Minor victory thread
- Thread starter Thread Necromancer
- Start date
In this case, I'm gonna tend towards "yes."
I may be lucky to make it there at all if I follow any of these "eat your way through Flushing Chinatown" articles I've found.
(I may be lucky to be able to waddle my way out of the hotel to get back home)
Taxes are done. Owed $171 to federal and am allegedly due back $61 from state. Allegedly since now WV will offset refunds for unpaid student loan debt, and the dispute with the Dept. of Education is at 25 years now. So I expect zero.
Took a bite out of the vacation fund, but it was money I'd already set aside into a prepaid card, and not my regular account. So plans will still move forward.
Took a bite out of the vacation fund, but it was money I'd already set aside into a prepaid card, and not my regular account. So plans will still move forward.
I've been doubling down on trying to get my son to do homework for the last month. It has sucked and taken up most of my afternoon/evening, but he's at least getting math and science homework done consistently. Now I just need to get him to suffer less while doing it so we can get it done faster.[emoji14]
It's an improvement over self harm tantrums and getting nothing done though. Thank god he's finally reaching a maturity level where he's embarrassed to do that in public so we can just do his homework at the library.
It's an improvement over self harm tantrums and getting nothing done though. Thank god he's finally reaching a maturity level where he's embarrassed to do that in public so we can just do his homework at the library.
Gonna have the house to myself with absolutely nothing to do until at least 5-6pm tomorrow. I'm super excited.
So, as I've crowed about in other threads, I'm going to be in Houston in May for Space City Comic Con.
One of the things I've wanted to do was figure out a way to sell ebooks easily and at a good price. Sure, I could take cash at the con and email the ebooks. Maybe I'm old, but I think that if I put something physical in someone's hand, they'd be more willing to put cash in mine. For a couple of years, I've been looking to find decent small-size (128mb) USB drives at a cheap price. Last year, I thought I found one on Ali-Baba, but after making the purchase, the seller told me the price was promotional only, for 1 unit, and that I'd have to pay nearly $1.00 more per drive to order in bulk. Fuck that.
Last month, I found another decent-priced USB drive on ali-express (ali-baba's more consumer-friendly side), and made an order for 20 drives. They arrived today.
They are very professional feeling. The black part has a slight rubberized feel. The parts are tightly fit together. The random sampling I took met size and transfer specifications for a 128mb usb 2.0 drive. And best of all, there was no bait and switch on the price! I got 20 of them for $1.57 apiece, shipping included. If I can load them up with all of my books in every e-book format, I'm hoping I can sell them for $10.00 apiece, which puts their cost in line with what Amazon takes off of my sales.
Now, I can perform my glorious experiment
One of the things I've wanted to do was figure out a way to sell ebooks easily and at a good price. Sure, I could take cash at the con and email the ebooks. Maybe I'm old, but I think that if I put something physical in someone's hand, they'd be more willing to put cash in mine. For a couple of years, I've been looking to find decent small-size (128mb) USB drives at a cheap price. Last year, I thought I found one on Ali-Baba, but after making the purchase, the seller told me the price was promotional only, for 1 unit, and that I'd have to pay nearly $1.00 more per drive to order in bulk. Fuck that.
Last month, I found another decent-priced USB drive on ali-express (ali-baba's more consumer-friendly side), and made an order for 20 drives. They arrived today.
They are very professional feeling. The black part has a slight rubberized feel. The parts are tightly fit together. The random sampling I took met size and transfer specifications for a 128mb usb 2.0 drive. And best of all, there was no bait and switch on the price! I got 20 of them for $1.57 apiece, shipping included. If I can load them up with all of my books in every e-book format, I'm hoping I can sell them for $10.00 apiece, which puts their cost in line with what Amazon takes off of my sales.
Now, I can perform my glorious experiment
I'll buy one.So, as I've crowed about in other threads, I'm going to be in Houston in May for Space City Comic Con.
One of the things I've wanted to do was figure out a way to sell ebooks easily and at a good price. Sure, I could take cash at the con and email the ebooks. Maybe I'm old, but I think that if I put something physical in someone's hand, they'd be more willing to put cash in mine. For a couple of years, I've been looking to find decent small-size (128mb) USB drives at a cheap price. Last year, I thought I found one on Ali-Baba, but after making the purchase, the seller told me the price was promotional only, for 1 unit, and that I'd have to pay nearly $1.00 more per drive to order in bulk. Fuck that.
Last month, I found another decent-priced USB drive on ali-express (ali-baba's more consumer-friendly side), and made an order for 20 drives. They arrived today.
They are very professional feeling. The black part has a slight rubberized feel. The parts are tightly fit together. The random sampling I took met size and transfer specifications for a 128mb usb 2.0 drive. And best of all, there was no bait and switch on the price! I got 20 of them for $1.57 apiece, shipping included. If I can load them up with all of my books in every e-book format, I'm hoping I can sell them for $10.00 apiece, which puts their cost in line with what Amazon takes off of my sales.
Now, I can perform my glorious experiment
Email'd be faster in this case
But if you want one, hit me up on fb to work out the details 
Ick. <hugs>
I'd rather have gotten the snow than the ice we have here in the middle of the state...
The yearly town Easter Egg hunt has already been rescheduled to an indoor location.
Whohoo! Now I'm getting snow ON TOP of that ice now...
No...I only gave birth to two of them.
This would have been an Epic Win if my son hadn't lost one of the little ones!
While I was downtown at the Central library today, I left a small stack of my business cards where they have a promotional section (events and such).
And then this happened earlier:
He not only retweeted my pinned tweet regarding my new book, but also tweeted this:
So yeah, the power of shameless self-promotion wins again!
And then this happened earlier:
He not only retweeted my pinned tweet regarding my new book, but also tweeted this:
So yeah, the power of shameless self-promotion wins again!
So, I have just gotten a price quote from a US company for "wafer" (credit card sized) USB drives.So, as I've crowed about in other threads, I'm going to be in Houston in May for Space City Comic Con.
One of the things I've wanted to do was figure out a way to sell ebooks easily and at a good price. Sure, I could take cash at the con and email the ebooks. Maybe I'm old, but I think that if I put something physical in someone's hand, they'd be more willing to put cash in mine. For a couple of years, I've been looking to find decent small-size (128mb) USB drives at a cheap price. Last year, I thought I found one on Ali-Baba, but after making the purchase, the seller told me the price was promotional only, for 1 unit, and that I'd have to pay nearly $1.00 more per drive to order in bulk. Fuck that.
Last month, I found another decent-priced USB drive on ali-express (ali-baba's more consumer-friendly side), and made an order for 20 drives. They arrived today.
They are very professional feeling. The black part has a slight rubberized feel. The parts are tightly fit together. The random sampling I took met size and transfer specifications for a 128mb usb 2.0 drive. And best of all, there was no bait and switch on the price! I got 20 of them for $1.57 apiece, shipping included. If I can load them up with all of my books in every e-book format, I'm hoping I can sell them for $10.00 apiece, which puts their cost in line with what Amazon takes off of my sales.
Now, I can perform my glorious experiment
They would look like this:
I like that there's blank space on the back for me to sign them, as I would an actual book. But the price point is much higher than the generic USBs I got from china. I'd have to sell my omnibus collection (2 novels, 1 homebrew guide, 10 sheet music books) at $15.00 to make it worth the cost. Considering that the genres are all over the place (as opposed to say 3 or 4 novels), do you guys see that as a good value proposition? Would it be something you'd consider buying (theoretically) at that price? I'm hoping the price point isn't too dear--espeically considering the inflated prices people already pay at conventions for stuff, and especially since there's a way to add value by signing the back.
But it's a big expense. I'm a bit nervous about pulling the trigger on it. So I thought I'd see what you guys might say.
I see these as not just a value-add due to the signature, but also as a sort of "collectors' edition" where you would include something that can only be acquired when getting this "wallet-sized" version. An MP3 performance of some of the sheet music, or something else unique to this format.
--Patrick
--Patrick
What he said
Yeah, market them as limited edition electronic omnibus, and only buy a limited number that you're almost certain to sell. Number them, sign them, and if you sell out you'll have an idea of the market and how to approach them next time. If you don't sell out then you'll know the market isn't right and you'll probably not have lost much.
Another thought is to include them as a special gift for those purchasing the complete collection. Used as a bookmark, limited edition keepsake, and electronic version of the books for those who invest in your whole collection. Might be able to drive more sales of the hardcopies by providing an incentive that can't be obtained any other way.
My guess, though, is that they won't be terribly popular. As a geek with geek friends you can see the value, but who are your customers? Are they also going to get enough value?
I think your best bet is to make them collectibles.
Another thought is to include them as a special gift for those purchasing the complete collection. Used as a bookmark, limited edition keepsake, and electronic version of the books for those who invest in your whole collection. Might be able to drive more sales of the hardcopies by providing an incentive that can't be obtained any other way.
My guess, though, is that they won't be terribly popular. As a geek with geek friends you can see the value, but who are your customers? Are they also going to get enough value?
I think your best bet is to make them collectibles.
I can certainly do that. They're 2 gig drives, and I'd only need 120mb for the ebooks. I could add some music, and maybe some work in progress sketches of the cover and stuff, and still have tons of space left over.
Heck, I could even throw in my band's DVD and still have space.
The problem is that I have to buy 100 in order to reach a price point that's worth it. But that's a lot of money to gamble...so that's why I'm trying to gauge interest in advance. Even buying 100, they'll be way too expensive to give away, unfortunately.
The best price break doesn't come until I buy 5000, but there's no way I can afford to do that.
Those cheap sticks are small...there's no way I could fit artwork and a signature on them.
The credit card ones he's getting should be under $10 each in quantities of 10, and under $5 each in quantities of 100.