Most people think ebooks are where the real money is in self-publishing. They are wrong. Paperbacks are quietly the most consistent earner for beginner authors, and here is the simple reason why. When you publish a paperback on Amazon KDP, you earn 60% of your list price minus printing costs. On a book priced at $15.99, you can put roughly $5 to $6 in your pocket per sale. That does not sound like much until you do the math. 100 paperbacks sold in a month is close to $600. From one book. In one format. Now imagine five books doing that. That is how self-publishing income actually builds. Not one viral book. Not overnight. Just multiple well-positioned books solving real problems for real readers, stacking royalties month after month. There are four formats you can earn from on KDP. Ebook, paperback, hardcover, and audiobook. Each one plays a different role in your income strategy and each one pays differently. I break down exactly how each format pays, what your actual royalty looks like after printing costs, and why paperback should be your primary focus inside my Self-Publishing Playbook. And right now, for a limited time, you can grab all four of my Publishing Playbooks for just $15. This is my complete brain dump on how I have earned over $100k self-publishing part-time. Four playbooks covering everything from choosing your topic to launching and selling your book. 👉 GET THE PUBLISHING PLAYBOOKS FOR $15 NOW

Is imposter syndrome stopping you from putting your book out into the world? I know this is a common challenge that many aspiring authors face. It’s that internal voice constantly creating doubt: Who is actually going to read this book? Who made you the expert to speak on this topic? What will readers think? What if I get a negative review? The truth is, you don’t have to feel completely confident before you publish your book. Confidence often comes after you take action—not before. Here are three ways to quiet some of that inner chatter: 1️⃣ Focus on the reader you can help. Instead of asking, “Who am I to write this book?” ask, “Who could benefit from what I know?” You don’t have to know everything or be the world’s leading expert. You may simply be a few steps ahead of the person who needs your knowledge, experience, perspective, or story. 2️⃣ Stop expecting your first book to be perfect. Your first book is not supposed to represent the final version of you as an author. It represents where you are right now. You will continue learning, improving, and growing with every book you publish. Give yourself permission to create something valuable without expecting perfection. 3️⃣ Separate fear from facts. Imposter syndrome often speaks in worst-case scenarios. Instead of assuming no one will read your book or everyone will criticize it, look at the facts. You had an idea for a reason. You have experiences, knowledge, creativity, or a message worth sharing. Fear is a feeling—not proof that you aren’t ready. Now, think about what can happen when you stop allowing self-doubt to keep your book unfinished: 📚 You become a published author. Your book is no longer sitting in a document, notebook, or folder waiting for “someday.” It becomes a real accomplishment that you can hold in your hands and share with others. 💡 Your book can make an impact. Your words could educate someone, encourage them, entertain them, help them feel understood, or give them the solution they have been searching for. But your book cannot help anyone if it never makes it out into the world.

If you don’t yet have a book listed in our Community Book Directory, the good news is that this is a completely free opportunity available to community members! I also want to apologize if you previously reached out to have your book added and I didn’t get a chance to update the directory. As the community has grown, keeping up with submissions manually became a little challenging—but I recently made a big improvement to the process! I built an AI agent using Claude that can now help automatically process submissions and update the book directory. 🤖 This should make it much easier and faster to keep the directory current while giving more of our authors an opportunity to showcase their work. To help ensure that all authors in the community have an opportunity to gain visibility, please limit your submission to one book per author. Choose the book you would most like the community to discover! Ready to get your book featured? Fill out the submission form below, and your book will be added to the directory. 👇 🔗 Submit Your Book Here 📚💜

Share whatever you’re working on or proud of right now. This community is full of creators, authors, and entrepreneurs, and sometimes the best thing we can do is help each other get a little more visibility. 💡 IDEAS ON WHAT YOU COULD SHARE: • Yourself and what you do • Your Skool community • A book you're writing or recently published • A project you're building • A shoutout to another member • A video, post, or resource • Affiliate links (yes, those are allowed) The goal is simple: help our members get seen. Just one request so this stays valuable for everyone. 👉 1 RULE: If you share something, please also leave a thoughtful or helpful comment on someone else’s post. Support goes both ways, and when we all participate, the whole community benefits. Now let’s see what everyone is building 👇

I’ve been getting this question a lot lately, and recently posted by @Mk Duma and I think there’s a big misconception around it. Some people assume that physical books are fading out and everything is moving digital… but that’s not what I’m seeing at all. In my own numbers, I consistently get more paperback sales than ebooks—and that’s not by accident. It’s part of how I structure my strategy. The truth is, people still want physical books. There’s something about holding a book, flipping through pages, highlighting, or even just having it sit on your shelf that makes it feel more valuable. It’s also easier to gift, and for a lot of readers, it creates a better overall experience. And if you zoom out for a second, the market is showing us the same thing. Barnes & Noble is actively expanding again. They’re opening new stores, investing in high-traffic locations, and doubling down on the in-store experience—including a major new presence in downtown Chicago. Companies don’t invest millions into retail space unless there’s real demand. That alone should tell you that physical books are far from dead—they’re actually gaining momentum again. Now, let’s bring this back to KDP and how this affects your strategy. With ebooks, your royalty is capped. You only earn 70% if your book is priced between $2.99 and $9.99. If you go outside that range, it drops to 35%. So you’re already working within tighter margins. Paperbacks, on the other hand, give you more flexibility. You can price them higher, they feel more premium to the buyer, and you typically earn more per sale. This is why I don’t focus my ads on ebooks. A lot of people assume lower price = easier conversion, so they push traffic to the ebook. But even if it converts, you’re making less per sale. Instead, I run ads to my paperback. That way I’m optimizing for: - Higher perceived value - Better profit per conversion - Stronger overall momentum across formats The ebook is still there, but it’s not the main driver.