Kindle, Print, or Audio, Which format is more important to your success?

It seems to me a lot of Kauthors are doing it all wrong. They have this tenacious focus on eBooks believing that print is dead.

The truth is anything but that. Yes, a lot of people have moved on to the new technology and wouldn’t dream of serving all of their new books up on anything but an e-reader. The thing is there are still a lot of people out there who like to read their books old style. They enjoy the feel of a book in their hands. They want to highlight their favorite passages; they want to make notes in the margins, and they just love to fold the corners to mark their favorite pages. Some people like it both ways. They like the feel of a good book in their hands for those lazy days around the house, but they load up their Kindles for when they’re on the go. Amazon recognized this with their Kindle Match-Book program. It lets readers pick up free or discounted eBooks when they purchase the print version.

What authors need to understand is readers appreciate a choice. How'd that old candy bar jingle put it, "Sometimes you feel like a nut, sometimes you don't." Camille Picott in her recent book, Indie Publishing Essentials, touches on this same subject. She tries to make all of her books available in print, eBook, and audio format because she never knows how readers are going to want her book served up. She writes that many months her audio books outsell the Kindle and print editions.

How about you? If you’re books are only available on Kindle, how many dollars are you missing out on in lost royalties? How many readers are you losing out on because you’re not offering them a choice?

In my own case, the majority of my books are available in eBook and print.

While my Kindle books outsell print copies by a margin of two or three to one, my paperback royalties from Create Space consistently exceed my Kindle royalties by hundreds, sometimes close to a thousand dollars each and every month.

Kindle authors, here is my question for you…

How many dollars are you leaving on the table, if you aren’t making your books available in print?