Self-Published eBooks Dominate Bestseller Lists

Self-Publishing is getting to be big business and on a monthly basis these indie titles are dominating bestseller lists. The New York Times, Amazon, and Barnes and Noble are the main ones people pay the most attention to. Today, we look at some interesting statistics on how self-published titles are starting to dominate the bestseller lists.

Penguin and Random House had 478 eBook bestsellers in 2013, while Hachette had 258. The vast majority of other titles that dominated the charts were written by independent authors.

In 2013, self-published books accounted for 27% of the 100 top selling e-books on Amazon each week, on average. Barnes and Noble has said that “30% of NOOK customers purchase self-published content each month, representing 25% of NOOK Book sales every month.” Many indie authors made the New  York Times bestseller list in 2013, such as Bella Andre, Rachel Van Dyken, Abbi Glines, Katy Evan, Barbara Freethy.

Mark Coker of Smashwords has stated that by 2020, 50% of all eBooks will be self-published.  Does this mean that the traditional bestseller list will have more indie works on it? Will we reach a time when the New York Times doesn’t even have a traditionally published book on it?

Michael Kozlowski (7743 Posts)

Michael Kozlowski is the Editor in Chief of Good e-Reader. He has been writing about electronic readers and technology for the last four years. His articles have been picked up by major and local news sources and websites such as the Huffington Post, CNET and more. Michael frequently travels to international events such as IFA, Computex, CES, Book Expo and a myriad of others. If you have any questions about any of his articles, please send Michael Kozlowski an email to michael@goodereader.com