We have all seen the ads. You know the ones: a tanned person sitting on a white-sand beach, a laptop resting precariously on their knees, claiming they make six figures “while they sleep.” They call it passive income, and they make it sound like a magic trick—as if you simply press a button and money falls from the sky.
But after years of building my own streams and teaching others to do the same, I want to pull back the curtain. If you are a beginner looking to self-publish for extra income, you need to hear the boring truth so you can finally get to the exciting part: actually seeing royalties hit your bank account.
The reality of passive income is much less like a lottery ticket and much more like a garden. If you understand the soil and the math, you can grow a forest. If you don’t, you’ll just be another person with a dormant KDP account wondering why the “magic” didn’t work.
The Two Truths Nobody Talks About (The “Boring” Part)
Before we talk about my first $5.99 sale, we have to clear the air. There are two fundamental truths about this business that the “gurus” often gloss over because they aren’t “sexy.”
1. Passive income refers to the asset, not the effort.
Passive income is a description of how you get paid, not how you work. It means you create an item once and it sells over and over again. It does not mean you stop creating.
To build a lifestyle of freedom, you continue to create because each new item is another “digital employee” working for you 24/7. The work is front-loaded. You do 100% of the work today to get paid 1% of the value every month for the next ten years. If you don’t love the “doing,” you won’t survive the “waiting.”
2. The “Dream” requires a digital forest, not a single tree.
Most people living entirely on passive income are not “one-hit wonders.” They didn’t write one book and retire. They have built a digital ecosystem. They write books on KDP, they sell courses, they consult, and they sell digital files or templates on platforms like Etsy.
Why do they do it? Because the things they are writing, designing, and creating bring them joy. For me, it was never about “not working”—it was about never having to work on something I hated again.
Let’s Do the “Unglamorous” Math
Let’s talk about the money. Specifically, the $5.99 sale.
When you see a royalty notification for $5.99, it doesn’t feel glamorous. It doesn’t feel like enough for a lifestyle of freedom and sunny beaches. In fact, it feels like “pizza money.” And if you only have one book, that’s all it will ever be.
But passive income is a volume game. To reach a full-time income, you have to stop looking at the individual sale and start looking at the “Math of Freedom.”
To earn $100,000 a year in profit, the math looks like this:
- You need to earn roughly $1,923 a week.
- At a $5.99 profit per sale, that is 321 items sold per week.
- That breaks down to just 45 sales a day.
Now, look at that number: 45 sales a day. If you have one book, selling 45 copies every single day is a massive challenge. But what if you have 10 “pamphlet-style” books? Now each book only needs to sell 4 or 5 copies a day. What if you have 20? Now each book only needs to sell twice.
Suddenly, the “impossible” goal of $100k a year becomes a simple matter of building more high-quality assets. This is where the “boring” truth becomes the most exciting thing in the world: It’s a system you can control.
How I Got Bitten by the “Royalty Bug”
My journey started on Amazon KDP (Kindle Direct Publishing). At the time, the landscape was a bit different—the competition was lower and the profit margins were higher—but the core principle hasn’t changed a bit.
I didn’t start by trying to write the “Great American Novel.” I didn’t spend three years locked in a room struggling with character arcs and plot holes. My first “books” were essentially meditation pamphlets.
They were 20-page Word documents. I wrote about what I knew, I formatted them simply, and I uploaded them. And then, the “bug” bit me.
I woke up, checked my dashboard, and saw a sale. Then another. Then five more. These tiny documents were out in the world helping people find a moment of peace, and in return, they were sending me royalties while I was out living my life.
I love writing. If I can spend my morning creating something that I enjoy, and people enjoy reading it enough to pay for it, it’s a win-win. That is the “Royalty Bug.” Once you feel it, you never want to go back to trading hours for dollars.
Why “List-Books” are the Ultimate Entry Point
If you are a beginner, the biggest hurdle is usually “The Blank Page.” You think you have to be a “writer” with a capital W. You don’t. You just need to be a curator of value.
This is why I am a huge advocate for the List-Book.
As Copyblogger famously noted, “list” content works because of the attention-grabbing power of the headline. It makes a very specific promise of what’s in store for the reader. It provides a “quantifiable return on attention invested.”
Take Pam Grout’s E-Squared as an example. It’s a global phenomenon that spent weeks on the New York Times bestseller list. Is it a dense philosophical treatise? No. It’s a list of 9 simple experiments. It is, at its heart, a List-Book.
Why Lists Work for Beginners:
- They are researchable: You can find a niche, see what people are asking, and create a list of solutions.
- They are scannable: Modern readers have short attention spans. They love knowing exactly what they are getting (e.g., “10 Ways to…”).
- They are easy to write: You aren’t writing a 200-page narrative. You are writing 10 or 20 “micro-chapters.” If you can write a solid blog post, you can write a List-Book.
3 Simple List-Book Methods You Can Use Today
If you’re ready to start building your “digital forest,” here are three proven structures for those 20-page “pamphlet” style books that sell:
1. The Transformation List (The “E-Squared” Model)
This is a list of steps, experiments, or actions that lead a reader from Point A to Point B.
- Example: “7 Days to a Quieter Mind: A Week of 10-Minute Meditations.”
- Why it works: It promises a result. People don’t buy “information”; they buy “transformation.”
2. The Resource List (The “Expert” Model)
This is a curated collection of the best tools, prompts, or ideas for a specific, hungry niche.
- Example: “101 Story Starters for Cozy Mystery Writers.”
- Why it works: It saves the reader time. In the modern economy, time is more valuable than money.
3. The “How-To” List (The “Problem-Solver” Model)
This is a hyper-focused guide that solves one specific, annoying problem.
- Example: “5 Steps to Organizing Your Cricut Craft Room on a Budget.”
- Why it works: It’s a “utility” purchase. People search for solutions to their problems every day on Amazon. Your list can be that solution.
From Blog Post to Bookshelf: Your Next Step
The beauty of the List-Book is that it bridges the gap between being a “content creator” and being an “author.” You can take a high-performing blog post, expand on each point with more research and personal stories, and suddenly, you have a 20-page manuscript ready for KDP.
You don’t need a permission slip from a publishing house. You don’t need a literary agent. You just need to find a topic that brings you joy, do the “boring” work of putting it into a list, and let the math do the rest.
The Challenge
I want you to look at your own expertise. What is something you could list out for someone else? What are the “10 things” someone needs to know to do what you do?
The goal of the Digital Author Academy isn’t just to help you make “extra income.” It’s to help you find that intersection where your creativity meets a reader’s needs.
The royalty bug is waiting. The math is clear. The only thing left to do is start your first list.
Would you like me to help you brainstorm 10 specific “List-Book” titles based on your current hobbies or areas of expertise?