Category Archives: Marketing

Work At Your Titles By W. Terry Whalin

W. Terry WhalinYou can’t underestimate the value of a good title for a magazine article or a book manuscript. Many writers don’t put much energy into those few words since they figure it will be changed in the editorial process. That’s not true. If you choose a good title, I’ve found it will remain and appear in print for the magazine article or the book.

Those few words are the first thing an editor will see with your submission so don’t slap something on the top of your manuscript then never revisit the title before you send it to the editor.

For some writers, the title can be a stumbling block–since it’s the first thing on your manuscript. To get around this difficulty, often I will throw the first thing that comes to my mind into that spot on the page. BUT I always revisit it at the end of the process, create several titles, and then select the most appropriate one before I send it off to the editor.

Titles come from many different places. Sometimes they are a play on words and for other titles, they are buried in a phrase inside the actual article or book. When I was on the staff of Decision magazine, we spent hours in Title Meetings where we debated the merits of a particular title for an article. Why? Because at the time the magazine had a circulation of 1.8 million copies and we knew a good title would draw readers. Each of us would suggest possible titles, and then we selected what we determined as the best title for that article. If the writer proposed a good one, then it stuck.

Some of my personal favorites are: Two Words That Changed My Life, the title of my personal testimony, http://www.terrylinks.com/TWTCML  A Strange Place To Sing, a children’s book I wrote about Paul and Silas in jail; Never Too Busy, another children’s book about Jesus and the children and finally Lessons From the Pit which I wrote about the Eurodollar Pit of the Chicago Mercantile.

Titles are definitely worth a bit of your creative thinking. The title might make the difference whether you get the editors’ attention or not.

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W. Terry Whalin is a former magazine editor, book editor and literary agent. He is the creator of an online course to teach writers how to create excellent book proposals, www.WriteABookProposal.com (http://bit.ly/wbkpro) and an Acquisitions Editor at Morgan James Publishing, a NY based publisher (http://terrylinks.com/mjp1s).  Get his free Ebook, Platform Building Ideas for Every Author: (http://bit.ly/wtwsite) Terry has almost 40,000 followers on Twitter: www.twitter.com/terrywhalin

Don’t have a copy of Become A Successful Author? What are you waiting for?Become A Successful Author will be used in the “How To Write That Novel” course at Chicago State because it covers everything from branding to writing to editing to formatting and uploading electronic and print books to marketing and so much more. Your time is money. Look at all the time, thus money, you’ll save by ending your search for answers: Purchase Become A Successful Author for only $4.99 (eBook) or $9.99(print) from: Amazon (US), Amazon (UK), Barnes & Noble

Amazon KDP Select Experiment by Deatri King-Bey

DeatriMany have asked me why I haven’t hopped on the Kindle Select bandwagon. That’s because the majority of my titles have nice Nook sells and I want my books to be available to my supporters. Granted, I know you just pull your books off other vendors for 90 days (minimum), so be sure to take that into consideration. You can always go back to selling your books everywhere. Anywhooo, I just don’t find the program is good for me. I still received numerous questions about the program, so I decided to do a KDP Select Experiment so I can give you first-hand experience instead of just opinion.

For those of you who don’t know, if you enroll your eBook in the Amazon KDP Select program, you say that you will sell and give away your eBook on Amazon.com only. You give them complete exclusivity. You can’t even give the eBook away on your website. In exchange for your making your eBook exclusive to Amazon, you are allowed to give your book away for free for five days and your book is placed in Amazon’s library for its Prime Members. When a Prime Member borrows the eBook, you are paid a certain amount.

When KDP Select started, the units downloaded for free counted toward your sales ranking when the book went back to regular price. The result, traditionally published books were being knocked out of “Best Sellers” list left and right. They lost visibility, thus sells, so I knew the publishing industry wouldn’t let that last long. Publishers complained and now free downloads barely count towards paid download ranking. That’s not the end of the story. You can still make money using the Amazon KDP Select program.

I think the Amazon KDP Select program is especially great for authors who don’t have many sells outside of Amazon, have a series (I suggest putting the first book of the series), multiple books out or have older titles that aren’t selling as well anymore. I think the program can give LOTS of exposure and the possibility of numerous new readers.

Onto the experiment.

I have decided to place two titles on the KDP Select program. Neither of these titles have sold a copy on Barnes & Noble in over a month, so though I’m still uncomfortable about being exclusive to Amazon for 90 days, I’m going to suck it up and do it. I just need to remember that this will increase the visibility of these titles and that’s the whole point in making them available to the public.

Step One (May 28): I logged into Pubit and took my two titles (The Other Realm and Picture Perfect) off sell. I’ll admit, that hurt. It’s processing and I should probably wait until the process is over before enrolling into the KDP Select, but let’s see what happens. I also updated my webpage to take off the Nook direct buy links.

Step Two (May 28): I logged into KDP and contemplated if I truly wanted to have my two titles exclusive on one site for 90 days. I’m not happy about this, but it’s only 90 days—at least that’s what I keep telling myself. It’s not the 90 days that bothers me. It’s the exclusivity. I don’t like that for even a second. Get over it. I read through the FAQs, several times. I’m anal about this type of thing and you’d best believe I’ve spoken with authors who are in the program.  A few new items I learned from the FAQs:

  • KDP Select-enrolled titles are automatically renewed for another 90 days unless you opt not to automatically renew. So you know I will hop on over to the “Edit book details” page and uncheck the box next to “Automatically renew this book’s enrollment in KDP Select.”
  • You can un-publish your KDP Select-enrolled titles at any time during the term. So if it is really driving you crazy that your book is only available on Amazon, you can remove it from there also. BUT you still cannot sell it other places either for the 90 days. So your book will not be available anywhere until the 90 days is up.
  • If you get cold feet, you have 3 days to get out of the program. I think all contracts work like that, don’t they? You get a 72 hour cooling off period.

There’s a lot more information on the FAQs. Be sure to read them.

I enrolled my two titles into the KDP Select program.  I looked at my term date and have to leave my books exclusive until 25 August. If these two titles were the same genre, I wouldn’t have done them at the same time, but since one is fantasy and the other women’s fiction, the target audiences (though overlap at times) are different enough. Now I’m off to uncheck that auto-renew (into the program) feature. Okay, I’m back and didn’t see where to not automatically enroll. I still have three days to get out of this program, so maybe that option will appear after that time. I’ll be back.

I’m back (June 5). Did you miss me? I am now able to uncheck the auto-renew.

Step Three (May 28): I’m not in a hurry to select my free days.  I know that I will do the free reads promo in three sets. Two Wednesday/Thursday sets and one Thursday set. I choose to do it this way because I’ve been told numerous times that the free downloads increase your sales ranking. No one knows how much. So let’s see if how much of a bump my numbers get just before the weekend. I’ll do the free day promos three weeks in a row because I’m trying to get it over with. Yep. I said it. This is an experiment and I just don’t feel like spreading the five free days spread out and having to report on each one. So I’ll group them and report on each group. If you are serious about the KDP Select program, I think it would be best to spread your five free days out.

I’ll be on vacation the second half of June, so I reckon I’ll start my free day promos then. There’s also another reason I’m choosing June to do the free promos. The 4th of July is vacation time. Lots of summer reading will be going on so this is a good time to have my books out there. Here are the dates I’ll schedule the free days for:

  • June 13, 14
  • June 20, 21
  • June 28 (FYI: I ended up cancelling this date for both)

Originally when the KDP select program started, it was said that the free downloads would count toward your rankings, but from what I’ve seen, that doesn’t seem to be true. I’ll let you know for sure at the conclusion of this experiment.

First I need to create a plan on how to promote my free days. My Facebook, Twitter, reading groups I belong to and mailing lists are givens, but there are other online avenues that promote free reads. I hear they are hit and miss. Let’s see what happens.

Here’s a tool that submits your promo information for your free days to various websites:

http://authormarketingclub.com/members/submit-your-book/

Step Four (May 28): My followers who wanted the titles I’ve entered into the KDP Select program have most likely already purchased them, so it’s time to maximize on the exposure and find new pockets of my target audience. Sounds like a great time to set up a blog tour. I only have the one fantasy book, which I entered in the KDP Select program, and in all honesty have neglected it. Thus I need to find places to be a guest blogger or be interviewed. I’d do my women’s fiction title also, but I just don’t have time to do it with all the other things I have going on in my life.

(June 4) I did some research into the sci-fi/fantasy/paranormal romance world and have sent blog appearance request to nineteen to appear on their blogs near the end of June. They’ve probably never heard of me before but oh well. Nothing beats a failure but a try.

(June 4) I’ve already heard from several of the authors I emailed this morning and have four guest posts lined up (fantasy) and one blog talk radio. Cool. I did receive an odd email from one of the authors. I’ve been in the business a long time, and I know some authors can be a tad bit snobbish, but such is life. One of the replies to my request was from an author who said something on the lines of, “I rarely allow guests authors on my website, and when I do, they are my peers.” Did that sound snooty to you? I’ve been turned down many times for interviews and such. It’s no big deal, but that seemed like the author’s nose was high in the air and stick stuck way up her behind. Authors, remember tone is important when responding to people. For one thing, you should always be polite because it’s the right thing to do, and also because you never know who you’re speaking with, especially online.

(June 13-14) I forgot all about my books being free until I checked my KDP stats this morning, which I do every morning. Only 6 a.m. and already a few hundred downloads for both books. Cool. My next step was to go onto Facebook and announce the free books in the reading groups I belong to and also on my author pages. By the way, I ended up with a seven spot blog tour for The Other Realm. Not bad, huh?

Next I’m off to see what locations ran my free tour. I know some places must have since I already have so many downloads and it’s early in the day.

I did a search on Twitter for “The Other Realm by Deatri” and BAM, @FreeEbooksDaily had indeed posted it. Thank you, Mom, for giving me an uncommon name. Next I searched for “Picture Perfect by Deatri” and BAM, @sylviahubbard1 had Tweeted it. It’s still early so I’ll check again later.

Next I moved onto Google and did a search of “The Other Realm by Deatri” and BAM, I saw both books on http://ereadernewstoday.com/free-kindle-books-17-free-books-for-6-13-12/6714313/

The Other Realm also made it to: http://www.facebook.com/kindledailydeal

Picture Perfect: Kindle Daily Deal

http://thekindledailydeal.com/bargain_preview.cfm?bargain_id=804

Wednesday 13 June I got 4262 downloads on Picture Perfect and 2536 downloads on The Other Realm.During the course of the day, The Other Realm ended at #4 on the free downloads for fantasy. Picture Perfect ended up #56 in free downloads overall.

(June 15) I was anxious to see what the ranking of the titles would be after the free promotion. I had been told that Amazon counts the free downloads towards your actual sales ranking. Not one for one, but they do help substantially. When I would ask for what substantially or a lot meant (I’m a numbers person. Those I understand), I could never get what they meant. Before this experiment started, both of my titles were over a million in the sells ranking. If you sell, one or two books, your ranking can go to around 150,000 range, so let’s see how “substantially” the free downloads worked on my rankings.

Picture Perfect finished with 8112 free downloads.

And the ranking this morning is: Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #69,829

 

The Other Realm finished with 3984 free downloads

And the ranking this morning is Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #364,856

Let’s put this into perspective. The Picture Perfect ranking is okay. It would translate to I’d sold a few books in the past couple of days. The Other Realm ranking looks as if I sold a book or two a few days ago.

This is very good information to know because I’ve read and been told numerous times by those in the program to run your free days Thursdays so your rankings will be higher come Friday when people purchase.  Keep it in perspective folks. From speaking with others who have participated in this program, and looking at the ranking on Amazon, I did extremely well on the download volumes. So well that Picture Perfect was the 56th most downloaded book of ALL of Amazon’s free titles, and though The Other Realm didn’t break the top 100 list for most downloaded free books on Amazon, it did get to 106 of the thousands of free books offered on Amazon. So you’d need a heck of a lot of free downloads to really increase your sales rank. Side note: Here is an excellent article about Amazon Sales Ranking. Please note that the ratio of Frees that count toward your sales ranking is not 10 to 1. It’s not even 1000 to 1.  Meaning for every 1000 free downloads that would count as 1 sell in the rankings.

You may now be thinking, what’s the point in giving away 12,000 books. Exposure. If even 10% of these people read the books, that’s up to 1200 people who have been exposed to my work who had probably never heard of me or considered reading my work. Hopefully, they will enjoy the titles and go back to purchase more. This is why the KDP Select program works better for people with a few titles released and those with a series (I suggest putting the first installment of the series in the program).

But more importantly, and an item I haven’t seen discussed in any of the articles I’ve read about the KDP Select program, is the Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought element of product pages. Over the years, I’ve had readers contact me who said they’d never heard of me but discovered my books through that Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought.

Picture Perfect had a total of 8112 downloads. That means 8112 Amazon customers’ book purchases are now linked to Picture Perfect. So on some of the product pages of books they have purchase, Picture Perfect will show in the Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought section. That is a heck of a lot of free advertising and a major strength of this program that I believe many overlook. I believe the Customers Who Bought section is one of the main strengths of the KDP Select program.

I need to write a few articles and submit the interviews for the mini blog tour I set up for The Other Realm. I’ve been neglecting this poor little title so long. Shame on me. Optimally, I would have set up a tour for Picture Perfect also during my free promo period, but I have a new romance coming out next month and will be touring then so just don’t have the time to promote both of these titles as I should. Be sure to always take into consideration your time constraints.

By the way, when I announced the free days in social media groups I belong to, I asked people to like the product page. People rarely hit that like button on anyone’s page, so I figured it couldn’t hurt to ask. I ended up with 20 additional likes on both pages.

(June 16) I’ve had a few sells of both titles which I shall credit to the KDP Select program since I hadn’t had sells for these titles in over a month. FYI: It looks like borrows count as sells in the ranking.

As of this morning:

Picture Perfect (Women’s Fiction) –  3 sells and 1 borrow, Amazon ranking: #33,650

The Other Realm (Fantasy Romance) – 3 sells, 3 borrows, Amazon ranking: #39, 586

(June 17) I haven’t been promoting either title but still received a few sells. Since the sales rankings for the books aren’t high enough to be placed on any list, I think the sells stem from the Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought section of the product page of Amazon.

Picture Perfect (Women’s Fiction) –  5 sells and 2 borrows, Amazon ranking: #36,365

The Other Realm (Fantasy Romance) – 7 sells, 4 borrows, Amazon ranking: #29,650

I’m curious how people find out a title is available to borrow unless they happen upon it while browsing Amazon. I’ll have to ask someone in the program I guess.

(June 18)

Picture Perfect 7 sells, 3 borrows Amazon ranking: #33,041,

The Other Realm 8 sells, 4 borrows, Amazon ranking:  #43,921

Don’t worry, I’m done giving the daily report. I think the borrows and sells will go down between free days because I’m not promoting the books. I suggest you promote the books for additional sells so you’ll, hopefully, get on some of the best seller list on Amazon to be more visible

June 19 Evening

The Other Realm #109,392 Paid in Kindle Store

Picture Perfect # #65,904 Paid in Kindle Store

August: Okay, I think you get the picture of how the KDP Select program works. The virtual tour of The Other Realm that I went on started near the end of June and went nicely, but by the time I’d started the tour, the bump in ranking I’d had was gone. So take that into consideration when you schedule your free days.

In conclusion, I think the KDP Select program is a good marketing option to boost your sells of older titles. If you have a new title, I do not suggest you place it into this program. FIRST, get the majority of the sells from the eBook, then enter the program so those who are downloading it for free wouldn’t have bought it anyway. You want to use this program to gain new readers, which is also why you want to have more than one eBook out (preferably in the same genre) when you enter this program.

Has this experience changed me into a KDP Select person. Nope. Don’t get me wrong. The titles I entered have received at least 20 sells each since I ran those free days and it is a way to get your work out there to people who may not know about your books. Once readers begin reading those free downloads, I’m sure many will come back for more. This program just not for me, that doesn’t mean it’s not just right for you.

Deatri King-Bey

If you found this post helpful, please use the Share buttons to spread the word about it.

Don’t have a copy of Become A Successful Author? What are you waiting for? Become A Successful Author will be used in the “How To Write That Novel” course at Chicago State because it covers everything from branding to writing to editing to formatting and uploading electronic and print books to marketing and so much more. Your time is money. Look at all the time, thus money, you’ll save by ending your search for answers: Purchase Become A Successful Author for only $4.99 (eBook) or $9.99 (print) from: Amazon (US), Amazon (UK), Barnes & Noble

Build Your Presence with a Blog by W. Terry Whalin

W. Terry WhalinBook editors and literary agents are looking for visible authors. I’m talking about authors who have an already established connection to their audience and communicate with that audience on a consistent basis. The buzzword that is commonly used in publishing is called “platform.” What is the author’s platform?

Many authors are chagrinned to hear this news. They thought the publisher was going to be the one to promote and market their book. These authors want to focus on storytelling and creating the best possible novel or nonfiction book. They don’t want anything to do with marketing. Because these authors resist being involved in marketing, their pitches are consistently rejected and they struggle to find an editor or agent to champion their project.

One of the simple yet effective ways to build your market presence is through blogging. On a consistent basis, I’ve been writing my blog since December 2004. The experience has been valuable in dozens of different ways and I’ve learned a great deal from it. Also I’ve increased my presence in the marketplace through blogging.

Whether you have a blog or not, as an author or would-be author, you have some questions about how to build your presence (platform) with a blog and also how to you make money with a blog? I want to provide you with some answers but first here’s

Five Ways Not To Blog

1. No focus. The word blog is short for a weblog and you start your blog with a literal use of this word. You write whatever comes into your head with no focus and no particular topic and audience in mind. In the process you crank a bunch of words into your computer. Yet are you drawing an audience?

2. No consistency. Sometimes you blog several times a day. Other times you go weeks or months without a single entry. You put information into the blog without any constant flow. And if you look at your viewing statistics, you see the results—lame.

3. Not picking a niche with passion. While this relates to focus, as a blogger, you need to select a particular niche that you will write about for a long time—with passion. Many bloggers fail to account for this element and they blog for a while then run out of steam. My blog has been going strong for years because I am passionate about the area I selected. Are you?

4. No email updates or RSS feed. Readers are different and you need to appeal to many types of readers. Some people like reading the entries on the site while others prefer to receive updates via email or their favorite blog reading tool which picks up on the RSS (really simple syndication) feed. You are missing out if you aren’t using these simple resources with your blog.

5. No links to other resources. No one contains all of the information about any particular topic. People who read and love blogs like to have other resources within a blog post. You need to include links to other people’s materials and resources as you write your entries. It will broaden your base and help you in countless ways.

I’ve just listed a few of the countless mistakes that people make in setting up and maintaining their blog. They do not attract readers nor make any money from their blog and quickly lose interest. They chalk it up to a wasted experience. You can avoid these mistakes with a little forethought and consistency.

I want to help you build your presence in the marketplace with a blog. Whether you are a blogger or not, I have some insights for you.

On Tuesday, August 7th, I will be answering your questions in a FREE live teleseminar at www.askterrywhalin.com I encourage you to ask your questions. Hopefully your question will be one that I will answer during the 70–minute event. If you can’t make the exact event, go ahead and register because it will be recorded and everyone who signs up will receive an email to the recording after the event.

To encourage your blogging efforts, everyone who signs up for the event will receive a free copy of my Ebook, Bloggers Guide to Profits, Discover the Little Known Secrets to Making Money with our Blog. If you scroll down the right side of my blog, you will see that I sell this book for $9.95. During this event, I’m giving away this valuable resource to everyone who registers. Please feel free to pass this information along to others and have them come to this live event.

I look forward to answering your questions on August 7th.

 W. Terry Whalin

If you found this post helpful, please use the Share buttons to spread the word about it.

Don’t have a copy of Become A Successful Author? What are you waiting for? Become A Successful Author will be used in the “How To Write That Novel” course at Chicago State because it covers everything from branding to writing to editing to formatting and uploading electronic and print books to marketing and so much more. Your time is money. Look at all the time, thus money, you’ll save by ending your search for answers: Purchase Become A Successful Author for only $4.99 (eBook) or $9.99 (print) from: Amazon (US), Amazon (UK), Barnes & Noble

BLING! Can You Pimp My Website by Deatri King-Bey

DeatriA few days ago, an author friend of mine asked if I could help pimp his website. The reasoning—little to no traffic because it was boring and in major need of jazzing up. He found a really snazzy looking template he wanted to use and needed guidance.

In one of my other lives (yes, I have several), I’m a web coordinator for the second largest employer in my state. I maintain high traffic websites, and I know a little about web optimization and all that techy web-stuff. I also maintain several websites of my own and have built websites for others. Enough about me, let’s get back to adding BLING to his website.

I had to be honest with my friend. What good would I be if I weren’t honest, right? Before he went through all of this work and shelled out dollars that could be used elsewhere, I had to ensure he understood the true reason why his website had little traffic—stale content.

He had his website/blog up for two years and maybe did three posts in all that time. And those posts looked more like Tweets than posts. When he had a new title come out, he’d place the new cover up, but beyond that, nodda-dang-thang.

I pointed out that my personal websites are nowhere near jazzed up, but are simple sites that have ever changing content that users return to see. Don’t believe me, here are a few of my websites:

I asked him how many websites he visited to see the bling on the site as opposed to the content. He couldn’t name one. Does this mean your website needs to be as simple as my websites? Of course not. I just want you to keep in mind that content is more important than BLING!

Back to the template my friend had chosen (a template is a premade design for websites you can customize for your needs).  The template was nice, but the service provider also had lots of bells and whistles he could add to the site. Bells and whistles are a good thing, when used in moderation. You don’t want to add so much “stuff” to your website that it distracts from the most important part—your ever changing content that keeps your readers coming back for more between your releases and for new releases. My friend had music, things flying across the screen, videos, pop ups, animations… I couldn’t even find the purchase links to his books. YIKES!

What to do, what to do? Before you pimp out your website, make sure you have your content ready. Below are not “pages” but types of content.

  • Author Information – Who are you—the author? Tell something interesting about yourself.  OK, so come of us are more interesting than others. What do you write? What is your writing known for? If you are writing non-fiction, what makes you qualified to write whatever it is you write? What are your literary accomplishments… I know a few authors who write under a pseudonym, and their About page is completely made up. I have a few pseudonyms, and I don’t do an About page for those.
  • Contact – How will your readers reach you, and how will you stay in contact with your readers? Will you use some sort of contact form for your readers to email you? Will you have readers subscribe to a mailing list using the services such as Mail Chimp or Constant Contact. If you have a blog, will your user be able to sign up for the blog? Don’t forget about social media. Make it easy for your reader to link to your Twitter, Facebook and other social media.
  • Purchase – How will your readers purchase your books? Where will you have links to purchase your books?  On every page, a dedicated page… Note: Make it easy for readers to find your purchase links.
  • Showcase – Will you have a page to showcase all of your titles? How will you organize this page? Will you have book blurbs, covers, videos, purchase links, reviews…
  • Repeat Offenders!—What will you do to keep your readers coming back for more? This is extremely important. You must keep the content on your website fresh. Most of us do not have a new book come out every month, so how do you keep your readers coming back for more between books? Are you going to have feeds to your Twitter, Facebook and or other social media? Will you be running contest? Are you going to blog? Will you have guest interviews or posts? Keep your content fresh if you want people to return.

Once you get your content together, figure out how you will organize it on the site and a way to continually draw readers to your site, you may now add the bling. There is nothing wrong with the bling, but don’t ever allow it to overshadow your content.

So did I pimp my friend’s website? Nah, once he stepped back and put things into perspective, he reorganized his website and added enough bells and whistles to jazz it up without turning it into a circus.

Here are a few other quick things about websites I’d like to touch on before I end this piece.

  • Try out several free website service providers such as Weebly, Wix, WordPress.org, WordPress.com, Blogger and Tumblr and see which one you are most comfortable using. Be careful, not all providers have full functionality on all internet platforms. Meaning, some people use browsers other than Internet Explorer. You want to read a wide audience.
  • Once you decide on who will host your website, purchase your domain name. Do not stick with the free one because it usually requires you having the companies name in the URL (web address). This is your business. Do not have someone else’s name in your business’s URL address.
  • Utilize the statistics functionality of your website. Keep track of where your traffic comes from and what links within your site are being clicked and when, then adjust accordingly.

Whew, I think that’s enough for now. Now go pimp your website.

Deatri King-Bey

If you found this post helpful, please use the Share buttons to spread the word about it.

Don’t have a copy of Become A Successful Author? What are you waiting for? Become A Successful Author will be used in the “How To Write That Novel” course at Chicago State because it covers everything from branding to writing to editing to formatting and uploading electronic and print books to marketing and so much more. Your time is money. Look at all the time, thus money, you’ll save by ending your search for answers: Purchase Become A Successful Author for only $4.99 (eBook) or $9.99 (print) from: Amazon (US), Amazon (UK), Barnes & Noble

Keep Experimenting to Sell Books

W. Terry WhalinI’ve never met a book author who didn’t want to sell more copies of their  work. It doesn’t matter if they are published through one of the largest  publishers or Podunk Press (I don’t believe there is such a small  publisher named Podunk Press but maybe since there are many of them).

I’ve interviewed more than 150 bestselling authors and spoken with hundreds  of other authors. If you bring up the topic of selling more books, almost every  author has a story about something they tried yet failed to work. Often these  stories are filled with the author blaming someone else for the lack of sales.  They blame:

  • their publisher
  • their publicist
  • their agent
  • their editor
  • the wrong title
  • the wrong cover
  • the missing endorsements
  • _____ you name it

It’s rare that I hear the author blame the real culprit: themselves. Yes,  it’s hard to admit but it is the first step toward selling more books and  understanding who bears the true responsibility for selling books—the author.

In Jack Canfield’s bestselling title, The Success Principles, How to Get from Where You Are to Where You  Want to Be, he begins the book with some fundamentals for success. The  first principle is: Take 100% Responsibility for Your Life.

For book authors, you can easily take the word Life and substitute Book: Take  100% Responsibility for Your Book. It’s amazing how your attitude will shift if  you take this simple step.

Many authors long to have their book appear on the bestseller list. For some  authors they equate getting on the bestseller list as their benchmark of success for their  book. Over ten years ago, I read Michael Korda’s Making the List, a Cultural  History of the American Bestseller 1900–1999. Korda at the time was the  Editor-in-Chief at Simon and Schuster, one of the largest publishers. If you  haven’t read this book, I highly recommend it.

In the introduction, Korda writes, “The bestseller list is therefore neither  as predictable nor as dominating as its critics make it out to be. Plenty of  strange books get onto the list and stay there for a long time…at least half of  the books on any given list are there to the immense surprise and puzzlement of  their publishers. That’s why publishers find it so hard to repeat their  success—half the time they can’t figure out how they happened in the first  place.” (Page xv) I love his honesty. There is no magic bullet and it is  different for every book. The author is key.

Some books start slow and steadily sell then catapult in sales. Other books  begin strong then sales drop to nothing. There is no consistent pattern.

My encouragement is for you to keep experimenting with different methods to  sell your book. Each author has a different experience.

Yesterday I spoke with an author who had sold 8,000 to 10,000 copies of his  self-published books. He had held over 300 book signings for his book. For many  authors book signings have yielded almost nothing but not for this author. He  regularly speaks at schools and service clubs and even AARP meetings.

If you aren’t speaking much as an author, I encourage you to get a copy of  Barbara Techel’s Class Act,  Sell More Books Through School and Library Appearances. This book gives  step-by-step help and is loaded with ideas where you can take action.

What proactive steps can you take to learn a new skill or try some new way to  sell books? It doesn’t matter if your book is brand new or has been in print for  a while. Keep the experimentation going until you hit the elements which work  for your book.

W. Terry Whalin

If you found this post helpful, please use the share buttons to spread the word.

Don’t have a copy of Become A Successful Author? What are you waiting for? Become A Successful Author will be used in the “How To Write That Novel” course at Chicago State because it covers everything from branding to writing to editing to formatting and uploading electronic and print books to marketing and so much more. Your time is money. Look at all the time, thus money, you’ll save by ending your search for answers: Purchase Become A Successful Author for only $4.99 (eBook) or $9.99 (print) from: Amazon (US), Amazon (UK), Barnes & Noble

If You Build It & They Don’t Come

W. Terry WhalinYears ago when I launched my first website, I worked hard at all of the details of this site—the functionality, the appearance and the contents. I was convinced this website would sell tons of books and generate terrific amounts of new writing business. I was stuck in fantasy and not reality because it did not happen.

I often meet unpublished authors who are convinced a website or lots of activity on Facebook is the single answer to sell many books. They have fallen into this trap of believing the line from the movie Field of Dreams, that if they build it, the people will come.

Today I’m wiser and have written more than 60 books for traditional publishers. As a book publisher, I’ve helped more than 150 authors launch their own book. From my years in publishing I want to give you five critical actions to take with your book marketing.

  1. Decide to take 100% responsibility for your book marketing. Many authors have told me about their dismal book sales whether they have been published from a recognized publisher or a self-published. They always want to blame someone or some event. Anything and everything is responsible except their own actions. Your attitude is critical and yes others will help you but you have to lead the charge for telling others about your book.
  2. Be willing to try a limited number of new things. You must focus your book marketing efforts to be successful. I encourage you to be reading books and online materials of others. As you learn about something new, try it and add it to your book marketing strategies. I understand you have to limit the new things or you will run in a million different directions and be completely ineffective at anything. It is important to be open to new opportunities.
  3. Always be learning something new. It is a book marketing attitude killer to feel like you know everything there is to know about selling books. No one knows everything. Look for new ideas through blogs and online reading and reading books. With this open attitude, you will find new opportunities to sell your books to others.
  4. Meet new people. Whether you go to a local Chamber of Commerce meeting or a conference, get out of your office and interact with others. Listen to their ideas and tell them about your own efforts. The cooperation and networking will increase potential for your own book sales. Many authors spend too much time at their keyboard or computer and not enough face to face time with others.
  5. Decide to never give up on your book. Some books are slow starters in the market and take a while to begin selling. Persistence will be your friend when it comes to selling your book. I’ve read an individual has to hear about your book seven times before they actually make a buying decision. Whether it is five or seven times, these readers have to hear about the value of your book repeatedly to make a purchase decision. Your persistence in telling others and reaching new audiences will pay off for you. Never give up.

Finally I want to give you two free resources to help your book marketing efforts. First is a free traffic newsletter from my friend Jimmy D. Brown. His success in Internet Marketing is legendary. Pick up the first issue of his Traffic Jam Newsletter and 10 Ways to Get Other People to Send You Free Traffic. His newsletter will stir ideas.

The second resource is my free Ebook, Platform Building Ideas for Every Author. Get it free at: http://terrylinks.com/pb  Next read this book and take action on the ideas.

You can build it and they will come but only if you continue to promote your book.

W. Terry Whalin

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________________________________________

W. Terry Whalin understands both sides of the editorial desk. A former acquisitions editor and a former literary agent, Terry is a Vice President and Publisher at Intermedia Publishing Group. He has written more than 60 books for traditional publishers including Jumpstart Your Publishing Dreams and several of Terry’s books have sold over 100,000 copies.  He has authored an innovative training for writers, Write A Book Proposal. Terry is an active member of the American Society of Journalists and Authors.

Upcoming Free Workshop: Character Cake (Character Development) Facilitator: Deatri King-Bey Date: May, 19 2012 Time: 4-5 p.m. Central Location: Become A Successful Author Website (link and password will be given the day before the event). Sign up for the newsletter to participate.

Don’t have a copy of Become A Successful Author? What are you waiting for? Become A Successful Author will be used in the “How To Write That Novel” course at Chicago State because it covers everything from branding to writing to editing to formatting and uploading electronic and print books to marketing and so much more. Your time is money. Look at all the time, thus money, you’ll save by ending your search for answers: Purchase Become A Successful Author for only $4.99 (eBook) or $9.99 (print) from: Amazon (US), Amazon (UK), Barnes & Noble

My Adventure as a Mainstream Author Doing Self Published ebooks: Part 2

Shelia M. GossLast month, I discussed why I, a mainstream author, decided to self publish ebooks too My Adventure As A Mainstream Author Doing Self-Published eBooks Part 1. This month, I’ll share my experience with using the Amazon KDP Select program.

I decided since The Commitment Plan and VIP were two of my older titles re-released as ebooks that I would try the KDP Select program and see what the hype was about.

One of the drawing factors to the program was being able to offer the title for free for a limited amount of time. Free? How does that benefit the author financially if the book is free?

Several ways. There are millions of people with Kindles. Unless you’re a Jackie Collins or James Patterson, you may not have a million readers so being able to offer the book for free is a good way to give readers an opportunity to read a book with no strings attached by an author they are not familiar with or who’ve they’ve always wanted to try but was unsure.

Will offering the book for free guarantee future sales? Nothing is 100 percent but from my experience being a part of the KDP program, my sales not only increased for the book that was offered for free but also sales for some of my other titles increased.

I saw sales triple for both The Commitment Plan and VIP after being put on the program. What gave it the boost? Believe it or not is offering the book for free over a one to two day period. I don’t know what the magic is about increasing sales after a free promotion but yes, folks, it works.

When the books were offered for free there were enough downloads to place the books in the top 100 Amazon best sellers list which brought more awareness to the books. Another thing that happened is the books were also offered as a “recommended” read after a customer makes a purchase of another book in that same category.

I experienced the most sales the first six weeks after being in the program. Although sales have waned some from the first six weeks, they are steady.

When is a good time to put your ebook in the KDP program?

  • If your book is an older title being re-released as an ebook, then it may benefit you.
  • If your book is part of a series and you want to get people interested in the series, then it may benefit you.
  • If you noticed low to no sales and need a boost, then it may benefit you.
  • If you only have one title out, it may or may not benefit you.

Another feature of the program that is either a plus or minus is people who have the Amazon Prime Membership will have the option to borrow the book. Authors get paid when the book is borrowed, but the amount paid per borrow will fluctuate. Members are only able to borrow one book per month but can extend the borrow. There aren’t any limits on how many people can borrow one book though.

In my opinion, the only negative I could find with the program is giving exclusive rights to sell for a period of 90 days. That means you can’t sell it on your website or at any of the other online retailers for the specified 90 day period. So people who don’t have Kindles, will not be able to read your book until after you offer it on the other devices after the 90 day period.

Overall, participating in the program has worked for me. Remember, my journey is not every author’s journey. If you decide to try it, put forth your best effort. Stop back by next month when I talk about writing under pen-names, the pros and the cons. 

Are you an author using the Amazon KDP Select program? What have been your personal pros and cons?

Feel free to ask me any questions in the comments field.

Shelia M. Goss

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For a full list of the books in the Shelia Goss eBook Collection go to: http://www.sheliagoss.com/ebooks

Shelia M. Goss is a national best-selling author and a 2012 Emma Award Finalist. She has over thirteen books in print and numerous of ebooks available. She writes in multiple genres. With unique storylines, her goal is to create “stories with a twist.” For more information, visit her website at http://www.sheliagoss.com/

ANNOUNCEMENT: Deatri will be conducting a FREE Character Development workshop for people who are signed up for my monthly newsletter. Workshop: Character Cake Cost: Free Date: Apr, 28 2012 Time: 4-5 p.m. Central Location: Become A Successful Author Website (link and password will be given the day before the event)

Don’t have a copy of Become A Successful Author? What are you waiting for? Become A Successful Author will be used in the “How To Write That Novel” course at Chicago State because it covers everything from branding to writing to editing to formatting and uploading electronic and print books to marketing and so much more. Your time is money. Look at all the time, thus money, you’ll save by ending your search for answers: Purchase Become A Successful Author for only $4.99 (eBook) or $9.99 (print) from: Amazon (US), Amazon (UK), Barnes & Noble

Twitter… Tweeps… Tweeties… Oh My!!!

Ok, let me first say that the creation of Twitter was a godsend to me because I am so random at times, and this social media site let’s me be just that, and others actually want to follow my randomness.

What is Twitter you ask? Well, according to PC Magazine it is –> A very popular instant messaging system that lets a person send brief text messages up to 140 characters in length to a list of followers. Launched in 2006, Twitter was designed as a social network to keep friends and colleagues informed throughout the day. However, it became widely used for commercial and political purposes to keep customers, voters and fans up-to-date as well as to encourage feedback.

After establishing a Twitter account at www.twitter.com/, individuals can import their e-mail addresses as well as use the Twitter search to locate and invite people. Twitter messages (“tweets”) can be made public and sent to anyone requesting the feed, or they can be sent only to approved followers.

Messages can be sent and received via cellphone text messaging (SMS), the Twitter website or a third-party Twitter application. To follow a Twitter feed, the Twitter site and feed name become the URL; for example, Microsoft’s Twitter feed is www.twitter.com/microsoft and for an actual person the twitter feed would be www.twitter.com/kishagreen

What does all of this technical twitter stuff mean to you? Well it means that you can tell the whole world wide web what you ate, plan on eating or don’t want to eat. The beauty is that even though you think this is useless information it is actual relevant to your followers since they find you interesting.

Commonly Used Twitter Lingo

Followers
These are the people who “follow” your tweets. Every time you tweet, these people automatically see it on their timeline, whereas someone else would have to search and find you on Twitter. The same goes for the people you follow; their updates will appear on your timeline

Retweet (RT)
Twitter became a viral conduit when users initiated “retweeting,” which forwards tweets they get to their followers. People retweet to pass on worthwhile information, and the ease of retweeting can quickly build large audiences. This is the same as sharing on Facebook

Direct Messages (DMs)
Initially a one-way broadcast from writer to follower, this is not seen on your timeline this goes to one person’s inbox. Writers can send followers a “direct message” (DM), and followers can do likewise. Followers can also delete the DMs they sent, making them disappear from the writer’s inbox. Please note: You cannot send DM’s to people who are not following you.

@ Signs
When someone replies to a Twitter posting, they use their Twitter account name preceded by an @ sign; for example, “@KishaGreen” This is how you know someone is talking directly to you.

# Hashtags
A hashtag is a # prefix used to group tweets together. For example, people commenting about a Twitter about my online radio show would use #WritersLifeChats in their postings (tweets) and all those messages could be viewed as a group by searching for #WritersLifeChats

Why should you tweet? Because it’s fun! LOL… Seriously, because it is a way to reach any and everyone all at once as opposed to just saying it to the same people on Facebook. Meaning if you have 1700 friends on Facebook and you want to advertise or promote something you are limiting yourself to just those 1700 whereas Twitter let’s you tell the whole world wide web, well all of those with a Twitter account.

How do you tweet? Easy just say what is on your mind, good or bad, but the trick is to keep it under 140 characters, so this requires you to be clever yet creative. You can tweet from a computer, iPads (tablets) and cellphone

Is Tweeting effective? According to Twitter, there are over 200 million registered users, but how many are active users that we don’t know yet. According to Business Insider, there were 119 million Twitter accounts following one or more other accounts. Either way, if you have a business to promote or a product to sell or in my case books to sell, Twitter is where we need to be to connect with a bunch of people for FREE! Yes, I said free. I don’t know about you, but that’s a good enough reason for me.

I promote my radio show, author promo services and my books all on Twitter, and have been more successful with it than on Facebook. How do I do this? Simply, by tweeting all relevant info to them all. If there is someone I want to interview, I tweet them and begin a rapport with them, and then we exchange contact information and from there I arrange my interviews. For selling books, I post pictures (twitpics) of my book cover along with purchasing URL’s. I then tweet about the most random things that to a complete stranger it is interesting and makes them want to follow me and eventually purchase my books. As for my Author Promo Services, I am constantly tweeting pertinent literary information, and those in the industry are interested, and then later on utilize my services. I cannot lie, it does require time and effort, but it is well worth it.

Examples

Book Tweet–> A Write Way to Love by @KishaGreen on Kindle for $2.99. One Click today! #ReadingIsSexy #GoodBook #Ebook

Author Promo Tweet –> Authors: Do you need help promoting your book? Let DivaBooksInc help YOU today. www.divabooksinconline.com #Promo #Books #Marketing

Radio Show Promo Tweet –> Writer’s Life Chats with @KishaGreen Mondays at 7pm www.writerslifechats.com #literaryjewels #authorinterviews #writerslifechats

See how the hashtags are all relevant to all of my tweets BUT most importantly less than 140 characters.

Kisha Green

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Kisha Green is no stranger to the literary world. She is the well-informed, knowledgeable publisher of DivaBooksInc.(www.divabooksinconline.com). Green is a senior writer and founder of the Writer’s Vibe (www.writers-vibe.com) a literary site to help promote artists.

ANNOUNCEMENT: Deatri will be conducting a FREE Character Development workshop for people who are signed up for my monthly newsletter. Workshop: Character Cake Cost: Free Date: Apr, 28 2012 Time: 4-5 p.m. Central Location: Become A Successful Author Website (link and password will be given the day before the event)

Don’t have a copy of Become A Successful Author? What are you waiting for? Become A Successful Author will be used in the “How To Write That Novel” course at Chicago State because it covers everything from branding to writing to editing to formatting and uploading electronic and print books to marketing and so much more. Your time is money. Look at all the time, thus money, you’ll save by ending your search for answers: Purchase Become A Successful Author for only $4.99 (eBook) or $9.99 (print) from: Amazon (US), Amazon (UK), Barnes & Noble

Be Active On Twitter & Automate It

W. Terry WhalinWhen I meet with writers at a conference or on the phone, they will often tell me, “No one knows me or my writing.” Maybe they have written a few magazine articles but never published a book. Or maybe they haven’t published anything but want to get published. Other people have written for magazines or newspapers but never written a book (nonfiction or fiction).

First a reminder: I know of no overnight successes in the publishing business. If you have someone who appears to become an overnight success, then look closer at the journey of that person. I’ve often found they have been in the trenches for years before they achieved their dream of success. OK, with this reality check, now what can you do to begin building your visibility in the community? There is not a singular answer to this question. There are many answers.

One answer is to become active on Twitter. According to Twitter’s site, as of September 14, 2010, there are 175 million users who tweet 95 million times a day. Those numbers are right–a million. What are you waiting for? Let’s get started.

1. Who is your target audience? Who do you want to reach and with what message? It is important from the beginning to select one or two “themes” to your tweets because this consistency will attract your audience and help you.

2. Create your Twitter profile and add your photo and bio. Get more details in my free Ebook, Mastering Twitter in 10 Minutes or Less.

3. Add a distinctive twitter background to your twitter profile. Here’s a free tool to create it.

4. Use a free tool like Hootsuite to send out your tweets and also to schedule them.

5. Locate Twitter Leaders in your area at Twellow. Follow those leaders and learn from their tweets.

6. Use a tool like TweetAdder to automate your twitter process of gaining followers. It is excellent and adding about 100 to 150 followers a day to my Twitter account. You can get 20% off TweetAdder by using code JONB20.

If you don’t like to tweet, then automate your content on Twitter using Google Alerts. Select several key words and pull in content to your twitter account.

Follow these ten steps:

1. Do you have a Gmail account? If not create one. While you are signed on to that Gmail account…

2. Go to Google Alerts

3. Select several phrases that you want to turn on alerts

4. Leave the Type as “comprehensive” or from anywhere on the web

5. Change How Often to “as-it-happens” because you want it throughout the day and fresh

6. Change Deliver to: and select “feed.”

7. When you save it, you will see the feed in Google. Notice the orange icon or the word “feed.” Right click on that and copy out the feed URL because you will need it for the next step.

8. Go to Twitterfeed and log on to this free application using your twitter username and password.

9. After you log on to Twitterfeed, you are creating a new Feed. Give your feed a title and paste the RSS feed URL from Google alerts into the feed spot.

10. Click the Advanced Settings. Change “Update Frequency” to every 30 minutes and post up to “3” new updates at a time.

This ten step system will automatically pull content into your twitter account. I have this system set up for some twitter accounts that I do not monitor as closely as I do for my main twitter account.

It is critical to provide content, point to articles, give free resources and not to engage in hard selling (buy me, buy me). It’s a soft sell approach that works on Twitter. With millions of people on Twitter and using some (or all) of these techniques, every writer can increase their presence and activity on Twitter.

W. Terry Whalin

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W. Terry Whalin, a writer and editor, lives in Scottsdale, Arizona. He has written more than 60 nonfiction books including Jumpstart Your Publishing Dreams. His website is located at: www.terrywhalin.com.

 ANNOUNCEMENT: Deatri will be conducting a FREE Character Development workshop for people who are signed up for my monthly newsletter. Workshop: Character Cake Cost: Free Date: Apr, 28 2012 Time: 4-5 p.m. Central Location: Become A Successful Author Website (link and password will be given the day before the event)

Don’t have a copy of Become A Successful Author? What are you waiting for? Become A Successful Author will be used in the “How To Write That Novel” course at Chicago State because it covers everything from branding to writing to editing to formatting and uploading electronic and print books to marketing and so much more. Your time is money. Look at all the time, thus money, you’ll save by ending your search for answers: Purchase Become A Successful Author for only $4.99 (eBook) or $9.99 (print) from: Amazon (US), Amazon (UK), Barnes & Noble

What to Do When Seeking Reviews

Stacy-DeanneIn my last article I outlined things that writers shouldn’t do when seeking out reviews. The article got a lot of attention and it led people to ask what they should do when seeking reviews.

So by popular request I’ve outlined some pointers below concerning what you should and can do when seeking out reviews.

Do#1: Check out other author’s reviews to find reviewers

I’ve done this myself plenty of times. Look up books of your author pals or authors in your genre on Amazon and Goodreads for example.  Read through their reviews from professional reviewers. Once you’ve found a reviewer you’re interested in, click on their profile. On Goodreads especially, it’s easy to contact reviewers. You can inbox them on the site. If they have a link to their website or blog, visit it. Make sure you pay attention to guidelines before contacting a reviewer. Do not spam them with advertisements or blurbs of your book. Just ask if they would like to review it.

Do#2: Create a list of book review sites and blogs that cater to your genre

You can find book reviewers by doing searches on Google, social networking sites and asking around. Once you’ve found the reviewers you want, gather them up in a list. Some authors prefer to only deal with reviewers who accept ebooks. Some need reviewers for self-published books. Whatever you need, write it down. Keep this list for your future books. You want to gain a bond with reviewers so they will be more willing to review your work down the line.

Do#3: Send out review copies to mainstream reviewers

Mainstream reviewers are reviewers like Publishers Weekly, New York Times, Romantic Times, etc. Mainstream reviewers tend to have strict guidelines. Most accept only print copies. There is no guarantee they will review your book. Most of these places are closed to self-published and ebook authors. Some require publishers to send copies, etc. Mainstream reviewers are more likely to review a book from Simon and Schuster than a book from a small niche press. These reviewers are usually bombarded with submissions so the chances of some authors being reviewed no matter who published their book are slim.

Do#4: Join Goodreads

Goodreads is the most popular book site on the net. The cool thing with GR is that your books are linked to your profile when you become a Goodreads Author.  It’s a wonderful way to network and interact with readers and other industry professionals. Librarians and book reviewers use GR to keep up with new releases. Book reviewers use it to scout for books to review. There are entire groups on GR that are dedicated to giving book reviews. There are also bloggers who offer promotional opportunities like blog tours, interviews, guest blogs and more for authors. The possibilities are endless. Just don’t resort to spamming. Become a part of the community, not just a drive-by author.

Do#5: Only send self-published books to reviewers that review self-published books

It can be hard to get a self-published book reviewed but not impossible. There are many sites dedicated to reviewing self-published books, Kindle books especially. If you’re coming to a dead end then get with other self-published authors and ask who have reviewed their books. A Google search will help too of course. If you are not sure if a particular reviewer reviews SP books (most will say they do or don’t on their sites) then contact them and ask. The downside is that SP authors tremendously outnumber SP reviewers. The competition to get a review is fierce since most SP reviewers are overloaded with requests.

Do#6: Give a list of book reviewers to your publisher

After publishers send ARC’s (advance review copies) they might ask you if you have any reviewers you’d wish to contact. Send a book reviewer list to your publisher. It’s a good idea to send your publisher a list whether they ask or not.  Sometimes publishers aren’t aware of potential reviewers that might be interested in your book.  It’s your job to make sure everything is squared away where reviews are concerned.

Do#7: Create press kits and press releases

With the age of ebooks some people believe press kits and press releases are no longer needed.  It’s always great to have a press kit handy for promotional purposes. Some publishers will create a media kit for you. Some will not. You need to learn how to create an effective press kit and press release. There are many sites where you can post your release for free. Book reviewers will often contact an author if they come across a press release of an upcoming book that seems interesting.

Do#8: Send books to magazines

Most magazines allow authors to send unsolicited books to their review editors or review departments. Look for magazines that cater to your audience and genre. Getting a magazine to review your book is a competitive sport but if you are lucky enough to be granted a review, it can bring you fantastic exposure.  Be aware that most print magazine reviewers don’t accept ebooks or self-published books but some online magazines do.

Do#9:  Follow book reviewers on Twitter.

Book reviewers are notorious for tweeting their latest book reviews as well as soliciting books to review. This is a great way for you to get to know reviewers and there are tons on Twitter. You can send them a direct message asking if they would like to review your work. Do not spam them with advertisements for your published works. Only contact them about a book you’d be interested in them reviewing and leave it at that.

Do#10: Take caution when picking out reviewers

I suggest reading a reviewer’s reviews before contacting them. You wanna make sure the reviewer is reputable and respectable. You don’t want a review from just anyone. Also you wanna look at the reviewer’s personality and tone when they review a book. Some reviewers are harsh. If you can’t handle the possibility of a tough review then don’t contact tough reviewers. Some reviewers will tell you like it is without sugarcoating so these are not for those authors without a thick skin.

Do#11: Thank the reviewer if they agree to review your book

If you are contacting reviewers on your own, you should thank a reviewer for agreeing to review your book.  You aren’t obligated but politeness goes a long way in this industry.

Do#12: Follow up with a reviewer if they haven’t gotten back with you on an accepted request

If a reviewer is late with a promised review then contact the reviewer. Some reviewers get thousands of review requests a day so keep that in mind. Smaller sites like book blogs aren’t usually backed up but large review sites often are.  Sometimes reviewers have to pull out of doing a review altogether. Don’t take it personally. It’s best to contact reviewers about three months before your book is released.

Do#13: Keep a positive attitude

If you think you can’t get any reviews then you won’t get any reviews. The art of positive thinking is a necessity during review searching. Keep an open mind and be organized.  It starts with a solid plan.

Resources:

John Kremer’s Book Market

http://www.bookmarket.com/newspapers.htm

(A fabulous writer’s resource for reviews and promotional opportunities)

Step-by-Step Self-Publishing

http://www.stepbystepselfpublishing.net/reviewer-list.html

(Great resource for SP authors to find reviewers)

Stacy-Deanne:  Crime/Mystery &  Suspense Novelist

NOTE: Be sure to view What Not To Do When Seeking Reviews

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ANNOUNCEMENT: Hello All, Dee here. I’ll be conducting a FREE eBook formatting workshop for people who are signed up for my monthly newsletter.
Topic: eBook Formatting Basics for Fiction Titles Cost: Free Date: March, 24, 2012 Time: 3-4 p.m. Central Location: Become A Successful Author Website (link and password will be given the day before the event)

Don’t have a copy of Become A Successful Author? What are you waiting for? Become A Successful Author will be used in the “How To Write That Novel” course at Chicago State because it covers everything from branding to writing to editing to formatting and uploading electronic and print books to marketing and so much more. Your time is money. Look at all the time, thus money, you’ll save by ending your search for answers: Purchase Become A Successful Author (eBook) for only $4.99 from: Amazon (US), Amazon (UK), Barnes & Noble  or print copies for only $7.99 by using the Contact page of this website and tell Dee know how many copies you’d like and shipping address. She’ll email the ordering information. Or you can purchase the print version from any book store for $9.99.

Conferences – Spend Your Money Wisely!

Iris BollingConferences – to go or not to go? That is the questions. The answer isn’t simple. In the short time I’ve been writing, I’ve attended several events or conferences. Some I left feeling unimportant, degraded and lower than dirt, as if I was totally out of my league. What made you think you were worthy of being in the same room with BIG name authors??? That was of course after I had spent my money to attend and was promised the world only to have it all pulled away.

But then….there are some that are the epitome of what author conferences should be about. You meet other authors in the industry. Some at the same in your career as you, some that have been in the industry for years and some that are just beginning to enter into the wonderful realm of being an author. And here’s the thing, you can learn something from every one of them. Then there are the readers. Those wonderful, delightful, hilarious readers that are not shy about telling you exactly how they feel about your work. Not to mention the workshops that teaches you about your craft, the industry, the business of writing. And the networking with agents, editors, publishers—there is nothing like a good conference.

There are several that take place each year, and no, you cannot attend and should not attempt to attend all of them. You will be broke before you sell your first novel. However, you should find one or two that will fulfill your need to improve your craft, build your brand and feed your drive to write. Every conference is not for everyone and it takes a minute to find the ones that fit your needs, but once you do, the rewards are endless.

Here are three conferences that seem to be popular and please anyone that reads this post add the ones you know about in the comment section.

There’s the Romance Writers of America Conference (http://www.rwa.org/ ),

The National Black Bookclub Conference (http://www.nationalbookclubconference.com/),

The Romance Slam Jam Conference (http://www.romanceslamjam.org/ ).

Why am I talking to you about conferences? I’m glad you asked. For the last two years I’ve attended the RSJ, Romance Slam Jam Conference. The event has proven to be not only worth the reasonable fess, but it is so worth your time. The RSJ will leave you energized and ready to take on the next year of challenges, adventures, setbacks and comebacks. You will leave there with lifelong friends, new readers, mentors with wisdom and experiences to help you along your journey but most of all—you will leave there with a sense of ownership of your writing career.

To be fair, I put in a conference I no plans to attend again, one I have not attended and one I will move heaven and earth not to ever miss. You have to select the one that works for you.

Until the next time,

Iris  Bolling
www.sirient.com
www.irisbolling.com

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ANNOUNCEMENT: Hello All, Dee here. I’ll be conducting a FREE eBook formatting workshop for people who are signed up for my monthly newsletter.
Topic: eBook Formatting Basics for Fiction Titles Cost: Free Date: March, 24, 2012 Time: 3-4 p.m. Central Location: Become A Successful Author Website (link and password will be given the day before the event)

Don’t have a copy of Become A Successful Author? What are you waiting for? Become A Successful Author will be used in the “How To Write That Novel” course at Chicago State because it covers everything from branding to writing to editing to formatting and uploading electronic and print books to marketing and so much more. Your time is money. Look at all the time, thus money, you’ll save by ending your search for answers: Purchase Become A Successful Author (eBook) for only $4.99 from: Amazon (US), Amazon (UK), Barnes & Noble  or print copies for only $7.99 by using the Contact page of this website and tell Dee know how many copies you’d like and shipping address. She’ll email the ordering information. Or you can purchase the print version from any book store for $9.99.

The Learning Never Stops

Renee Daniel FlaglerHoning your skills as a writer is vital to the pursuit of a successful writing career. Like editing, the learning never really stops. One of the best ways to hone your writing skills is to constantly challenge yourself. Continuous learning is the key to perfecting any skill. When it comes to writing, no matter how seasoned you are, there’s always room for improvement.  Many prolific writers use writing prompts to fine tune their skills.

Allow the first draft of every story to flow naturally. Do not try to disrupt the creative flow by being overly concerned about grammar, sentence structure and other technical issues. Initially, keep your focus on getting your story out. Once you’ve gotten the story out of your head and onto paper (or into your laptop) then go back and begin to shape the story into a crafty, well-written tale. This is where you first begin to challenge yourself. Examine your first draft and determine all the ways you can improve upon your story. How can you make the second version better than the first?

Read, read and then read some more. As a writer, reading is imperative. I can’t stand it when a writer says, “I don’t read.” I know that I’m won’t be interested in anything that they write since I doubt I’ll learn anything them. Even when a writer reads for entertainment, learning inadvertently happens. Staying in the realm of the written word helps to massage your writing muscles. Chose books from various genres and authors of all walks of life. Pay attention to all of the techniques other author’s use to pull you into a story. Study these elements and try to perfect them in your own work.

Writing workshops and classes are available at libraries, schools and conference centers across the country. You may even consider enrolling into an MFA program. You will be amazed by how much you can learn about yourself as a writer. Take advantage of these courses to help you hone your skill, get started on that next novel or simply find out more about the world of writing. Take a variety of courses to help you develop your skill. Whether you are a seasoned writer or just starting out, you’re bound to learn something new.

Now sit down and write something fabulous!

Renee Daniel Flagler
www.reneedanielflagler.com
www.facebook.com/ReneeDanielFlagler
www.twitter.com/ReneeFlagler
www.shebiz.net

If you found this post useful, please use the Share links to spread the word to other authors.

ANNOUNCEMENT: Hello All, Dee here. I’ll be conducting a FREE eBook formatting workshop for people who are signed up for my monthly newsletter.
Topic: eBook Formatting Basics for Fiction Titles Cost: Free Date: March, 24, 2012 Time: 3-4 p.m. Central Location: Become A Successful Author Website (link and password will be given the day before the event)

Don’t have a copy of Become A Successful Author? What are you waiting for? Become A Successful Author will be used in the “How To Write That Novel” course at Chicago State because it covers everything from branding to writing to editing to formatting and uploading electronic and print books to marketing and so much more. Your time is money. Look at all the time, thus money, you’ll save by ending your search for answers: Purchase Become A Successful Author (eBook) for only $4.99 from: Amazon (US), Amazon (UK), Barnes & Noble  or print copies for only $7.99 by using the Contact page of this website and tell Dee know how many copies you’d like and shipping address. She’ll email the ordering information. Or you can purchase the print version from any book store for $9.99.

Readers Speak Out: Authors’ Online Marketing Techniques

DeatriThough I’m an author, I always try to view my actions in social media type groups from the perspective of a reader. To ensure I’m not allowing my author status to taint my view, I often ask readers for their opinion/habits on items. Last month I took it to the people (readers) and asked several questions I believe authors need to hear the answers to. My sample came from reading groups of romance, multicultural-romance, urban lit, chick lit, sci-fi, fantasy, mainstream fiction and general reading groups from social media sites such as Yahoo groups, Facebook, MySpace, Kindleboards…

Instead of placing all of the replies in this post, I will give you the strong themes I saw repeated in the replies of each question. I also asked if the respondents were authors and/or aspiring authors and threw out those responses if they were.

I started off easy:  For those of you who own an iPad, where do you purchase the majority of your eBooks?

  • Only 32 people answered this question. All of them said Amazon and quite a few purchase their eBooks from Amazon and Barnes & Noble. Only two said they also purchase from the iBookstore.

Next came the tough questions:

What behaviors in groups (ie: Yahoo groups, Facebook) do authors have that turn you off from purchasing their book(s).  There were two common themes that just about all of the respondents had. I’ve picked two reader responses that capture the essence of the 200+ replies. (Note: I have done a little proofing of the replies and edited out group names.)

  • Turn-offs for me are when authors constantly post a link to their books saying “Buy my book” and pressure me to buy their books if I haven’t purchased them yet. So I’m supposed to buy your book because you’ve flooded my group with your cover and buy link? How about announcing your book once, then posting something more interesting like an interview or a review at later dates? I stress “a review” because I get tired of authors coming in with every review they get, and I also get tired of authors begging for reviews. I’ve had to leave many groups because they’ve been taken over by author promotions.
  • When authors network with your group “until” you purchase their book, and then afterwards they hardly have time to even say “hello.”

Here are additional strong sentiments from readers I polled. Again, I’ll pick a few of the responses that capture the essence of the reader’s feelings:

  • I hate it when an author adds me to groups and their email lists without my permission. I hate, hate, hate, hate this! Did I say I hate this?
  • Things that turn me off from purchasing an author’s book is when you are a fan of that particular author and you give them a compliment or a shout out on a book they’ve written. You take the time to buy the book, read it, rate it and express to them how much you love their work, and they basically ignore you. I’m not saying they need to bend over backwards or anything or you should be some kind of stalker, but just an expression of gratitude that someone is actually paying their money to support you in your endeavors to spin your craft would be nice.
  • Authors who have absolutely no clue what the group is about. I belong to a Nook reading group. We all own Nooks and Nook is in the name of the group. So why do authors post Amazon links to Kindle books that aren’t available on Nook? Because the authors don’t care, they just push their books.
  • Drive by promoters. Authors who ask to be my friend, then instead of even asking how my day was, they start posting “like my page,” or “buy my book,” all over my feed. I also don’t like it when authors join groups and the first thing I see from them is “buy my book.” That’s all they have to say. How about joining the conversation? How about getting to know us and letting us get to know you?
  • I’m in a group where I swear every comment this particular author has goes back to her book. I’m serious, it’s like every email is somehow related to her book.
  • I gave an author a negative review because I didn’t like her book. She was in one of the groups I belong to complaining about my review and how she’d gotten 25 great reviews and mine was the only negative one, so I must not know what I’m talking about. I don’t think she realized I was in the group and the one who wrote the review. I was so angry. A few others jumped into the conversation, but I remained quiet and decided not to purchase this author’s books again. I would have given the author a second chance, but not after this.

What motivates you to click an author’s purchase link? (Note: I only received around 50 responses to this question.) Here are two responses that capture the essence of the responses.

  • I’ve belonged to a group on Yahoo for three years now, and there are certain authors who actually participate in conversations, give and take. It’s about more than their book. I usually buy these authors’ books.
  • What motivates me to buy an author’s book is feedback, reviews, reading the synopsis and reading the samples. Also if they’re a new author overall promotion (friendly in groups) will help in making me more willing to give them a try.

Let’s say you read a novel. Now what about the novel makes you not want to read another book by this author?

  • Over 100 answered this and almost all of them said poor editing. I’m an editor so followed up with many of the respondents and asked what they meant by editing. The majority of them said the manuscript needed to be proof read. Many of them said the plots had holes or inconsistencies and such.
  • There were a few responses such as the back cover blurb didn’t match the book, but otherwise, the readers said they just didn’t like the author’s style.

What do you think about free and $ 0.99 eBooks? I received mixed reviews on this question. Of the 77 who answered, here are the replies that captured the main themes.

  • I like the cheap books to get to know an author. I find a lot of them are poorly edited. I’ve noticed a lot of free eBooks on Amazon lately that aren’t too bad. Much better than the $0.99 eBooks.
  • I will not purchase another $ 0.99 eBook or download a free eBook unless I know the author. I can’t stand another poorly edited book.

I’m sure none of the responses were a surprise, and this was by no means a scientific study, but many times we (authors) get so in the promote-promote-promote mode that we don’t realize we are turning off our readers. Learn from what’s been said by the readers.

Deatri King-Bey

Please help your fellow authors by sharing posts you find helpful.

Don’t have a copy of Become A Successful Author? What are you waiting for? Become A Successful Author will be used in the “How To Write That Novel” course at Chicago State because it covers everything from branding to writing to editing to formatting and uploading electronic and print books to marketing and so much more. Your time is money. Look at all the time, thus money, you’ll save by ending your search for answers: Purchase Become A Successful Author (eBook) for only $4.99 from: Amazon (US), Amazon (UK), Barnes & Noble  or print copies for only $7.99 by using the Contact page of this website and tell Dee know how many copies you’d like and shipping address. She’ll email the ordering information.

What Not to Do When Seeking out Reviews

Whether you like it or not book reviews are an important tool when it comes to promoting books. The jury is out on whether reviews actually influence readers to make their decisions but one thing’s for sure, reviews bring attention to books and you can’t have sales without attention.

I hear you mumbling from here. “Oh but Stacy it’s such a pain in the butt to gather reviews.” True but this is a necessary evil you must learn to like.  Most new authors don’t realize there are certain rules in the industry when it comes to seeking reviewers. Well, I’m here to help.

Below are nine things you shouldn’t ever do when seeking out reviews.  Imbed these into your mind and learn from them.

Don’t #1: Approach published authors you do not know for a review

This is definitely not recommended. There is a difference between asking an author to blurb your book but never ask an author you don’t know to review or critique your work. Soliciting an author for a review is intrusive. Unless the author is also a reviewer and actively seeking books to review, cross authors off your reviewer list.

Don’t #2: Send a reviewer your book before asking them for a review

Make sure you follow guidelines for a reviewer before contacting them. Most reviewers prefer an author or publisher to contact them before sending them a book to review.

Don’t #3: Hold a grudge against a reviewer who declined to review your book

Sometimes reviewers will decline to review your book. It doesn’t mean they don’t like you or wouldn’t be interested in reading it. Reviewers have TBR lists like you wouldn’t believe and sometimes it’s impossible for them to finish the books they’ve already committed to. If a reviewer declines your book remember that rejection comes with the territory of writing. Suck it up and cross the reviewer off your list for now. But don’t hold a grudge against them on a personal level.  You might wanna contact them for a review again some day.

Don’t #4: Hassle friends and family for reviews

Friends and family members are the first ones to promise reviews and most of them never even read your book. That’s life. Whether your book is already out or is soon to be released, don’t beg and hassle friends or family to write a review for you. If you got to ask them there might be a reason. They might not like your book or might not have even read it. That might be tough to swallow but this is where you gotta realize that the world doesn’t revolve around your book. Let family and friends decide on their own whether to review your book. You don’t wanna be the annoying dope they all run from because they are afraid you’ll ask them about your book.

Don’t #5: Contact reviewers who do not review your genre

 Enough said.

Don’t #6: Beg people on Facebook for reviews

I can’t count how many times I see authors and even publishers begging for reviews on Facebook. This is unprofessional and tacky. The more you annoy people, the less they’ll be interested in reviewing your book.  You can contact reviewers on Facebook unless they say otherwise but leave the general public alone.

Don’t #7: Stalk readers who have read your book and hound them for a review

If you see that someone on Goodreads has read your book don’t contact them asking them to review it. This will put the reader on the spot. They might not want to review it. If a reader intends to review the book then they will. They are not obligated to review a book.  Don’t be that nutty author that stalks for reviews. No one will want anything to do with you.

Don’t #8: Speak negatively about a reviewer in public

Don’t badmouth reviewers or anyone in public. Whether the reviewer declined to review your work or didn’t respond back to you, don’t post about it on FB, your blog or anywhere else.  If you do and other reviewers see this, they most likely will keep their distance from you and your book.

Don’t #9: Expect the publisher to get reviews

Most publishers will get reviews for you or at least aid you in getting them. But some won’t lift a finger to get you one review.  It’s your responsibility to know which type of publisher yours is beforehand. Don’t sit around for months before your release date assuming your publisher will get you reviews. You’ll end up scrambling for reviews at the last minute.

Stacy-Deanne

Be sure to view the post: What To Do When Seeking Out Reviews

Please help your fellow authors by sharing posts you find helpful.

Don’t have a copy of Become A Successful Author? What are you waiting for? Become A Successful Author will be used in the “How To Write That Novel” course at Chicago State because it covers everything from branding to writing to editing to formatting and uploading electronic and print books to marketing and so much more. Your time is money. Look at all the time, thus money, you’ll save by ending your search for answers: Purchase Become A Successful Author (eBook) for only $4.99 from: Amazon (US), Amazon (UK), Barnes & Noble  or print copies for only $7.99 by using the Contact page of this website and tell Dee know how many copies you’d like and shipping address. She’ll email the ordering information.

Make It Easy For Readers To Buy Your Book

DeatriMany authors believe they are making it easy for readers to purchase their books, when in reality, they aren’t.  When I’m on social media sites I often see promos from authors on the lines of “1-Click” for a great read and there’s a handy-dandy link to the Amazon product page. Great job.

This is where most authors stop. And I feel confident saying “most” because I belong to a lot of reader groups, and the overwhelming majority of authors only promote the Amazon product page link for their books. I was in that crew. Shame on me.

I’m also an avid reader who owns a Nook Color. When I see a book that I like, I get the pertinent information from the author’s promo (which usually leads to Amazon), then I hop my happy little electronic butt on to Barns & Noble and download the book onto my Nook if it is available. I never gave it a second thought. Not until one of my readers complained that my books weren’t available on Nook.

I was completely confused. My eBooks are on Kindle and Nook. This reader had been introduced to my writing through my print editions and now followed me on Facebook so saw my announcements when eBooks became available. After a short discussion, I learned that when she sees a link on social media for a book, if it is for a Kindle book, she moves on because she has a Nook. Hmmmm, this got me to thinking.

I conducted an experiment. The month of December when I promoted my eBooks, I gave the link for the Amazon and the Barnes & Noble product pages, and guess what? My Nook sells took off. I had been averaging $30 a month in Nook sells. My December sells were almost $300. Needless to say, I was floored. Now in all fairness, I place the majority of my titles on sale the month of December so the number of sells usually increases for that month, but I drop the price of the books $2-4 to $1.99 so I make a lot less per sell. Also, the previous December, I made $35.

Your title may be available from several sites. Find the audience for each of those sites and let them know your book is there. Make it easy for readers to buy your book.

Let’s talk about another trend I’ve been seeing that as a reader I find annoying. Authors who only have a Facebook, Twitter and/or some other social media account. As a reader, I do not want to have to play detective to purchase your book. I saw this really nice cover the other day on Facebook. I was like, “Okay, where’s the rest of the information, such as where to buy it.” I had extra time so went to the author’s Facebook page and again saw the cover splattered several times on this author’s wall. She must have placed her cover on several of her friends that we share. Anywhooo, still no information on how to buy this book. So instead of going to Barnes & Noble, I decided to read the author’s information tab in hopes she had a link to her website where I could view all of her books and maybe learn a little something about her. I get there and there was no website. Okay, soooooo, I head on over to Barnes & Noble, and the book isn’t there. Next I head onto Amazon and wha’la, the book was available in print.

Many newer authors are starting to use social media such as Facebook to replace having a website. In my opinion, this is a big, Big, BIG mistake. Your website is the showroom for your titles. From your webpage, I should be able to purchase your book, join your mailing list, learn a little something about you, follow your career… I have a friend who posts things to her Facebook page, then gets upset when people don’t know what she posted. Many people do not read though their newsfeed daily. Same concept applies to other social medial.

While we are on the subject of webpages, the concept of “make it easy for readers to buy your book” still applies. I visited a few authors’ websites over the past month and was amazed at how many times I was tempted to hire a detective to help find the purchase links. You don’t need to place a huge red button that says “Click Here To Buy My Books,” but don’t hide the links. If possible, have a purchase or access to the purchase links on every page of your site.

In the end, remember, make it easy for readers to buy your book.

Deatri King-Bey

Please help your fellow authors by sharing posts you find helpful.

 

Don’t have a copy of Become A Successful Author? What are you waiting for? Become A Successful Author will be used in the “How To Write That Novel” course at Chicago State because it covers everything from branding to writing to editing to formatting and uploading electronic and print books to marketing and so much more. Your time is money. Look at all the time, thus money, you’ll save by ending your search for answers: Purchase Become A Successful Author (eBook) for only $4.99 from: Amazon (US), Amazon (UK), Barnes & Noble  or print copies for only $7.99 by using the Contact page of this website and tell Dee know how many copies you’d like and shipping address. She’ll email the ordering information.