How Long Should My Book Be?

An important part of the equation of any book should be its length.  The simple and not so inaccurate answer is however long it needs to be.  I'm a big believer in stories going as long as they're entertaining and/or interesting.  I think that when people try to artificially lengthen or shrink a story, they damage it.  In fact, I wish movies would switch to a more open format, charging viewers based on their lengths.  There are some movies that would be wonderful 30 minute stories but feel stretched into two hours, (I felt that way when I saw Ex Machina,) while some movies are true epics and should last 3 or 4 hours, or be series.  (I felt that way when I saw the movie Elizabeth.)

However, you do want to make sure to categorize your book accordingly, then price and promote it based on its length.  If a story is more of a novella, you don't want people expecting an epic and being let down.  That only leads to bad reviews.  Likewise, if your story is a simple one, and it drags on, people aren't going to finish it.

Having come from the film industry, my own rule of thumb on novels comes from comparing the number of minutes to the number of words.  A typical movie is a little over or under 100 minutes, (about 70 minutes to 130 minutes.)  A typical novel is a little over or under 100,000 words, (about 70,000 to 130,000 words.)  That's average.  If you have a specific promotional goal in mind that you plan to sell it like it's Game of Thrones, you go for more words.  If you're going for a more serialized view where you're coming out with a lot of books, you go for fewer.  But be careful how few you go, you don't want the readers feeling it's more of a short story.

There are things you can do with sizes of pages and typsetting with the physical books, but remember that most people are purchasing your books on Kindle, so word count is more important than ever today.

10,000 - 30,000 words usually makes a short story, and 30,000 to 70,000 is usually a novella, but these numbers are flexible.  The most important thing to bear in mind is what your readers will be interested in, and be honest with them, because the most important thing to remember is that reviews trump everything in the book world.  They not only cause people to decide whether or not they'll buy your book, but they also place you up or down the rankings on sites like Amazon.

Kindle Promotions on Amazon

Over the past year or so, Amazon has added some options for promoting your book on their site.  They seem to be the only ones who understand that the more money you make as an author, the more they make as a platform, a lesson Barnes & Noble seems unable to figure out; but whatever.  Let's look at the three major options on Amazon.

First, there are the two options that are free to you: the Kindle Countdown Deal and the Free Book Promotion.  Of these two, you would think Kindle Countdown Deal is the better one.  First, it puts your book on sale without making it free, so you make some money from it.  It also places it prominently on the website so there's more exposure.  There's also a timer with this ad so people feel under pressure to buy it soon.  This sort of advertising works a lot with larger companies.

But somehow it hasn't seemed to work so well with independents.  When this option first came out, a lot of people tried it, and quickly said they were going back to Free Book Promotions because they saw better results with it.  I experienced the same thing.  I think that ultimately it comes down to people not wanting to take a chance, not even with a dollar, on something they don't know.

As for the Free Book Promotion, this allows you to give away your book for free for five days.  There's still a part of me that rolls my eyes when I hear that.  Gee, can I really give away my own product for free?  Thanks!  And what's worse, the book does not get placed in a better position; people still need to find it and happen to notice that it's free without a catch.  Generally, you have to pay other sites to show off that this sale is going on.  So why does it work so well?

It basically puts your name out there to people who weren't going to take a chance on you otherwise.  I think people who are giving a chance to unknown authors are wanting to see as much as they can for free before purchasing anything.  That's why series work best for indie authors.  If you have a solo book, once you've given it away for free, that's it.  They might buy it as a physical book, but what you're really hoping for is that enough people download it that the book raises high in the rankings, and when it goes up for sale at a price again, it's more visible on the site.  This does happen, but it fades back into obscurity pretty quickly, and whatever sales you got is what you got.

But when it's a series, that one book is given away, and people become curious as to what the next book will be, and the next, and so on.  The general strategy today is to release the first book for free as much as possible, always advertising the fact that it's free, and have the second and third one available for a price, sometimes 99 center for the second, then 2.99 for the third to get the readers slowly into it.

The paid ad campaign is the newest feature.  Ads never work as well as reviews in books, but they certainly don't hurt.  Sometimes all the social media work in the world doesn't help as much as just having your book image appear on thousands of computer screens.  And best of all, Amazon only charges you for the clicks that went through, meaning you're only paying for the ad when it's successful enough to grab a customer.

In this way, I believe it's helpful.  It's not the end-all be-all.  You need to remember that the ad campaign needs to be run in conjunction with other efforts, and it's more of a long-term goal rather than a short one.  You'll get more people looking at your work and who you are when they see this ad, which will hopefully turn into sales.  This is another reason series are a bit better, because they can stick with you, checking you out from time to time as your work keeps getting released.  And that journey sometimes begins with an ad.

So what I'll be using is Free Book Promotions on the first book in my series in conjunction with an ad campaign that comes out more and more the closer we come to the release of book 2.

The Top 6 Mistakes People Make Self-Publishing a Book

I've been watching this woman's work for a while now and she has wonderful advice for independent authors and publishers.  This is about mistakes that indies often make.

Beginning Science Fiction Promotions

The biggest lesson I learned from publishing and promoting Two Gun Hart is that there is a reason the independent bestsellers are not typically non-fiction, they are fiction.  In fact, they're typically sci fi or fantasy, and they generally are in series.  So I've had to look hard into what works.

I can't say I've entirely figured it out, but I'm learning as I set it all up.  My original plan had involved a lot of concentration on pre-sales, trying to get so many people to buy before the release so the release date would look huge, and hopefully I would get into the New York Times Bestseller list.  I learned from Two Gun and from other top sellers that this isn't a goal that's good to concentrate on for independents.  People don't know us yet, so they need to learn to trust us.

That's why series work the best.  Readers want to see what we can do before they spend money.  That means seeing something for free.  And if you have only one book, you're limited on what you can show.  You can give away a chapter, maybe two, but after you've given those away, you don't have a lot more to give to get attention on another day, and audiences typically need to see you multiple times before they'll buy your work.  I think I heard the number is something like nine times before they'll consider buying your work.

So the best thing to do is to have a series where you have multiple books.  Most of the top sellers have given away the first book and the second costs some money, often still very cheap.  This entices readers in slowly but surely.  I have been coming out with short stories and giving them away to anyone who would read them to hopefully get them involved.  I always direct them back tot he website where new products are constantly being posted.

As for my plans for promotion, they go in three stages:  Pre-pre-release, Pre-release, and Post-release.

Pre-pre-release is 6-3 months before release.  This is when I send out everything that's been done before.  I'm trying to get my first book out to as many reviewers as possible, and make people aware of the series, the short stories, and the products that existed before.  I'm sort of catching up during this period.

Pre-release is beginning Christmas day, and will go until release in March, a period of almost exactly 3 months.  This is going to be when I build hype for the book coming out, and will mostly focus on how the story is directing towards the second book.  The short stories will start leading toward something specific, that something being what's in the second book.  Also, this step begins on Christmas because I will be giving away the first novel and the pick your path book that day to get people who just got a new Kindle into the series.  The pick your path book in particular leads to the second book as it's the introduction of the villains who are in it.

And finally, release.  This will be the biggest time for this.  I've found that with self-published authors, readers typically want to see what you've got, not what could be.  While it's good to generate hype leading up to the product, I've noticed that those who have done well have done so once the book's out.  The release will be happening at Wondercon, which will be the big event where we have a booth, are hosting a game, and will be doing everything we can to bring attention to the book.  Just before and after that, we'll be throwing up every advertisement we can, and appearing on every social media group possible, giving away the first book, short stories, and every manner of giveaway item we can just to bring attention to that second book, which will be available on Kindle for a low price to attract readers.  The number of downloads will be more important than the profit as these numbers get the attention of more numbers, and it's the interest in the series I'm most interested in at this time.

If it becomes popular enough, I can continue the series, and the fan base will grow for book 3.

RPG Into a Book

I’ve been thinking about a role playing video idea I've had and I know what I want to do with it.  First, I want to do my own version.  It won’t likely have as good of production value as Wil Wheaton’s, but I plan on doing something he didn’t; use miniatures.  This will bring over what I’ve already collected for my mini-wargaming show, and will hopefully bring over that audience.  It will also give a separate voice from other rpg videos already out there.  It should also look really cool.

But what will also make this endeavor work is the idea that I could make a book based on the story at the end.  The videos can generate an audience which is then drawn to the book at the end, because it’s the story they just watched unfold.  What’s more, I have had this idea for a fantasy world for a long time, but I didn’t have a specific story put together.  This will fill in that all-important part while giving me the chance to fulfill this desire to build my fantasy world.

I’ve also determined that sci fi and fantasy are a lot more likely to sell in self-publishing, and have determined to focus on that from now on, so this fits with my overall plan more anyway.

The New Schedule of Relic Worlds

After reviewing what’s been working and not working for me in publishing, and where I am in terms of Relic Worlds, I’ve reworked the schedule for the second book, short stories, and pick your path books.

The second book will now be released at Wondercon at the end of March.  The short stories will continue to be released up to that point, and the fourth pick your path book will come out on Christmas day.  In fact, the fourth pick your path book and the first novel will both be available for free on Christmas as an incentive to get people to reading them.  I might make all the pick your path books free on that day as well.  The idea is that people will be getting new Kindles on Christmas, and they’ll likely turn them on to see what’s available for free, so I’m hoping they’ll pick these up.

I plan on having a lot of events between January and March to build interest in Relic Worlds, and to generally have fun with it.  Overall, Relic Worlds is intended to be fun, so I want people to enjoy some events and games that relate to the adventure and science fiction of the story to get into the series.  Some of these will include geocaches, programming, online treasure hunts, etc.

For now, it’s time to release more short stories and continue building up the website for the immersive experience that is Relic Worlds.

Independent Book Review - End of Pawnee Starlight

Independent Book Review - Raiders!

Independent Book Review - Evolution of a Wine Drinker

The Martian - Self-Publishing to Major Movie

After watching The Martian I was so glad to see that such a smart movie could get made.  I was particularly happy when I learned that it was based on a book that was originally self-published, though I shouldn't be surprised.  Just as it's hard to get a smart film past studio executives, it's also often hard to get a smart book past the publishers.  While people assume books are the smart form of storytelling, this notion is often mocked by executives at publishing companies and literary agents.

Here's how it seemed to have happened.  Andy Weir was a computer programmer who enjoyed writing on the side.  He began uploading a story about a man stranded on Mars to his blog in 2009.  This slowly got the attention of more and more people who asked him to publish it on Kindle.  Weir had no goals to profiting on this story, so he wanted to put it onto Kindle for free, but Amazon doesn't allow that, so he made it available for 99 cents, using his five free days to give it away to as many people as possible.

This part is critical.  First, it's important to note that this only became possible because Amazon allowed anyone to publish to Kindle.  While Weir was getting a lot of people visiting his blog, Kindle was where he would get the most exposure, and where his fans could share his work most easily.  Without this, we would probably still not know about this wonderful novel.

What's also important here is to note the fact that Weir's lack of greed for the immediate present is what made him a success in the long-run.  If he had priced the book higher and expected everyone to pay for it, it probably wouldn't have been discovered.  But since he grew his audience slowly through blogs, then gave it away for free on Amazon, tons of people saw it and became interested, then they began sharing it, and he exploded onto the scene.

He still didn't make a huge amount of money from this, but it caught the attention of a larger publisher.  They then asked to publish it with their larger promotion engine, and when all was finished, it rose to #12 on the New York Times Bestseller list.  This, in turn, got the attention of film studios, (though it probably also was facilitated by the publisher as they often try to get their books made into movies as soon as possible.)  Once that got done, now everyone knows about it and even more copies are selling.

So Andy Weir, a great example of how a lack of immediate greed can yield large long-term results.

Relic Worlds Games Will Be at Strategicon This Weekend

I will be showing two Relic Worlds games at Strategicon this weekend.

First will be Relic Worlds: Showdown, the miniatures game using the Savage Worlds rules.  This will be Saturday at 10 am.

Second will be The Lost Worlds, the Relic Worlds board game where players search various planets for lost treasures.  This will be Saturday at 3 pm.

Come out and join us!  Directions for the convention can be found at their website:

http://www.strategicon.net/

Independent Book Review - Curse of the Fates by Sydney Olson

Everything Wrong with The Ables by Jeremy Scott

Independent Book Review - Mobsters, Gangs, Crooks, and other Creeps

Book Review - Secrets of a Hollywood Private Eye

Independent Book Reviews

Last week I went off on self-published bloggers who refuse to review self-published books.  I have also noticed that vloggers on Youtube who review books do not review independently published books.  They, too, are self-published, but refuse to recognize the hypocrisy.  I've even confronted a few of them.  Most did not respond.  One responded only when I made a comment on one of her videos; so when she was faced with the public seeing what I was saying, she finally spoke out.

Her reasoning was that self-publishing is more personal, and she doesn't want to hurt the writer's feelings by saying something bad about the book, and hurt all the other authors who she doesn't review by turning them down.

There are two problems with this logic.

First, if her viewers were to use the same logic, she would have no viewers.  They would all be so concerned about hurting the feelings of every Youtuber they were not watching while viewing her videos that they would instead just not watch her at all rather than hurt the feelings of those they turned away from.

Second, while it is noble to be concerned about someone's feelings as to how they will be hurt if she says something bad about their book, the simple truth is that it's better to have SOMETHING said than nothing.  By reviewing the books published by large corporations, she's making people aware of those books, regardless of whether she gives them a good review or a bad one.  So more people learn about these large corporate books and no one learns about the smaller ones all in the interests of "protecting" those small publishers.  As a result of "protecting" them, they are dying out because they can't afford to continue publishing.

What's particularly amazing about this second part is this vlogger pointed this same issue out with bookstores, saying people should support the small bookstores or they're going to die out, but she couldn't see the similarity of independent publishers to corporate ones.

I became very disenchanted with Youtube book vloggers.  There's a whole community of which I wanted to become a part; but not a single one of them will have anything to do with independent books.  The vlogger I spoke of above at least responded.  None of the others did.  They refuse to see their hypocrisy, so I made the same decision with them that I did with bloggers.  Any independent artist who refuses to support other independent artists are not worthy of my time.

However, I'm a big believer in putting my time where my  mouth is.  And so I've decided to review independently published books on Youtube.  As far as I can tell, I am the only one doing this.  I hope others do.  I want the competition.  But until they pick up the torch, I will run with it, and do the best I can.

KDP Select Free Book Promo – Days of the Promotion

In looking over my blogs, I found that I never posted this very important blog entry.  This one should go in between the preparations of the KDP promotion and after.

After several weeks of preparation for the KDP Select free promotion, I was ready for the event itself. I had activities scheduled for each day of the event, from July 1-5. Below are the activities and the results on each day.

July 1: I posted information about the free book promotion on my own Facebook and Twitter accounts. Since Facebook is looked at primarily by my friends, I explained on it what the KDP Select program was, and why I was giving books away for free. To people who are not in this industry, the entire idea seems odd, so I wanted to explain how giving books away for free was actually helpful to me. I said also that it would be great if people could pass this on to anyone they thought might enjoy it. I immediately saw results, with friends sharing the post and putting their own explanation on it. They downloaded the book, and even downloaded copies for other people. I had planned on gifting the book to some people and asking them to gift it to others, but I didn’t need to because so many people did it already.
I also posted details about the sale to groups that are relevant to the book. In this case, that includes baseball and Civil War groups, as well as some general history groups. I was a little worried how they would take it, but because I had been actively part of these groups for the past week, it worked better than anything else I did during this promotion. A bunch of people liked it, commented on it, and shared it with their friends. They even thanked me for giving it away for free rather than getting annoyed that I was promoting on their site. 
I also posted on writing and reading groups I belong to. These are the least effective as so many authors post on these all the time, but you occasionally get that writer/reader who’s interested in the graphic if it stands out who shares it.
Finally, I talked about the sale on Twitter with specific hashtags, including: #Amazon #eBook #BookBuzzr #BookGiveaway #BookMarketing #Kindle #KindleBargain #KDP #WLCFreeToday #FreekKindleReads #free… #Kindle #Freekindle #freebook #FreeKindleBook #ReadThis #authorshelpingauthors. This last worked better than expected. I’ve never been good with Twitter and rarely does anyone respond to anything I post, but all day I was getting notifications of people retweeting me, favoriting my posts, and following my Twitter account.
The result of this first day was 166 downloads, #3 in historical fiction, #52 in literature and fiction, and #1,330 overall on Amazon. This was down from around 13,000.

July 2: My paid promotions kicked in, and the number of downloads soared. This is the greatest lesson you could learn from all of this. Pay for the promotions on several sites that are effective where they tweet about you, post on their website and on their Facebook page. That’s where you get the numbers. I immediately saw my numbers jump before I did anything.
I also went through my social media and I responded to comments, liked other people’s comments about things unrelated to my book, (this grabbed their attention without me having to say anything.) I should mention here that my profile picture is a picture of my book, so every time I commented or even liked anything, people saw my book cover without me having to say anything about my book.
I also wrote a thank you on my own Facebook and Twitter to those who had helped spread the word about the book, then I gave the good news about the results, giving them the credit for getting it there, (and not mentioning the paid promotions.)
The results were #2 in both historic fiction and literature fiction behind a book called The Widow of Larkspur Inn in both categories, and #106 overall with a total of 1,471 units downloaded that day alone. I was achingly close to achieving one of two very important goals: #1 in my category, or in the top 100 overall.

July 3: Unfortunately, I was not to reach any of them. I had peaked already, and the next day, as the paid promotions faded, my numbers slipped. I still had some promotions to go as I was sending direct tweets to a list of Twitter handles: @DigitalBkToday @kindleebooks @Kindlestuff @KindleEbooksUK @KindleBookKing @KindleFreeBook @FreeReadFeed @4FreeKindleBook
One place I saw something that I might try in the future; someone placed up a meme with information about their book. More people read memes than text on posts, so I might try that in the future.
I also found reasons to post information about the sale again on some of the same groups, and on my own. Typically that reason was to give everyone an update on how the sale was going, and informing them that it was still going on. I told them about the results of the day before, that I was on the cusp of being #1 in two categories, and in the top 100 overall. I didn’t tell them it was slipping.

July 4: And it continued to slip, even on this day which was supposed to be the biggest one of all. It had gone on long enough by this point that I was having trouble making excuses to talk about it and make it feel organic. I continued to post on free book groups on Facebook, which allow you to post once a day, and I gave some updates on my own profile.
My girlfriend Jamie had a good suggestion as well that I tried. I found several posts other people had put up that I believed others would want to see. I shared it on a page or group of my own with hashtags that were popular, (especially #4thofjuly) and I also put the hashtag of my book #americangame. I also posted a link to the book on my author page with the hashtag #americangame. That way, when people were going through #4thofjuly they would come upon one entertaining entry that also happened to have #americangame. The hopes was that people would shift onto that track and find the link to the book itself. I don’t know how well this worked, as it was in the middle of a lot of other things, and in the middle of a holiday, but I’ll be trying it again for Relic Worlds.
I posted on my blogs in multiple locations and put links up to see the blog. It was discouraging, an exercise in futility. It seemed like the harder I worked to post about it, finding new and creative ways to make it look organic, the more it slipped in the ratings. All the while I saw other people’s postings on Facebook about their fun times at 4th of July parties on a beautiful day while I was stuck inside trying to give away my book. At last I gave up, put it all away, and went to a party.

July 5: I did the one thing I had forgotten to do on either the 3rd or 4th, I posted the book trailer. This was especially useful in reenactor sites as I used reenactors to make the trailer. After the link to the trailer was a link to the book. I tweeted and posted about this trailer all over the place.
I got some more views on the trailer, and it no doubt got some final sales, but the promotion had lost its impetus. It closed still at #2 in historic fiction behind that same Widow of Larkspur, #21 in literary fiction, and #638 overall. I might have regretted not putting the trailer up sooner, as I had intended, but it wouldn’t have mattered, as I discovered in going over the results.

First, I had intended to put the trailer up at some point during the weekend. Something I discovered with this promotion, and, funny enough, I happened to see in the news while doing these promotions, is that people tend to post during the weekend, but rarely read anything. This is especially true on holidays, and even more common on sunny holidays where everyone is out at grills and pool parties. According to the news report, the most effective days for social media are Tuesday and Wednesday morning. I guess it helps people get over the hump of the week.
I also discovered that shorter promotions, 2 to 3 days, are more effective. The intent is to get your book into the top list in your category and overall. Though I didn’t reach number 1 or the top 100 overall, I got close to both, and would still have been visible when the book came out of being free. Mainstream shoppers would have seen it suddenly appear high on the rankings in Amazon for sale at $2.99. Instead, because the free promotion continued to go on, it slipped after reaching that top spot until it tumbled back down to the 600s. That’s still pretty good, especially compared to where it had been, but it’s less impressive. I discovered through this that it’s best to have your book launch to the top through an efficient and compressed promotion, then pull it out of the promotion so everyone else can see it. If it doesn’t work, you still have a couple days left on your KDP Select free promo days to try again.
What I was surprised to see were the other books that were in the category lists with me. Both historic fiction and literary fiction were mostly romance novels. The historic fiction ones tended to be geared for older women, and the covers had an upper class woman in fancy clothes standing in a romantic field near an upper class European home. Often a man was there with his shirt unbuttoned and muscles rippling underneath. (His face was often unseen.) The covers implied some connection between the woman and this wealthy, mysterious stranger, and the titles confirmed it. At the end of my run, the book that was in the number one spot was titled A Daughter’s Inheritance.
The literary fiction ones were the opposite end of the spectrum. Women wore ripped clothes, or clothes that were too big as they seemed to be falling off, and a bad boy with torn blue jeans and no shirt or a tank top, again with rippling muscles and no face, stood nearby. Their titles implied what the covers were implying, the women were winning over the bad boys. The book that bumped The American Game from number 2 was entitled These Hoes Ain’t Loyal.
I don’t know what to make of this, except that I’m concerned for the independent book world if these are what hold the top spots most of the time. Almost all the rest of the books that shared the top 25 were classics from mainstream publishers. It’s disheartening both in regards for independent publishing, and feminism.
There was one other element though that seemed to put books in the top list; one which I will exploit on my next attempt. The top books tended to be parts of series. This meant readers were following these books, and the author was served in that readers were downloading an earlier book for free, then purchasing the sequels if they moved on.

So that’s what I will be doing with Relic Worlds.

Attention Bloggers Who Will Not Review Self-Published Books...

ATTENTION ALL BLOGGERS WHO WILL NOT REVIEW SELF-PUBLISHED BOOKS

I have mind-blowing information that may shock you, so hold onto your seats because this might get ugly.

YOU... YES, YOU... ARE SELF-FREAKIN' PUBLISHED!!!

That's right.  Every time you press that "Publish" button, guess what?  You have just self-published!  You have just committed the crime that all of us self-published authors have done which cause you to refuse to review our books!

Okay, for those of you who don't know what I'm talking about, here's what I've witnessed online.

So I was looking for people to review my independently published books.  The traditional media largely ignored me because they're all in bed with the big corporate publishers.  Fair enough.  They're all part of the same family.  So I figure I'll go to my family, the community of people who are interested in independent publishing, i.e. the blogging community.  They're all self-publishers, so why wouldn't they give a chance to self-published books.

Now I expected many of them to not have the time to read my book.  There are a lot of independent authors and publishers out there, so if they're already full, I completely understand.  What I wasn't prepared for is this:

"No self-published books."

That's right.  BLOGGERS sticking their noses up to self-published books.  The hypocrisy here is amazing.  They want you to overlook every traditionally written newspaper, magazine, large format business, etc. to read their blogs, but they won't lower themselves to read your self-published writing.

So I have made a basic determination.  Any blog which says it will not read self-published material is not worth my time.  I even look for that policy first.  Because if they don't have time to help their fellow independent artists, then I have no time for them.

A Few Weeks After My KDP Free Book Promotion

It's been nearly a month since I did my KDP free book promotion for my book The American Game.  I did it over the long 4th of July weekend, and I put a lot of work and preparation into it.  You can see how it went at the time in my earlier blog posts.

One thing I forgot to mention in them, however, is the value of what it does for you a few weeks after the promotion.

First, the book now gets listed in the categories when Amazon says, "People who bought _____ also bought The American Game."  The blank is any book that was bought by any of the people who downloaded American Game for free.  So the more people who buy other things who downloaded it, the more the book gets listed.

Also, people start reviewing the book.  I went from 5 reviews to 11 reviews, and hopefully that number will grow.

There have not been many paperback sales since then, and I'm said to say the Kindle numbers have not gone up very much either.  However, the Kindle Edition Normalized Pages, (or KENP for short,) went up significantly.  These are pages read by subscribers to Amazon and Kindle.  So people who are already subscribers are more willing to give it a try.

This shouldn't be a huge surprise as people, (me included,) don't want to take chances on things they know nothing about.  So the best thing to do, in my opinion, is go after the people who are already at a place, have already paid their subscription, and lose nothing for trying me out.  That's a good lesson for any independent artist, writers especially.

Finding alternative Venues for Your Book

In an earlier blog entry I explained that sometimes it’s best to have book events, such as readings and signings, at alternative venues other than bookstores and libraries.  In this entry, I’m going ot describe how to find these venues.

This sort of marketing works better for non-fiction, as many of the venues are going to be educational institutions.  But there will be some for genres of fiction as well.  Just understand that they will probably be venues that are strongly into a certain genre, so you’ll have to focus on that.

To figure out what venues will be appropriate for your book, the first thing you need to do is define what subjects your book covers.  For instance, in Two Gun Hart I cover:  Italian-American studies, American history, the Old West, gangsters, law enforcement Nebraska history, and Chicago history.  I also lightly cover these areas:  Italian history, Idaho, Washington, South Dakota, New York, and Iowa history, and film history.

In fiction, my book Relic Worlds covers:  Adventure stories, science fiction, space travel, archaeology, anthropology.  (I told you it’s harder with fiction.)

What you want to do now is figure out what places cover these subjects, then narrow in on specific locations.  For instance, with Two Gun Hart, I assume that Italian-American culture and history is studied at universities.  I figure out what schools have these sort of programs, then read a bit about them before writing them down.  I also look at Old West museums, groups interested in law enforcement history, etc.  I make a long list of all of these places, then begin calling to see if they’d be interested.  I send them a copy of the book; preferably an e-copy, but sometimes a paperback version.  Then I set a time to follow them up.

This will eventually narrow down into a  manageable list of places to visit, and I set times to go and give my signings and lectures.  You’ll need to space them out, or combine those that are close together, to make sure you can afford the trips.  As you make your budget, remember that you’re not concerned with making a profit at these locations, you’re trying first and foremost to spread the word.  What you make at the venues merely help with the costs of going to them.

KDP Select Free Promo Days - The Results

 After several weeks of preparation for the KDP Select free promotion, I was ready for the event itself.  I had activities scheduled for each day of the event, from July 1-5.  Below are the activities and the results on each day.

July 1:  I posted information about the free book promotion on my own Facebook and Twitter accounts.  Since Facebook is looked at primarily by my friends, I explained on it what the KDP Select program was, and why I was giving books away for free.  To people who are not in this industry, the entire idea seems odd, so I wanted to explain how giving books away for free was actually helpful to me.  I said also that it would be great if people could pass this on to anyone they thought might enjoy it.  I immediately saw results, with friends sharing the post and putting their own explanation on it.  They downloaded the book, and even downloaded copies for other people.  I had planned on gifting the book to some people and asking them to gift it to others, but I didn’t need to because so many people did it already.

            I also posted details about the sale to groups that are relevant to the book.  In this case, that includes baseball and Civil War groups, as well as some general history groups.  I was a little worried how they would take it, but because I had been actively part of these groups for the past week, it worked better than anything else I did during this promotion.  A bunch of people liked it, commented on it, and shared it with their friends.  They even thanked me for giving it away for free rather than getting annoyed that I was promoting on their site. 

I also posted on writing and reading groups I belong to.  These are the least effective as so many authors post on these all the time, but you occasionally get that writer/reader who’s interested in the graphic if it stands out who shares it.

Finally, I talked about the sale on Twitter with specific hashtags, including: #Amazon #eBook #BookBuzzr #BookGiveaway #BookMarketing #Kindle #KindleBargain #KDP #WLCFreeToday #FreekKindleReads #free… #Kindle #Freekindle #freebook #FreeKindleBook #ReadThis #authorshelpingauthors.  This last worked better than expected.  I’ve never been good with Twitter and rarely does anyone respond to anything I post, but all day I was getting notifications of people retweeting me, favoriting my posts, and following my Twitter account.

The result of this first day was 166 downloads, #3 in historical fiction, #52 in literature and fiction, and #1,330 overall on Amazon.  This was down from around 13,000.

July 2:  My paid promotions kicked in, and the number of downloads soared.  This is the greatest lesson you could learn from all of this.  Pay for the promotions on several sites that are effective where they tweet about you, post on their website and on their Facebook page.  That’s where you get the numbers.  I immediately saw my numbers jump before I did anything.

            I also went through my social media and I responded to comments, liked other people’s comments about things unrelated to my book, (this grabbed their attention without me having to say anything.)  I should mention here that my profile picture is a picture of my book, so every time I commented or even liked anything, people saw my book cover without me having to say anything about my book.

            I also wrote a thank you on my own Facebook and Twitter to those who had helped spread the word about the book, then I gave the good news about the results, giving them the credit for getting it there, (and not mentioning the paid promotions.)

            The results were #2 in both historic fiction and literature fiction behind a book called The Widow of Larkspur Inn in both categories, and #106 overall with a total of 1,471 units downloaded that day alone.  I was achingly close to achieving one of two very important goals:  #1 in my category, or in the top 100 overall.

July 3:  Unfortunately, I was not to reach any of them.  I had peaked already, and the next day, as the paid promotions faded, my numbers slipped.  I still had some promotions to go as I was sending direct tweets to a list of Twitter handles:  @DigitalBkToday @kindleebooks @Kindlestuff @KindleEbooksUK @KindleBookKing @KindleFreeBook @FreeReadFeed @4FreeKindleBook

            One place I saw something that I might try in the future; someone placed up a meme with information about their book.  More people read memes than text on posts, so I might try that in the future.

            I also found reasons to post information about the sale again on some of the same groups, and on my own.  Typically that reason was to give everyone an update on how the sale was going, and informing them that it was still going on.  I told them about the results of the day before, that I was on the cusp of being #1 in two categories, and in the top 100 overall.  I didn’t tell them it was slipping.

July 4:  And it continued to slip, even on this day which was supposed to be the biggest one of all.  It had gone on long enough by this point that I was having trouble making excuses to talk about it and make it feel organic.  I continued to post on free book groups on Facebook, which allow you to post once a day, and I gave some updates on my own profile.

            My girlfriend Jamie had a good suggestion as well that I tried.  I found several posts other people had put up that I believed others would want to see.  I shared it on a page or group of my own with hashtags that were popular, (especially #4thofjuly) and I also put the hashtag of my book #americangame.  I also posted a link to the book on my author page with the hashtag #americangame.  That way, when people were going through #4thofjuly they would come upon one entertaining entry that also happened to have #americangame.  The hopes was that people would shift onto that track and find the link to the book itself.  I don’t know how well this worked, as it was in the middle of a lot of other things, and in the middle of a holiday, but I’ll be trying it again for Relic Worlds.

            I posted on my blogs in multiple locations and put links up to see the blog.  It was discouraging, an exercise in futility.  It seemed like the harder I worked to post about it, finding new and creative ways to make it look organic, the more it slipped in the ratings.  All the while I saw other people’s postings on Facebook about their fun times at 4^th of July parties on a beautiful day while I was stuck inside trying to give away my book.  At last I gave up, put it all away, and went to a party.

July 5:  I did the one thing I had forgotten to do on either the 3^rd or 4^th, I posted the book trailer.  This was especially useful in reenactor sites as I used reenactors to make the trailer.  After the link to the trailer was a link to the book.  I tweeted and posted about this trailer all over the place.

            I got some more views on the trailer, and it no doubt got some final sales, but the promotion had lost its impetus.  It closed still at #2 in historic fiction behind that same Widow of Larkspur, #21 in literary fiction, and #638 overall.  I might have regretted not putting the trailer up sooner, as I had intended, but it wouldn’t have mattered, as I discovered in going over the results.

            First, I had intended to put the trailer up at some point during the weekend.  Something I discovered with this promotion, and, funny enough, I happened to see in the news while doing these promotions, is that people tend to post during the weekend, but rarely read anything.  This is especially true on holidays, and even more common on sunny holidays where everyone is out at grills and pool parties.  According to the news report, the most effective days for social media are Tuesday and Wednesday morning.  I guess it helps people get over the hump of the week.

            I also discovered that shorter promotions, 2 to 3 days, are more effective.  The intent is to get your book into the top list in your category and overall.  Though I didn’t reach number 1 or the top 100 overall, I got close to both, and would still have been visible when the book came out of being free.  Mainstream shoppers would have seen it suddenly appear high on the rankings in Amazon for sale at $2.99.  Instead, because the free promotion continued to go on, it slipped after reaching that top spot until it tumbled back down to the 600s.  That’s still pretty good, especially compared to where it had been, but it’s less impressive.  I discovered through this that it’s best to have your book launch to the top through an efficient and compressed promotion, then pull it out of the promotion so everyone else can see it.  If it doesn’t work, you still have a couple days left on your KDP Select free promo days to try again.

            What I was surprised to see were the other books that were in the category lists with me.  Both historic fiction and literary fiction were mostly romance novels.  The historic fiction ones tended to be geared for older women, and the covers had an upper class woman in fancy clothes standing in a romantic field near an upper class European home.  Often a man was there with his shirt unbuttoned and muscles rippling underneath.  (His face was often unseen.)  The covers implied some connection between the woman and this wealthy, mysterious stranger, and the titles confirmed it.  At the end of my run, the book that was in the number one spot was titled A Daughter’s Inheritance.

The literary fiction ones were the opposite end of the spectrum.  Women wore ripped clothes, or clothes that were too big as they seemed to be falling off, and a bad boy with torn blue jeans and no shirt or a tank top, again with rippling muscles and no face, stood nearby.  Their titles implied what the covers were implying, the women were winning over the bad boys.  The book that bumped The American Game from number 2 was entitled These Hoes Ain’t Loyal.

I don’t know what to make of this, except that I’m concerned for the independent book world if these are what hold the top spots most of the time.  Almost all the rest of the books that shared the top 25 were classics from mainstream publishers.  It’s disheartening both in regards for independent publishing, and feminism.

There was one other element though that seemed to put books in the top list; one which I will exploit on my next attempt.  The top books tended to be parts of series.  This meant readers were following these books, and the author was served in that readers were downloading an earlier book for free, then purchasing the sequels if they moved on.

So that’s what I will be doing with Relic Worlds.

My KDP Select Free Promotion Blogs

I promised to write about my experience with the KDP Select program as I did it, but, as often happens, I wound up being so busy doing it that I didn’t have time to write about it. I’m glad I did, as I feel that I stretched as far as I could with the information I had, and if I had taken time to write about it, I wouldn’t have done everything I hoped.

I’m now going to write about each part of the KDP Select free promotion as a separate blog entry.  The first one will be about selecting and preparing for the days of the promotion.  Each subsequent entry will then be about the promotion itself.  I’ll put the first few up today, then the rest will go up after the promotion is over.

In the meantime, the promotion itself is still going on through the weekend, and my book The American Game is available for free on Amazon at:  http://www.amazon.com/American-Game-Jeff-McArthur-ebook/dp/B00LJII7GG/ref=tmm_kin_title_0?_encoding=UTF8&sr=8-1&qid=1435946633

Alternatives to Bookstores for Talks and Sales

One thing I’ve found most shocking during my attempts to distribute and promote my books is how little support I’ve found from bookstores, especially independent ones.  One would think that they would want to utilize the resource of local artists to draw in more local readers.  At the very least, you get the friends and family coming in.  Most amazingly, independent bookstore owners are asking their customers to bypass major corporate stores to go to their stores, but they refuse to bypass major publishers for independent ones, so there’s a large amount of hypocrisy there.

Some bookstores have been supportive, and I can go at length about this subject alone, both as a rant, and providing information.  But today I want to talk about some of the alternatives I’ve found.

While I was preparing for my book tour for Two Gun Hart, I tried to arrange talks at bookstores in Nebraska, Chicago, San Francisco, and Austin.  While Nebraska businesses opened their doors wide, none of the others did.  I was particularly surprised about Chicago and San Francisco.  Chicago, of course, is where the famous Capones lived, and San Francisco prides itself on having large numbers of book lovers and having the independent spirit.  But the bookstores in both entirely ignored me.

Meanwhile, one of the Capone family members set up a talk at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City.  As I mentioned in one of my earlier blog entries, the event was a success, partially because students were offered extra credit if they came.  Also, it was a venue where people wanted to learn, and the staff was not inundated with requests by self-published authors to have readings and signings.  By going to the correct department, (in this case the Italian-American studies,) Corey was able to set up a highly successful talk.

It got me thinking of other venues where this sort of thing will work.  There are museums dedicated to the old west, Italian studies, and crime in America.  Each one would make good venues.  There are other departments at universities and high schools that would like to learn about this story.  Libraries, too, are good sources, though they are also often contacted by many independent authors, so the competition is fierce, and promotions can be difficult.

I’m of the mind right now that school systems will be the best as they’ll have a ready-made audience, sometimes even a captive one.  However, if one can work out the promotions correctly, especially if they can go to a venue that has members who meet regularly, they can be successful.

By the way, in this instance, I am defining “success” as selling a number of books of course, but more importantly, getting the word out.  You will not sell enough books at any of these venues to make it worth your while.  But, if successful, you will get enough people interested that they’ll tell others.

The American Game Will Be Free on Kindle

Beginning tomorrow, July 1, The American Game will be free on Amazon Kindle.  It will be free for 5 days, (July 1-5) to celebrate the 4th of July weekend.  You can download it at:  http://www.amazon.com/American-Game-Jeff-McArthur-ebook/dp/B00LJII7GG/ref=tmm_kin_title_0?_encoding=UTF8&sr=8-1&qid=1435710093

Why do we give away books for free when we worked so long and hard on them?  Well, there are a couple reasons, but I'm first going to explain a reason that's somewhat unique to me.

I first wanted to make this story into a movie, and I tried to get it made for 18 years.  A child could literally have been born and grown up to adulthood in the time it took me to get this story told.  (And one that I knew actually did.)  That would seem like all the more reason to charge a lot for the book and not give it away for free.  However, in my view, I spent so much time on this book that no matter how much I charge for it, I would never make enough money to equal the time I put into it.

But the main reason that people in general do the KDP Select free giveaway is because it generates interest, and helps them get noticed.  How does it do this?  Well, first of all, Amazon places listings based on the number of downloads a book has had so far, not only how much money it's made.  Therefore, if you get 10,000 downloads and make no money you're going to go further up the chart than the person who made $100 and had 500 downloads.  Authors who are further up the chart get noticed more by other readers and then get more sales.

A good way to describe it is to have you imagine one person in a park.  He's shouting out a message, and no one's listening to him because it's just a crazy guy in a park trying to get people's attention.  When three or four people join him, well, it becomes a small group, but it's still probably just a group of crazy people.  However, when a bigger and bigger crowd gathers, this starts to catch people's attention.  And then when this group turns into a crowd huddled around a large area of the park, it really gets other people's attention, and soon people are going to the park just to see what that crowd is all about.  That initial crowd is the people who downloaded your book for free, and the other people coming are those whose attention was grabbed because of that crowd.  The trick now is to get them to pay.

I'm going to report on this giveaway as I do it.  I've been preparing for this giveaway for a month now.  I'll describe how I prepared in another blog, and then report on the results as they come in.  Keep following to see how it goes.

Radio Talk Shows and the Extremist Bent

In our constant search for promotional opportunities for our books, one of the best options for us seems to be the radio, namely, talk radio.  They work primarily in words without images, just as we do.  They need content 24 hours, we are trying to get ourselves heard by the public.  It seems like a perfect match!  Alas, it is much harder to make that match work than one might imagine.

First, you have to wade through the majority of radio stations that play mostly music and only interview celebrities.  That leaves a much smaller number of talk and news shows that will actually consider what you have to offer.  You can narrow down to these stations using the Radio Locator found here.  This will still provide you with a pretty large number, especially if you’re looking for stations nationwide.

However, when you go to these stations, you discover a very discouraging trend.  Most of these talk radio stations are dedicated to irrational, angry hate speech, most of it conservative.

This is not to say there is something inherently problematic with conservatism.  Though I’m a centralist who leans left, I see value in beliefs on the right; and above all, I’m a big believer in everyone having the right to their opinion.  However, most extremist talk-show hosts do not.  Shock-jocks like Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck are nothing more than authoritarian bullies.  They pretend to be conservatives to gain an audience, but the truth is, they don’t really care about politics or what’s best for the country.  All they care about is the controversy they spread to raise their ratings.

This is not where I want to talk about my books.  It has nothing to do with what side of the political fence I stand on.  It has everything to do with the fact that I don’t want to be on a show that refers to people as “pinheads” and tell callers to “shut up” just for disagreeing with their opinions.  As for the stations that carry them, that is a bit more of a gray area with which I have struggled.  For a while, I sent my press releases to stations that carried these shows, but had other programming that might be worth my time.  But I’ve stopped doing this.  Part of the reason is I have such a long list of places to contact now that I’ve narrowed down the number of places I contact in the interest of time.  But another reason is because I got to thinking about what kind of station manager would play programming of that sort.  Let’s take Rush Limbaugh for example.  When Robin Williams died, he heartlessly said that he deserved it.  When Michael J. Fox came out about his disease, Limbaugh callously made fun of him.  A station manager who plays Limbaugh actually listened to those things and said, “I want that on my station!”  That is a channel for which I have no respect, and no time to appear.

What I do instead now is look for “news” channels.  “Talk” channels have become so overrun by these extremist that they are virtually code words for “duchebags who merely want to spread the seeds of hatred.”  It’s still difficult to get news producers to notice you because you still need some angle that is informative for today.  (My books being historical in nature often don’t have any relevance to today, but I try to take advantage of any opportunity I get.)  I also try to get onto NPR.  Some like to say they have a liberal bias; but regardless of whether they do or don’t, you don’t hear them raging against someone day in and day out, belittling anyone who disagrees with them, as you often do on talk radio.

Either Do Social Media, Or Get a Publicist

I have to confess something.  I hate doing social media.  That’s an ironic thing seeing as this post is appearing on social media and I’m wanting a lot of people to follow what I say.  But I really do.  I’d rather be writing one of my books or short stories, putting together a game, or videotaping for one of my shows.  Basically, I’d rather be creating the things I set out to create.  Anything else feels like a distraction.

It especially feels like a distraction when I’m having to promote to get people to look at these side projects, such as blog posts, Twitter, etc.  In essence, I’m promoting the promotion.  I have enough side projects as it is; I don’t need another one.  And on top of everything else, it feels like I’m wasting my time when I look at the number of views, and I make up a quarter to half of the views!

I know that social media has an effect.  I’ve seen it myself.  It’s subtle and has not made too large a change in my numbers, but I have seen occasional spikes when I tweeted something important, or posted something people wanted to read.  But it’s frustrating how much work goes in to such little results.

But then, a couple months ago, a man named Stefan with Skyboat Entertainment, an audiobook company, gave me the kick in the pants I needed.  Someone at a GLAWS meeting was asking about social media.  They kept going on about it, and it became clear that what they really wanted was for him to tell them they didn’t have to do it, or at least provide an alternative.  He gave them a wake-up call by shrugging and saying, “Then you have to get a publicist, or just not expect anyone to read your books.”  He laid it out there as plainly as could be.  It may suck if you don’t enjoy doing social media, but you have to do it, or you have to get a publicist.  Those are your two options if you want to sell books.

I hear Stefan’s deep, gravel voice every time I want to quit posting.  Like a trainer shouting from the edge of a boxing ring, Stefan’s words lay it out there for me.  Do it or quit.  Those are your options, plain and simple.

Self-Publishing Promotion 3 - Release (Release - 3 months after)

As I stated in the last blog entry, the week of release is vitally important.  This week is your best chance to reach the New York Times Bestseller List, and other important lists that will be seen by thousands of people.  You need to work hard this whole week, but it can't be the start of the work.  This will be the time to follow up all the work you've been doing for the past six months.  Remind everyone who's been showing interest that the book is now out.  Post anywhere you can that all the clips you've been showing are connected to a book that just released.  Basically, get all those people who have been on the fence about whether or not to purchase to take the leap and buy it already.

Also, this is very important, Amazon and Barnes & Noble to not allow reviews to be posted until the book is released.  So go to all those folks who said they'd post a review to do it now.  This is vital as it determines how far up in the list you'll be.  I have books still on Amazon that, when you type in the exact title, are not the first to come up.  (Instead it's other books that don't have the exact title, but have more reviews.)  Even bad reviews help you reach the top of the list, so have them post it immediately.

I did all of these things.  I took time off from work to reach out to everyone.  I was even on a true crime podcast the week of release.  Still, I had dismal results.  On retrospect, I believe the reason was because the entire six months I was dependent upon news organizations to spread the word.  Of course I did a number of things as well, informing people in groups that the book was releasing, and putting up an ad on Goodreads and on Facebook.  But ultimately nonfiction depends heavily on readers hearing about the story from people they trust.  This is usually the news media, such as the radio, NPR, television, etc.  The fact that I was largely ignored by them hurt my chances greatly.

This has explained to me why that other author said fiction is easier to promote when you're self-published; you have more control over reaching your niche.  You do need to make them trust your writing style and storytelling abilities, but they're not so stuck on reading and listening to traditional sources that they won't give you a chance.

However, all hope is not lost for non-fiction.  The week before release, I was flown out to Salt Lake City to speak to an Italian-American department at a university.  Many of the students got extra credit if they went to listen to my talk.  Others in the university who was what the subject was about came out to see what it was all about.  Since that time I've also found other venues with the same sort of niche; genealogy groups, other universities, old west and crime museums, etc.

I thought that bookstores would be interested in this, but again, I was largely ignored.  Most surprising were the bookstores in San Francisco, who claim to pride themselves on supporting independent artists.  I guess that doesn't include independent authors, as most authors they have listed are from major publishers.  (So, they don't want you going to the big company called Barnes & Noble or Amazon, but they themselves will only deal with big publishers.  Great.)

However, these niche locations are far more interested.  I am now scheduling those events, and each time I go, I see the people's eyes get wide, and they take their books home to tell everyone about it.  I always notice my sales go up after these.

So that's about it.  I know I didn't cover it in anywhere near as much detail as I intended, and there's for more that would be helpful, but too much for me to think of and include in the blog.  So the best thing for me to do is leave it as it is, and let anyone reading this ask me questions.

Self-Publishing Promotion - Phase 2 (3 months before release - Release)

This phase is, in many ways, the most crucial, as it is your best chance to get into the New York Times Bestseller List, or other lists of the same sort.  You can put your book up for pre-order during this time, and start getting it purchased by bookstores.  All sales during this period count during one day, the release date, so the longer time you give yourself, the wider your net.

The first obvious thing you want to do is have the book go on pre-order as far from release date as possible.  This will probably be 90 days.  You also want it available in as many sites as possible.  The top ones are Amazon and Barnes & Noble, the latter of which should be done through Smashwords.

Now is the time to build the buzz as large and as fast as you can.  Reviewers who were getting it during phase 1 should start putting out their reviews now.  You want to do a general press release to go to as many places as possible, and to write to the places that you believe will be your biggest supporters early on so you can schedule interviews to happen before release.  These will probably be on your list you made on the Excel sheet.

For the major press release I used PR Web, and I used the $250 option.  This wasn't the top service, but it wasn't the bottom.  It provided wide coverage without offering a lot of information I didn't need.  There are "cheaper" options, but nothing that's actually cheap.  There are a few sites that do this for free, but no one does it with the sort of coverage and results PR Web gives you.  What I've discovered from doing all this is "go big or go home."  I've done the free service in the past, the $100 option, and now the $250 option.  The free option barely got picked up by any news sources.  The $100 got some moderate coverage, but not a lot.  The $250 option got covered by several hundred places, so it seemed to be worth it.

The one problem is that the news sources who picked it up barely mentioned the book, if at all.  I had done the press release near the beginning, so the book still wasn't releasing for nearly 3 months.  Therefore, most sources seemed to ignore it since it was going to be a while before the book would be out.  I had done it so far in advance in case some of them wanted to do interviews, but that didn't happen.  I don't know what to say about this.  The results seemed really positive, and in some ways it was as the news of the subject of the book really got out there.  But the book got no sales directly from it, and people didn't really learn of its existence.  Bottom line, if you're going to do this option, do it closer to the release date, and make a bigger deal about your book.

As the release date got closer, I talked more and more on Facebook groups and sent out to Twitter.  (I'll be honest, I suck at the latter.)  I let out bits of information and clips from the book to get interest.  This worked in small, yet sure ways.  People showed interest who backed it up with sales, though VERY few bought pre-order copies.  They wanted to make sure the book was out before they got it.  But I did see people talking about it, and not always just with me.  Those same people bought the book when it came out.

The month leading up to release, I spent all my time working on the book and its promotions.  (I still had a little work to do on it.)  I wrote to every media place I could, especially public radio and television.  They pretty much entirely ignored me, which was bizarre considering the incredible story.  One of them sent a link to the kind of "historical" stories they do, and it went to someone who went to a psychic and got "possessed by the ghost of Montgomery Clift."  I guess, how can the long-lost Capone brother who broke the Italian stereotype compete with that?

I had scheduled the release date for a Friday, assuming it would follow the same rules that movies do.  Have it released through a weekend that people will want to buy it and read it.  About halfway to release, I learned that the best day to release is Monday, as the New York Times and others count the first week of sales along with the pre-releases, and every day will count to your total all the way to Sunday.  I couldn't push it back without losing the right to do pre-orders with Amazon again in the future, so I had to pull the date back from Friday to Monday of the same week.  It made a few things have to rush, but I got them all done...

...and had only 11 sales.  It was disheartening.  I know I made a few mistakes, especially in sending out the press release too early, but I'm satisfied that I did enough things right to feel I couldn't have done a lot better.  I can't force the media to tell my story and talk about my book.  I can't make them interview me.  And the subject matter is dynamic enough that I refuse to believe that's the problem.  I mean,it's Capone's long-lost-freakin'-brother, and he was a freakin' Prohibition officer.  If that isn't a perfect story for public radio and history stations, I don't know what is.

I have been remembering what I read from another self-published author, that he self-publishes fiction, and traditionally publishes non-fiction.  I didn't understand why at the time, but now I do.  When promoting non-fiction, you are counting on news sources, such as newspapers, radio stations, and especially NPR and PBS.  You count on them because your readers trust them more than they'll ever trust you.  History readers are typically more traditional, and they want to know that what they're reading is the truth.  Most have bought into the idea that a traditional publisher has multiple readers and editors scouring over the facts and double checking them to make sure they're accurate.  They do not realize this is all a myth.  Nevertheless, the media outlets perpetuate this stereotype by connecting with the traditional publishers, and their time and space is filled up with authors from these publishers.  Many of them are friends with the editors and producers of these media outlets, having made these connections while they were both climbing their career ladders.

It was a discouraging lesson, and I was frankly very depressed by it.  But I did start having a small ray of hope as I began moving into phase 3...

#self-publishing #bookpromotion

Self-Publishing Promotion - Phase 1 (6 - 3 Months Before Release)

I'm going to use the publishing of my Book, Two Gun Hart, as an example of the promotional methods I used, along with my suggestions on how to promote your independently published book.

You should have your book mostly done six months before the books release.  I did not have all of Two Gun done, but I had enough to send out as an advanced readers copy, also called a galley.  I clearly marked these as such so anyone who saw grammatical errors and such would know this was an unfinished copy.  However, I've found that this might not have been such a good idea as I suspect that a few places bypassed doing stories about this because they ignored the "advanced" part and judged it as though it was done.  I now believe it's best to have the book almost done with only a polish left to it six months out.  (You still want to be flexible all the way to close to release as good ideas and suggestions might come up in time.

Most of this phase is spent sending the ARC to reviewers, or the story out to news sources that will need time to go over it, such as magazines which have long lead times.  This is also a time to have friends go over it as well to find issues you may not have noticed, or to make last minute suggestions.  It is also a great time to slowly start to build the buzz.

For Two Gun, I got it out to reviewers, and because it was such a huge news story, I started sending it to news sources that would require some time to look over it.  I did not send it out a mass press release yet as I wanted that to be closer to the actual release time.  Also, bear in mind, the book is not available for pre-order until three months from release, so anyone who reads about it during this time cannot order it.  So everything I did was intended for future results.

The one thing I largely ignored were magazines, which was more or less a mistake.  I didn't intend to ignore them altogether, but I put them as the lowest priority as magazines don't have as large a readership as other sources.  This still holds true, however, a large number of people who read about history get magazines, so this is something I should have made a larger priority.

Also during this phase I did a lot of my research.  I started an Excel sheet that had all the different types of media color coded along with the names of the various stations, newspapers, magazines, blogs, etc.  So, for instance, all the radio stations were color coded blue, and they had the station's name, any contacts I might have, their email address, their phone number, etc.  Newspapers, the same thing, but I color coded them white.  Blogs had just the web address and email address and was color coded yellow, and so on.  These will be used in the next couple phases.

#selfpublishingpromotion