Damned Pirates!
I have spoken to a number of authors who were very cross to discover that their work was being pirated. I totally sympathise. Whether indie or in house, we work incredibly hard on our books, they are sold at a very reasonable price (most indie authors spend at least some time selling their e-books for 99p), and we see little of that money. To find that people are so cheap that they would rather steal our work than pay less than the price of a fifth of a bag of Maltesers is hugely frustrating. Top it off with the publishing industries plaintive wailing that piracy is destroying the industry, and it is easy to see why we get upset.
But there are several good reasons why we should not get ourselves wound up about piracy. In this article I am going to explain what they are.
Does Piracy Eat into your Audience Share?
Here is an arbitrary bar showing your e-book sales in a wonderful world without piracy. Wow aren’t you popular!
In the dramatically titled “Internet Book Piracy: The Fight to Protect Authors, Publishers, and Our Culture”, Gini Graham Scott estimated that in 2011 20% of all e-books were pirated. Which gives a first impression a bit like this:
But there is a crucial fact we are overlooking. MOST PEOPLE WHO PIRATE YOUR BOOK WOULD NOT HAVE BOUGHT IT IN THE FIRST PLACE. Sorry for the all-caps, but this is an important point to remember. People who pirate books, pirate books. It is hard to go back to buying things when you can get them for free. When they do buy them, they do it for a different reason than people who refuse to pirate – which we will come to later. The graph and the 20% figure are misleading because they give the impression that 20% of people who would have bought your book have pirated instead. This is incorrect. Let’s look at what our world with 20% piracy probably is like:
It is safe to say you have lost some buyers. You haven’t lost 20% of buyers from piracy, because more people are reading your book: in our completely made up numbers model you have 6000 readers and 4750 buyers, as opposed to 5000 buyer/readers in a world without piracy. For illustrative purposes we’ve guestimated that about 5% of people who would have bought the book have pirated it, which I expected is overestimated. Most pirates would not have had become readers if they had had to pay for the book. Still, we have lost some buyers, so why is piracy sometimes a good thing?
1. A pirate is still a reader.
Whether they have paid for it or not, just like someone who has borrowed it from the library, pirates can tell other people about it, leave reviews on amazon or goodreads, and do all the things a normal reader does. After all, they consider themselves a reader just like any other.
Some of the people they talk to will go out to buy your book. This means, with the correct treatment (and we will come to that in the final section, audience engagement), pirates may grow your buyer audience beyond what it would have been without piracy.
2. Do not sweat things you cannot control.
Ask all those computer game designers with their posh DRM systems: you ‘aint going to stop piracy, and sometimes the effort to stop it costs more than the piracy in the first place. Writing is stressful enough in the first place. Some people are going to “steal” your book. Try to remember that it is great that your book is being read at all, that more readers is defacto better than fewer readers, then focus on finding more readers and writing more books.
3. Sometimes people buy books they have already read.
The best example of this is not in books but in DVDs. Game of Thrones is the most pirated series in the history of television, and yet an awful lot of people saw it by illegitimate means first then went out and bought the DVD boxset. HBO made HUUUUUUUGE amounts of money from Game of Thrones, and it was not just from people who paid the subscription. Think of it like giving your book out for free to build an audience. Nobody thought a fantasy TV series could work until they saw it, and nobody would have paid for it until they knew it would work.
Another type of book buying when you have already read the book: I have a pristine paperback copy of A Place of Greater Safety, a book I originally borrowed from family but bought because I loved it so much. Some people who pirate your book will go out and buy it because they really enjoyed it. It does not have to be all of them; it does not have to be most of them. Yet any proportion is more sales that would not have happened otherwise.
4. A pirate can become a fan.
It is just possible that reading your first book for free makes them love your work so much that they decide to buy your work in the future. The fan relationship is vastly different to that of a casual reader[i]: someone who came across you work as a pirated e-book can end up wanting to support your work as an artist because they admire what you do.
Every reader is an opportunity. Thus, hopefully, with time:
The expanded readership leads to some pirates buying your books, and more potential buyers becoming aware of your book via the pirates. Thus, over time, piracy increases your sales. You just have to deal with it correctly.
A Short Note about Numbers
This should not happen, but it always does, and it is the reason why it is dangerous to use “example” numbers in a post.
I am not saying that if you have 5000 buyers and your book is pirated you will end up with 6400 buyers. The numbers are entirely illustrative, to show you that the “20%” figure that floats around doesn’t work the way it sounds it work, and that over time piracy (which you can’t stop) will increase the number of people who buy your books. So, focus on the positive, and the principle.
Your real numbers will be personal (and the 20% is misleading in itself – most piracy is focussed on the big names.). I am just trying to say that the percentage does not do what you think it does, and piracy does not work the way publishing houses think it works (bless them.)
If I did have a precise, working model of exactly how piracy impacts sales I’d be selling it, not blogging it! But I don’t do that sort of work any more, because I’d rather focus on my wife and kids instead.
TL; DR: Don’t pay attention to the numbers, look at the proportions. Piracy increases your readership, which over time increases your income. It might be better if there was no piracy, but as that is impossible you should concentrate on the advantages (and not the numbers).
Developing your audience relationship.
Your two principle marketing jobs are a) to attract casual readers and b) to turn casual readers into fans, who are prepared to financially support your work because they have become attached to you as a writer.
Part a) is the reason giveaways, selling your book for 99p, and competitions, are all so valuable. They pull people in. The importance of book reviews and thus book connecters cannot be understated.
Amazon ads, Good AdWords, Face ads, all of these have very little impact if you aren’t already famous (I know, I A/B tested and blew a whole lot of money making sure.)
Yet there are people out there who will happily read and talk to their followers about your book provided you a) find people who like your genre b) approach them clearly and politely, c) give them all the time and space the need to review the book, d) don’t have a fit if they don’t review (I know it’s annoying if you’ve sent somebody a copy of your book and they don’t review – the sad fact is i) some people will let you down and ii) some reviewers won’t like your book, and will prefer not to leave a review than to leave a bad review).
If somebody pirates your book it is a sign your doing something right – at least they have heard of you (and may even tell people about you.) Keep on doing things so that people know you exists, keep on doing it in a positive and friendly fashion so that people want to give a shit about you, and see the piracy as a sign of your success.
How to turn casual readers into fans
There is a spectrum between casual reader and fan, so I do not want you to think this is some sort of secret formula to getting author groupies coming backstage after your events.
Your second job, part b, is to build a relationship with the people who read or might want to read your books. You need a website. The website must talk about who you are and why you love writing (I do hope you love writing, otherwise you should probably stop; there are much better paid jobs you can hate doing!)
If you can possibly bear to do it, you should keep a blog. It does not have to be anywhere near as extensive as mine (this is my reflective journal to learn how to write – all this blogging is a useful side effect). That blog should be reblogged out across Facebook, Twitter and apparently most importantly Instagram – do not ask my why, I do not get Instagram and do not use it well. Through this process you are trying to make it as easy to find you (and your books) as possible.
By the by, if anyone can explain to me why Instagram works for book reviews and how I can do it better, I would love to hear from you!
Add onto this visiting other writers’ and reviewers’ websites, tweets, etc, and commenting, retweeting, liking etc. Be part of the community. Be a positive part of the community. Say kind things and help people find what they are looking for. Seriously, for all of us (bloggers and authors), there is a constant feeling of loneliness, of calling out into a void and not getting a response: saying something nice about somebody’s article can make their day, and just possibly lead to them doing the same when you desperately need a review for your new book.
What does this have to with piracy? Like I said before, a pirate is a reader just like any other. Just one who, for whatever reason, has chosen not to pay. People who borrow a friend’s copies effectively do the same thing – they read without paying. However, if you can make yourself a real person to your readers (including the pirates), if you can build a relationship with them, then in many cases their preference will be to pay for your work.
To put it another way, it’s harder to steal from someone who you feel you know as a real person.
By the by, do not rant about pirates. I know you want to. I know you want to shout at them “the book costs 99p, why the hell would you steal my 13p profit!?” The cost of your personal satisfaction is looking hostile to readers. Just sit on it. Today’s pirate could be tomorrows buyer. Today’s pirate might be best mates with a book addict who tells all their friends about you. Keep that foremost in your mind.
Writers like Neil Gaiman are superb at this: they are approachable, kind, and make the reader pre-disposed to like the book. Before the whole transphobia controversy JK Rowling was also good at this (which may be a warning about how far writers should delve into politics and should be steered well away from in this article.) Focus on being kind, helping people out, and being seen.
Every pirate is a reader. Ever reader is a potential customer. Most importantly every reader is someone who read your damned book, and if you’re in this to worry about the money rather than celebrating every person who spends some time transported by your writing, you need to go into another business. Piracy is annoying, of course it is annoying, but it is also an opportunity. Use it.
[i] The fan relationship can become quite difficult, because generally when someone becomes a fan they want you to keep writing the sorts of books you were writing when they became fans – particularly if you write series. Fan backlash can be an extremely difficult thing to manage, but as I’ve only witnessed it second hand and am certainly a long way from having that problem perhaps we shall leave it for another day. For now, casual readers good, fans better.
