Smashwords vs Amazon

[lovecraft68]

This is a link that I found pretty interesting. The author is pretty much saying how she is doing far better through SW and their affiliates than Amazon which is pretty much touted as the largest market for e-books

http://blog.smashwords.com/2012/03/ruth-ann-nordin-shares-her-secrets-to.html

I'm wondering if anyone else here has found the same to be true as I have this year. MY monthly sales on SW "proper" are less than what I've gotten on Amazon, but counting the affiliates sales especially Barnes and Noble I am doing far more with SW.

For me personally (and many others I suppose) is that Smashwords, unlike Amazon, stood up to censorship and people whining about questionable material and still sells incest and I'm doing very well with it.

In fact 75% of my incest sales are through B&N and Apple. No one over there seems to have any morality issues and SW is making a killing off of it.

My non incest work is about 60/40 skewed towards Amazon, but its still impressive considering as I said many people claim Amazon is the biggest fish in the pond and all but mock people publishing on SW.

So curious to see what other people's numbers are telling them and also want to encourage anyone who buys into Smashwords as being "less than" or not "real" publishing to give them a shot.

They have nothing like the nazi like kindle policies and I have never had a hassle with payment. And at the end of the day cash spends the same no matter where it comes from.

 

[Zeb_Carter]

I find just the opposite to be true. I sell much more via Amazon than I do at through Smashwords and their affiliates.

I sell 75% more via Amazon.

 

[lovecraft68]

I find just the opposite to be true. I sell much more via Amazon than I do at through Smashwords and their affiliates.

I sell 75% more via Amazon.

What's the material?

 

[Zeb_Carter]

What's the material?

Porn...a mix of LW, Incest, Lite Bondage, etc. Actually my incest stuff does much better at Amazon, especially in the UK.

 

[lovecraft68]

Porn...a mix of LW, Incest, Lite Bondage, etc.

My BDSM kills it on amazon compared to SW. when you say incest I'm assuming "pseudo" or "step"?

I slipped a "real" one up there once. A mother son. I shouldn't say slipped The title said it all and I described it as the real deal They were lax and let it through. I sold a 100 copies in a week and someone reported it.

From the standpoint of businesses are in business to make money it still makes me scratch my head that Amazon listens to an extremely small percentage of complainers and costs themselves thousands a month in royalties on a topic that whether people like to admit it or not sells like wildfire

 

[Zeb_Carter]

My BDSM kills it on amazon compared to SW. when you say incest I'm assuming "pseudo" or "step"?

I slipped a "real" one up there once. A mother son. I shouldn't say slipped The title said it all and I described it as the real deal They were lax and let it through. I sold a 100 copies in a week and someone reported it.

From the standpoint of businesses are in business to make money it still makes me scratch my head that Amazon listens to an extremely small percentage of complainers and costs themselves thousands a month in royalties on a topic that whether people like to admit it or not sells like wildfire

Well...the story line is about a young man and his Godmother, yet he does tend to slip into his mom a couple of times, along with his cousin and other ladies he knows. No, his mom is his mom and his Godmother is his mom's first cousin.

 

[bashfullyshameless]

My book does dramatically better on Amazon than Smashwords. I get a steady trickle of sales weekly on Amazon; I see a little note in my inbox about a Smashwords sale once or twice a week and that's usually about it.

I'm happy to be on both, though. Amazon seems to hold the bigger market share as far as I can tell (not that I've done serious research), but I'd hate for my book to be only available for the people who had one specific device or brand name rather than another.

 

[Firebrain]

Smashwords was key for me because it got me on to iBooks, and iBooks ended up being a huge venue for me. I wouldn't say Smashwords was "better" though.

 

[Boxlicker101]

I do't know why, but I get barely even a trickle of sales on Amazon. I have four titles, and last month had a total of eight sales. I'm offering them all for free borrows, but don't even get many takers there.

These are all relatively short works, about 5,000 words.

 

[R. Richard]

I started on Smashwords and then put some of the milder stuff in Amazon. I still get more sales in Smashwords, but Amazon is catching up.

 

[PrincessErin]

.....

 

[Firebrain]

For those of you not selling through Smashwords, are you making it into the premium catalogue? Because that's how you make money.

You can do it with erotic stuff; you just have to make it a bit more subtle (and that won't stop it from selling if the vendor it ends up on is a bit more subtle, for example). A cover/title can still be sexy without a bare arse and "Daddy" in the title

I paid for formatting because a) I'm lazy and b) it guaranteed premium status so long as the cover was decent (I used a designer, who is fortunately a friend). It was cheap too. I've got 35 ratings on Amazon and 640 on iBooks for the same novella. That kind of difference is worth a bit of extra work.

 

[lovecraft68]

For those of you not selling through Smashwords, are you making it into the premium catalogue? Because that's how you make money.

You can do it with erotic stuff; you just have to make it a bit more subtle (and that won't stop it from selling if the vendor it ends up on is a bit more subtle, for example). A cover/title can still be sexy without a bare arse and "Daddy" in the title

I paid for formatting because a) I'm lazy and b) it guaranteed premium status so long as the cover was decent (I used a designer, who is fortunately a friend). It was cheap too. I've got 35 ratings on Amazon and 640 on iBooks for the same novella. That kind of difference is worth a bit of extra work.

Yes, The premium catalog is where two thirds of my sales are coming from. As I said in my first post B&N is really doing well

They also just started with Baker and Taylor and I am curious to see how that works.

You make a good point about the covers/titles that is part of the reason Amazon ended up doing away with incest is pure idiocu on the part of authors.

My covers are done by me $4 a piece stock photos and a site that ads text and borders for free.

Except for my Broken covers which are done by Excessia's Dakota Trace