I know I said that I might let the blog go but I have to be honest, I miss it. I love coming here and just ranting and rambling and really, I seem to have a never-ending list of things to rant and ramble about!
Life is a precarious balancing act right now. I'm happy, I'm scared, I'm a little bit angry and there is a whole lot of uncertainty in many areas. A lot, right? Okay, so here's the run down on what's going on.
Books. OH. MY. GOODNESS. Let's see, the last time I wrote I had released book number two in my Montgomery Brothers series, "Trust in Me". It's done well on the charts but amazingly enough, it never hit the heights as the first book, "Wait for Me". I'm okay with that; I'm just thrilled that people actually read my stuff! Who knew?
Earlier this month I released another book, "In the Eye of the Storm". This book was the one that a New York agent wanted to represent but ultimately could not sell and it was also a top five finalist with Harlequin for their Desire Editor's Pitch Challenge. Clearly people liked it so I decided to just release it myself. So far? The numbers aren't too bad. I had tried pricing it a little bit higher than the other, at a whopping $1.49, but after two weeks of so-so sales, I lowered it to .99 cents and it's flying. As much as I hate doing it, it seems like the way to a reader's heart is a .99 cent eBook. Lesson learned. I collaborated with four other indie authors and we put out a box set that is a collection of contemporary romances that all deal with CEO's as main characters. It's called "Loving the CEO". My book "Catering to the CEO" is part of it and right now the set is available for only .99 cents. There's that price again, right? Well, THAT is flying up the charts and if all goes as planned, we are hoping to see it hit the USA Today bestseller list.
THAT IS MY DREAM!!
Actually, it is my dream to hit the USA Today list with a single title but I'll take the success where I can get it.
Book number three of the Montgomery series will be out mid-August and I am starting to get some serious fan interaction on Facebook. It's kind of cool. THEN...because I am just loving the author thing, I broke into the top 100 Overall Authors on Amazon! EEK!! I'm talking OVERALL! Not categorized by genre (although I am on FIVE of those in the top 100) but the whole shebang! That was mind-blowing!
So...with all of the good things happening with the writing, something had to give. I will be leaving my office job in two weeks. It was not a decision that I made lightly. I used to enjoy my job and I love the people that I work with but there have been some changes being made and I sort of got put in an awkward position and, long story short, it became blazingly obvious that it was time for me to leave. I'm excited to be able to focus on being a full-time writer but I'm terrified to sort of be flying without a net!
We had a major power surge hit the house two weeks ago and it blew out our stove and refrigerator. I THOUGHT my insurance was going to cover it, but they are not. So we had to go and buy replacements. Thanks for NOTHING. They told me that surges weren't covered but have yet to answer me on what exactly has to happen to my stuff for it to be covered!
Basically, I've been busy. Tonight I'm working on tweaking the new book cover and eating some gelato to celebrate my Amazon Author Ranking. I'm feeling pretty sassy right now. If you look at the post below this one, you'll see the video for an interview that I did. My first ever video interview! Not my greatest look but all in all, a total blast.
Please share the book links with your friends; please buy the books. I would LOVE to keep climbing the charts and feel a little more secure in my new-found employment! Let the journey begin!!
There are a lot of lists out there and to be honest with you, I cannot wrap my brain around how they work. It seems like a crap shoot most of the time how a book gets on one but you can be certain that the most popular authors with the big publishing houses behind them will be on there first.
It's not as easy of a trek for us indie authors.
I write, I publish. After that it's anyone's guess on where those books will show up and on what lists. I have been blessed enough to hit the "bestseller" status on both Amazon and Barnes and Noble with my books but there is no formula to guarantee that.
Frustrating as all get-out, I can tell you that!
I have yet to hit a point where I am comfortable spending a lot of money on marketing and promoting my work. I know plenty of authors do it and I commend them on it and they do see results but I am too scared to spend too much money at this point in my career and then have it not work. I'll get there some day, just not right now. So by marketing you get seen by more people, the more people that see you the more they may be inclined to buy your work. The more people that buy your work, the better your sales stats, blah, blah, blah and then there you are on a list. I get that but what I find amazing is the vast difference in rankings.
What do I mean? Okay, this morning my newest book "Trust in Me" is number 32 on Barnesandnoble.com. And not just in romance! No! It is #32 on the site! That is pretty freakin exciting, right? I mean, top 100! There are some seriously big named authors on there all around me! So I get all giddy and excited and dance around the house and then I jump over to Amazon.com and there is the same book, released the same day and where is "Trust in Me" on their list? I'm number 1406. The book is only .99 cents on both sites so it's not like one has the advantage over one another but if you do the math, clearly there's a difference.
A big difference.
Now I understand that the two sites really are vastly different. For me, when I think of a physical bookstore, I think Barnes and Noble. But online? It's Amazon all the way. So that takes a little of the shine off of my bestseller glory because it's a ranking on a smaller site. People look at you a little bit more - or take you a little more seriously as a writer - if you are an Amazon best seller.
And don't even get me started on the NY Times or USA Today lists. I haven't even figured those two out. If there is a way to get your book on there, I haven't found it. Although, I am working on a collection/box set with several other indie authors and as of late, collections like this HAVE gotten onto the USA Today list. We'll also be paying a decent amount of money to be seen so maybe that's a big part of it.
I know, I know, you gotta spend money to make money, blah, blah, blah. Someday I'll do it.
Then you have the Goodreads lists or the Shelfari lists...it's exhausting. Can somebody please just buy the books and save me from obsessing over the lists??
It's Release Day! Love, love, LOVE Release Day! "Wait for Me" is officially out there and is available on Kindle and Nook for only .99 cents! Such a deal!
This is book one of The Montgomery Brother's series and focuses on youngest brother Lucas Montgomery; a former NFL quarterback who is living a very solitary life after a career ending injury. The only hope of getting him out of his self-imposed exile? Sweet and sassy Emma Taylor.
I love this story because Lucas is a fairly complex character while Emma is a very down to earth and practical. Their differences make for some great interactions. I think that you'll love reading about them as much as I enjoyed creating and writing them.
It is a very busy time to be me. Seriously. I just released my fourth indie book (this time a full-length novel), I'm editing a completed novella, writing a follow-up to said novella, and trying to figure out which work-in-progress I want to finish up/polish to submit to my agent.
As if that isn't enough, I am doing 95% of my own marketing and promotion on all of my books and just found out that I have been nominated for THREE Indie Romance Awards that I have to campaign to get people to go and vote for me! It's exhausting. All of this WHILE being a wife and mother, working a full-time job and just fighting to survive.
WHEW!
So how can one person with a VERY limited budget do it all? It's not easy, I can tell you that! Okay, the fourth book, "Catering to the CEO", is out on Amazon. I went with the Kindle Select again just because. Honestly, it's very time consuming to submit your file to multiple sites because they all want it in different formats and whatnot and I just don't have the time or energy. I am trying a little bit different of a marketing strategy on this one and I'll see if it pans out for me. Being that this book is a full-length novel, I was able to justify pricing it a little bit higher. Again, we'll see if it pays off.
I'm guessing that the "Like" button on Amazon is a thing of the past because I have used multiple browsers on multiple computers and asked dozens of people and nobody seems to see the dang thing. Why would Amazon take it away? Probably because people try to manipulate results and do the "I'll like your page if you like mine" and so the results are kind of not an accurate telling of what people honestly think of the book. I can admit that I am guilty of that. But still, I wish there was a way that they could track traffic just to see if there is interest in your book! Then the Indie Romance Awards. I'm pretty excited about these but this offers a challenge all its own. Getting votes. Good grief, you'd think I was asking people to donate a damn kidney. With 500 fans on my Facebook Author Page and another almost 900 on my personal page, do you know how many votes I have? 21. TWENTY-FREAKIN-ONE. I can't even get angry anymore but I'm still seriously annoyed. This whole self-publishing thing is hard enough - with just the actual writing and editing. Add marketing and promotions and then campaigning for votes? There aren't enough hours in a WEEK!
There's a site called "Get Online Votes" that you can submit your info too that will direct people to your site where you need votes. It's not as sketchy as it sounds because people have to actually go to the site, click on your link and go and vote; it's not like it's hacking the site or anything. And believe me, I don't know enough about computers or programming to even try to hack anything! No, right now I'm seeing if I see any results from them to help me gain some votes and in return, I go and vote for other people's stuff. We'll see.
So it's new book release day! "Catering to the CEO" was released today on Kindle and I am very excited about it. This is a full-length novel (my last two were novellas) and is $2.99 right now on Amazon for the Kindle version.
And as a gift to you to celebrate CEO's release, "Ever After" is FREE today! So happy reading everyone!!!
This whole indie publishing thing is a daily learning process. Just when you think you've got it worked out, your formula doesn't work. When I wrote "The Christmas Cottage", I did not set out to write a best seller. It just happened. Only I didn't realize that until about two months after its release.
What does that mean? Well, here I was thinking that I was doing something phenomenal with my cheap and free marketing. The truth was that I released a romantic holiday novella at Christmas time and people enjoy a holiday themed book. It was priced at .99 cents as an ebook and so basically, the planets lined up on that one and I had a best seller.
When I wrote the follow-up, "Ever After", there was no hook; there was no holiday that it was tied into and so I was just hoping to ride the coattails of the success of "The Christmas Cottage". I marketed the same way; utilized a lot of the same websites that offered free or low cost promotions. And I got two VERY different results. "The Christmas Cottage" went into the top 100 Best Seller List in the Kindle Store in eight days. "Ever After"? It has never gotten that high on the list.
Well, that's not totally true; let me clarify. The Kindle Store is the listing of ALL Kindle books. Then it gets broken down into genres. So while "Ever After" has (just recently) been on the best seller list, it was in sub-sub-SUB genre categories.
I did the free promo option on "Ever After" and STILL didn't break the top 100 in the Kindle Store. And I did not get the bounce-back sales that I've heard people talk about, either, after their free days.
I have blogged, tweeted, Tumblr'd,Facebooked...everything I could to spread the word about BOTH books and lightning did NOT strike twice. I've come to learn through multiple indie authors that what happened with "The Christmas Cottage" sales-wise, was not the norm. What I am experiencing with "Ever After" is. A month after it's release, some random romance web-site promoted it on their bargain e-book day and I sold almost 800 books on that day alone! That was more than I had sold in the month! That was pure luck. I'm learning to not obsess about the numbers and to not rely on this income. I thought that I was going to be a bit more on easy-street when I was seeing the sales from "The Christmas Cottage" but have quickly learned that that was a seemingly one-time deal and I was lucky to experience it. So what makes a best seller on Amazon? There seemingly is no direct answer. They took away the like button so there goes that. You need to get reviews. THAT is a biggie. The more reviews the better (and even more so when they are GOOD reviews). But I've seen well-known authors having to essentially beg for reviews so imagine how hard it is for little ol' unknown me to get them!
I'm going to keep writing. I'm going to keep marketing the way that I do and maybe someday I'll luck out and get noticed by a big review site or by someone who just likes my work and I'll be able to get on and stay on the best seller list again.
Okay, so I've been M.I.A. again and for that I apologize. But seriously, it's with good reason.
Life.
I took my week off from work and yes, it was quite refreshing. We did the Great Wolf Lodge, we went and visited Nick at school, I had breakfast with friends and read two FABULOUS books (thank you, Kristan Higgins and Jill Shalvis!) and did very little writing.
Bad author!
While we were visiting Nick at school, something very traumatic happened. We went out to dinner Saturday night and while waiting for our table, I pulled Nick aside to talk to him. I've been a little concerned about Michael and he won't talk to me or Frank but I thought he might actually talk to his brother. So I had a very adult conversation with my elder child and asked him if he could maybe talk to his younger brother and just sort of see what was going on with him. I had overheard a conversation Michael had with a friend while playing Xbox where he admitted that he'd asked a girl out and she said no. I wanted to make sure he was okay.
Never send a snarky 21 year old to do ANYTHING.
Basically, rather than just talking TO Michael, Nick decided it would be better to talk AT Michael and dump on him everything that he doesn't like about it. By Sunday afternoon, Michael had essentially been told that everything about him is...wrong.
Thank you, Nick. Don't go in to motivational speaking.
We arrived at Nick's place to take him to lunch before we headed back home and he convinced Michael to basically shave his head.
Moms, are you as outraged as I am???
Did I mention that Michael has BEAUTIFUL curly hair???
Did I also mention that Nick essentially had some dull utility scissors and a fairly useless electric razor to take on this task???
I asked Michael if he was okay with it and he said that he was but I sort of feel like he was trying to save face here. Then Nick and his fiance took him into the bathroom to get him ready. When the razor turned on, I had to step in. I told them they were NOT allowed to shave his head. No buzz cut; I did NOT want to see scalp. So they cut it really, really, REALLY short. I don't recognize my child. There was about three pounds of hair on the floor and the look on Michael's face broke my heart.
They aren't allowed near him any time soon.
I cried that night for HOURS.
I know, I know, it's just hair but to me, those curls were Michael. That was my boy's signature thing and a part of his childhood is now gone thanks to the dull-scissor-happy-duo. Wait until they have children and I do something like this - take their first born for the first hair cut or get her ears pierced without their permission. Ah...revenge.
Then there's our car situation. We've known that we need another car and that we need to get rid of Frank's van. We were kind of hoping to do it this summer when my car was paid off.
Best laid plans and all that...
The van died the other day. Frank call's me from the damn interstate and is like, "The van died". Well, okay. We have AAA, call them. No, no, no, it's just overheated and he needs water. It's 5:00, I'm getting ready to leave work, okay, I can do it. Where is he? He's not sure. He wasn't paying attention. So I now have to head west while he was driving east and hope that I can see him on the opposite side of the side of the road!
Wanted to KILL him.
Got there, we got the van home and essentially as we turned into the driveway it died. Thank God we made it home. But now there is no money from the sale of the car to help with a down payment on another one. There goes my new computer that I desperately need and that my royalty check was going to get for me.
And speaking of royalty checks, there's me, the indie author. Harlequin and Random House turned me down on the book my agent submitted. I wasn't upset about Harlequin but I was pretty bummed about Random House. It's still in with one other publishing house but they don't thrill me.
I'm releasing another book on my own on April 2nd. This one is called "Catering to the CEO" and it was originally written to Harlequin guidelines but I never submitted because basically it's been in the press a lot lately about how poorly Harlequin treats and pays its authors. Thanks, I'll pass. So I got my cover designed by the wonderful Gilded Heart Designs, I created my video trailer with Animoto and I will be releasing it with Amazon. All in all, I'm not overly psyched like I was with "Ever After" which has been a bit of a disappointment. I think I hyped it too much in my own mind and there was no way it was ever going to live up to those expectations.
I should be doing some major pre-launch work right now but I just don't have it in me. I've got work, a car to try and finance, Easter is right around the corner and just everyday wife and mother stuff to deal with.
Wow, we are one mean spirited group of people. I am telling you, I don't think I'll ever get used to getting a bad review but hopefully I'll get to a point where I'll stop READING the bad reviews. Sheesh!
If I don't like a book, I'm annoyed, sure; but I don't go on to the book's Amazon page and trash the crap out of it. I would seriously like to tell some people to get a life because they must have way too much time on their hands. And what adds insult to injury? These are the same people that got the damn book FOR FREE!! I mean, come on! I download plenty of free books that, quite frankly, SUCK. Bad writing, bad story, unlikable characters, you name it but I don't go on there and kick a gift horse in the mouth. I didn't invest anything and if I didn't enjoy it, I don't finish it!
Although this time around, the complaints are with the heroine of "Ever After" NOT my poor editing so maybe that's something. LOL! I'll be honest, "Ever After" was not a planned book. The main character, Ava, was a bit over the top in "The Christmas Cottage" but people wanted to know her story. I couldn't suddenly make her NOT over the top when the book was focused on her. I had to stay true to the character so if you don't like it, too bad.
I just don't know why we feel the need to unload so much negative stuff. Does it make you feel better, reviewer? Did ripping apart something that someone else worked hard at make your day any better? Did you walk away feeling uplifted?
As I said the last time this topic came up, I take comfort in the fact that all of the really BIG NAME authors get bad reviews too so who am I to think that I'm above it? But criticism is criticism nonetheless and there's no getting away from feeling just a little bit crushed.
Not a good feeling.
To make myself feel a little better I actually went to some of my favorite author's books and read their reviews. Even their bad reviews (one and two star ones) still had the decency to just disagree with the storyline or a character and NOT the author.
I can only hope to get to that point some day - critique the work not the writer.
So have a little pity and go and write me a nice review, will you please? It would totally make my day!
Today was one of those days when it probably would have been best for me to just stay home and stay in bed and not communicate with the outside world at all. I felt like crap, I'm pretty sure I looked like crap and basically everyone around me annoyed the crap out of me.
Should have stayed home.
But something weird happened today. There is movement on the Amazon charts. Yes, yes, it's true. All weekend I offered "Ever After" as a FREE promo and I ended up essentially giving away over 13,000 (yes, thirteen THOUSAND) copies away. It hurt, I'm not going to lie to you. The promo ended last night and when I got up this morning and checked the stats, the book was back at $1.99 and had no ranking whatsoever.
I almost threw up.
I understand that at that point, they had no sales to go by because it had been free. It had made it all the way to #3 in women's fiction in the FREE best selling (?) category. So now it was time to start tracking again.
I came in at 138,971.
And almost threw up again.
I mean, before the free promo I was at LEAST in the twenty thousand range. I was panicking; I was frantic. I was at work and couldn't do a damn thing. As the day went on, something amazing happened. It started to climb the charts. By 3:00 I was in the 6,500 range and now I am at 5,175! I so don't understand how it all works but I am excited. What a difference a week makes!
So while all this great stuff is happening and "Ever After" is climbing the charts, I happened to go over and check out how "The Christmas Cottage" was doing. It's back on TWO best seller lists! I kid you NOT! Last week it was in the 8,000 range and tonight it is at #727 in the Kindle Store (out of like a million books) and it is #74 in best selling women's fiction and #83 in best selling contemporary womens fiction. Go figure.
So THEN...that had me going over to my first (and almost long-since forgotten) book, "Jordan's Return". That one never made it ANYWHERE on a best seller list and pretty much never made it below 18,000 on the Kindle store list. It's #24,804 in the Kindle Store and it's been out for well over a year! It's madness I tell you!
I've done little to no marketing in the last two to three days, I had to let my assistant go last week because the book wasn't making any money and my son who is supposed to be helping me with some of this is knee-deep in mid-terms so he's not helping so that only leads to one thing...
PEOPLE MUST LIKE MY BOOK!
I wish I had confetti right now to throw. If the damn LIKE button on Amazon would work, things would be perfect but it's not. After all of their promises, people still can't find the like button on their Amazon page. I am beyond frustrated. Next up is getting people to post reviews on Amazon; you can do that without a like button! LOL!
I may have to wreak a little havoc with Amazon tonight. Wish me luck!!
I would like to start out by saying thank you for offering so many wonderful products on your site. You have made shopping for me so much easier on many occasions.
However, I am having some severe issues with your site as a seller. In the past I have self-published books and offered them for sale through your site and have had success with them. My recent release, however, has had nothing but issues due to technical difficulties and "testing" that you claim to be doing. As a seller, it would have been nice to have been notified of this testing period so that I didn't release a product during this time. Nor would I have offered a promotion on my book during this time.
By the removal of the "like" button, all of the people who have purchased my book or who are fans of my work, cannot be tracked on your site. This seems to be an internet-wide issue; some browsers can see it, some cannot. I find if offensive that you would remove such a KEY issue to tracking success on your site but only seem to remove it from indie authors and not the big name ones.
In my book, that is discrimination.
I notice that you don't mind taking 65% of my royalties for a book that you had nothing to do with writing and nothing that you are doing to promote or market. And in return for taking the majority of my pay, you took away one of the most important tools to help ME, the writer, have some form of success in moving up the charts on your site.
I even signed up for the Kindle Select program so that you had the exclusive digital rights to my book. I thought that might work in my favor. Clearly, it did not. You wave around this "fund" that we get to be a part of but what difference does that fund make when we aren't getting any action or movement on your site because you've stifled us?
What do you have to gain from this? Why would you take such an important tool away? Why am I being punished for being a faithful customer and seller to your site? I have had to jump through hoops for almost two weeks now for answers on when this issue is going to be fixed and I was told it would happen by today and you know what? The button still isn't showing up! How is that possible?
I cannot even begin to describe all of the ways that your practices have hurt me as a writer, a seller and a customer. I cannot even begin to tell you all of the ways that I will be getting the word out on how poorly you treat those that are loyal to you and your site. I think what you've done here is despicable and that you should be ashamed of your business practices.
I believe I will be looking to do business elsewhere before I do any more business with you.
It's not even possible to put a number on the ways that there are to utilize Social Networks or the internet to market whatever it is that you do. Basically, any time you put your name or product out there, isn't that considered marketing?
The problem is that with an infinite number of places and ways to get your name out there, which ones are the most helpful and will yield you the biggest response? This is something I am currently trying to work through and let me tell you, there aren't enough hours in a day to figure it out any time soon.
I blog. Obviously you know that because you are here and reading it. I never did the paid posts thing. For a while there was a site called "Entrecard" that was sort of like an "I'll stop by your site if you stop by mine" and it drew traffic to your site and somehow made your site more relevant in search engines.
They went away.
I have followers here but to be honest, I follow a lot of sites that I just don't get around to visiting on a daily basis. Or weekly. Or monthly. Heck, I think I follow some sites that I was only on a couple of times and never went back to again. It wasn't that they were bad sites, but I just don't have the time that I used to.
I tweet. I have almost 600 followers on Twitter. Apparently this is a good number. My son was highly impressed. So I tweet. I put out news about my books, promotions, when I need help and people to go to a site and click LIKE for me (curse you Amazon!) but basically, I'm certainly not getting results from each of those nearly 600 people.
I'm on Facebook. I'm on there as both me and my alter-ego. I have over 800 friends on there. My alter ego has almost 300 likes on the page. Does that amount to anything? Not really. I post all the live-long day about where I need a little help from my friends and you know what I notice? People will click like all day long on a cartoon or a picture of Grumpy Cat but I can't get nearly the same amount to click on a link for me.
I did Facebook advertising. I spent a lot of money and got little to no return. Sure, people looked at my page but that did not equal book sales or likes on the page. They liked my AD, just not my page. Awesome.
The funny thing with Facebook is that in order for a page to be a somewhat successful marketing/promotional tool, you have to have a lot of followers from all over the country/world. If your group is just people who are local to you and you are not getting any help from the locals, don't waste your time promoting anything to these people! WASTE O TIME! I don't have time to waste on sites, pages or whatever that aren't going to support of promote me.
I heard of this thing called laddering. I'm not sure I understand it but it's sort of like the whole Entrecard thing - you like my Facebook page, I'll like yours. Great, your Likes go up but again, if you aren't promoting me or my product and vice-versa, where is the benefit? Stats only mean something if it's helping you to promote your business! You can have 5,000 likes on your products page. That doesn't mean that 5,000 people have purchased your product.
I'm on Goodreads, Google +, Shelfari, YouTube and more. And you know what? I'm spending 3 hours a DAY on getting my name and my book out there and for all of that time and energy (and in some cases, money), it is not equaling book sales. What am I doing wrong? We're told that getting the word out, getting your Google rank up, getting your Facebook likes up is all what we should aspire to. But what good is that high number when nothing is happening for you? So here's my thought...why am I killing myself on this? Why am I missing out on family time? There are over 1,000,000 books on Amazon that I am fighting against. I'm in the 20,000's. Not a bad stat after less than a week, right? But when will Amazon fix it's issues to help their author's who are using them exclusively and put the Like button back?
In the case of Amazon, that's a stat that I am interested in! That stupid Like button and the ranking are a very coveted thing! Why won't they fix it? Why won't they help the authors whose money they are benefiting from? Help an indie author out. Please go to Amazon and click on the link for Ever After and leave me a comment on whether or not your see a like button. I would love to present them with some stats. And while you're there, get your copy of "Ever After".
Well, here I am three days into "Ever After"'s release and STILL finding issues with Amazon. I am NOT amused.
Don't get me wrong - I understand that this is a process and that when I wrote and published "The Christmas Cottage", it was a completely different beast. Why? I published a feel-god Christmas story and released it right after Thanksgiving. As an avid reader of romances, I LOVE reading a good holiday romance at Christmas time. So basically, the timing was beyond perfect.
"Ever After" is a new challenge. There was no holiday that I wanted to tie in to (I don't want to write like that) and I released it just like every other author and now it has to compete like every other book with nothing to draw any particular attention to it. It's frustrating to say the least. What people don't realize is that, as an author, you are ALWAYS going to want your book to be a success. You write, you publish, you wait for success.
No one likes the waiting.
Ever.
So things are moving slowly right now and a HUGE hindrance to the process is that Amazon still has not figured out or fixed the problem with the "Like" button. I chose to publish through Amazon's Kindle Select program and so the only place you will find "Ever After" is on Kindle. Well, how does Amazon track traffic to your page or your popularity?
Through the like button.
Basically, you don't have to have a boatload of sales to move up the charts. Weird but true. But you need to get traffic to the page and have people click like. Hard to do that when the "Like" button isn't there!
So now here I sit with a book that is competing with a million other books and a missing marketing tool. Not a good place to be sitting. So what am I getting by being a part of this whole Kindle Select program? No one knows. There is the possibility of some higher profits from some special fund that they have but I'm not seeing them doing anything to move my book to get it to have higher profits.
Correct me if I am wrong but considering that they take a HUGE part of my profits, wouldn't it make sense for them to try and SELL my book??? I don't understand it. I want to scream; I want to have an all-out hissy fit. It won't do any good and unless you are a writer yourself, you probably don't understand what the big deal is.
Basically, I am marketing myself/my books. Local advertising is a waste of time and energy. I have to be all over the internet and not just on sites visited by people that live around me. World-wide. Global sites. It's not a difficult concept but you'd be surprised. Amazon is world wide and they are limiting my marketing. I have a fan club base of almost 300 on Facebook (thank you, Nick!) and I have gotten multiple complaints that they can't go to Amazon and like the book! I've gotten enough comments about it that it's sincerely and issue and all I get from Amazon is that they cannot identify the problem.
Why? Because it's like the "Like" button is basically playing peek-a-boo; now you see it, now you don't. Two computers in my house, one has the like button, one doesn't. At work, there are 15 computers, half have the like button, half don't?
What in the world is up with that? Shouldn't an INTERNATIONAL company like Amazon do a little more to support the author's whose money they are taking?
Help me, readers! Please go to Amazon and get your copy of "Ever After" - it's only $1.99 and if you can see it, click the LIKE button!
But at this time yesterday I was spouting both of those things.
Yesterday was the release day of my third book, "Ever After". I chose to go with Amazon exclusively and utilize their Kindle Select program where they get the exclusive digital rights to the book for the first 90 days. I was happy to do it because when I analyzed the sales from "The Christmas Cottage", 98% of them came from Amazon/Kindle.
So what about yesterday had me completely freaked out?
At first I thought I was seeing things but then I remembered how last week when I went to check my stats on "The Christmas Cottage" there had been no "Like"button then either. So what was up?
Let me start by saying if you are suspicious of something, do NOT go onto ANY discussion boards because THAT is where you find all kinds of conspiracy theories. There were customers who had written articles and blogs on how this was Amazon's way of snubbing Indie Authors and making room for only the "real" published ones and I have to tell you, after messaging Amazon and emailing Amazon and chatting with Amazon, I was starting to believe it.
No one had a reason WHY the "Like" button was gone! How could that be? I mean, they are one of, if not THE largest on-line retailers in the world and their IT department can't figure out this 'glitch'? Seemed a little suspicious to me.
And why is the "Like" button so important? Well, it is a way for Amazon to track traffic to your page. It's not the only way but it's an important way and really, in order for my stats to go up on "Ever After", it would certainly help if people went over there and clicked the "Like" button! But they can't do that when it isn't there!
I ranted and raved to their support people and one idiot sent me a lengthy email on the function of the "Like" button. Really? I KNOW THE FUNCTION OF THE LIKE BUTTON!! THAT'S WHY I'M SO PISSED THAT IT'S NOT THERE!!! What the hell???
By 5:00 yesterday afternoon, it was back on "Ever After"'s page. How? Well, for me I had to log out of my Amazon account, clear my internet cache, restart my computer and then log back in.
That only worked on my desktop. I still can't see the "Like" button my laptop.
Come on, Amazon! For real?? Work this stuff out! You keep the majority of my sales on MY hard work and you can't give me my freakin "Like" button??? How about in exchange, I get the majority of my sales profits and you can take your "Like" button and...
Well, you get the picture.
And if you get the chance, head on over and click "LIKE" for me!
I am so excited. Today is the release day for my newest novella, "Ever After"! I thought this day would never come!
For those of you who are new to the blog, "Ever After" is the followup to my holiday novella, "The Christmas Cottage". In the new story, we follow up with Ava Callahan, who was the best friend in "The Christmas Cottage". Though the two stories are related, they can each stand alone.
Here is the back cover blurb:
She walked away from her fairytale wedding in search of her true happily ever after.
She hadn't counted on it coming searching for her first.
Eight months after canceling her wedding, Ava Callahan finally has her life in order and sees nothing but blue skies ahead. A chance encounter with the man responsible for ruining her wedding has her newly organized world in chaos.
Brian McCabe had persevered for eight long months seeking the woman he loves and his patience was about to expire. Purposely putting himself in every path Ava was on might now always work to his advantage, but he wanted to make sure that she truly saw him for who he was.
Her happily ever after.
"Ever After" is available exclusively on Amazon/Kindle starting today for only $1.99!!! Please go to the page HERE and get your copy and don't forget to click LIKE while on the Amazon page. Share the link with your friends and on Facebook, Twitter and anywhere else you can.
You know, it's kind of nice to not be locked in to any one type of writing. For most authors I've seen them go from writing romance to writing mysteries and thrillers, from righting light, fluffy romances to more in-depth novels with a romantic element.
I'm not there yet.
For me, I have always been a romance writer at heart. I started messing around with it in high school and then let it go for years and then messed around with it again in my thirties and now here I am in my forties and making it happen. But along the way, particularly in the last ten years or so, I got in to TEACHING writing. I taught creative writing to middle school kids and high school kids who were homeschooled and I loved it.
I had created my own curriculum that I used but I stopped teaching about two years ago and still had all of these lessons on my computer. So what did I do? Well, I decided to start self publishing them too! They were just sitting there not getting used and so basically, most of the work was already done; all I had to do was organized the files into a workbook format and upload them to CreateSpace.
There will be a total of four workbooks in the Creative Writing Series and this weekend I released the first two - Introduction to Creative Writing and Developing Your Character in Creative Writing. The next two which will be released next month will be The Art of Dialogue Writing and then Introduction to Fiction Writing. Each workbook is $9.99 each and as of now they are only available through CreateSpace but by the end of the coming week, they should be available through Amazon as well. I will put the link out there once that happens. For now you can order Intro to Creative Writing HERE and Developing Your Character HERE.
So for now, I may not be writing blockbuster novels or doing the crossover genre thing, but I'm pretty darn happy to have my light little romances out there and my workbooks. But it doesn't hurt to dream, right?
Oh, and while I'm in self-promoting mode (and really, when am I not?) don't forget that Monday is the big release day for "Ever After" on Amazon!!
So we have less than five days to go until the release of my newest book, "Ever After". I am learning so much about publishing and marketing and promotion and I'm hoping that it will get easier with each book because right now it is still exhausting!
I feel like we are all over the web and very easy to find and follow. That is truly the best way to market your book. I am still feeling no love whatsoever from the local community - bookstores, newspapers, etc. It was kind of depressing at first but then I realized that I want a much bigger audience than they have to offer and so, really, they are doing me a favor. Plus, they are missing out BIG TIME! LOL
I was blessed this week by two great websites. Riley Banks did a wonderful interview with my alter-ego and published it two days ago. It's titled "Samantha Chase gets her happily 'Ever After'". Pretty clever right? You can read it HERE.
Then the wonderful blog, Book Addict Mumma not only is promoting me as the author but is doing a giveaway for the set (The Christmas Cottage AND Ever After)! You can go to the site HERE and enter for your chance to win the ebook set.
Both of these sites are amazing and it would be greatly appreciated if you shared the links with your friends, too.
So if you're thinking about doing any book marketing and promotion, where should you go? Well here's the list of where to find me on the web (besides here at All Stace - lol):
I'll be honest with you, there is about another half dozen sites to go to but these are the main ones. Check them out, like the pages and mark your calendars for Monday, February 25th, for the release of "Ever After".
Okay, so here we are, mid-February and it has begun; the pre-launch marketing hooplah for the new book, "Ever After". I'm not going to lie to you, I really enjoy getting the word out and seeing people share it but this is the first time that I've ever done it PRE release!
When I wrote "Jordan's Return", I sort of just published and waited. Not a good plan. Clearly you have to market and promote your book in order for it to sell. Then with "The Christmas Cottage", it wasn't supposed to be anything but a way to keep my name out there until I possibly heard from the agent in New York on a full-length novel I had written. My assistant was AMAZING in getting the word out on it and we sold 15,000 copies of it in the e-book format!
Not too shabby!
So now here we are with "Ever After". The release date is February 25th and we want to hit the marketing bandwagon hard so that we generate excitement and get people ready to purchase. I am not going to lie to you, I would LOVE to match the number of sales that we had with "The Christmas Cottage" and even surpass them. Realistically? I'm not sure that lightning will strike twice.
So what's a writer to do?
Well, we keep moving forward. Each book is it's own entity. I have learned that sometimes even your favorite author - whose work you love - can sometimes put out a book that is less than stellar. I can name a few right now but I'm not going to. That just wouldn't be right. I'm not here to bash anyone, I'm just saying that even the best writers can't put out books that are awesome all of the time. All I can do is sit and wait and pray that people will enjoy it.
We're hitting the Samantha Chase fan page hard; I'm hitting my own personal Facebook page hard. I will be blogging, I will be using Twitter. My son is making me a Tumblr page and basically, anywhere and everywhere that I can get the word out about "Ever After", the better. You know where I CAN'T promote the book right now?? Amazon! The one place that will be primarily selling the book will not let me do any pre-launch, pre-release stuff on it! How wrong is that??
Won't you help spread the word too? Tell your friends! Share the links! Share this post!! Send them to the Facebook fan page. Let's make the week of February 25th a huge success!!
I had a great time tonight. Why? Well, tonight I traveled to visit a cousin that I haven't seen in probably 30 years! We had reconnected on Facebook and her parents (my aunt & uncle/2nd cousins? Still not sure! LOL) were in town and she was hosting a Christmas get-together and I was invited. Very excited at the invite, I took the 90 mile trek to visit my family.
What a great night!
There were more people there that I didn't know than those that I did but everyone was super nice and it turns out that my sweet cousin had been promoting my book to her friends and co-workers so people knew who I was! Then my dear aunt was introducing me as a best selling author! I even signed and autograph! How funny is that?
I may not be signing books at Barnes & Noble or at some Romance convention, but this little get together was probably one of the most endearing and entertaining events I've had as an author and it wasn't even planned to be one! I had the chance to talk to some amazing people, reconnect with family and generally, talk about my book with some people who were genuinely interested. How could someone not enjoy that?
So while around town here I am still just Stace, it was kind of cool to go someplace and have my alter-ego get some attention.
I found out today that "The Christmas Cottage" is no longer eligible for the Hot New Release category. I was really kind of bummed about that one because it doubled the number of lists I was on. But really, after a month of being on the market, I guess it kind of makes sense that I am no longer considered "new". My numbers are dropping but really, it was exciting to know that I peaked at #10 in Women's Fiction and #116 in Kindle books. Some authors never get that kind of rankings and so I am honored to have hit those highs.
The plan is to keep in marketing mode until New Year's and then start on the next book. Will it be something that goes along with "The Christmas Cottage" - like maybe Ava's story? I don't know. Her story isn't coming to me clearly yet. I have some other plots swirling around in my brain that my need attention first.
I'm trying to reach that 10,000 sales mark on "The Christmas Cottage" by New Years. If you haven't gotten your e-copy yet, now would be the perfect time! Did you get an e-reader for Christmas? Don't you want to stock it with .99 cent books? LOOK NO FURTHER!! Click HERE to go to the Amazon page and get your copy and remember to click like while you are there!
Okay, the holiday's are almost over and we've hit the one month mark since the release of "The Christmas Cottage". As an indie author, this has been a very exciting month. I mean, I never in my wildest dreams thought that I'd sell a whole lot of copies; I thought if I hit a thousand, it would be amazing. After all, my first book, "Jordan's Return" really only sold a little over 100 copies.
So imagine my complete and utter surprise that at the one month mark, I've sold almost 7,500 books! WOW! Who knew? I am not going to lie to you, it's a lot of work and I've met all kinds of authors who have had various degrees of success and it doesn't matter if they are traditionally published with big name (or any name) publishers or self published. The key is in the marketing.
This particular book has a limited shelf life due to the fact that it is set on Christmas and not many people are wanting to read a Christmas story in the Spring. I've had to hit the promoting hard and fast and really, I kind of shot myself in the foot a little bit on this one because I released it so quickly that there wasn't any time to build up any hype and get some professional reviews done on some of big book review sites out there before Christmas. Most sites have me on a waiting list and that's going to put the book getting reviewed somewhere around the end of February.
Not good.
I've set small goals for myself as we've gone along. Sell a thousand books. Sell twenty-five hundred books, five thousand...etc. Then it was getting in the top 100 list on Amazon, then the top 50, top 30 until I hit the top 10. I did that on Christmas Eve. It was pretty darn exciting. Now my goal is to hit 10,000 sales by New Year's. Baby steps. It's all about baby steps...
Just need to take them really fast before my window closes.
So here's the thing, I really want and need people to spread the word. I need help getting the word out about the book - it's only a .99 cent download on Kindle, Nook and Smashwords. I need "likes" on Amazon. I mean, 7,500 sales and only 81 people clicked like...I have 36 reviews (most are positive, two are just nasty).
HELP! HELP!! HELP!!!
So if you are looking to do a good deed, help a struggling Indie Author achieve her dream of ending 2012 on a high note! Go to Amazon and click on "The Christmas Cottage". If you haven't already, download the Kindle version or send it to a friend! Click "Like", leave a cheery little note (I cry easily). Let's celebrate the success of the little book that could!
Thank you again for all of your help! Let's show some of those big name publishers what they are missing and that you don't need to spend a fortune to have a best seller.
I hope all of you had a very Merry Christmas and here's to some successful book selling as we prepare to say farewell to 2012!!
You know, I may have shared this story before but for those of you just joining us, I'll recap.
On November 25, 2012, I released a book titled "The Christmas Cottage". This was a book that I wrote for National Novel Writing Month - November 2012. Yes, I wrote it in less than a month. The story wasn't planned, I started on NaNoWriMo late and basically the words just came to me. I thought it was pretty cool.
Anyway, I had a book signing event for my first book, "Jordan's Return", and I wanted to have something to offer anyone that showed up other than my signature in the book. So I came up with a plan to offer a free ebook for Christmas. The problem was that the book signing was at the end of November and I was still really in the editing process of my quickly written book. I rushed through the edits and had bookmarks made that essentially said "My gift to you...free ebook...blah, blah, blah" and then I found out that Amazon would not allow me to do that.
Again, I was in a rushed mode and didn't do my research. Shame on me.
So I decided to put the book out there for .99 cents. It was a novella so I felt that the price was fair. I got creative with the bookmarks and took out the "free" part. I put the book out there and started marketing with the help of an assistant. I didn't have particularly high hopes for the book because I remembered how little the first book had done but this book wasn't about the sales, it was about keeping my name out there until the agent in NY decided what she was going to do with a book of mine that she has in her possession. You see, this novella was more about keeping my name out there; it wasn't about any great plan for a best seller.
Best laid plans and all that...
Imagine my surprise when the book started climbing the charts. Imagine my surprise that people were actually excited about it and responding to my ads and cries for support. Totally unlike the response I got to book number one. I was giddy and excited and damn near in tears when the book hit one of the best seller lists!
Imagine my surprise when I started getting negative reviews and critiques because of my spelling/grammar/keystroke errors. I have no excuse; I rushed the book, I didn't spend enough time editing. The funny thing is that most of those negative reviews say that they really enjoyed the story, just that the grammar/spelling errors were too distracting.
I spent three days currently re-editing the book and tonight I re-submitted it to Amazon and will have to do the same tomorrow with Nook. I should have taken more time. I should have waited to release it but I was really not expecting all of the hooplah that I got. I wasn't expecting so many mean people.
I'm reading a book right now that is a collection of short stories that is absolutely horrible. I mean, I don't know who chose these stories but they are not a grouping that should be together. Some stories are short and sweet while others are just crude and full of vulgar language and sex scenes. I'm not a prude and I've written many a sex scene for my books but these scenes made me wince. Am I going to attack the publisher and writers? No. Am I going to ask for a refund? No. I bought it, I read it, I own it.
I'm just praying that I have learned from the negative reviews and from reading some bad books and that my next book won't be such a downer to so many people. Sorry that I let my excitement ruin your reading experience. That wasn't my intention...
Your gentle face and patient smile with sadness we recall, you had a kindly word for each and died beloved by all. The voice is mute and stilled the heart that loved us well and true, ah, bitter was the trail to depart from one so good as you.
You are not forgotten loved one nor will you ever be as long as life and memory last we will remember thee. We miss you now. Our hearts are sore. As time goes by we miss you more, your loving smile, your gentle face. no one can fill your vacant place.
Grandma & Nick
Priorities
PRIORITIES
"A hundred years from now it will not matter what my bank account was, the sort of house I lived in, or the kind of car I drove.... but the world may be different because I was important in the life of a child."
I am a 40 year old mother of two who is still trying to figure out what I want to be when I grow up! I am a wanna-be author, a homeschool mom, wife, and all around mom-on-the-go who does her best to avoid her crazy, extended family!
Earlier this month I released another book, "In the Eye of the Storm". This book was the one that a New York agent wanted to represent but ultimately could not sell and it was also a top five finalist with Harlequin for their Desire Editor's Pitch Challenge. Clearly people liked it so I decided to just release it myself. So far? The numbers aren't too bad. I had tried pricing it a little bit higher than the other, at a whopping $1.49, but after two weeks of so-so sales, I lowered it to .99 cents and it's flying. As much as I hate doing it, it seems like the way to a reader's heart is a .99 cent eBook. Lesson learned.
