Writely Ways

[cornerofmadness]

Marketing. I don't know how some of the self pubbers do it. Even with help, even with doing most of the things I read about in the advice articles, my sales are still flatlined. Even with a beautiful cover and a genre favorite paranormal creature, it looks like zero books are selling (though I know some have to be as I see the reviews on Goodreads but wished they'd put them on Amazon too. I couldn't even give away arcs. Maybe it was a mistake not to have a newsletter but to be honest I'm not sure anyone reads them. I get dozens of them a week and basically I scan it it and delete it if I even bother to open them. (got on most of these thanks to insta-freebie now prolific works)

So I'm marketing a little right here. These are all my holiday related stories and my novel and the best part it's ALL on sale. In fact if you've ever wanted any of my stories, follow that link to Dreamspinner and just search me out because ALL my DSP stuff is on sale.


Professional Book Cover Design For me, this is SUCH a catch-22. I would want a good cover but the cost is more than I'll make on the book based on nearly 10 years of experience at this point.

How to Market Your Book: AskALLi Beginners’ Self-Publishing Salon December 2018

And from Betty
10 Top Book Marketing Articles from BookBub in 2018 (hey speaking of marketing)


Cut and Cut (and Cut Again) — The Self-edit Credo

Feeling Stuck? Focus on a Single Sentence

Five Essentials for an Opening Scene I need to look at this one for Splinters of Silver and Cold Iron. I NEED to rewrite it for a third time because it just doesn't work. I would love someone to look at it after I do (well I'll probably just hand it back to my writers group)

Eight Terrain Features for Fantasy Kingdoms to Fight Over This one is quite good

Damaged Goods PODCAST
202 – Omniscient Narration Hint I haven't listened to it yet but Omniscient Narration is NOT a mistake or a sign of bad writing, just saying



What made you start writing fanfic?
Which of your own fanfics have you reread the most?
Describe the differences between your first fanfic and your most recent fanfic.
Do you think your style has changed over time? How so?
You've posted a fic anonymously. How would someone be able to guess that you'd written it?
Name three stories you found easy to write.
Name three stories you found difficult to write.
What's your ratio of hits to kudos?
What do your fic bookmarks say about you?
What's a theme that keeps coming up in your writing?
What kind of relationships are you most interested in writing?
For E-rated fic, what are some things your characters keep doing?
Name three favorite characters to write.
You're applying for the fanfic writer of the year award. What five fanfics do you put in your portfolio?

What kind of relationships are you most interested in writing? Honestly I never thought about it. If I had to analyze it, I'd have to say troubled family dynamics are some of my favorites to write. I enjoy that even more than romantic relationships.

Comments

[havocthecat]

Have you gotten on some Facebook marketing groups? There are some very useful ones out there, though I'm not at the marketing stage yet, so I haven't done any. 20booksto50k is one that I've heard a lot about, though it does get a little culty, I've heard, so you have to pick and choose.

[cornerofmadness]

What I've heard from just about everyone who has used it that FB has not done what it promised and a series of other complaints so no I haven't used it (nor will my publisher use it) I do wonder if what we write plays a role because it's amazing how fast they'll ban anything remotely queer.

[havocthecat]

I think they mostly just use it to discuss marketing instead of using it to actually post ads. Because of exactly that reason. I'm on an FF marketing group, but I think you write mostly MM, right?

Oh, Facebook. Why so terrible to anything queer? (I mean, that's half-rhetorical because there's never a good answer.)

[cornerofmadness]

Now that would be useful (I'd hope), under Jana I mostly write m/m with a little f/f. Under my actual name I'm doing (mostly at the moment) YA and Middle grade stuff.

Well ...

[ysabetwordsmith]

>>What kind of relationships are you most interested in writing? <<

1) The ones nobody else is writing.

2) The ones other people write in really fucked-up ways.

Re: Well ...

[cornerofmadness]

sounds good to me

[notasupervillain]

The only advice I've heard was someone who was on a 10 top reviewers list on Amazon and said they got more arc than they knew what to do with. Their suggestion was to look at people who are on the top 100s list. Or 500. People who do review things, but who probably aren't as overwhelmed by requests.

I can't get anyone to read my chapters for free, though, so I'm hardly the person to be giving out advice!

[cornerofmadness]

That's an interesting suggestion though, thanks.

And I hear you, no one wanted one of my ARCS

[notasupervillain]

There is so much content to consume in the world, I can't possibly keep up with all of it. A free arc wouldn't do it for me when I'm behind on reading books I've already paid for. I wouldn't look on an arc as a free gift, but as a task to be accomplished. I might do it for an author that I have a relationship with (including "have already read one of their books and liked it" as a relationship), but not for a stranger.

If you just need any review rather than a specific person's review, I'd offer to review someone else's arc in return? Maybe to your writing group or on here?

[cornerofmadness]

And that's just it. It's also why I almost never take ARCs myself. I'm slow as hell reading ebooks because of the issues it causes my eyes and migraines. I could never read one fast enough.

I think my actual frustration here is that is the 'new best way' to market books but from what I can see of authors who put out 'street teams' or 'arc reader teams' is they give out a dozen books (sometimes 100 or more if they're self publishing. My publisher would never let me give out that many which is probably wise) and they get a very low return on reviews. Amazon frowns on ARC reading but then their own algorithms insist on having a large number of reviews within the first few days or you're buried.

[notasupervillain]

It sucks, but it's the only game in town.

[cornerofmadness]

That is true