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Old 08-27-2011, 11:53 AM   #101
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Only one reported sale last week, in the Johnstown-Altoona, PA, area.

The novelty of this tracking method is beginning to wear thin. There's no way that I'm aware of to track e-book sales (I've looked!) and I wonder what difference will show up between online and in-store purchases.
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Old 08-28-2011, 12:02 PM   #102
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Only one reported sale last week, in the Johnstown-Altoona, PA, area.

The novelty of this tracking method is beginning to wear thin. There's no way that I'm aware of to track e-book sales (I've looked!) and I wonder what difference will show up between online and in-store purchases.
Hey, they found me! This is my (media-big brother) tracking area.
I am reading it now. Good job Nords.
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Old 09-03-2011, 10:29 AM   #103
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Five sales reported, mostly from New Orleans & Idaho. If you're keeping track of the Amazon Author reporting tool, that's 40 copies. (The totals roll off Amazon's history after eight weeks.) Actual sales (direct from Impact, e-books, and those not reported to Amazon) are far higher but I won't know the numbers until December, when the first royalty check is calculated.

Thanks to whoever donated a copy to the Boise library-- nine libraries & counting, plus Hawaii!

The military guide to financial independence & retirement (Book, 2011) [WorldCat.org]
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Old 09-17-2011, 09:07 AM   #104
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It's been two weeks since the last update (I was traveling), and during that time Amazon.com logged four copies sold.

A couple weeks ago I talked with Karen Jowers at Military Times. Her interview was published in this week's service editions (Army Times, Navy Times, Air Force Times):
Consumer Watch: Risk and reward - Military Money, Navy Money, navy pay, pay charts - Navy Times
Consumer Watch: Risk and reward - Military Financial Advice - Army Times
Consumer Watch: Risk and reward - Military Money, Air Force Money, air force pay, pay charts - Air Force Times

I also interviewed with Andrew Tilghman, who actually received the review copy of the book that was sent to Military Times. He's working on an article or a book review or possibly both. I haven't seen his in the press yet. It's not clear to me that he or Karen knew that the other was talking to me.

So based on Facebook and the blog's activity, we should have a few new members signing up on this board soon...
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Old 09-24-2011, 10:47 AM   #105
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Another one-copy week.

Thanks to the reader who donated a copy to the library in Laredo, TX!

Finally, the "answer" on Kindle sales:
Quote:
Currently, Sales Info features do not include Kindle sales data. However, we offer information about Kindle sales if you participate in our direct-publishing platform, Kindle Direct Publishing. Click here to learn more.
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Old 09-24-2011, 10:54 AM   #106
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How do you know that a book was donated to a specific library?
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Old 09-25-2011, 12:20 AM   #107
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How do you know that a book was donated to a specific library?
You can look it up on WorldCat.org.

The military guide to financial independence & retirement (Book, 2011) [WorldCat.org]

From one week to the next I can tell when a new library pops up. But I can't tell who donated it or why they'd pick Laredo...
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Old 09-25-2011, 07:56 PM   #108
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Got it. Thanks for the explanation.
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Old 10-01-2011, 09:06 PM   #109
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Five more copies this week, bringing Amazon's national-retailer count over June-September to 50.

That's not the total number of hardcopy sales, and it doesn't include Kindle sales, but it's a starting point for an estimate. When Impact Publications gets the "real" numbers then we can determine what fraction has been tracked by Amazon.

Apparently Amazon pays Kindle royalties on the "Trust us, we know what we're doing" system, similar to the one used by Facebook. Dammit.
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Old 10-08-2011, 11:47 PM   #110
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Seven copies this week! The book broke into Amazon's top 100,000. Maybe a trend?

Two more copies donated to the San Francisco public library and the Little Rock AFB library. Thanks!
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Old 10-09-2011, 10:00 AM   #111
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Hi Nords, a belated congratulations on your book. I'm probably the last one on this site to notice this thread.

I'm wondering about the cover design for your book. It appears to be a more attractive cover then the average book on subjects such as this. Once I mentioned to Larry Swedroe that his books could do with a more attractive design. He mentioned that he was glad enough to just get published and did not have control over this aspect, or something to that effect. How do you feel about that aspect of your book? Did you have any say on how the cover design was handled?

Just curious. Of course, the cover is not the most important aspect of a book but it has an advertising purpose. Plus the owner sees it every time he picks it up. I've probably never rejected a decent book because of a cover design but may have been drawn to a book that had an appealing design. BTW, my wife was a book designer many years ago and we share an ongoing interest in this arcane area.
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Old 10-09-2011, 06:21 PM   #112
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Hi Nords, a belated congratulations on your book. I'm probably the last one on this site to notice this thread.

I'm wondering about the cover design for your book. It appears to be a more attractive cover then the average book on subjects such as this. Once I mentioned to Larry Swedroe that his books could do with a more attractive design. He mentioned that he was glad enough to just get published and did not have control over this aspect, or something to that effect. How do you feel about that aspect of your book? Did you have any say on how the cover design was handled?

Just curious. Of course, the cover is not the most important aspect of a book but it has an advertising purpose. Plus the owner sees it every time he picks it up. I've probably never rejected a decent book because of a cover design but may have been drawn to a book that had an appealing design. BTW, my wife was a book designer many years ago and we share an ongoing interest in this arcane area.
Thanks, and I'll pass your compliments to the publisher!

I used Impact Publications because I wanted to get the book into military exchanges, and the exchange managers don't talk to authors.

As a first-time author I have orders of magnitude less control over book covers than Larry Swedroe. At least when his publisher hires a graphic artist there's a reasonable expectation of payback...

Actually we posters influenced the design theme (http://www.early-retirement.org/foru...ide-52483.html). Impact seemed happy to get our suggestions. (I think they appreciate people who have a plan.) However once the publisher turned it over to the graphic artist, my next opportunity for feedback was "Purple stripe or not?" I wasn't shown any other designs. IIRC at that point I was deep into proofreading the galleys and the cover was just one more distraction.

Speaking as an engineer and a guy, I'm delighted that this painful décor decision was turned over to a real no-foolin' qualified graphic artist who earns an actual living from plying her craft. I would've screwed it up with something resembling the cover of a reactor plant manual.

We're not the only ones who like the way it looks. It also stopped a lot of shopper traffic last month when I was doing book signings at the San Antonio military exchanges. (Lessons learned on book signings | Military Retirement & Financial Independence) Not very many people wanted to talk with me, but the cover caught their eyes.

With what I've learned from the publisher, and from the trend among the reading public, if I was doing another book then I'd use a self-publishing firm or maybe just go straight to e-book. I see a lot of e-book "publishing" logic along the lines of: "What the heck, I'll just crank out 50 pages, call it an e-book, whip it out there for 99 cents by Friday, and move on to some other e-commerce project. If it earns a couple thousand effortless bucks then maybe I'll turn it into a real book."

Heck, we could do 50 pages on "Should I pay off the mortgage or invest the money?" Hmmm....
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Old 10-09-2011, 07:05 PM   #113
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Seven copies this week! The book broke into Amazon's top 100,000. Maybe a trend?

Two more copies donated to the San Francisco public library and the Little Rock AFB library. Thanks!
Is there some on-line way to donate copies to local libraries? (I live almost across the street from a large USAF base).
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Old 10-09-2011, 10:37 PM   #114
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Is there some on-line way to donate copies to local libraries? (I live almost across the street from a large USAF base).
Not directly. I think WorldCat just gets its holdings info from scraping the public library websites, and it still doesn't show the book I donated to our local Hawaii library system. But that donation just finished cataloging and joined the online database this week.

You could call the base for the phone number of their library, and then tell the librarian that you'd like to mail a donation. Then you could buy the book online and have Impact Publications (for a bulk discount) or Amazon.com ship it to their address as a gift.
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Old 10-15-2011, 11:32 PM   #115
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Two more copies this week, in no particular part of the country.
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Old 10-30-2011, 11:15 PM   #116
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Three books the week before last, and another two books last week.

Library donations jumped up sharply! Thanks to those of you at:
Keith A Campbell Memorial Library in Ft Sam Houston,
the Kansas City Public Library,
the "Mid-Continent Public Library" in Independence,
the Nashville Public Library,
the Hurlburt Field base library, and
the Minuteman Library Network in Natick.

Including my local library (which is still not on WorldCat.org) we're up to 18 military & public libraries.
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Old 11-05-2011, 08:42 AM   #117
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One more copy reported sold last week.

Depending on what else is selling that day, the book oscillates between 100,000 and 700,000 on Amazon.com's sales rank.
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Waiting on your book to arrive!
Old 11-05-2011, 03:43 PM   #118
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Waiting on your book to arrive!

Hi Nords, that may have been my purchase thru Barnes & Nobles.com. Was hoping to get it delivered before I leave for TDY tomorrow, but there was a delay in shipping. Also ordered Extreme Retirement aand Live More, Work Less...thx for the recommendations on your blog.

FWIW, I'm an O-6 coming up on 24 yrs in May. In my Command assignment until Summer 2013 when I'll be at 25 yrs. Going to TAPS seminar first week of December just to get a lay of the land. Since coming across this website and your blog, I've really shifted my thinking on what I want to do, or at least consider other options on what's out there.

I have a 12 & 6 yr old and want to be able to spend time with them as they grow up. Not sure if taking another assignment in 2013 will provide that opportunity or deciding to retire is the route to go. That's why I'm excitedly looking forward to getting your book delivered!
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Old 11-09-2011, 08:21 AM   #119
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Hi Nords, that may have been my purchase thru Barnes & Nobles.com. Was hoping to get it delivered before I leave for TDY tomorrow, but there was a delay in shipping. Also ordered Extreme Retirement aand Live More, Work Less...thx for the recommendations on your blog.

FWIW, I'm an O-6 coming up on 24 yrs in May. In my Command assignment until Summer 2013 when I'll be at 25 yrs. Going to TAPS seminar first week of December just to get a lay of the land. Since coming across this website and your blog, I've really shifted my thinking on what I want to do, or at least consider other options on what's out there.

I have a 12 & 6 yr old and want to be able to spend time with them as they grow up. Not sure if taking another assignment in 2013 will provide that opportunity or deciding to retire is the route to go. That's why I'm excitedly looking forward to getting your book delivered!
Thanks for buying the book, and let us know how TAP goes!

We're also collecting contributor's stories for the second edition...
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Old 11-12-2011, 09:43 AM   #120
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Five more copies last week, two of them in the Washington DC area.

The Kindle edition is ranked #168,334 "out of over 750,000". Since the Kindle edition came out in June, sales ranks have bounced between roughly 100,000 & 300,000. I think it's safe to call that "top half".

The print edition is currently ranked #628,128 out of over 8,000,000 books. Over the last six months the sales ranks have been as high as 43,000 and as low as 957,000. I don't know what the sales distribution curves look like for all eight million books but I don't think "top half" means nearly as much in this category.

Amazon's data is all relative because these sales (this week) are compared to everyone else's sales (this week). I can't tell if the numbers mean that the book's Kindle sales are moving a lot faster than the book's print sales, or if the rest of the Kindle catalog is crap compared to their print inventory.
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