Before we get into this article, I’d like to clarify that when I say that you can make $40,000 per month from coloring books or $10,000 per month from logbooks or anything like that, I make sure I have gotten these figures from somewhere concrete.
I haven’t just plucked these figures from thin air and say “hey upload 1000 logbooks and you’ll make $10K per month!”.
No, I like to take my figures from real life case studies and that’s what this post is all about. A real brand, making real money. And it’s something that anyone of us can do too.
If you are involved in low content publishing, already publish your own coloring books or are just a keen “color-inerer” (and that’s the technical term) then you might have already heard of Jade Summer.
If not, Jade Summer is one of the leading brands of coloring books available on Amazon and in just a few short years have built an absolute mammoth of a brand within the adult coloring book niche.
I’ve been looking into this brand for the past couple of months and working out how they have become so successful.
In business you’ll quite often hear “don’t reinvent the wheel” or “find what’s working and do the same”.
When you hear that they don’t mean go and copy someone’s product or design or anything like that. They mean copy their strategies. Copy the way they execute marketing. Copy the way they have built a brand.
So, when I see someone who is super successful, I want to know how they have done it and is it something that I can do too?
Let’s take a quick look at the Jade Summer products available on Amazon.
Jade Summer uploaded their first coloring book in 2016 and now have 160 coloring books available.
They do discontinue books sometimes that are perhaps some of their older ones that don’t generate as much sales as the newer ones and they are always releasing new books too, so they aren’t focussed on just having a large amount of books in their inventory. They like quality.
Before I go on, I want to show you how I came up with the figure of $40,000 per month that Jade Summer could possibly be earning and then I’ll go over how they have done it.
Each book on Amazon is given a Best Seller Ranking, which can change all throughout the day, week and month depending on what sales they are receiving, so my figures are based on the BSR I looked at, at the time I was doing my research. But it’ll give us a good idea of their potential income.
I looked at their books sorted by popularity and went through the first 100 books.
I then used an Amazon Sales Calculator to get a prediction of what sales they could be making based on those BSR’s.
| BSR 484 – SALES 3620 | BSR 40,339 – SALES 112 | BSR 55,056 – SALES 84 | BSR 95,163 – SALES 50 |
| BSR 1,126 – SALES 2021 | BSR 98,550 – SALES 49 | BSR 36,889 – SALES 121 | BSR 55,062 – SALES 84 |
| BSR 1,296 – SALES 1827 | BSR 31,179 – SALES 141 | BSR 110,378 – SALES 44 | BSR 78,104 – SALES 61 |
| BSR 3,856 – SALES 806 | BSR 16,077 – SALES 251 | BSR 44,754 – SALES 101 | BSR 79,954 – SALES 59 |
| BSR 3,214 – SALES 929 | BSR 31,129 – SALES 141 | BSR 59,185 – SALES 78 | BSR 48,445 – SALES 94 |
| BSR 23,349 – SALES 182 | BSR 16,340 – SALES 247 | BSR 40,637 – SALES 111 | BSR 50,186 – SALES 91 |
| BSR 13,567 – SALES 290 | BSR 28,145 – SALES 154 | BSR 175,063 – SALES 28 | BSR 71,523 – SALES 66 |
| BSR 21,160 – SALES 198 | BSR 15,246 – SALES 262 | BSR 32,551 – SALES 135 | BSR 105,804 – SALES 45 |
| BSR 9,801 – SALES 381 | BSR 84,938 – SALES 56 | BSR 17,181 – SALES 237 | BSR 73,592 – SALES 64 |
| BSR 9,780 – SALES 381 | BSR 23,993 – SALES 177 | BSR 33,742 – SALES 131 | BSR 93,147 – SALES 51 |
| BSR 8,549 – SALES 426 | BSR 60,484 – SALES 77 | BSR 36,221 – SALES 123 | BSR 152,849 – SALES 32 |
| BSR 10,004 – SALES 374 | BSR 34,362 – SALES 129 | BSR 29,456 – SALES 148 | BSR 67,764 – SALES 69 |
| BSR 9,534 – SALES 390 | BSR 45,225 – SALES 101 | BSR 73,422 – SALES 64 | BSR 56,240 – SALES 82 |
| BSR 14,229 – SALES 278 | BSR 23,895 – SALES 178 | BSR 77,593 – SALES 61 | BSR 299,414 – SALES 16 |
| BSR 12,585 – SALES 309 | BSR 80,914 – SALES 59 | BSR 43,989 – SALES 103 | BSR 33,489 – SALES 132 |
| BSR 42,032 – SALES 107 | BSR 31,396 – SALES 140 | BSR 66,187 – SALES 71 | BSR 74,599 – SALES 63 |
| BSR 15,478 – SALES 259 | BSR 78,836 – SALES 60 | BSR 52,730 – SALES 87 | BSR 103,468 – SALES 46 |
| BSR 15,349 – SALES 261 | BSR 39,571 – SALES 113 | BSR 65,594 – SALES 71 | BSR 73,001 – SALES 65 |
| BSR 12,233 – SALES 316 | BSR 30,905 – SALES 142 | BSR 76,722 – SALES 62 | BSR 201,337 – SALES 24 |
| BSR 18,428 – SALES 223 | BSR 54,078 – SALES 85 | BSR 75,504 – SALES 63 | BSR 49,086 – SALES 93 |
| BSR 15,486 – SALES 259 | BSR 78,016 – SALES 61 | BSR 198,570 – SALES 25 | BSR 207,850 – SALES 23 |
| BSR 15,252 – SALES 262 | BSR 55,399 – SALES 83 | BSR 39,494 – SALES 114 | BSR 197,109 – SALES 25 |
| BSR 31,858 – SALES 138 | BSR 47,943 – SALES 95 | BSR 57,465 – SALES 81 | BSR 356,863 – SALES 14 |
| BSR 53,921 – SALES 86 | BSR 65,602 – SALES 71 | BSR 49,397 – SALES 93 | BSR 158,146 – SALES 31 |
| BSR 22,064 – SALES 191 | BSR 35,299 – SALES 126 | BSR 95,163 – SALES 50 | BSR 133,372 – SALES 36 |
We have total sales of 21,505 books sold per month. If we look at using a $2 royalty that is $43,000 per month.
Firstly, they are making way more than this and I’ll tell you why. I just can’t tell you exactly how much more they are making.
One – I only looked at their first 100 books, so there are at least 60 other books making sales that I haven’t included in this figure.
Two – The sales that the Amazon Sales Calculator tool provide are conservative so the sales they are making are likely to be higher than what the calculator predicts.
Three – They not only sell paperback books they also sell digital books, which we’ll look at later on. The sales for their digital editions aren’t taken into account.
Four – They sell books with a range of different page counts. Some books have 100 pages, some books have 200 pages. The books with less pages typically are priced lower than the bigger books. Using amazon’s royalty calculator, they are probably making somewhere between $2-$3.50 royalty on their books depending on page count and sale price but I have don’t my calculations based on $2 royalty just to be conservative.
If they are making higher royalties on some of their books, then their income will be higher than what I’ve calculated.
I’d would LOVE to know their actual sales income (because I’m nosey like that!) but even so, $40,000 per month is absolutely incredible and I think every single one of us would love to be in that position.
How have they done this? Let’s take a look.
When you look at the Jade Summer Amazon page, they have completed their author information.
Also, I’m saying “they” because Jade Summer is a brand, a pen name. It’s very unlikely it’s a real person.
They have listed their website address, so we can hop on over there and see what’s going on there.
It’s a very simple website that looks like WordPress site with a very basic theme – probably a free theme. And their website is strictly to promote their books. There’s no generic landing page, there’s no popups or popovers or any annoying distractions to take away from the actual coloring books for sale.
Earlier I mentioned they are making sales from digital editions as well as paperbacks. If we click on one of their products, what they do is they have this link to go buy the paperback version on Amazon.
Which as a side note is an affiliate link, so they are also making affiliate income for sending their own customers to amazon to buy their books!
Then just below they have a link for if you want to buy the digital version. Click on that link and it tells you that you can buy the digital edition from Lulu. Lulu is a print on demand book service, much like Amazon KDP but you can print hard cover books, spiral books and more specialised types of books and covers.
Honestly, I’m not sure why they are selling their digital editions through Lulu when they could just sell them through their own website and make a much higher profit but, perhaps they wanted access to Lulu customer base.
Are you’re wondering whether they would even sell many digital versions? Well, I saw a post in their Facebook group recently where someone asked about the quality of the paper that the paperback version is printed on and guess what? SO many people commented on that post saying they prefer to buy the digital version because they can then print it on whatever GSM paper they like.
I regularly see posts in their private group about people buying the digital versions and printing the pages themselves.
Back on their website they have some links right down in the footer and there is also a copyright attached to this publishing company, Fritzen Publishing. So, I had a look there.
This website has nothing other than a link to Jade Summer. I originally assumed that they only had the Jade Summer brand but there is also a link to Fritzen Publishing on Amazon that leads to an author called Alexander Kennedy.
In the author bio it says owned by Fritzen Publishing. That’s interesting, it’s a totally different niche of books, but it looks like they aren’t focussed on this brand as there are no recent books uploaded here.
There is a Fritzen Publishing Facebook page but it’s not active and they don’t have a following here. There is also a link to an Eric Fritzen, Manager of Fritzen Publishing on LinkedIn but again no activity here either.
I did look up on Facebook the people connected with Fritzen Publishing but their Facebook profiles are private or they aren’t active there ,so they aren’t publicly talking about their business on their Facebook profiles.
On Facebook they have a Jade Summer page, which has almost 34,000 followers. Here they have a “Coloring Page of The Day” where they post images of their customer’s completed coloring pages.
I mean, what better marketing for your product than their customers showing off your product.
They also post when there is a new book released on Amazon or Lulu.
They also have a private Facebook group and this has over 12,000 members. In the group their customers get to be even more involved in the brand.
They will post alternative book covers and ask the group members to choose which one they like better. This helps them get their branding and books on point and know in advance what cover will sell better.
They give their group members advance notice when a book is going to be released.
Their group members get to make their own posts to show off their coloring pages as well as being able to ask questions about coloring such as what kind of markers to use or showing photos of receiving their Jade Summer order in the mail.
Seriously, you cannot get marketing better than this. Not only is it free, you create this community around your brand where your customers become so involved, they feel like a part of the brand.
They then turn into dedicated, loyal customers, buying pretty much everything that you release. AND they are more than happy to rush over to Amazon to leave 5-star reviews.
Now, they are not only promoting their brand through Facebook.
On their website, they have a link to a free coloring book. This book is available to buy on Amazon for $9.99, but if you hand over your email address on their website, they’ll send a digital version to you for free.
Something interesting was, when I looked at their Facebook page while I was doing my research last month, they were running an advertisement. This ad isn’t currently running so I can’t show it to you.
It was an ad directing people to that page to download a free coloring book.
So, the main secret to their success is building up their email list and I would love to know how big their email list is.
When I joined their email list, the first email was the free coloring book download.
Their email sequence then told me about their Facebook page and group. And since joining the newsletter a month or so ago, I received at least 2 emails per week from them.
I receive an email either promoting a new release coloring book OR an email asking for an Amazon review. And I’ll show you how they word it.
They don’t target which book you’ve purchased or even whether you’ve purchased one or not.
Not only is it asking for reviews, but it’s also even telling you about another coloring book they have, which you may not have known they have before getting that email. And you might go take a look and buy it.
These emails combined with their private Facebook group is how they get so many reviews and such good BSR’s so quickly.
They advise their group members there’s going to be a new release so it’s building that anticipation. As soon as it’s released, their customers are straight on Amazon buying it which gives them a low BSR from the get-go.
Then as soon as their customers start receiving their new books, they are back on Amazon leaving reviews.
And what does Amazon do when a book is generating so many so quickly and so many good reviews? It’s going to keep pushing it up the best seller rankings and putting it in front of more of Amazon’s customers and that’s how they cement those great BSR’s.
As you can see these are strategies that anyone can implement and it can be done in any niche at all, not just the coloring book niche.