How I Made $70k Self-Publishing a Book about Ruby on Rails
Just to add a data point, I earned about $2,000 with a self-published "how to start a podcast" book in 2015: <a href="http://record-and-release.com" rel="nofollow">http://record-and-release.com</a><p>I wrote it and released it in 10 days and followed a highly-abbreviated version of the promotional plan from Nathan Barry's _Authority_ to market it.<p>I know $2,000 is small money compared to some of the figures being tossed around in here, but I'm thankful to have earned that much.<p>My 2nd book was a total flop, commercially: <a href="https://gumroad.com/l/clientconflictbook" rel="nofollow">https://gumroad.com/l/clientconflictbook</a><p>The people who bought the book found the content super-useful, but the subject matter just did NOT catch on as something my audience was willing to spend money on. I found d a real pain point, just not one that was compelling enough. I also prompted it poorly.<p>Here's hoping my 3rd book does better! I feel optimistic about the profit potential of self-publishing, generally speaking. As has been mentioned here, you have to market it well AND have a compelling subject matter with a hungry audience. It's not easy.