt’s time

For years, make that decades, my business focus was on one-on-one sessions. There was barely enough time to write books, let alone market them.

Recently I let go of the one-on-one sessions. Because I knew it was time to focus on writing and marketing my eBooks. (I still do services by email.)

Marketing Books

Ask anyone who is self-employed, they’ll agree marketing isn’t easy. Most authors prefer to write than market.

There are many methods to market a book. I prefer content marketing, which means writing (or being a guest) on blogs, articles, columns, and newsletters. This educates and helps people while getting the word out about my books and services. I’m all about gentle marketing and not doing a hard sales pitch.

Marketing on Other Platforms

There are so many eBooks on Amazon and other stores hindering an author’s books from being discovered.

Amazon is all about their bottom line. Their stunts have hurt authors. If an author’s eBooks aren’t in Kindle Select (can only sell at Amazon for 90 days) or paying for ads, their books get pushed down to the bottom of the pile.

Other well-known online bookstores are friendlier. However, they’re not as popular. It takes effort to drive readers there.

All major bookstores take a percentage from 30% to 65% and delivery fees. An author does not know who their customers are, and whether they found their books from marketing efforts or the customer stumbled upon them.

Why should I bother with a particular merchant who doesn’t care about me as an author? Does it make sense to spend time and effort to market to other online bookstores who take a nice percentage and do not know how the customer found my eBook?

These were the questions I pondered.

Pamela Cummins’ Bookstore

The results of my pondering were I might as well sell eBooks from my shop, too. If I’m going to spend my time marketing, I might as well get a higher percentage of the sales.

Yet more importantly, I’ll have a personal relationship with my readers.

I can also create bundles for my eBooks and meditations!

My eBooks will still be available for readers at their favorite online bookstore. I understand how frustrating it is when a particular eBook isn’t available at my preferred stores.

*Physical books won’t be available at the store. Why? The number one reason is I have five cats. It’s impossible to keep them away from boxes and books. This would be a nightmare for those who are allergic to cats. Ahchoo!

Please check out Pamela Cummins’ Bookstore.

Why I Used Fourthwall for Selling My eBooks Direct

There are a bunch of choices an author can use as their bookstore. Shopify and WooCommerce are popular. Some authors use Payhip or Gumroad.

All of those have pros and cons. The biggest con for those sites was I would have to deal with VAT tax for Europe and sales tax for every state in the USA! At sixty-two, I’m working smarter, not harder.

Enter Fourthwall

Fourthwall does the sales tax for you! Yay! This gives me more time to serve my cats.

They also have products they ship out to my customers. I bought samples to make sure they are of excellent quality.

Their website is pretty easy to set up, and they have nice templates. It works for me because I don’t need a fancy Shopify shop.

They take 3% and the normal credit card fee, so I get a higher percentage than the online bookstores.

My Last Thoughts

I’m excited about this new chapter! It will be interesting to see where it leads…

You can check out Fourthwall to see if it’s a good fit for your eBooks, art, or whatever. And I’ll be adding a new bundle and other products at Pamela Cummins’ Bookstore soon.

The post Selling My eBooks Direct appeared first on Pamela Cummins.