Do erotic short stories sell?

[Nomadwoman]

Hi All
Ive been looking at people's covers as that seems to be a huge factor. CArl a couple of yours really POP.
Are there dedicated designers who tackle this genre and have access to these sorts of photos?
Im in NW Argentina (very religious) at the moment and i think my designer would asphyxiate if I asked him for this

[Tara Shuler]

Hi All
Ive been looking at people's covers as that seems to be a huge factor. CArl a couple of yours really POP.
Are there dedicated designers who tackle this genre and have access to these sorts of photos?
Im in NW Argentina (very religious) at the moment and i think my designer would asphyxiate if I asked him for this

I've done a number of different covers for the genre for various authors.

[Carl246]

Hi All
Ive been looking at people's covers as that seems to be a huge factor. CArl a couple of yours really POP.
Are there dedicated designers who tackle this genre and have access to these sorts of photos?
Im in NW Argentina (very religious) at the moment and i think my designer would asphyxiate if I asked him for this

This is an area where you can choose to spend some serious money by checking out the various artists out there, or you can do what I do and find your covers at places like Fotolia, which is the cheaper end of the market. All the pictures you see in my sig are from Fotolia, so there are good covers to be had. Of course just buying the picture is only the start of the story, how you use the graphics and fonts on your covers can make all the difference. For an example of that take a look at two covers of mine. The pictures themselves are exactly the same but the one that was worked on by my Audiobook editor is far better than the one I did myself.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B005CWN01C

http://springbrookaudio.com/2011/08/23/hot-tales-of-lust-by-carl-east/

Click on the picture in the second version and it will show a larger cover.

All the best.

Carl

[ShaunaG]

A question for those who have experience with bundling their stories...Do you ever have readers who are upset that they brought the stories singly only to see that you later released a bundle that was a little cheaper per story?  I did see someone get upset over this (in a collection in another genre), but I wonder if it was because the author included a new story in the bundle that had never been released separately (and people who'd already bought the single stories had to buy the bundle just to get the one new story).

If I had bought stories individually and then saw the author put out a compilation with a new unreleased story that wasnt available anywhere else, I would be mad too. But if it was just a compilation it wouldnt upset me. People do it all the time, in books, movies, music.

I was just about to ask this question.  Are you in my brain?  IT'S A TRAP.

Ahem, sorry, a little punch drunk today.

I'm working on a 4-piece story arc, and I think they will end up being novellas.  How would you recommend releasing them?  All 4 at once, then bundle a month later?  Release 1 every 2 weeks? I know I should probably, you know, finish them before I get too worried about it, but I'm curious!

Really appreciate you sharing your hard won knowledge with us.

For my erotica I just released them as they were ready. Its an in demand, saturated market so I didnt want to be left out. This is one genre where you dont wait to dive into. Especially if you're doing short stories, novellas and novellets. Take time to edit and proofread, yes, but dont wait to get them out there.

Hi All
Ive been looking at people's covers as that seems to be a huge factor. CArl a couple of yours really POP.
Are there dedicated designers who tackle this genre and have access to these sorts of photos?
Im in NW Argentina (very religious) at the moment and i think my designer would asphyxiate if I asked him for this

Tara did my covers for The Taryn Malloy Fantasies (covers 2-4 in my sig) and I did the covers for my short stories (covers 5-9). I bought my pics from bigstockphoto.com and used paint.net (free) to edit them.

[DelilahFawkes]

What a great thread!    Now I'm going to experiment with the price of my most popular short story and see if it works out... $2.99, here I come!

As for covers, I go the Carl route and make my own with stock photos from dreamstime.com.  If you turn off the smut filter on that site and search for whatever kind of images you'd like, there's actually a decent selection in the $5-$15 price range. After that, it's just a matter of playing with fonts you like. The folks on these boards are absolutely lovely at giving feedback on covers if you're doing them yourself.

As for the free part, I definitely saw a major boost after Tit for Tat went free. However, be prepared that folks who may not be into "quicky" stories will be downloading it for free on a whim, forgetting its short, and then get really disappointed and sometimes grouchy.

You can't please everyone, and with a freebie, everyone will be picking it up whether it's truly their cup of tea or not  .  It made my skin thicker while also building a great fan base for my other stuff. Works for me!

[Sara Pierce]

What a great thread!    Now I'm going to experiment with the price of my most popular short story and see if it works out... $2.99, here I come!

As for covers, I go the Carl route and make my own with stock photos from dreamstime.com.  If you turn off the smut filter on that site and search for whatever kind of images you'd like, there's actually a decent selection in the $5-$15 price range. After that, it's just a matter of playing with fonts you like. The folks on these boards are absolutely lovely at giving feedback on covers if you're doing them yourself.

Wow, maybe that's why my search stunk so bad, I didn't turn off the filters! How do you do it, I haven't been able to find much there on Dreamstime no matter how creative my searching!

Re: the pricing, I'm experimenting a little this month and making my shorts (3k+ words) $1.99 and my compilation $3.99 just to see how it goes. I had a decent first month with my one short story at $.99 and while I hope for that again, I'd like to see how far I can go.

[DelilahFawkes]

Wow, maybe that's why my search stunk so bad, I didn't turn off the filters! How do you do it, I haven't been able to find much there on Dreamstime no matter how creative my searching!

Re: the pricing, I'm experimenting a little this month and making my shorts (3k+ words) $1.99 and my compilation $3.99 just to see how it goes. I had a decent first month with my one short story at $.99 and while I hope for that again, I'd like to see how far I can go.

Nice! We'll have to swap stats and see how this whole "pricing" things works out  .  Good luck!!  (I hope this whole making more money thing is true, cause that'd be pretty rad.)

Also, on dreamstime I had to get crazy with the searches  . Stuff is labelled in really weird ways like "sensual couple" instead of "naked man and woman" or whatever. You have to search over and over and once you find a picture you like, figure out how they might have labelled similar stuff.  Just go crazy in their search box, and eventually you'll hit on something that works.

Hope that helps!

[Margo Lerwill]

What you describe is a no-no at least to my way of thinking. People should be aware that a bundle is a collection of stories that they might already own. Bundles in and of themselves attract buyers who see reviews for the single stories and figure that they will save money by going the bundle route. Then there are those that have paid for one short story and have liked it so much that the bundle looks attractive to them. It's all dependent on the prices as well.

Good luck to you.

Carl

Ah, okay, that's what I was thinking, but I didn't want to assume, as I haven't put out either a collection or an erotic story.  Thanks (and to ShaunaG too) for the feedback.

[Nomadwoman]

Just want to say a BIG thank you.
You know, before I published I read on various other forums about Kindleboards and Writers cafe authors writing rotten reviews for each other out of spite etc but everyone here has been amazingly supportive of others
 

[HAGrant]

I can't really speak to EROTIC short stories, per se, but my first self-published work is a short story (8,500 words). It's a romance (Scottish-set historical), but I wouldn't call it erotic.

Since mid-January, this story has sold over 8500 copies. At one point, it was 223 in the Kindle store overall and #10 in Historical Romance. In its best month (July), almost 4,000 copies sold. Sales have slowed a lot since then (I'm down to the 3,000s in the Kindle store and last month I just barely cracked 1,000 sales on Amazon), but I've been so pleased with the results that I've decided to do more self-publishing. Even at only 99 cents a copy, I've made more money on this short story than on the print anthology I sold to Kensington books (and have sold more copies).

All of this said, I have NO idea why this story did as well as it did and I have no great confidence that I can repeat these kinds of sales. So I don't think large sales of short stories (or really, of any individual book) are the norm.

Jackie, that's such a great story. Congratulations.

[Vicky Foxx]

Nice! We'll have to swap stats and see how this whole "pricing" things works out  .  Good luck!!  (I hope this whole making more money thing is true, cause that'd be pretty rad.)

Yes Delilah, do keep us posted on how the price swap works! When I went from .99 to 2.99 my sales increased. Nothing huge, I went from 1 sale a day to about 3 daily sales. But that was a big deal for me. I checked out your books, and noticed your paid offerings have really decent Amazon rankings. So going 'Free' on one, seems to have really bumped your sales. I bet you one virtual martini, that you'l see a nice income change with a price increase.

[Rex Jameson]

OP: "Do erotic short stories sell?"
Me: "Does a bear crap in the woods?"

[Sara Pierce]

Nice! We'll have to swap stats and see how this whole "pricing" things works out  .  Good luck!!  (I hope this whole making more money thing is true, cause that'd be pretty rad.)

Also, on dreamstime I had to get crazy with the searches  . Stuff is labelled in really weird ways like "sensual couple" instead of "naked man and woman" or whatever. You have to search over and over and once you find a picture you like, figure out how they might have labelled similar stuff.  Just go crazy in their search box, and eventually you'll hit on something that works.

Hope that helps!

Oh it's a BIG help, "sensual couple" pulled up a HUGE list of useable files! Maybe now I won't need to farm out my cover art (although I really heart my cover guy).

And I'll definitely keep you posted on pricing experiment! I hit a wall the end of last month after a really amazing run (don't know what happened but I was doing 3-4 sales a day for nearly a week at one point!) and hope it's a momentary glitch. I'll see what happens for a month then lower it again if necessary for another month. I love having the control to do that!

[SarahSalari]

OP: "Do erotic short stories sell?"
Me: "Does a bear crap in the woods?"

Obviously a man who's never heard of Grizzly Port-a-Johns... *sigh*  

[Juliette Dupree]

Nomadwoman, I haven't been on here that long, but I've never heard of any authors writing bad reviews out of jealousy.  If anything, I think it's the opposite. 

Delilah..."sensual couples"?  Geez, no wonder why I spent all day searching for pics and coming up empty. I wish these photo stock sites would make their search engines more user-friendly! 

By they way, love the fact that we're seeing more posting activity among the erotica authors. 

[jackKate]

By they way, love the fact that we're seeing more posting activity among the erotica authors. 

Not sure if it's just coincidental timing or that we're feeling a bit more secure amongst ourselves in the group, but yes, nice to see more people in the genre

(side note, lost our 5-star purity today *sob* now down to 4.4 )

[SarahSalari]

Kate,

4.4 stars is still pretty great.

I'm not sure what readers will think of my shorts. No reviews yet. But hey, I'll take sales over reviews any day! (I suspect some readers are too shy to review erotica...)

[jackKate]

At least there's such a massive variety of erotica available now, so there's something for everyone.

[bettymidnight]

I love these threads.

Erotic is quite interesting.  I've heard of people uploading and selling copies right then and there... sadly, that wasn't me.  But then again I chose August to start publishing!

I've been out networking, getting reviews, doing the blog swap thing with Vicky.  And of course, I'm plannning on more stories.  My goal is one a month.  I have such a long list of stories that I wrote with nothing to do with... and then in the background, I'm writing an erotica romance novel.

Right now my two stories are this:

1. Straight up erotica i.e. sex sex sex
2. An erotica thriller i.e. murder and sex

I'm going to test all the markets and sub genres I feel comfortable with and see what happens.

~BM~

[jackKate]

I have to say, we were surprised/lucky with how quickly things took off for us, sometimes I think it's purely the luck of the draw.

[Juliette Dupree]

Luck may have something to do with it, but I firmly believe that a well-written book that has been properly formatted with an attractive cover and good blurb WILL sell itself, at least to a certain point.  Luck can play a role in whether that book gets catapulted from "selling fairly well" to "selling extremely well" or even "selling like crazy".  But from what I've seen, when a book has been out two months or more and is still seeing only single-digit sales, there's a reason for that, and it's usually pretty clear to the casual observer (but not the author).

I was just thinking about this recently.  I've seen a few authors on Writer's Cafe bemoaning their negligible sales stats, when I know for a fact those authors asked for help a couple of months back for their cover/blurb/etc., got tons of great advice, then blew it off and never made a single change--even when several people pointed out the same problem.  I think that's why we're seeing less people chiming in with cover/blurb help.  Who wants to waste their time, knowing that it's usually ignored?  Not that any of us have to take the have to take the advice of others--but when seven people tell you your cover title is unreadable or the picture is not appropriate for the genre you're writing for, you just might want to take that under serious consideration.
 
I'm not saying a person with single digit stats necessarily has a sucky book.  I'm just saying it's usually an indicator of one or more problems.  Whether it's an amateur cover, a poorly-written blurb, bad formatting, typos, or a combination of these, it tends to be pretty obvious (to me, anyway) when I check out those authors' books.  It's not always the case--sometimes the books just aren't getting found, or are written for too small of a niche audience--but usually it's indicative of a problem(s).

[Sara Pierce]

I was just thinking about this recently.  I've seen a few authors on Writer's Cafe bemoaning their negligible sales stats, when I know for a fact those authors asked for help a couple of months back for their cover/blurb/etc., got tons of great advice, then blew it off and never made a single change--even when several people pointed out the same problem.  I think that's why we're seeing less people chiming in with cover/blurb help.  Who wants to waste their time, knowing that it's usually ignored?  Not that any of us have to take the have to take the advice of others--but when seven people tell you your cover title is unreadable or the picture is not appropriate for the genre you're writing for, you just might want to take that under serious consideration.

Here here!! I've grown tired of those threads too; there are several people whose help threads I now actively ignore. However, I still enjoy helping those truly looking to make themselves better, especially when it comes to blurb or cover advice. I've learned, however, to stay the heck out of "Do I really need an editor?" threads!!!

[Steve Richer]

And I'll definitely keep you posted on pricing experiment! I hit a wall the end of last month after a really amazing run (don't know what happened but I was doing 3-4 sales a day for nearly a week at one point!) and hope it's a momentary glitch. I'll see what happens for a month then lower it again if necessary for another month. I love having the control to do that!

I'm in the same boat. The last week of August my sales ground to a screeching halt, even my erotica which so far had been selling 3-4 a day. You know things are bad when you get a couple of sales on Smashwords and nothing on Amazon! I chalk it up to the back-to-school belt-tightening and time-suck.

Good luck with the price experimentation. FWIW, my erotica is in a popular niche and aside from last week I've had no problem selling at $2.99. My cheaper stuff is at $.99 and much more vanilla; it doesn't sell much.

[Carl246]

Writing erotic stories can be a hit and miss affair, depending on the subject matter. I mean, even a good title for a story can make a big difference. A good cover is essential and proper grammar is paramount. You could be the best writer out there but if your story is boring and un-erotic you might as well go back to your 9 to 5 job. Time is also an issue in the erotic story business, no one who writes erotica ever made it overnight. Therefore, patience and the ability to write good erotica is important. I have over 100 tales out there now, some novels, some novellas and loads of short stories. I'm now in a position 2 years down the road when I can afford to convert a few of my books into audio, which I recently did. It cost me almost $7,000 to convert six books, but to me that was an investment for my future.

My advice, keep writing and improving your skills and let the rest take care of itself. When you're confident enough write a trilogy, set the first at a low price to get their interest and the others will pay for it. If you ever get a book that seems to be popular write a follow up, but keep to the same format as the one before it.

Good luck to you all.

Carl

[Marata Eros]

I sold around 300+ across Amazon/NOOK/SW. I don't know how that compares to others but I've been happy with the result. That was seven titles and one anthology. They were released each week but were not all available for the entire month. September will have all eight titles and two anthologies. That will be a truer representation of sales. Also, I keep hearing August is a bad book sales month...maybe September will improve?