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Articles about book / author promotion and marketing, and author platform.

Interview/Review: Be Still and Know That I Am

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 Interview/Review for my new novel "Be Still and Know That I Am" written and conducted by Garry Crystal :  

5 Ways to Publish a Book for iPad, iPhone, and iPod

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This post, by Dana Lynn Smith, originally appeared on the BookBuzzr Blog on 4/22/11.

There’s no doubt that ebooks are hot. Although Amazon’s Kindle ebook reader is the most popular ebook reading device, many readers also enjoy books on Apple devices. Here are five ways of publishing a book for the iPad, iPhone, and iPod Touch.

1. Publish to the Amazon Kindle store.

It may seem strange to talk about Kindle in a discussion on publishing a book for iPad and other Apple devices, but Amazon offers a free Kindle reading app for iPad and for iPhone and iPod Touch. The apps allow readers to purchase and read Kindle books on these Apple devices.

 

The Los Angeles Times reported that 31 percent of iPad owners consume ebooks using the Kindle app rather than Apple’s own iBooks app, so having your ebook in the Kindle store certainly makes it available to iPad users. Among avid readers who go through 25 books or more a year, 44 percent prefer using the Kindle app on the iPad. And according to a study by JPMorgan, 40 percent of iPad owners also own a Kindle.

To learn more about publishing ebooks for the Amazon Kindle store, read April Hamilton’s free guide. Go to http://indieauthorguide.com/?page_id=24 and click on “Indie Author Guide To Kindle Publishing.”

2. Use an ebook publishing service.

Another way of publishing a book for iPad is to use an ebook publishing service that will
get your book listed in the ebookstores for Apple, Barnes & Noble, Sony and more. My favorite ebook publishing service is Smashwords. There’s no upfront cost and you receive a hefty percentage of the sales price as a royalty. Get general information on Smashwords here and learn more about publishing a book for iPad on this page. Be sure to download and read the Smashwords Style Guide.

Note that both Apple and Sony require ebooks listed in their stores to have a unique ISBN (different from the print version of the book). Smashwords can provide a free or low cost ISBN, or you can buy ISBNs from your country’s ISBN registrar (Bowker in the United States) .

Smashwords works well for novels and other books that are made up of plain text with some subheads. If your book needs special formatting, you may need to hire an ebook formatting service and publish directly to the various ebookstores.

3. Publish an ebook directly to Apple’s iBookstore.

 

Read the rest of the post, which includes three more ebook publishing options, on the BookBuzzr Blog.

How To Write Fight Scenes With Alan Baxter

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In today’s interview I get very enthusiastic about writing fight scenes with the brilliant Alan Baxter who combines his martial arts life with writing.

Alan Baxter is the author of Realmshift and Magesign, speculative fiction novels published by Gryphonwood Press as well as a podcaster with Thrillercast, on writing and reading thriller novels. Alan is also a martial arts instructor with 25 years experience and has published “Write the Fight Right” in order to help authors write more effective fight scenes.  **warning – there are a few mild swear-words in the interview**Video interview is below the text.

  

Podcast: Download (Duration: 43:12 — 25.7MB)

 

If you want to improve your own fight scene writing, you can join our Fight Scene MasterClass – click here to register your interest.

In this interview, you will learn:

  • Constant improvement in both martial arts and writing. You never finish becoming a better writer or better at martial arts. There is discipline in both. Alan has always done both and the book has sprung from a workshop he does for writers which combines both of his loves.
  • I went to a Krav Maga class last weekend and got my ass kicked and we talk about this and how I was completely out of my comfort zone. There was a lot of adrenalin and I’m covered in bruises but it was good experience.
  • What is it like when a non-fighter is in a fight? What does it feel like when you don’t have the experience of fighting? From a character’s perspective, you need to understand responses. There is  the classic fight, flight or freeze. If you have no experience and are not aggressive, you will react differently. It is also surprising how people react when threatened. From a writer’s point of view, take the character’s personality and how they would react in other situations e.g. being upset, angry – would they just run away? The situation also makes a difference e.g. defense of a child vs. self-defense.
  • What does a professional see and feel? It’s important to relax which is very difficult when under stress. The more relaxed you are, the more control you have over yourself. Constant training for peripheral vision is important. It happens in normal life but when threatened, there is tunnel vision and you lose peripheral vision. A good fighter will see a punch or a kick coming which comes from practice of watching how the body moves. You can see from other signals how they will move. This will give more time in the fight which untrained people don’t have.
  • The attraction of violence for writers and ‘normal’ people. It is partly escapism as most people haven’t had a fight. Fighting is awful and the first defense is run away. When you are writing action, it is good fun and adrenalin on a fun level whereas if we were actually in that situation it would be awful. It’s also the natural extension of conflict in stories. You don’t need to write what you know. You can write what you find out about. Research is one of the most fun things about writing, especially in thrillers as you can go rent a fast car, or go shooting (and it could be tax deductible!)
  • Movie fight scenes vs writing a proper fight scene. The movies are a visual genre and the fight scenes are awful. They are choreographed for 2 dimensions and so are a turn-based arrangement. People never take turns in fights. People regularly punch each other at the same time. It is chaos, not choreographed. In writing, we don’t have a 2D environment. We can be in the heads of the people, we can explore sounds and smells as well as visceral contact. Fighting is barely controlled chaos.
  • Fight scenes should also not be blow by blow physical description, a bit like sex scenes – don’t make it too clinical. It should be fast and furious and chaotic. It’s good to have a bit of experience through classes or something. Have the writing match the pace e.g. shorter sentences, less detail. When you’re fighting, you don’t have that detail. If you saw the punch coming, you would move or block. The writing cannot be slow.
  • Is there an internal sense when writing fight scenes? There is no dialogue while fighting. It never goes like that. You don’t have time, although there may be a few sharp words but no conversation. An experienced fighter will have a bit more time for internal dialogue but all a novice will do is not think or panic thoughts. There is very little coherence.
  • Training is about knowing how it feels. Something happens, we react without thinking. By practicing, you can understand how adrenalin feels and how to react but most people don’t have this.
  • Gender differences in fight scenes. Alan’s wife is a martial arts instructor as well. In books, women are often beaten on and defended by guys but I have a female protagonist who kicks ass. Can women beat a guy? Yes and no. It depends on training but there is always an advantage in big, heavy and strong. That’s why there are weight differences in pro fights. Skill and training, speed and footwork, learning the right targets to hit – these can all balance out the difference. More vulnerable targets are smaller, harder to find but women would maybe have to hit there. Women can defeat big guys but they are at a disadvantage. Women also take longer to get used to hitting anything, even pads in class. It is more confronting for girls to be violent but once they get into it, they are usually enthusiastic! So give your female protagonist some training and they will have a better chance!
  • Creating a setting that will make a fight more interesting in your writing. Whatever environment you are in, you need to use and make it real. In a bar, you need to have lots of chairs, other people, bottles, glass – use the environment. When writing, you can set up a good place to fight that is more interesting e.g. restaurant means you can move into kitchen with knives, hot water etc vs/ a field with nothing interesting to use.
  • What is the role of bystanders in a fight? How do people react? In this day and age, the first reaction is to pull out a phone and start filming for YouTube. Then some people will have nothing to do with it, they will leave or ignore it. Or the people who will call the police or try to stop it. It depends on the person and also their experience. If you do get involved, it may be dangerous. There are gender differences in reactions as well.
  • What happens after the fight? I was shocked by how exhausted I was and bruised just from a class. How do our characters feel afterwards? (in a fist fight, not a gun or knife) Chinese saying – When two tigers fight, one limps away horribly wounded, the other is dead. If you fight, you will get hurt. You will absolutely have physical results and many movies show people carrying on fine, even after concussion. You need to have a realistic recovery period. Adrenalin also has a long lasting effect on the body. That happens with real fighting too but the adrenalin will always be there. If you even get in the one punch that finishes it, you will likely hurt your hand. Being hit in the face means you can’t chew or eat. The first time a person gets hit, it is a shocking experience and many people break down. It’s unsettling. There are always effects.
  • On writing fight scene cliches. When you write the scene, go back and check whether you have transcribed a movie fight scene and rewrite. Get more chaotic and less removed from the fight. Engage emotion. Some of the cliches are true e.g. tunnel vision – so it’s more about how you deal with them. Keep the writing fast.

You can find “Write the Fight Right” on Amazon and other online bookstores. You can find Alan and his other books and short stories at AlanBaxterOnline.com and on twitter @alanbaxter

If you want to improve your own fight scene writing, you can join our Fight Scene MasterClass – click here to register your interest.

 

This is a reprint from Joanna Penn‘s The Creative Penn.

19 Ways to Get More Readers for Your Author Blog

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Author blogs are an intrinsic part of your author platform. You can get more readers for your blog. You may have read many of these ideas before, but let me ask you: How many have you done in the last 30 days?

Blogging is a marathon, not a sprint. You are building a media asset, and that takes time. Many of these techniques take a little effort and can be done in a few minutes a day. There is never going to be a day when you do them all at once, so look at it more like a menu.

 

  1. Write more often—if you don’t have enough traffic, write more often. This is not necessarily good news, since you may feel you already have enough to do. But when you’re growing a blog, there’s no better way to increase the energy flow to your blog than increasing the amount of energy you put into your blog.
     
  2. Write better articles—look at the last 10 articles you’ve posted to your blog. How many did people really care about? How many did you write for yourself, more than your readers? If you have to, and in contradiction to #1 above, write less frequently but better.
     
  3. Do something different—give readers a reason to come to your blog. If you’re doing what everyone else in your niche is doing, why should they? What is it that no one has done? What angle is uncovered? What insight is lacking in the conversation?
     
  4. Do something big—create a big list, a smashing resource directory, an exhaustive collection of tools, a survey of every viewpoint on a subject. Whatever it is, make it useful, the kind of thing you yourself would link to or bookmark for future reference.
     
  5. Kidnap a celebrity—interview the biggest star in your niche, or the most controversial, or the person with the biggest blog in your field. Aim as high as you can, you will be surprised. Make a regular feature of profiling or interviewing movers and shakers in your industry.
     
  6. Start an argument—disagree loudly with an established authority in your field, an “A-list” blogger, or the institutional overseers of your domain. Demand a response.
     
  7. Rant—find an injustice in your field, something blatantly unfair or a monopolistic company taking advantage of the little guy. Rant about it, invite others to contribute.
     
  8. Guest post—take your show on the road. Create a goal to contribute to someone else’s blog on a related topic once a week, once a month, whatever you can do. Query bloggers and read their archives. Fashion a headline for an article they’ll find irresistible.
     
  9. Comment—leave comments that add to the discussion, that amplify what others have said, that disagree respectfully with the author, that bring something to the table. Pick 5 or 10 blogs and stay in touch with them, commenting when appropriate.
     
  10. Upload articles—put some articles on articles sites like ezinearticles.com and make sure you link back to your blog. Use the same keywords you use in your blog posts.
     
  11. Explore your analytics—dive into your blog’s analytics to find the keywords people are using to arrive at your blog, then. . .
     
  12. Research keywords—use keyword tools to find as many keywords related to your blog as you can. Compare different forms of common terms in your field, since they can have radically different search volumes. Use this information when you write your blog posts.
     
  13. Curate content—serve up links to content elsewhere that you’ve checked out. Use your expertise and the time you spend surfing to collect links that others will find useful. Use social media to spread these links and do link posts on your blog to save others the time of finding great content.
     
  14. Run contests—have a regular contest, giveaway, prize, sweepstakes, awards or some way to create an event. Use your blog to promote it and ask participants to link back.
     
  15. Frequent forums—make a habit of commenting on forum threads that concern your topic. Like commenting, aim to improve, amplify or otherwise contribute to the ongoing conversation. Don’t forget to put a link to your blog in your signature that shows up when you post a comment.
     
  16. Give something away—put together an e-book, a PDF, a template, a checklist, a special report, a worksheet or anything else that others can get real value from. Give it away every day, not just once. Make sure people know they can share it with everyone, and remember to put a live link back to your blog in the giveaway.
     
  17. Write list posts—write the top 7 things, the best 9 widgets, the 5 things people haven’t considered, the 9 top places to get stuff, the 5 best tools for the job, and the 3 reasons list posts beat all others.
     
  18. Take a course—there are several excellent blogging courses that will teach you a huge amount about blogging and gaining traffic. Blog Mastermind is the one I used to grow this blog, and you can find others. Invest in yourself, it pays. (affiliate link)
     
  19. Ask readers—run a survey, ask for comments, ask your readers what they need, what articles they would like to read, where they are stuck, what they need help with.

Blogging is more fun, and more effective, when you have more readers. Every blogger wants more readers, but you have to spend time on more than just your writing to get that blog traffic.

Pick a couple of these ideas and put in 15 minutes today. It takes many little streams to build to a river.

Got something to add to the list?

 

This is a reprint from Joel Friedlander‘s The Book Designer.

How To Build A List Of Readers For Your Next Book Launch

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So you’ve written a book and you’re about to publish it. Maybe you know you’re going to write another, maybe you have six more planned in the series, or maybe you have no idea what will come next, but you think perhaps you should know who your readers are. These days we all have to market ourselves and if you can market directly to people who love your work, it’s that much easier.

You are in the most powerful position right now to capture information about your market.

If you have no website, no twitter following, no social media presence at all, no speaking platform – nothing else at all – you can still start building a list of people who like your writing.If you have all these things, you can still capture a specific list who love your books.

Simply add to the end of the book a link to a website with a sign up list.

You can do this inside your print book or at the end of your Kindle book. Even if your book is out there, you can modify your files for print on demand or ebooks. So it’s not too late for anyone.

The example right is at the end of Pentecost and www.ProphecyNovel.com points to a signup page.

How do you actually set up list-building software?

Read about the basics of list-building here. I use Aweber (affiliate link) which is one of the best and most highly reputable services as well as being easy to use. You also need a site to put it on (you can use a wordpress.com free site) and a URL if you want an easy to remember one. This one just points back to a page on this blog so nothing too exciting there but I will point it to a special page once Prophecy gets going e.g. free chapters etc.

This has the obvious benefit of giving you a list of people who liked your book enough to sign up for the next one. You can email them directly when you have your next book out or send out information prior to get the launch started early.

It also has the added benefit of giving you a kick up the ass! I get emails daily showing that people are signing up for Prophecy and every day, I think I could have made another sale. There is great power in the backlist, and great earning potential and this is a daily reminder I need to get on with the series.

How are you building a list of readers for your next launch? Does this help?

 

This is a reprint from Joanna Penn‘s The Creative Penn.

Ebook Pricing: A Rumination

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There have been numerous articles, online and off, discussing ebook pricing and I won’t bother to list or link them here – I’m sure you ingenious readers can find them. So why am I chiming in again? Well, it’s a fluid subject, always on the move. More and more people all the time are taking up ebooks and it will become the norm. It’s impossible to put timeframes on something so variable, but it will happen.

There are several theories on how ebooks will fit into the mainstream. Firstly, it’s important to remember that it’s not either/or. You don’t have to choose. I love all books. I love print books and ebooks. The vast majority of new books I buy these days are ebooks, but if I really like something I’ll get a hard copy to go on the shelf. Or if a book is a particular piece of art, I’ll get it. I love getting contributor’s copies of books I have stories in, because I’m a vain fucker and like to point to the brag shelf and say to people, “Yes, I have work in all those anthologies. And those are my novels. Ahaha.” Shut up, I need validation.

I see the general breakdown of production settling into something along these lines: All new titles will be ebooks, some, especially from smaller publishers, being only ebooks. Alongside that I see a lot of publishers using Print On Demand technology to make paperbacks available to those who like them. And then a short run of actual printed stock, possibly limited edition hardbacks for collectors. That makes three primary delivery systems of stories – electronic, mass-market (though probably POD) and artefact. This is my prediction, but it’s not particularly relevant to this post. I’m looking here at ebook pricing based on the fact that ebooks will become mainstream and will eventually be everyone’s primary method of consuming stories. Don’t get upset, there’s nothing you can do about it. Have you seen Star Trek? How many real books do you ever see? Yeah, it’s gonna be like that. You can’t hold back the future any more than you can hold back the tide with a broom.

So, how should we price ebooks? I ran this question by the straw poll that is my Twitter and Facebook tribe and got some really interesting answers. Firstly, I’ll give my personal opinion.

An ebook should always be cheaper than the print book, by a fair factor. If most paperbacks are $9.99 or less, then ebooks of those titles should be $7 at most. If a book is really popular and in demand, like the new George R R Martin book, it can be more. The Kindle of that one is $17, which is fine, because the only other option is a $40 hardcover. At least, that’s true for Australia. On Amazon, the book is listed at $35 but on special at $18.81. Add postage to Australia and it’s close to $40 again. However, once the paperback edition comes out, that ebook puppy better drop to less than the paperback price or the publisher is taking the piss.

So, for the purposes of simplicity, let’s look at standard paperback vs ebook pricing. If the print edition is $10 or less, the ebook needs to be at most two thirds of that price. There’s no production cost once the e-edition is set up and ready. There’s no distribution cost. And there’s no physical artefact for the reader. Sure, we’re buying the story and that deserves to be paid for, but the item itself is also a factor.

“What about the poor starving author?” you cry. I am one, so don’t come crying to me. Of course the author needs to be paid and we need to value his or her product. But let’s not get all high and mighty without the facts, ma’am. Ebooks generate a massive royalty compared to print. If the author has signed a good contract – and they should be getting a new agent if they haven’t – they should be getting a royalty model on ebooks different to print.

My novels are $9.99 in paperback and $3.99 in ebook. (So reasonable I’ll wait here a moment while you go and buy them… got ‘em? Good. You’ll love them.) I make a bigger royalty on ebooks than I do on print, even though the retail is less than half. That’s because the margin on print production to retail is very slim and I get a slim cut of that. The margin on ebook to retail is far bigger, often up to 70%, and I get a far bigger slice of that pie. Mmm, virtual pie.

So authors can actually do better selling ebooks for far less than print books. Right now, if I sold 10,000 copies of RealmShift this year, I’d much prefer to shift 10,000 ebooks than print ones, as that would pay me far more handsomely. And I do like a handsome paycheque. I would also love to sell 10,000 copies of anything this year, please tell your friends.

Personally, I’m against the popular 99c price point for ebook novels. As an introduction, or a special offer, it’s a good idea. But for novels I think it generally undermines the value of the product. In my experience, most avid readers will view a 99c novel with suspicion and expect it to be shit. They’ll often be right in that assumption. It’s important for authors and publishers to not devalue their content. As one author said, “If people think my novels are only worth 99c, I don’t want them as fans.” That’s a bit extreme, but he has a very valid point. If people aren’t prepared to pay the equivalent of a cup of coffee for your months of hard work, well, fuck ‘em.

I have a novella available for 99c, which is deliberately priced low for several reasons: It’s only around 30,000 words, it’s available for free right here on this website and it’s a teaser, to help people notice me. I also self-published it, so I keep all the royalties, such as they are. Sure, I think it’s worth more than 99c, but I also think it’s fair to charge that and hope to get more readers that way.

So my thinking is that the sweet spot for ebooks is the $3 to $7 price range, with exceptions made for very special items. Authors will make at least as much, if not more, than they would from paperback sales and consumers get to read more and still value the work of the people they like to read. Given that paperbacks here in Australia are usually around $20, I’m actually happy to pay anything up to $15 for an ebook, but I really stop and think twice if it’s over $10.

I won’t name names, because I didn’t ask permission to use the comments, but here’s what some of the people on my social networks had to say on the subject:

I’ve paid up to $9.99 for a book a really wanted, but insofar as most genre fiction the price range generally is settled between $4.99-$7.99. A lot of indies sell their books at 99 cent, but I personally think that is a mistake because all it does is get the value shoppers and it rarely builds a loyal following. At least at the $4.99 range you have wiggle room to offer periodic sales and such.

I’ll pay up to $15, but only for something I really want to read. Generally $7-10. I tend to steer clear of anything at 99 cents simply because it’s so ingrained in my mind that anything priced so cheap can’t be good.

I’d pay up to $15 though the most I’ve yet paid was half of that. I love that you can get classics and foreign books, many that are not available in print here in Australia, for free or very cheap.

I think 10 bucks is reasonable.

I usually pay around the $10 mark – give or take $2-$3. Like others, I get twitchy if it’s only 99c or so, unless I know the author.

$2.99. Can’t borrow ‘em out. Can’t resell them. No physical formatting. No shipping. No distribution.

I get uncomfortable with anything over the $10 mark, but have no real basis for that limit. Will pay more for favourite authors just as I was and am willing to pay for hardcover rather than wait for paperbacks for same.

$5 its a new technology.

I generally won’t pay more than $5 depending on restrictions. If it’s only a license to read (a la Kindle) I pay less

up to $10 is ‘buy without thinking twice’ & up to $15 is ‘buy at once if I *really* want it. Anything higher, I hesitate.

$6-7? Like to compensate author/editor for the work, but don’t want to pay non-existent print/delivery etc costs.

So from that selection of comments it seems there are certainly a number of things people still take into consideration and DRM is a big factor. But the general consensus is ten bucks or less overall, with a couple stretching out to a maximum of $15. Interesting times, indeed.

You’ve read my thoughts and heard a few others. What do you think? How much will you pay? And how much or how little do you think is unreasonable?

 

This is a cross-posting from Alan Baxter‘s The Word.

Melissa Conway Presents: The Indie Author Lament

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In which indie author Melissa Conway presents a humorous ditty and video that details her journey from being a writer who aspired to publication with a traditional publisher to a published indie author who’s now coping with the realities of author platform and self-promotion.

 

Also see Melissa’s new site, Indie Review Exchange, where indie authors and their fans can help one another out with review exchanges.

The write, promote cycle

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 Digital publishing has made the publishing process much easier for an author to publish on their own. If you’re an author, you can now focus your attention on your writing without worrying about what you’ll do with your work afterward. However, for people to find and read your story, you will have to do some promoting to let them know about it. Promotion is really what traditional publishing companies do. They’re successful because they have processes in place that they have fine-tuned for many years.

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And that’s the secret to promoting well, having a process for it. To do it yourself, it should be a part of everything else you do. Here are some ideas of ways to integrate some promotion during the writing and publishing process:

  1. Write – As you do research or get ideas for your story, explore concepts you come across by talking to people about it, either via online forums or by attending related events. Why not make the whole process a journey and start a blog about it.
  2. Talk about it – Before your story is finished, give a sneak peak with a summary of what it’s about and post it to your site or online profiles. Or find blogs and user forums that might be interested in your idea.
  3. Publish – Once you have your story ready, send review copies to zines or blogs that would be interested in your kind of story and would post a review about it. Make sure it’s easy to point people to buy it; the Indie Aisle marketplace can help with that.
  4. Interact – Setup events either in-person or online on forums or via a live chat to interact with people who want to talk about your story; hold contests; find niche websites that might be interested in your genre and would want to interview you.
  5. Repeat

While there are many ways you can promote, you ultimately figure out what works and doesn’t along the way. As you continue to do it, you improve and figure out your own process. And by using tools on the web, you’re on the same playing field as publishing companies. Here are some ways to get started online:

  • Start using social media networks
  • Keep links of relevant websites you can submit to
  • Regularly check and participate on blogs and discussion forums
  • Keep track of contacts you make that can help you later on
  • Experiment with techniques and keep notes of outcomes

You enjoy writing because it’s a creative process, so use the same formula for promoting: be creative and have fun with it!

 

Social Media Roundup

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Now that so many authors are getting savvy to the ways of the web and the need to utilize social media effectively, it seems hardly a day goes by that we here at Publetariat don’t come across some commentary or how-to article on the matter. Here are some we’ve decided are worth a closer look.

The New York Times Technology department reports that Half of America Is Using Social Networks, which should convince you that making social media an integral part of your author platform strategy is definitely worth the effort.

If you have never used Twitter and have no idea what it’s all about, this YouTube video, Twitter in Plain English, is for you.

If you’re even further behind the curve and have no idea what social media are all about, Social Networking in Plain English provides an excellent, easy-to-understand introduction.

But maybe you’re more of a Facebook fan. In that case, you’ll want to check out Mashable’s Facebook Guide Book.

Over on Slate, Farhad Manjoo and Emily Yoffe debate the question: Is it OK to tweet your own horn?

Along those same lines, kikolani.com offers tips on how to self-promote through social media without turning off your online friends and followers in a post entitled Self-Promotion Through Social Media – Don’t Be A Narcissist.

Back on Slate, Kevin Gold addresses the "leaky" nature of internet privacy on social media sites like Facebook. As it turns out, people can learn plenty of your personal details just from your contacts’ profiles and links.

Now get out there and get social!

Self-Publishing: How You Can Learn And Improve

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Those who say that self-publishing is a vast world of bad quality writing, are right… still right. They do not take into account the fact that self-publishers learn and improve.

Self-published authors, those who think seriously about their writing, are highly motivated to find answers to their failures or successes, are willing to analyze and receive feedback. All that to write, publish and promote a better next book.

The beauty of the Internet is that they can find almost everything here. They have the same access to knowledge, resources and tools as big publishers.

Many of the tools were already mentioned in this series. Let’s say, the author is using Bite-Size Edits. He can observe, bite by bite, how his text is being edited and improved. Or after testing a couple of self-publishing platforms he decided to focus on two of them. Or he learns that the best way to communicate with readers is podcasting.

Internet is the biggest self-improving system on earth. Users are learning from each other – from comments, number of likes or favorites, number of retweets, you name it. Every such micro-fact can be, and usually is, analysed. And self-publishers have tools to make the analysis more accurate.

Let’s start from book statistics functionality. The biggest and most advanced platforms offer different ways and levels of analyzing how the book is doing. You can then match it with your online activity and locate the effort which gave best results.

One of the best analytics is provided by Feedbooks. It shows not only a number of downloads and favorites. What is tremendously useful is the split into different file formats, clients (apps, browsers) and countries. You can see how many of your readers are using mobile devices with Android operating system or how many of them are downloading your book directly to a computer. This can help you intensify your communication to the most promising group of readers.

Feedbooks stats

Analytics dashboard at Feedbooks

If you promote your book heavily on social media, you can use tools to measure the effectiveness of your activity. The most common and advanced one is Bit.ly. It’s a URL shortening tool with an extended statistics functionality. You can check the influence of every link you share: the number of clicks, tweets, Facebook shares, likes and comments.

The basic way to use Bit.ly is to check the impact of the message associating the link. Send two tweets to your book page – each time with a different text. You’ll see which one is more convincing.

Another great tool to consider is Hootsuite. It’s a Twitter client with many powerful features. Among many options, you can compare traffic to your blog (Google Analytics) with your Twitter activity. Other Twitter based analytics tools are Klout, TweetReach, BackTweets and TweetStats.

If you liked this article, please share it with your friends. Get free updates by e-mail or RSS, powered by FeedBurner. Let’s meet on Twitter and Facebook. Check also my geek fiction stories: Password Incorrect and Failure Confirmed.


This is a reprint from Piotr Kowalczyk‘s Password Incorrect.

The Day Digital Died

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This post, by Evan Schnittman, originally appeared on his Black Plastic Glasses blog on 8/1/11.

It was a seemingly innocuous situation… I was sitting in a room filled with publishing types: book publishers, librarians, agents, industry press, metadata specialists, and consultants of varying shapes and sizes. We were there in an advisory role to one of the digital publishing conferences.

Things started innocently enough – the usual suspects began to chime in (I am shamelessly unable NOT to talk in a group). As I spoke I began to feel a strong sense of familiarity. And that feeling grew and grew as the conversation rolled forward until I felt I was having a deja vu on steroids moment. It dawned on me that I was in the exact same discussion about the exact same conference in the exact same room as I was last year. And you know what – it wasn’t déjà vu, it was reality.

We were having the same discussion because we were talking about digital as if it were a new way of thinking, publishing, selling, etc. We were circling the carcass of a topic that had been discussed ad infinitum – because it was all speculation and postulation. And nothing is better fodder for discursive debate than speculation and postulation!

At that moment I realized the world of publishing is now so thoroughly changed by digital, that digital is no longer a discrete topic/subtopic/theme/raison d’etre. Digital has ceased to be an independent, stand-alone, separate entity; digital is now blended into the very fabric of the entire publishing business.

And so, as we sat and attempted to determine the topics of a conference that would be presented to hundreds of participants and thousands more via broadcast and Twitter, we became stuck on what was possible and practical to discuss.


Read the rest of the post on Evan Schnittman‘s Black Plastic Glasses.

What It's Like Being A Writer: An Examination and Explanation

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This post, by Chuck Wendig, originally appeared on his terribleminds site on 8/10/11.

Okay, you know how Muggles don’t get what it’s like being a wizard? And how crazy people don’t know what it’s like being sane and sane people don’t know what it’s like being crazy?

Those who are not writers do not know what it’s like to be a writer. Ask someone who is not infected with the Authorial Virus (Types A through G) what a writer does and you’ll probably get a blank stare. Then that person will noodle it and shrug and say, “He sits up there in his room with his My Little Ponies, pooping fairy tales out of his fingertips for ten minutes. Then he masturbates and talks to people on Twitter.”

[Editor’s note: strong language after the jump]

Masturbate? Well, fine. Everybody’s got a lunch hour, and it doesn’t take me 60 minutes to eat a damn sandwich. Nothing wrong with exploring my own body with various textures and food products. As for Twitter? Hey, you go and mill around the water cooler like a bunch of thirsty water bison, and I go and mill around Twitter like a digital version of the same.

But I do not defecate fairy tales out of my fingertips. If only the act of writing was quite so simple as all that.

(And, by the way, leave my ponies out of it. They didn’t do anything to you.)

Point being, it’s time to take this big callused toe of mine and drag it across the sand. There, then, is the line. On this side is me, the penmonkey. On that side is you, the… I dunno. Pen-muggle. Shut up.

What I’m trying to say is, this is what it means to be a writer. Got people in your life who just don’t grok the trials and tribulations of the everyday word-chucker? Show them this.

I Swear On The Life Of Word Jesus, It’s Actually Work

This one sucks because you know what? I get it. I’ve tried explaining to people what I do, and at no point does it sound like work. “Uhh, well, I wake up at 6AM and I get my coffee and then I get in front of the computer and I… make stuff up… and then I try to convince people to buy the things I just… made up.” It sounds like the world’s biggest scam and explains why so many people want to be writers.

I might as well have said, “I sit out in a sunlit meadow and play Candyland with a bunch of puppies.”

Let’s just clear this one up right now:

Writing is work. It’s not back-breaking labor, no — though, by now I probably do have scoliosis (and a Deep-Vein Thrombosis whose clot-bullet will probably detonate in my brain) — but it is mind-breaking just the same. I can sit here for hours metaphorically head-butting the computer monitor until this story — or article, or blog-post, or sex-toy instruction manual — bleeds out across the screen. And then I have to keep fucking with it, keep hacking it apart and juicing my skull-meats until it all makes sense. Everything else is emails and spreadsheets and outlines and porn and shame and homelessness.

Am I doing work on par with fire fighters or soldiers? Fuuuuu-huuuu-huuuck no. But neither are you, Mister Cubicle Monkey. Or you, Target clerk. So. You know. Hush up.

All I’m saying is, no, I don’t need a “real job” because I already have one.


Read the rest of the post on Chuck Wendig‘s terribleminds.

The Trouble With Trailers

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This post, by Peg Brantley, originally appeared on the Crime Fiction Collective site and is reprinted here in its entirety with that site’s permission.

Do book trailers really do what they’re intended to do, or are they more of an ego trip for the author?

This post originally appeared on my personal blog, Suspense Novelist, but I still feel pretty much the same way.

Book Trailers

What makes a successful book trailer?

I’m beginning to believe that just as one person loves a book while someone else puts it in their DNF (Did Not Finish) pile, it’s pretty much the same with book trailers.

With all of the creativity, time—and often expense—that goes into the creation of trailers, the bottom line has to be sales. Does the book trailer make you want to go out and buy the book? Or, at the very least, check into it a little more?
Here are some things I like:
 

  • Short. Maybe as long as 2 minutes, but 1 minute or less is best. Sort of like a visual Twitter program.
     
  • Endorsements. If you’ve got some name-candy to throw around, throw it around early in the trailer. I’m shallow enough to pay more attention to something endorsed by Dean Koontz than well . . . Peg Brantley, or no one at all.
     
  • Live action. Unless your still photos are super spooky and filled with tension, I’d much rather see living beings in action. I don’t need to see their faces, but I want a sense of real people, not photos or statues or drawings. Even with historicals.
     
  • Set the mood. If the trailer is for a cozy, it shouldn’t be dark and evil. Music is huge, but so is color choice and pacing.

These are my personal preferences, and I’m curious . . . do you have any? Are there book trailers you love? Some you hate?

Have you ever bought a book because of its trailer?

By Peg Brantley, Writer at Work, Stumbling Toward Publication

Book Marketing Toolbox – Logo Snap, SnagIt and Jing

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There are several online services that allow users to create a logo at no charge or for a modest fee. [After the jump] is a new logo that I just created using Logo Snap. Their service is by donation, so you can choose how much to pay.

Logo Snap allows you to select from a number of different icons and then add one or two lines of text. Because I wanted three lines of text on my logo, I exported the icon to Microsoft Publisher and added my text there. (You could do the same thing in Word, using text boxes.) Then I took a screenshot of the logo and saved it as a JPG file.

I make a lot of screenshots to create images for my books and articles, and in creating graphics. I use a terrific program called SnagIt that captures an area of my computer screen and then lets me edit the image by adding borders, arrows and other cool things.

The makers of SnagIt also offer a free program called Jing, which can make screenshots or short video clips of what’s on your screen.

 

This is a reprint from Dana Lynn Smith‘s The Savvy Book Marketer.

What I Have Learned In The Last 2 Years: 100th Podcast Celebration

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This is podcast number 100 and it’s just over 2 years since I started podcasting.  [Editor’s note: podcast is included at the end of this article]  At the time, I had one non-fiction book out with pretty much zero sales and I was living in Australia. Self publishing had a huge stigma and I wasn’t even on Twitter!

How things have changed. I now have an Amazon bestselling thriller novel that has sold over 7500 copies and 3 non-fiction books behind me, I have a pretty big social network now and I’m living in London. I knew nothing when I started and this morning I did a webinar on how to podcast!

In the last 2 years, self-publishing has morphed into indie, John Locke has sold over 1 million Kindle books as an indie author, big names are going indie and Amanda Hocking got a massive book deal from indie success. Oh, and JK Rowling has left her publisher to self-publish her own ebooks and start Pottermore direct to fans. So I was part of a fringe movement 2 years ago that is now solidly mainstream especially with layoffs in publishing and bookstores close – Borders has just gone under as I speak today. It is a very different time and most people agree that there has never been a better time to be an author taking charge of your own destiny!

Today I am discussing some of my lessons learned from the process of podcasting and also from some of the stand out interviews for me:

First up, the state of the podcast in July 2011 is that there are around 2500 downloads per month of new and old episodes. 60% of the listeners are in the US, with 15% in China and 14% in UK and the rest spread between Australia, Germany, Canada and some other countries. It’s truly a global show! Thanks to everyone for tuning in and I’m so glad you enjoy the show. I’m always keen to hear from you – email: joanna AT TheCreativePenn.com

 

Here are some of my lessons learned in general from podcasting:

Just start, even if you don’t know what you are doing. My first interview was with 4 Ingredients author Rachael Bermingham who is HUGE in Australia, self, published and has sold millions of books now. I did it on the landline phone, I held a recorder next to it. I edited in Audacity and loaded the file to my very new and pretty ugly blog (which has since been redesigned). I didn’t know about mics, or Skype or Pamela/ecamm or hosting or anything. Things have changed and here’s how I do it now.

Fear and nerves will always be there. Just do it anyway. I am still nervous before phoning anyone. I have to force myself every time. My heart races, my mouth is dry and I go to the bathroom three times before starting. I also do public speaking and its the same thing with that. But we need to get our ‘breadcrumbs’ of content out there, so it has to be done.

I credit the podcast with the growing success of The Creative Penn because of my ability to network and offer something that many blogs don’t offer i.e. multi-media interviews. I get requests all the time and other people promote the blog because of it. All the people I interview link back to their show so the incoming links have helped my SEO ranking. I have connected with you as listeners – you have heard my voice and laugh and mannerisms and annoying tics for years now. I know some of you have bought my books for which I am very grateful. I am also personally fulfilled by being useful and I feel this is useful to people, so I love to do it. I love to get emails from people who have found the information helpful.

You can learn from everybody. Podcasting is a great way to learn about writing, publishing and book marketing. It’s also an amazing way to network. The people I have had on the podcast I have connected with and got to know more. There is a widening circle of mutual support. I also firmly believe in no snobbery – you can learn from everyone. It doesn’t matter what they have written or done, you can’t underestimate anyone’s experience. You also never know where they will end up.

Stand out episodes for me

I learn something with every podcast but these are particular ones where something clicked and my own life changed.

JC Hutchins on transmedia. This was an early interview and a big influence for me. JC had the 7th Son podcast, a book deal and is now transmedia guru and he was generous with his time. He had just spoken to the NY Times or something and is generally the nicest, loveliest man. He gave me a chance which I appreciated greatly. He also got a book deal from his podcast success. I saw how he was doing marketing with internet based and fan based methods and realized you could basically ditch mainstream media. He sparked my massive interest in online marketing which I credit with all my book sales now. Pivotal moment! I had just done national TV in Australia and multiple newspapers and got no sales at all, so it was great to just stop all that work and focus on online methods. Here’s the interview with JC on transmedia. Here’s the interview on writing thrillers.

Tom Evans on writer’s block. I have been scared about writing fiction for many years as I always held up Umberto Eco’s The Name of the Rose as the way you had to write. Prize winning literature as Eco is an academic although that book still had mainstream success. We discussed this block and Tom basically helped me get over it during this episode. All I needed was a kick in the pants. I have continued to interview Tom about this work – he is a brilliant guy especially if you are into the more esoteric world of thought and consciousness. Here’s the interview with Tom Evans on beating writer’s block. 
Here’s the latest interview we did on lightbulb moments.

Mur Lafferty – It’s ok to suck. After speaking with  Tom, I decided to do Nanowrimo in 2009 and get into some fiction. I’ve been listening to Mur’s I should be writing podcast for a while and asked her on to the show to discuss one of her mantras which is “it’s ok to suck”. Basically your first draft is going to be bad. This is also said by Anne Lamott in Bird by Bird “shitty first drafts”. IT’S OK! This released me from more fear and I wrote 20,000 words of crap during Nanowrimo BUT that turned into the seed idea for Pentecost which has now sold over 7500 copies and is still in the Amazon bestseller lists for Action-Adventure and Religious Fiction. I am now 20,000 words into Prophecy and I see myself as a fiction writer. This is a HUGE turnaround for me. HUGE. I mean my life has changed and I am thrilled and overjoyed to be here! Here’s the podcast with Mur Lafferty.

Gideon Shalwick on using video for book promotion. This interview finally changed my view on video and I had been teetering for a while. I took Gideon’s advice and got heavily into video and now I make them every week. I rank on the first page of Google for the search term “thriller novel” in text and in video. I’ve had nearly 50,000 views of my videos on YouTube and it continues to be a traffic source for me. I personally prefer audio to video and I hardly ever watch videos myself, but it’s a great way to reach new people and VERY few authors are doing video right now so it’s another way to stand out in a crowded market. Here’s the interview with Gideon Shalwick.

Scott Sigler on being a NYT bestselling author. I learned that successful authors work bloody hard. Scott is a machine, writing every day, podcasting his novels, networking, promoting and basically getting out there. He is a businessman as well as a great author. I seriously recommend his books , his latest Ancestor is a kind of Jurassic Park/ genetic engineering style thriller. I also learned that writing is a long term career, you’ve got to keep writing. Here’s the interview with Scott Sigler.

Clare Edwards on accepting criticism, being an introvert and resilience. This really helped me at a time of burnout. I have a day job and at the time I was working VERY hard and was exhausted, plus I have tried to keep the momentum with the blog, podcast, videos etc and trying to write the novel – my confidence was low and I needed the help. This podcast helped me reassess my own life and get back on track. We all need help and I am lucky to have built a great network of people who I can trust and talk to. Here’s the interview with Clare Edwards.

There have been many, many more amazing podcasts and a big thank you to all my guests and also my listeners. I look forward to the next 100 podcasts!

I would love to hear from you. I don’t get much mail from podcast listeners so I send these out into the ether and hope you enjoy them.

If you do have something to share please email me: joanna AT TheCreativePenn.com or leave a comment as I would love to know which episodes you enjoyed and which ones you learned from, or what else you would like to hear on the show.

If you haven’t yet, you can subscribe to The Creative Penn podcast in iTunes by clicking here.

 

This is a reprint from Joanna Penn‘s The Creative Penn.

 

Podcast: Download (Duration: 34:48 — 21.6MB)