If your dream is to become a rich man, don't write computer trade books.
The Basic Economics
There are three major variables involved in determining how much a book author will make with a particular book:
- Royalty percentage1,
- Number of copies sold, and
- The book's price2
1 - the royalty percentage is usually fixed per book, not per author. A sole author might receive, say, a 10% royalty rate, whereas a book with three authors, each author would receive only, say, a 3% royalty rate.
2 - The price used in the calculations is the price the publisher sells the book to the bookstore. This is typically half the cost of the retail price.
In simplest terms, the revenue grossed by a book for an author is:
Gross = RoyaltyRate * CopiesSold * BookPrice
Running the Numbers...
Let's examine some of the common figures for these three variables - royalty rate, copies sold, and book price.
- Royalty Rate - This figure varies by publisher and by the author. O'Reilly does a standard 10% royalty, although they likely increase the royalty for more accomplished authors - I can hardly see Larry Wall getting only 10% to write Programming Perl, but who knows. More accomplished authors can expect a higher royalty, in the low teens. This rate can also vary by publisher. I had a colleague who was very accomplished in his field and was offered in the 15-20% range by assorted publishers.
- Number of copies sold - This number varies most heavily on the book. Since there are soooooooo many computer trade books on the same subject, there are a number of books that have dismal sales. By dismal sales, I mean under 5,000 copies sold. For ASP.NET, if a book can break the 20,000 mark, you're doing good for yourself. If you break the 40,000 mark, you really wrote a great book that has really been well received.
In my personal experience, the technical book market has been painfully soft over the past couple of years. This can be evidenced by Wrox's demise.
- Book price - Again, keep in mind that the price used in the computation is the price the publisher sells the book to the bookstore. This is roughly half the price that you, Joe Sixpack, pay at the bookstore. With the declining sales, this figure has also come down slightly over the past couple of years. Boo.
So, let's say that you decide to write a computer trade book and you receive a 10% royalty. The book does fairly well, selling, say, 10,000 copies (not at all unrealistic, especially for a first-time author like yourself) at $29.95 per copy in the bookstore (which means the bookstore dropped, say, $14.00 per book). How much dough did you make? Well, let's find out:
Gross = RoyaltyRate * CopiesSold * BookPrice
Gross = 0.10 * 10,000 * 14.00 = $14,000.00
You made $14,000! Not bad for your first book. But... how long did it take you to write the book? And when, precisely, did you receive the $14,000?
The Book Writing Process and Payment Schedule
How long it takes to write a book depends on a number of factors, the most pertinent one being how much free time you have. This can be near zero if you have a regular full-time job and family. Other factors contributing to the duration it takes to write a book is the book's total page count, the author's writing speed/efficiency, and the author's knowledge of the material.
Technical books can range from 150 pages to 1,500 pages, but most, I'd say, are in the 400-800 range. The book writing process, for such lengthed books, usually takes, at minimum, three months and, at maximum, a year. (If you can output 400-800 pages in less than than three months time then clearly you are a very efficient professional writer! All five of my books took right around three months to write, and I consider myself to be a quick writer and throughout those times I've not had a "standard" nine-to-five job, leaving plenty of time for writing.)
So, returning to our fictional example, let's say that your book will be 700 pages long, and it takes you seven months of writing to get the first pass of the writing done. Sure, there will be another three to four months of techincal reviews, edits, and whatnot, but from the author's perspective, these months require much less work and energy than the intense writing period. So, 700 pages in seven months is 100 pages per month. Recall that we already determine that you will make $14,000 off the book, it's as if you are being paid $2,000 a month (since it took seven months to write), or $20 per page.
In case you were wondering, the payment of the $14,000 is spread out as follows: you will receive part of it as an advance during the writing process, typically anywhere from $5,000 to $15,000 dollars dolled out over the seven months of writing. Let's say your advance is a typical $10,000. The remainder of the money is distributed as the books sell. With technology changing so quickly, computer trade books have a very short shelf life, usually limited to two to three years at a maximum. For example, in early 2000 my first book, Teach Yourself ASP 3.0 in 21 Days, hit the bookstore shelves. Here it is, three and a half years later, and ASP 3.0 is like so passe. So, the remaining $4,000 or so that we determine the book will make will trickle in over the next two years.
Magazine Writing - A More Profitable Venue
Recall that books pay somewhere in the neighborhood of $20 per page. Magazine writing, on the other hand, comes in at a much higher dollar per page number. For example, many magazines like articles in the two to four thousand word range, which translates to five to ten book pages. For these two to four thousand words, though, magazines will pay between $500 to $2,500 dollars, depending on the magazine and author. Using the 10 page estimate, this comes down to $50 to $250 per page! Also, magazines are far less stressful to write since a magazine article can be crunched out in a few days to a week, rather than requiring several months.
While magazine writing is definitely more profitable, don't totally discount book writing. There's something cool about being able to stroll into a bookstore and see your book(s) on the shelf. Nothing makes a resume look better than having authored a book or two on the technology that you're being hired to work with. And book writing and book publishers are a great way to move into magazine article writing.
In a future posting I'll be sure to share ways to get started writing a book, from creating a proposal, to contacting prospective publishers.