The Mini Book Series Experiment
I started an experiment several months ago and I’m ready to share it.
At the beginning of this year, I realized that there were several places that were creating more revenue for me than much of my other focuses and I wanted to double down this year in order to grow my business.
One of those areas was in book royalties.
I started self-publishing in 2019, and the first few years, I didn’t have a lot to show for my efforts. However, in 2024, after I updated my publishing strategy and system, I started seeing more revenue than ever before.
After spending time some time reviewing what changed (primarily the fact I published a lot more short books), I realized that the mini book was on the rise, my readers wanted to read these types of books, and they were easier to produce.
So, I started the year slowly, but I have decided to write a series of 10 mini books that come out of The Thriving Life Publication that I write on here on Substack. So far, I have a few books I have previously written and several new ones:
Now, I had three books in this series already, and I have published two more since starting. However, that has started to happen already is exactly what I was hoping for and I wanted to share a little bit about it with you today.
3 Improvements to My Self-Publishing Business with Mini Books
I shared a little bit about this in a recent live that I did, but I wanted to go into this a little bit deeper since I am starting to see this work.
1. Click-through Sales
One of the things I expected to see was an increase in click-through sales. Basically, someone is buying the latest book that comes out, reads it, and sees that there are more books in the series and picking up others in the series.
This can also look like someone finding one book in the series, seeing that all the Kindle Books are reasonably priced, and buying the entire series upfront. I have noticed that I will get bumps in sales like this from time to time.
I expected to see these sales spikes as I publish more books. However, with only two new books out so far, the last two months I have noticed a lot more of these click through sales which is excellent.
The older books in this series had stalled out quite a bit prior to the jumpstart in publishing and now, I am seeing more sales to these older books than I thought I would.
2. Amazon Author Followers
Prior to my mini book series experiment, I was hovering around 100 Amazon Author Followers. If you didn’t know, you can go to Amazon Author Central, and update your Author Page on Amazon. If you haven’t done this and you have a few books out, I would highly recommend doing it.
For more information on setting up your Amazon Author Page, check out my post: A Complete Guide to your Amazon Author Central Page.
Since updating my page and setting publishing more mini books, I have seen this number grow to nearly 400 in two months. Book sales from the previous month are up and I am seeing more sales already into this month.
More Followers = More Customers
3. Email Subscribers
Another thing I have finding to come from this is an increase of email subscribers. This is because I put a call-to-action in the front and back of all my books. And as I publish more of these books, I think the readers are starting to sign up.
More email subscribers is good for your business because they will buy more books and they will be more likely to buy your digital products too.
Since I started the experiment, I have seen a slow rise in email subscribers. And several of them have come to my other projects and picked up products or joined paid subscriptions. This is the power of mini books: it can help you build upon what you have already started.
What’s Next? Completing the Series.
Now, I have plans to complete this series in the number of 10 books. So far, I have published four: Goal Setting, Life Planning, Focus, and Discipline. The next book I am working on is Resilience. This one has a few more stories of my personal experiences and I am super excited to share that one.
All of these books point people to my Substack Publication: A Thriving Life.
And then, I am working on a digital product that I will price low at $27 that will help those readers who pick up my books. That is currently in production and will hopefully have ready by the middle of summer.
The goal: Create a series of books and resources that will help people live better lives.
And much of it will come from my experience and the things I have been learning over the last fifteen to twenty years. The other goal, is to share it in a way to help people get started.
In my experience, the hardest part is getting started.
So, I want to create things that aren’t complete guides or exhaustive resources. I want to create books and resources that will help people start and what they want to learn or focus on more, can be found with many of the books and resources I have used myself.
Final Thoughts on the Experiment
I’m sharing the experiment now to help encourage you. And because I am putting together this next month’s resource for my paid subscribers: The Mini Book Method. It will share how to get started, how to define and prepare your series, and how to create the backend product to sell and create additional income.
If you are interested in wanting to get this resource, be sure to become a paid subscriber. If that doesn’t interest you, you can also pick up my past paid resources here: The Minimalist Author’s Paid Resource Library
If you could write a series of mini books and create a business from them, what would they be on? Share in the comments!
My name is J.R. Heimbigner and I am a #1 Bestselling Author on Amazon with 20 self-published books. Learn more about The Minimalist Author HQ!
Also, this post may contain sales or affiliate links, so I might get a little kickback if you purchase anything. Thank you in advance!
I'd love to write a series of devotionals based on my favorite scriptures. ❤️
Loving this experiment and future direction JR!