Category self publishing

Jul 8 2014

The Beauty of Marketing

Beauty

Book Marketing

There isn’t just one way to do it. The fact that there are many different book marketing strategies is your opportunity. Find a way to look at marketing in a way that you can enjoy it.

You want to be successful, right?

  • It’s not about embracing someone else’s idea of marketing and carrying it out with due diligence.
  • It’s about finding an effective marketing method that you can embrace with a passion and make it your own.

Most indie writers are artists at heart, not businesspeople. Yet self-publishing success, both on and off Amazon, depends on effective book marketing.

  • That doesn’t mean that you have to switch from artist to salesman to sell books. That’s like hammering a square peg through a round hole.
  • It means you have to view marketing as an art or craft to master, and pursue it with passion. That will fuel your self-motivation.

Look at this article. It’s about book marketing. I didn’t use $ signs for the picture. I left my artistic hat on and turned marketing into a rose.

You, too, can wear your artistic hat successfully both as a writer and an artist. Successful indie authorship is a combination of writing and marketing, both of which are driven by passion and feature creativity.

The business side of marketing books can seem dull and boring to writers. Many indie authors think of the following features when they first encounter marketing:

  • Advertising.
  • Self-promotion.
  • Screaming loudest.
  • Generating hype.
  • Judging a book by its cover instead of its content.
  • Salesmanship.

Actually, most of the things on the above list aren’t effective when it comes to book marketing.

If you approach marketing as something that’s dull or boring, you’re definitely not going to succeed at it.

  • Again, this doesn’t mean you have to get excited about something that you naturally feel is boring. That has inherent limitations.
  • Rather, it means that you have to find a way to look at marketing that makes you inherently passionate about doing it.

Fortunately, marketing does have highly artistic and creative elements that can appeal to writing artists:

  • Marketing is about sharing your passion with others.
  • It’s a chance to interact with others and let them discover your excitement about your book. (Let them ask you what you’ve done lately, rather than advertise what you’ve done. This distinction makes a huge difference.)
  • It’s an opportunity to put readers in a positive mindset before they open your book. People you interact with in person and who enjoy the interaction are more likely to look forward to your book with a good frame of mind.
  • You can wear your artistic and creative caps when you get involved in the cover design (a big part of marketing—it’s part of the packaging). Even if you hire a cover artist, you’re still involved in the design of your cover.
  • Blogging is a great match for marketing books. You love to write, right? Not only that, you get to interact with people who read your blog. You get to be creative coming up with ideas for posts and finding images to use.
  • Creativity is a great tool for catching the attention of your target audience and engaging interest in your book. When you talk to people, you have the chance to show your creativity in the conversation.
  • Imagination can also be a helpful marketing tool. Come up with a creative marketing idea and you’ll enjoy carrying it out; others may enjoy your creativity and check out your book.
  • Even your curiosity can be a benefit here, such as your curiosity for how to think of marketing in a way that doesn’t sound like salesmanship. Use your creativity to find other ways to think about marketing.
  • Branding is an art form. Pursue it as an art. Brand an image for yourself.
  • You can even approach marketing as a scientist. Come up with different hypotheses about marketing strategies and test them out.
  • Embrace book marketing as an art form and strive to master the craft.

If beauty truly lies in the eye of the beholder, then you have the power to see how beautiful marketing can be.

Chris McMullen

Want free information about book marketing? Find all my marketing posts by clicking here.

Copyright © 2014 Chris McMullen, Author of A Detailed Guide to Self-Publishing with Amazon and Other Online Booksellers

  • Volume 1 on formatting and publishing
  • Volume 2 on marketability and marketing

Follow me at WordPress, find my author page on Facebook, or connect with me through Twitter.

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Jul 4 2014

Master Page Numbers in Microsoft Word 2010

Page Numbers

 

Introduction

There are several problems that one must solve when numbering pages in Word, and this can be the source of much frustration:

  • You change the page number on one page, and it changes the style or numbering on one or more other pages.
  • You insert a page number on a page, but the formatting doesn’t match that of the other pages.
  • You try to make the front matter have Roman numerals, but all the page numbers switch from Arabic to Roman.
  • You discover that the same page number appears twice in a row.
  • You add page numbers and the file freezes on you. Worse, it won’t open back up.

WHY doesn’t it work? WHY can’t it just be easy?

Calm down. Take a deep breath.

It is possible to number the pages exactly how you want them. The problem is that the way to do it isn’t intuitive. You have to use section breaks, and you have to implement the page numbering a certain way.

If you follow the procedure that Word is looking for, you can master pagination in Microsoft Word.

 

Before We Begin

Microsoft Word is somewhat more prone to file freezing or corruption when making changes to page numbering.

What does this mean to you?

It means you should back up your file before you edit Word’s pagination.

Save your file with a new filename (like Book v2.docx) and save it in two different places (like jump drive and email). If you’ve already spent months typing hundreds of thousands of words for a book, the worst that can happen is that you have to start over… unless you wisely back up your file in multiple places.

 

Procedures

Follow these steps in Microsoft Word. This outline is specifically for the 2010 version, but 2007 and 2013 are nearly identical and 2003 follows the same ideas (but the toolbars are different).

A picture is worth a thousand words, right? At the end of the procedures you can find some screenshots of the key steps.

  1. Insert a section break anywhere you want the style of page numbering to change. For example, if you want to number your first page on the fifth page of your manuscript, you need a Next Page section break at the end of the fourth page. If you’d like to switch from Roman numerals (v, vi, vii, viii, ix, x) to Arabic numbers (11, 12, 13) on the eleventh page, insert a Next Page section break at the end of the tenth page. Remove the ordinary page break (if that’s what you have presently) and instead go to Page Layout > Breaks > Next Page to insert a section break instead of an ordinary page break. This section break tells Microsoft Word that you wish to change the header or footer style (your page numbers are either part of the header or footer, depending on where you place them).
  2. Press the Show/Hide button (it looks like ) on the Home toolbar. This will help you identify page breaks, section breaks, and blank lines, for example. (If your page numbers aren’t lining up between different sections, this will help you see if you accidentally pressed the Enter key while formatting the page numbers in one of the sections, for example.)
  3. Start at the very beginning of your Word document and work your way forward one section at a time. Very often, sections link to previous sections (though you can choose to unlink them), so if you make changes to one section, it often affects every section that follows (sometimes it also affects previous sections). Problems are best minimized by starting at the beginning and working forward one section at a time. After you make any change, immediately review all the previous sections to double-check that none of the previous page numbers have changed. You can save a great deal of frustration by nipping problems in the bud. It’s worth checking. It might seem like it’s a lot of extra work, but in the long run it might be much less work.
  4. If you don’t already have page numbers, go to the page where you’d like to add them and find Page Numbers on the Insert toolbar. Choose one of the options (it’s possible to customize it after inserting them); the simpler options are less likely to result in freezing or file corruption, but nothing is foolproof. Return to the same place and click Format Page Numbers. This gives you the option to change the starting number, continue from the previous section, or change the style from Roman numerals to Arabic numbers, for example. You can highlight the page number and change the font size or style. You can also place your cursor just before or after the page number and type characters (such as ~ to make your page numbers look like ~17~).
  5. You can remove page numbers the same way as you add them. Just go to Insert > Page Numbers > Remove Page Numbers.
  6. Remember to check the previous sections each time you add, remove, otherwise make changes to page numbers. You don’t want previous sections to change. It’s okay if following sections get changed; you’ll be able to correct that once you get to those later sections. If previous sections do change, hit the Undo button at the top of the screen (what a handy button!). Then you need to unlink the current section from the previous section before trying to make these changes. See the next step.
  7. The magic button is called Link to Previous. It’s actually a checkbox. Simply place your cursor in the page number area to open the Design toolbar for page numbers. Uncheck the box to remove the Same As Previous flag and that will allow you to modify the current page numbers without affecting previous page numbers. (Changes you make might affect page numbers in following sections, but that’s okay—you’ll be able to fix those when you get there. It’s the previous sections that you need to check on repeatedly. You don’t want previous sections to change.) Sometimes you do want the current section to follow the same style and numbering as the previous section. In these cases, you want the Link to Previous checkbox to be checked.
  8. When you want a new section to have different page number formatting from the previous section, remember to uncheck the Link to Previous box and verify that the Same As Previous flag disappears before making the changes. Otherwise, previous sections will change, too. It’s easy to forget. Remember also to go back and check all the previous sections anytime you make changes. Once in a while, a previous section (sometimes, it’s way back) changes even though the Link to Previous box is unchecked. So it pays to check. Also, remember to insert a Next Page section break (see Step 1) instead of an ordinary page break anywhere you’d like to make changes to the page numbering style. Not sure if you have a section break where you need it? See Step 2.
  9. Place your cursor in the page number area on a given page to open the Design toolbar. Two of these options can be quite useful. One is the option to have different page number styles on odd and even pages. For example, this helps you place page numbers near the outside edges, which would be the right side for odd-numbered pages and the left side for even-numbered pages. Another option is to have a different style on the first page of each chapter. Many books don’t number the first page of the chapter, so this option allows you to remove the page number from the first page of each section without disturbing the other pages. Well, if you suddenly remove the page number from the first page of the chapter, you may need to go in and reinsert the page numbering on subsequent pages of the same chapter (in addition to just checking the box for a different first page).
  10. Note that the two-page view in Word does NOT show you an actual book view. In a real book, such as one you self-publish at Amazon using CreateSpace, odd-numbered pages appear on the right-hand side and even-numbered pages show up on the left-hand side. Word shows it backwards. Just ignore the way that Word shows it; don’t try to adjust your page numbering based on Word’s incorrect two-page view. If you would like to see how your book will really look, save your file as a PDF file and open it with Adobe Acrobat Reader (you can get the Reader for free from Adobe’s website). Then go to View > Page Display > Show Cover Page in Two Page View, then View > Page Display > Two Page View.
  11. If you’re having trouble getting two different sections to display page numbers the same way, try clicking the Show/Hide Codes button (see Step 2) and comparing the formatting marks in both sections. Also check the settings in the Page Setup Dialog Box (click the funny-looking, arrow-like icon in the bottom right of the Page Setup group on the Page Layout toolbar to open this dialog box); check all three tabs there—Margins, Paper, and Layout. Especially, check the From Edge values in the Layout tab (which should be the same for every section if it’s applied to the Whole Document).
  12. You can change the position of page numbers relative to the body text using the From Edge values (see Step 11). The right combination of margins and From Edge values should allow you to get the body text and page numbers to look exactly how you want them to appear.
  13. Note that headers and footers are set differently. For example, if you unlink one section’s header from the previous section, the footer may still be linked to the previous section. So, for example, if you have both page headers at the top and page numbers in the footer below, unlinking the page numbers won’t unlink the page headers. This is important to keep in mind when you’re trying to format both headers and footers in the same document.
  14. If at first you don’t succeed, vent some of your frustration, get some rest and relaxation, and try again. See the suggestion in Step 15.
  15. Unfortunately, once in a while Word seems to go haywire. That is, you’re sure did everything right, but it doesn’t seem to be working. Sometimes, it helps to undo the last change, remove the section break, reinsert the section break, and then try again. It’s also possible for a Word file to become corrupt, in which case it’s best to start over with your back-up file. Didn’t back it up like I recommended? Ouch!
  16. If you just can’t hammer the square peg through the round hole, there is an alternate solution, which can really come in handy for self-published authors formatting books for print-on-demand services like Amazon’s CreateSpace. You can break your file up into smaller files. Before you do this, see if you can find a Word to PDF converter that allows you to join multiple PDF files together (e.g. Adobe Acrobat XI Pro offers a free trial period, and also offers a monthly subscription; Nuance PDF Converter Professional offers this feature; and there are also many free converters available on the internet). When you publish with CreateSpace or Ingram Spark, it’s best to submit a PDF anyway. If you’re able to join PDF files together, then you can break all the separate sections of your Word document into separate files. The trick is to ensure that all the page sizes, layout, and formatting is consistent across all of your files. Then you just need to get the page numbering right in each individual file, which is easier than getting it right in several different sections of a large file.
  17. If you’re also self-publishing an e-book, remember to remove page numbers (and all headers and footers) from the e-book version of your file.

 

Breaks

20140703_222956

Link to Previous

Show Codes Arrow

Page Setup Location

Page Setup

Page Headers, too

Headers and footers in general work the same way as pagination.

For example, if you would like to have even-page headers show chapter names and odd-page headers show the book title, you can do this by formatting the page headers the same way as page numbers are formatted. It’s also common to exclude the page header from some pages, such as some of the front matter and the first page of each chapter. It would be wise to see what header and page numbering styles are common for the type of book you’re publishing before you decide on the formatting.

Chris McMullen

Copyright © Chris McMullen, Author of A Detailed Guide to Self-Publishing with Amazon and Other Online Booksellers

  • Volume 1 on formatting and publishing
  • Volume 2 on marketability and marketing
Jun 29 2014

Eradicate Negativity: Your Marketing Depends on It

Happy Sad

Negative vs. Positive

Reading should be a positive experience, right?

You want to create a positive shopping experience and a positive reading experience.

And writing is a positive experience, right?

(If not, why on earth are you doing it?)

So should publishing and marketing be positive.

But not everything and everyone you come across will seem positive.

And you will definitely encounter people and issues that will challenge you to stay positive.

  • Don’t let ’em bring you down.
  • Don’t let it make you negative.

You want to appear positive when you interact with potential readers. Even with fans.

The best way to appear positive is to be positive.

  • It’s easy to fall into a negative mindset.
  • It’s often not easy to stay positive.

But it’s so worth consciously working toward this. You can do it. 🙂

Author Branding

You’re striving to build a positive image as an author.

A critical review will challenge you to remain positive.

Cynics will challenge you.

Failed authors will challenge you.

Many people and occasions will challenge you to stay positive.

Don’t appear negative on your blog, in person, on social media, or anywhere.

  • What will readers think if they read about you complaining about a review on your blog?
  • What will readers think if they see you behaving negatively on a discussion forum?

You’re in the public eye now. Your image is at stake.

  • What will readers think if they meet you and you appear very positive about your book?
  • What will people think if you always come across as positive, even when you’re dealing with adversity?

Win your battles to stay positive. Build a positive reputation.

Each challenge is an opportunity to shine.

It’s not just your book and image that matter.

  • If authors complain about Kindles and readers hear this, why would they want to buy one?
  • If authors complain about Amazon and readers hear this, does it make them want to shop for books?

Positive Marketing

Staying positive has its rewards:

  • Visualize a positive outcome. It helps motivate you to work toward your goals.
  • When your positive mindset is challenged, think of it as an important battle toward long-term success. Win this battle by staying positive and making positive decisions. Don’t let this battle turn you negative and impede your chances for a bright future.
  • You’re more likely to show confidence when you stay positive.
  • You’re more likely to put your best effort into something when you feel positive about the outcome.
  • When readers see your positivity, it impacts their buying decisions.

But challenged your positive mindset will be.

And in some cases, it won’t be easy. You’re likely to feel, “Come on! Not again! That’s more than enough,” but you just have to be that much more determined.

Think to yourself, “Bring it on. Is that the best you’ve got?” When you get through this battle, things will start going your way.

Negativity definitely has its disadvantages.

Interact with positive people. Add positive authors to your circles. Avoid negativity.

Chris McMullen

Copyright © 2014 Chris McMullen, Author of A Detailed Guide to Self-Publishing with Amazon and Other Online Booksellers

Follow me at WordPress, find my author page on Facebook, or connect with me through Twitter.

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Jun 22 2014

Most Valuable Marketing Tools for Self-Published Authors

Tools

1 Word of Mouth

What it can do for you:

  • It can generate sales even when you’ve had a couple of recent unfavorable reviews. What a reader’s buddy tells them about your book carries more weight than what some random stranger writes on your Amazon product page.
  • It doesn’t rely on Amazon to sell your book through search results or customers-also-bought lists. Those can change over time. Word-of-mouth sales can yield traffic during times when Amazon’s marketing isn’t helping your book.
  • It helps your book get discovered. Instead of having to hunt your book down amongst thousands of others in that genre, your book is reaching readers’ ears directly.
  • It lends credibility to your book. Somebody that readers trust is recommending your book.
  • It gets readers interested in your book and puts them in a positive frame of mind at the outset. Readers discovering your book on Amazon often approach it with concern.
  • It can lead to a very long-term chain reaction. A few readers hear good things about your book. It may take weeks for them to buy and read your book. If each of them recommends it to their buddies, the number of readers and recommenders has grown. Many months later, what starts out small can lead to something much bigger.
  • It can build your reputation as an author. This helps not only to sell one book, but to generate interest in your full line of books.

Word-of-mouth sales can be the most valuable, but also the hardest to get.

How to earn them:

  • Your book has to have a wow-factor. When strangers pick up your book and feel impressed with the read, you really have something. Your book’s strengths need to compel readers to want more of that. Give readers more than they expect; much more.
  • Fiction books need to evoke strong emotions in readers; they need to also deliver on readers’ expectations for the genre. Nonfiction books need to fulfill the range and depth of information that readers want; they also need to be well-organized, communicate ideas clearly, and present the information at the right level.
  • You need to shore up your book’s weaknesses. Even if the storyline or characters are incredible, readers find it hard to recommend books with editing, formatting, or other issues. Their reputation is on the line, too, in the recommendation. Your book needs to earn it. You’re charging money for your book; it needs to appear professional.
  • If your book has that wow-factor, get it into the hands of readers. Run promotions, find bloggers who review books in your genre, and find and interact with your target audience. Find experts to read your book and politely request an editorial review or a quote that you can use in your book’s blurb—that’s a professional recommendation that carries weight with some customers.

When the author goes the extra mile to impress readers and produces a book worthy of word-of-mouth praise, this can have a huge impact on the long-term success of the book.

2 The Horse’s Mouth

What’s the next best thing to hearing positive things about a book from a trusted source?

Interacting directly with the author, of course.

Even in today’s world where millions of authors are getting books out there, it’s still a treat to meet and interact with the author.

Why does it matter? This personal interaction can do things that your product page can’t:

  • Show your passion and enthusiasm for your book.
  • Make the reader feel special. Don’t just draw interest in your book. Get interested in your readers, too.
  • There is greater potential to establish credibility as an author.
  • Answer any questions that the reader has.

Of the most common ways for books to sell, personal interactions with the target audience is the one big factor that is most accessible to self-published authors. (The other big factors include shopping the bestseller list, shopping by the name of an established author, browsing through the gigantic haystack of books on Amazon, professional book reviews, and bookstore recommendations.) When you aren’t dealt a good hand, you better play the one good card you do have. If you do play your cards right, you can eventually benefit from the other popular ways that books sell, too.

Think long and hard about where to find your target audience. Go out and interact with them. Charm your potential readers.

While you can reach greater numbers online, interactions in person are more likely to result in sales and reviews.

3 Flash It

Your book needs attention.

Shoppers will be browsing through hundreds of thumbnails in search results. Others will see your cover when they come across your marketing efforts.

Your cover needs to stand out.

It also needs to look the part. If it looks like a mystery, but it’s really a fantasy, your sales will be a bad romance.

A fantastic cover won’t provide long-term success for a lousy book.

But a fantastic cover can have a significant impact on the sales of a quality book.

For a highly marketable book (i.e. there is demand for the book and the content delivers on expectations), investing a modest amount toward a fantastic cover can pay nice dividends in the long run. And what you might lack in terms of financial investment, you can make up for in time. After all, time is money. Take the time to learn the how-to, get feedback, and get it right.

There are no guarantees in the publishing business, but most successful self-published authors credit their covers for being valuable players on their books’ sales teams.

4 Talk to Me, Baby

An effective cover grabs the attention of the target audience and brings shoppers to the product page.

Now it’s time for the only salesperson you have at the point-of-sale to close the deal.

“Who’s that,” you ask? It’s your blurb.

The description of your book isn’t a summary. It’s a sales tool.

The blurb needs to attract attention right off the bat. It needs to engage interest in the first line and hold that interest until the customer clicks to Look Inside.

Many effective blurbs are very concise, especially in fiction. Too much text there can be intimidating. If you’re exploring hundreds of books, you don’t want to read a long description for a book you might not even buy. In nonfiction, you can make important points easy to read by using bullet points (such formatting is possible through Author Central).

If the reader gets bored, it’s no sale. If the blurb doesn’t reinforce the genre depicted by the cover and title, it’s no deal.

Once the blurb generates a click to Look Inside, the Look Inside needs to wow the customer into making the purchase. Like the blurb, the Look Inside needs to engage interest immediately and keep it throughout. It must also look professional and read well.

Finally, the book must deliver on the promise made by the cover, blurb, and Look Inside. Otherwise, you get returns and frustrated readers.

5 Hunt ’em Down

Your book is out there, but who knows it?

You want to find your target audience. The word for this is marketing.

A great cover and blurb help, but first people must find your book. Recommendations are great, but first people must read your book. First, you need to get your book discovered.

Paid advertisements probably won’t be cost-effective for marketing a single book. Unless you have an amazing promotion going on and you supplement the paid advertising with much free marketing. In that case, a BookBub (click the link to learn more) or other type of promotion may come in handy.

There are many free marketing strategies, which are often more effective for books than paid marketing. Blogging, Twitter, Facebook, and other social media sites help you build a following and interact with your target audience. The key words here are target audience, which means posting content that will be relevant for them, using appropriate hash tags, and finding relevant Facebook groups.

Social media is a slow process. Now you go from just getting your book discovered to getting your social media pages discovered. You can do this through months of effective posts, interacting with people in your target audience, and directing readers to your social media pages in an About the Author section in your book. Then you’re kind of going in circles. But your social media helps two ways: You want people to discover you and your book, and you also want to attract fans so you can tell them about your next book when it comes out.

Don’t forget old-fashioned media: newspapers, magazines, television, and radio. Local papers often have column inches to fill and local radio stations may have minutes of air time to fill. Think about what can make you interesting to their audience. You’re selling yourself to sell your book. Learn how to prepare a press release package.

Remember, personal interactions are valuable to self-published (and all) authors. See if you can put together a successful reading or signing. Visit local libraries to see if you can get a paperback copy in circulation there or volunteer to read (appropriate material) to kids or senior citizens (visit a senior citizen center, too). Try to get stocked in local bookstores, and antique and other kinds of stores that sell books, but don’t specialize in books.

You need to work hard to find your target audience. But you can also help your target audience find you. Over time, turn your blog into a content-rich website with nonfiction material (even if you write fiction) that will attract your target audience through search engines. Your goal is to get 100+ visitors daily to your site through relevant search engine queries after a year of posts. That’s a lot of people discovering you and your book. It starts out very slow, but if you do it right, it can be very effective toward long-term success.

6 Can’t Get Enough

It’s easier to market several similar books than it is to market a single book.

It’s also easier to buy a book from someone who looks like a committed writer. When readers try out new authors, they’re looking for someone with the potential to provide a lifetime of good reading. If you just have a couple of books out, there isn’t much potential reward even if the book turns out to be good (i.e. comparing a reader who likes your book to a reader who likes a book by an author who has a dozen books out, this second reader will be enjoying many more books).

You also look like a professional writer when you have several books out.

And then each book that you sell helps to sell your other similar books. A hot promotion on one book helps to sell all your other books. More books, more readers, more recommendations, multi-book sales… If you’re looking to grow your sales, you need to publish a full line of books.

Don’t try to build Rome in a day. Take your time and get your books right. Just look ahead to the future. Your long-term goal is to have several good books that all help one another. It won’t help at all to have several books out unless readers enjoy them.

Chris McMullen

Copyright © 2014 Chris McMullen, Author of A Detailed Guide to Self-Publishing with Amazon and Other Online Booksellers

Follow me at WordPress, find my author page on Facebook, or connect with me through Twitter.

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Jun 17 2014

So Your Friend Is an Author…

Judge

Amazing, Isn’t It?

Yes. It is.

How many authors do you actually know?

Now your friend is one.

The key word there is friend.

This was your friend before. Becoming an author doesn’t change that.

Sure, you can tease your friend about this, if your relationship ordinarily involves teasing.

But your friendship is based on more than just teasing:

  • You support one another. Even if one of you writes a book.
  • You’re honest with one another. Even if you think the book isn’t quite, well, you know.
  • You know each other well. How to get on one another’s nerves. How to put things gently. So you can figure out the right way to share honest feedback.
  • You motivate one another. So in addition to honest feedback, you’ll provide encouragement, motivation, and direction.

Your friend wrote a book. That’s a huge accomplishment. Treat it as such.

There are some things you should know about writers:

  • Writing is a lonely process. Literally: Alone with the computer, writing. Marketing can be lonely, too. This same author, all alone, is reading reviews, which sometimes tear down the author’s hard work. Friends can remind that author that he or she isn’t alone. They can help the author handle criticism, and prevent the author from doing anything rash.
  • Once in a while, the author needs to be dragged outdoors into the real world, kicking and screaming. But if you try this when the author’s muse has just shown up after a long absence, it could prove to be a fatal mistake. You have to judge how vigorous the kicking and screaming is.
  • Writers can be a little eccentric at times. Your friend has some personality. You’ll be occasionally entertained. What’s not to like about this?

There are many ways that you can support an author (and still be honest and scrupulous):

  • Read the book, especially if it’s a kind of book that you’d normally be interested in. But if it’s not your kind of book, you can still support the author without reading it.
  • Help spread the word, especially if you’ve read the book and enjoyed it. But even a “Hey, my friend, Joe, just wrote a mystery” mention is valuable advertising for your friend. Most authors feel uncomfortable with the necessity of promoting their own books (even if they do this, they often feel uncomfortable doing so). Readers, also, sometimes put more stock in what someone else says about the book than the author’s own self-promotion. Gee, if only that author had some wonderful friends who could help spread the news… Hint, hint.
  • Do you know someone who read the author’s book? Ask that person to write an honest review. Authors need reviews, but asking for reviews of your own book… can look unprofessional (and again, authors can feel uncomfortable doing that). But an author’s friend, taking the initiative to do this (i.e. the author didn’t ask you to ask for reviews)… you could be that secret helping hand. You’d be like a superhero with a secret identity.
  • Follow the author’s blog, tweets, and Facebook posts. Encourage the author to keep separate Facebook pages for personal and authorship (e.g. there are author and book pages at Facebook). You should follow both. Expect to get tired of hearing about your author’s book. Don’t feel obligated to read and comment on every one of the author’s book-related posts. Your name is there. You participate occasionally. This means a lot.
  • If you have your own blog or website… just imagine if you mention the author’s book. Don’t even tell the author. Let him or her happen to come across it someday. “Wow! When did you do that? That’s so cool!”
  • Check out your friend’s product page at Amazon. Vote on reviews. Offer some feedback to the author on the cover, description, and Look Inside.
  • Visit local libraries and bookstores. Ask them why they don’t have this most amazing book right there on the shelf.
  • Attend a signing or reading. Encourage your author friend to do these. If you don’t feel like attending yourself, you can still help spread the word and encourage other people to attend.

Your friend spent months finding a little extra time each week, typing tens of thousands of words, massaging those words into a book. That’s no small achievement.

Your friend has considered agents, publishing houses, and self-publishing. There is no easy answer, no clear road to success. It’s a challenge.

Your friend is navigating the deep waters of marketing. It’s a strange world, but necessary to share the book with others. It’s daunting.

A little support from a friend would go a long way.

Mix that with some patience and understanding.

Remind the author that there is a real world here, which the author is part of… which the author needs to physically seem be a part of from time to time.

Remind the author that friendship works both ways. You have needs, too. It’s not just all about the author.

Throw in a little teasing, perhaps.

If your friendship survives authorship, it’s mean to last forever.

Copyright © 2014 Chris McMullen

Chris McMullen, Author of A Detailed Guide to Self-Publishing with Amazon and Other Online Booksellers

Follow me at WordPress, find my author page on Facebook, or connect with me through Twitter.

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Jun 10 2014

Quality vs. Profit—Is it a Choice?

Quality

Why not Both?

Jack Eason posted an interesting article recently entitled “Profit or Quality” (click the title to check it out). While that post analyzed this in the context of video games, it got me thinking about this in terms of self-publishing.

You might be wondering whether or not it’s really a choice. Shouldn’t lesser quality result in lower profits in the long-term? Shouldn’t better quality be favored in the long run?

Well… to an extent.

You could spend an outrageous amount of money publishing a book in the highest possible quality:

  • First off, how about a nice textured hardbound cover with full-color images. If the book costs over $100, you might not sell any. So much for profit! Suppose we restrict ourselves to e-books and inexpensive print-on-demand publishing.
  • Well, you could spend thousands of dollars on formatting and editing services. If you aim for the highest possible quality (not necessarily given by the most expensive service), you might not make any profit at all even if you sell a thousand books.
  • A few writers claim that you should spend years honing your craft, perhaps you should even pay good $$$ to develop the skills you need. Invest hundreds of dollars and wait a few decades and surely the quality will be better, right?

Okay, so going to great lengths to make the quality extreme might not lead to any profit at all. It might leave you considerably in the red.

Let’s look at the other extreme. Suppose you spit out a new novel per month. You’ll have a platform of dozens of books on the market in no time. You’ll always have a book in the Last 30 Days new release category, helping to give exposure to your previous books. Assuming you succeed in drawing in readers, your fan base will grow, so that when you release each book, there will be more and more people waiting for it.

But how much quality can you provide spitting out a book per month? Won’t the ideas, storyline, editing, and more suffer greatly?

The best solution probably involves some compromise:

  • Achieve the best quality you can at a reasonable cost.
  • Invest extra time to significantly improve the quality. I’m not saying to hold off publishing for years. But if a few months could greatly improve the quality, consider that your book might be available for decades. Those few extra months could greatly improve sales over those decades, and the sales of other books that you haven’t even published yet.

Each reader has expectations. Some are higher than others. The higher the quality of the book, the more likely it will exceed those expectations. When it doesn’t, that leads to no sale or no recommendation (maybe even a bad review).

Quality is important for the long-term. Exceed a reader’s expectations and you can gain valuable word-of-mouth referrals in the long run. You can build a fan base that eagerly anticipates your next book. But don’t rush that next book out for all your enthusiastic fans, or there may not be much anticipation for the next one. Once you create high expectations, you must work to deliver on the promise.

Chris McMullen

Author of A Detailed Guide to Self-Publishing with Amazon and Other Online Booksellers

  • Volume 1 on formatting and publishing
  • Volume 2 on marketability and marketing

Follow me at WordPress, find my author page on Facebook, or connect with me through Twitter.

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Jun 7 2014

The Value of Your Book

Value Book

What’s Your Book Worth?

Your book. The idea you conceived, nurtured for months, and eventually gave birth to. The book you love and defend like it’s your baby. Thousands of words written passionately. That you slaved over. So that others might find some joy, entertainment, emotions, wisdom, or knowledge for your effort.

That book. What’s it worth?

It’s worth much more than any buyer will pay to read it.

Its value far exceeds the royalties that you will draw from it.

It’s definitely not worth any painful criticism.

So why do we writing artists suffer through months and years of labors to write books. Earning in many cases less royalty than the cost of a cup of coffee. Suffering sometimes harsh criticisms.

It’s because your book has value that extends well beyond royalties and reviews.

Your book has value as a work of art.

Your book has value to you as a complete and meaningful project. And a book is no small undertaking.

Your book has value to the niche audience who discovers it.

Art is meant to be shared, and finding your target audience, big or small, is a wonderful thing in and of itself.

Your story is a work of art. Craft it until you feel like it’s a masterpiece.

Frame it with editing, formatting, front matter, back matter, and a cover fitting the artwork.

Even your blurb and marketing are art forms. See the art in this and they become part of your passion, a hobby and not a chore.

Marketing isn’t advertising and business to the artist, it’s sharing your passion with others.

Art is the self-published author’s advantage.

We have no overhead. We’re not a business. We’re creating works of art to share with others.

Art’s value goes way beyond dollars. We create art for art’s sake. The rest is just gravy.

Copyright © 2014 Chris McMullen

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May 31 2014

Self-Publishing Jokes

Whoops

1. How do you get an indie author to wash your dishes every day for a month?

Make a deal to buy his book at the end of the month.

Please, please, please.

I’m begging you.

Please buy my book.

2. Why did the self-published author cross the street?

To tell anyone and everyone about his book.

Extra, extra.

Read all about it.

I wrote a book.

3. What’s black, white, and slightly red?

Thousands of self-published books.

Does that book really have…

a typo in the title?

4. Why does an indie author use his phone a dozen times during dinner?

To check his stats.

What? No sales in the last 45 minutes?

Not even a view on my blog?

How can that be?

5. What causes a depressed indie author to jump up to cloud nine?

A great review.

I loved this book so much…

I wish I could marry it and

bear its children.

6. What sends an enthusiastic indie author into a state of depression?

A bad review.

This book would have been better if…

the author had taped pages from

a dictionary to a wall and thrown

darts at it to choose the words.

7. What kind of review does a self-published author feel is unfair?

One with fewer than three stars.

“** 2 stars. Would have been great, but…”

But, but, but…

Why does there always have to be a BUT?

That BUT stinks!

8. What takes months of hard work to build, yet can be destroyed by uttering a few stupid words at the wrong time?

An indie author’s reputation.

You obviously don’t know how to read a book!

9. Why do authors self-publish?

Because they can.

I think I can, I think I can.

See. I just did.

10. You might be an indie author if… you’re more likely to know your book’s current sales rank than the date of your anniversary.

Sorry, honey. You know I’ve been busy.

But look how many books I just sold!

Copyright © 2014 Chris McMullen

Seriously, though…

If you’re familiar with my blog, you know I’m an avid supporter of self-publishing.

Indie publishing is an art, but it’s also a business. Readers expect quality books for the money and time they invest in them.

Let us remember that there are, in fact, many excellent self-published books out there.

If we can’t laugh at ourselves, what gives us the right to laugh at anyone else?

So I offer this little dose of self-publishing humor, perhaps mixed with a bit of realism, so we might laugh at a few jokes, remember to smile when we get frustrated, and strive to improve while enjoying the experience.

Chris McMullen

Author of A Detailed Guide to Self-Publishing with Amazon and Other Online Booksellers

  • Volume 1 on formatting and publishing
  • Volume 2 on marketability and marketing

Follow me at WordPress, find my author page on Facebook, or connect with me through Twitter.

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May 28 2014

Sell More Books

Fourth Quarter Pic

How to Sell Books

Perception marketing: A great book doesn’t just appeal to the target audience, but attracts the target audience.

  • A fantastic cover that the target audience loves. “Wow, look at that!” “That looks like a great read.”
  • A title that creates interest, is easy to remember, and indicates what to expect. Three words or less for fiction, but informative and including keywords for nonfiction.
  • A killer blurb that creates interest, flows well, has the right vocabulary and writing style for the target audience, and clearly shows what to expect, but doesn’t give away too much. Concise for fiction, separated into bullet points for nonfiction.
  • A look inside that looks professional, catches interest immediately and engages it throughout, and delivers on the expectations created in the blurb.

Delivering on the promise:

  • A great book that engages the reader’s interest throughout and exceeds the expectations created in the blurb and look inside.
  • A story that generates strong emotions, balances opposite emotions, and pleases the reader so much that the reader craves more. Nonfiction that provides excellent content and presents it at the right level for the target audience.
  • A book that goes beyond expectations so that it generates many word-of-mouth sales.

Word-of-mouth sales are critical toward building strong and lasting book sales.

Change Your Perception

You want to create a fantastic perception for your book. Start with the perception that you have when you are developing the concept, choosing the title, writing the book, editing, formatting, designing the cover, writing the blurb, perfecting the look inside, and marketing:

  • Don’t think: “I’ve seen books with worse covers sell,” or, “Don’t judge a book by its cover.” Think: “I want the target audience to drool when they see this cover.” Do: Spend time on your cover, tap into available resources, get feedback, get help if necessary.
  • Don’t think: “I’ll just get this book out there and see what people think.” Think: “I want to know that the target audience will love this book.” Do: Get feedback before you publish. Do you really want to risk selling just a few books after all your hard work? Isn’t worth the extra effort—whatever it takes—to ensure a positive, lasting success?
  • Don’t think: “I want everyone to see my book.” Think: “How do I find and interact with my target audience?” Do: Learn effective marketing techniques.
  • Don’t think: “I need to scream loudest to get my book discovered.” Think: “How can I get my target audience to discover my book?” Do: Build a content-rich website with content that will interest your target audience, and write more quality books.
  • Don’t think: “I don’t know if it’s worth investing in editing, formatting, or cover design because I might not even sell 100 books.” Think: “I want to write a book that people will love, which has a significant audience (it’s okay if it’s a niche audience; in fact, that may be a plus), which will sell enough to make an initial investment worthwhile.” Do: Your research on top-selling, self-published books similar to yours. Study covers, blurbs, titles, look insides, copyright pages, title pages, first pages, author pages, blogs, and marketing tactics.
  • Don’t think: “That reviewer is personally attacking me.” Think: “My book evoked a strong opinion,” and, “Is there anything useful I can take from this review?” Do: Focus on writing more books and marketing effectively. New sales will help to generate more reviews. Quality content will help achieve valuable word-of-mouth sales, which will help to offset any negative reviews.
  • Don’t think: “Let me try to summarize my book.” Think: “My blurb needs to generate interest, engage the reader, and make the reader curious.” Do: Study effective blurbs of similar books, especially top-selling self-published books.
  • Don’t think: “___ doesn’t matter as much as ___.” (Fill in the blanks as you please.) Think: “Let me excel at my strengths, shore up my weaknesses, and achieve good balance,” and, “Let me get it all right, not just part of the book.” Do: Assess your strengths and weaknesses, and strive to improve.
  • Don’t think: “This will do.” Think: “I want my book to be fantastic.” Do: Your best to make that happen.

Visualize an amazing book from cover to cover, and the packaging and marketing, too. Work hard to make your vision a reality.

Don’t settle. Put in the time, effort, and research to achieve a wow-factor.

Chris McMullen

Author of A Detailed Guide to Self-Publishing with Amazon and Other Online Booksellers

  • Volume 1 on formatting and publishing
  • Volume 2 on marketability and marketing

Follow me at WordPress, find my author page on Facebook, or connect with me through Twitter.

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May 19 2014

Self-Publishing Is Like Golf

Golf

Self-Publishing Is Like Golf

Front Nine:

  1. Both seem easy until you try them. You think you’re gonna make a hole-in-one the first time out on the golf course. You think you’re going to sell 100,000 books your first year. Whoa! Where’s that easy button when you need it? Reality check in aisle three.
  2. One little mistake and you can look pretty silly. Great big swing… ball goes almost nowhere. Oops! Did I just do that? No, it was a practice swing. Honest! Misspelled the title. Three whole pages in italics. Paragraph gone missing. Page numbers out of order. Feel like crawling under a rock now?
  3. The easiest things can be the most frustrating. Miss a two-foot putt? Whiff the ball? Try not to break your club. Misspell your name? Accidentally upload the wrong file? Don’t smack your forehead too hard.
  4. There is always a silver lining. You can have 17 miserable holes, but if you get one birdie, it makes your day, it brings you back to the course. Even if you hit 100 miserable shots, you’re bound to have one good one, so that even your worst rounds leave something positive to provide encouragement. Whether your self-publishing venture seems like a success or failure, there must be something good you can take out of it. If nothing else, you’re a published author. You can see your book in print. Your first book is a learning experience. Kind of like being thrown into the deep end of a swimming pool. Infested with crocodiles. Hungry crocodiles.
  5. Mulligans are tempting. It’s easy to shank your teeshot on the first hole, and tempting to start over by taking a mulligan. It’s hard to nail that first book, too. Don’t worry too much. Pen names can help with that.
  6. You’re expected to observe proper etiquette. Don’t talk while your opponent is swinging. Don’t walk in your opponent’s line. Don’t spam your friends with repeated advertisements for your book. Don’t pester your ex-girlfriends for reviews.
  7. You can spend a ton of money that won’t necessarily help. Seven bucks for one ball that might not last more than one shot. A few hundred bucks on one club. Thousands on equipment. Hundreds more to dress like a golfer. The shot might look ugly, but you’ll look great on the course. You can spend hundreds on a cover, hundreds on editing, thousands on marketing. But if the content reads like a slice in the water hazard, it could be a book that looks great, yet doesn’t sell. Except to your mom.
  8. There is a ton to learn. It takes time and patience. Lessons can help, if the instructor knows what he’s doing. Even if you receive great advice, it’s easy and common to go against it. Because you’re the one newbie who isn’t going to make any mistakes, right?
  9. Out of bounds hurts. In golf, it costs you a stroke and distance (and a seven-dollar ball). There are boundaries in self-publishing, too. Like not commenting on all your reviews, telling your fans whether you wear boxers or briefs (maybe this is one time when telling is better than showing!), promoting your book on your competition’s blog, or reviewing your own book. You will get caught and the penalties will be severe. We’re talking tar and feathers.

Back Nine:

  1. You must clean up your mess. When you take a divot that goes further than the ball, you must repair the real estate. When it takes five shots to get out of the bunker, as an added bonus, you get to rake your mess. When you discover typos in your book, whether it’s selling or not, you fix them. It’s just the proper thing to do. Like covering a puddle with your new leather jacket so a woman you don’t know can walk across the street without getting her feet soaked.
  2. All golfers, golf-courses, books, and authors are not created equal. Some courses are much easier than others. Some golfers are much better than others. Some books have wider appeal than others. Some authors have more talent or experience than others. But it can still be fun for everyone to play the game. And when it isn’t fun, you get to exercise your vocabulary of four-letter words. All too often.
  3. There are rules to be followed. On the course, a marshal looks for signs of slow play, un-raked sand traps, and high heels on the greens. A rulebook dictates how to determine relief and penalties. Competitors attest your score. Retailers decide what can or can’t be published. Amazon determines what is or isn’t acceptable behavior. Yes, the rules do apply to you.
  4. Luck is involved. The ball doesn’t always bounce the way you’d expect. Sometimes it skips across the pond. Other times it hits a sprinkler in the middle of the fairway and rolls out of bounds. A great book can get a lousy review right off the bat. Or the right person can fall in love with your book and tell hundreds of people about it. Or your boss can discover you’ve been moonlighting as an author.
  5. Never fear, help is near. You can have a caddie carry your bag, help you choose the right club, walk off the yardage, tell you which way the putt breaks. Experienced authors can help you with formatting, publishing tips, marketing advice, which finger to pick your nose with.
  6. Practice can help. Hit a bucket of range balls. Spend time on the putting green. Write, write, and write some more. Read, read, and read more, too. And when nothing seems to help, maybe try some of that advice you’ve been ignoring. You know, the advice that requires doing hard work. But not that advice promising amazing results with super shortcuts. That’s the kind of advice where you pay hundreds of dollars for someone to toss you into a dumpster. And then you try it again because it didn’t work out the first time.
  7. Golf and self-publishing are both spectator sports. There is a gallery in golf to watch the pros, and millions of viewers on t.v. to support the sport. Authors have readers. A pro has a fan base in the crowd to support him. Authors have small followings, too. Whoa, dude! You’re, like, famous now!
  8. Starting out, you have a ton of anxiety for no good reason. On the first tee, you’re highly visible. People on the putting green, at the driving range, in the clubhouse, pulling up in the parking lot, or walking by can see your shot. Why do you have all those butterflies? It’s not like your name is Jack Nicklaus. You’re not expected to drive the ball 350 yards down the middle of the fairway. All those butterflies show up when you press that publish button, too. You don’t even have a gallery yet.
  9. Natural talent and years of hard work can pay off big time. You could become a scratch golfer. You could finally become a bestseller. Then, of course, you’ll meet that perfect someone and drift off into the sunset.

Nineteenth Hole:

  • Whether you finish a round of golf or a book, you deserve a little time to celebrate. If you make a hole-in-one or become a bestseller, the drinks are on you. Whether you can afford it or not.

Copyright © 2014 Chris McMullen

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