Well, my first Kickstarter project wasn't as successful as I'd hoped it would be, but that's okay. Self-publishing is always a learning process, and I think the next time I try to go this route I will get things more right than I did this time.
In the meantime, though, I do plan to move forward with the polishing and publication of Hungry as a Wolf. I'm in communication with an editor/proofreader on Fiverr who can work within my (tiny) budget, and a graphic designer on Facebook has offered to do my cover in exchange for a copy of the finished book.
So, for all of you who backed this project, thank you! It means a lot that you took the effort to invest in my novel, and I will keep you in mind when Hungry as a Wolf is finally published.. In the meantime, I have a lot of work to do! Feel free to follow along with my progress on my website here or my blog here!
In other news, I'm very close to finishing the first round of edits for Necromancy Will Kill Your Dating Life, so I fully expect that title to be available for beta reading next month. Anyone who likes supernatural YA fiction should feel free to give this one a shot. Follow my progress here.
Showing posts with label self publishing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label self publishing. Show all posts
Thursday, April 16, 2015
Tuesday, March 17, 2015
Hungry As a Wolf Kickstarter Campaign is now Live!
That's right, readers--the Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign for Hungry as a Wolf, the sequel to my weird western novella Sheep's Clothing, is now live! It will last until April 16th, 2015, and every dollar you donate brings me that much closer to getting Hungry as a Wolf polished and looking awesome for the public!
I'm really excited about my first crowdfunding campaign, because and despite the fact that I'm going into this more or less blind. Just like self-publishing, I imagine crowdfunding will be a learning experience.
If you want to check out my Kickstarter campaign, just go here. I'm got a fair number of rewards for contributors of all kinds, and I'm not asking for much in the grand scheme of crowdfunded publishing, so donate what you can! Thanks in advance!
I'm really excited about my first crowdfunding campaign, because and despite the fact that I'm going into this more or less blind. Just like self-publishing, I imagine crowdfunding will be a learning experience.
If you want to check out my Kickstarter campaign, just go here. I'm got a fair number of rewards for contributors of all kinds, and I'm not asking for much in the grand scheme of crowdfunded publishing, so donate what you can! Thanks in advance!
Friday, February 14, 2014
Adventures in Self-Publishing Part Three: The Fine Art of Marketing
Writing your manuscript is, I've found, the hardest part of self-publishing. It's time-consuming, it takes up lots of blood, sweat, and tears, and the agony of having to take a chainsaw to a beloved scene, character, or entire plotline can feel like amputating your own leg with a chainsaw. With self-publishing, however, you skip over a lot of the drama that would go along with getting your story into the light of day, but unfortunately it's replaced with the second-hardest part of self-publishing.
Marketing your work. (Dun-dun-DUNNNNNNN!)
With traditional publishing, the publishing house typically takes care of all the marketing for you. It's in their best interest that your book sell, so they can recoup the royalties or whatever they've paid you for it. They'll advertise the hell out of your book, and if it's good enough for them to pick up (or marketable enough, at least), you can just sit back and let them do all the work.
Self-published authors, of course, have to do that all by themselves, and I tell you, it's hard. Many writers I know are introverts as well, with makes going up to people and howling variations of "HEY! Buy my book!" really, really sucks for an introvert.
Fortunately, I have a few resources that I'm bringing to bear with this venture, and your marketing army can be every bit as important as your Fellowship of Self-Publishing (see relevant post) with getting your book out there and in the hands of readers.
Here they are, in no particular order:
Word of Mouth
Tell people about your book. Tell your friends and family and co-workers. This might not be easy (see above point about introverts), but in many cases if you get the right balance of passionate vs. annoying (that is, way over on the passionate end), then some of these people might be interested in buying your book when it's available in whatever format. (Having it both in paperback and ebook formats helps.) If you're part of a guild or other writing group, they might let you bring copies of your book to sell at gatherings and workshops, and talk about your book.
Bookstores
Not a lot of brick-and-mortar stores left in my area, to be honest, but there are a few. If you can find a place that will accept your work on consignment (that is, they have to sell it before they will pay you), try it out. I have a local bookstore that specializes in St. Louis authors that I'm going to try with Sheep's Clothing; they're a small place, and will only take five copies at a time, but if you're not a big-name author this is a good way to get your foot in the door.
Talk to Local Media
Talk to your local paper about your book. It helps to get together a press release ahead of time so you're prepared if they want more info or an interview.
I even talked to a woman at work who was in charge of the library's internal newsletter (doesn't get much more local than that!) and she agreed to include an article on Sheep's Clothing in a future issue.
Libraries
Many libraries will want to purchase books that are actually going to circulate, so you might want to build up a bit of a demand through things like positive book reviews before heading here, especially if you aren't well-known just yet.
Swag
Swag is any free giveaway dingbat that doubles as a handy-dandy form of advertisement for your book (or even you as an author). This can be anything from business cards to bookmarks to flyers--and bookmarks would be perfect as a free item for people you know are readers to start with. Sites like VistaPrint offer all sorts of promotional swag at a variety of prices to let you get your name out there.
Go Online
Online coverage will offer you the widest net to cast to get potential readers and fans, but this will be a multipart venture in itself.
Author platform
Get yourself an author's website, the more professional-looking the better. You can set it up so people can buy copies of your book right from your site, and find out about what projects you have coming down the pipe at the same time. You can even offer samples of things you are offering for sale, or teasers of things you're working on.
Social Networking
Any sort of social networking site will offer you a good chance of finding someone who is interested in reading your book. Facebook, Twitter, and Google+ are the ones I use, and I already have a few nibbles.
Goodreads
Get yourself a Goodreads account if you don't have one. Not only is this a good site for bookworms to meet similarly-inclined bookworms, but the Author program offers you ways to promote the crap out of your book, from making your own ads to offering promotional giveaways. You can also make sure your book has an entry in Goodreads so the curious can find out what the silly thing's about.
Magazines
There a whole pile of writer-centric magazines, ranging from Writer's Digest to Publisher's Weekly. Contact them with a copy of your book and a press release and see if they'll run with it.
Public Readings
This may run up against the comfort zones of the introverts, but if you find the right venue and you like entertaining potential fans, you can bring along a couple dozen copies of your book to sell on the spot, though if the venue you choose won't let you sell your stuff on site, you can offer bookmarks or business cards to attendees. (See swag, above.)
I won't pretend that this is anywhere near a comprehensive list of all the things you could possibly do to get your book sold, but these are the ones I've seen recommended by a lot of fellow writers. I'm still wading my way though all this myself, but then my book's only been out two days at time of writing. My only remaining advice is to get creative.
We're writers. Creative is what we do.
Marketing your work. (Dun-dun-DUNNNNNNN!)
With traditional publishing, the publishing house typically takes care of all the marketing for you. It's in their best interest that your book sell, so they can recoup the royalties or whatever they've paid you for it. They'll advertise the hell out of your book, and if it's good enough for them to pick up (or marketable enough, at least), you can just sit back and let them do all the work.
Self-published authors, of course, have to do that all by themselves, and I tell you, it's hard. Many writers I know are introverts as well, with makes going up to people and howling variations of "HEY! Buy my book!" really, really sucks for an introvert.
Fortunately, I have a few resources that I'm bringing to bear with this venture, and your marketing army can be every bit as important as your Fellowship of Self-Publishing (see relevant post) with getting your book out there and in the hands of readers.
Here they are, in no particular order:
Word of Mouth
Tell people about your book. Tell your friends and family and co-workers. This might not be easy (see above point about introverts), but in many cases if you get the right balance of passionate vs. annoying (that is, way over on the passionate end), then some of these people might be interested in buying your book when it's available in whatever format. (Having it both in paperback and ebook formats helps.) If you're part of a guild or other writing group, they might let you bring copies of your book to sell at gatherings and workshops, and talk about your book.
Bookstores
Not a lot of brick-and-mortar stores left in my area, to be honest, but there are a few. If you can find a place that will accept your work on consignment (that is, they have to sell it before they will pay you), try it out. I have a local bookstore that specializes in St. Louis authors that I'm going to try with Sheep's Clothing; they're a small place, and will only take five copies at a time, but if you're not a big-name author this is a good way to get your foot in the door.
Talk to Local Media
Talk to your local paper about your book. It helps to get together a press release ahead of time so you're prepared if they want more info or an interview.
I even talked to a woman at work who was in charge of the library's internal newsletter (doesn't get much more local than that!) and she agreed to include an article on Sheep's Clothing in a future issue.
Libraries
Many libraries will want to purchase books that are actually going to circulate, so you might want to build up a bit of a demand through things like positive book reviews before heading here, especially if you aren't well-known just yet.
Swag
Swag is any free giveaway dingbat that doubles as a handy-dandy form of advertisement for your book (or even you as an author). This can be anything from business cards to bookmarks to flyers--and bookmarks would be perfect as a free item for people you know are readers to start with. Sites like VistaPrint offer all sorts of promotional swag at a variety of prices to let you get your name out there.
Go Online
Online coverage will offer you the widest net to cast to get potential readers and fans, but this will be a multipart venture in itself.
Author platform
Get yourself an author's website, the more professional-looking the better. You can set it up so people can buy copies of your book right from your site, and find out about what projects you have coming down the pipe at the same time. You can even offer samples of things you are offering for sale, or teasers of things you're working on.
Social Networking
Any sort of social networking site will offer you a good chance of finding someone who is interested in reading your book. Facebook, Twitter, and Google+ are the ones I use, and I already have a few nibbles.
Goodreads
Get yourself a Goodreads account if you don't have one. Not only is this a good site for bookworms to meet similarly-inclined bookworms, but the Author program offers you ways to promote the crap out of your book, from making your own ads to offering promotional giveaways. You can also make sure your book has an entry in Goodreads so the curious can find out what the silly thing's about.
Magazines
There a whole pile of writer-centric magazines, ranging from Writer's Digest to Publisher's Weekly. Contact them with a copy of your book and a press release and see if they'll run with it.
Public Readings
This may run up against the comfort zones of the introverts, but if you find the right venue and you like entertaining potential fans, you can bring along a couple dozen copies of your book to sell on the spot, though if the venue you choose won't let you sell your stuff on site, you can offer bookmarks or business cards to attendees. (See swag, above.)
I won't pretend that this is anywhere near a comprehensive list of all the things you could possibly do to get your book sold, but these are the ones I've seen recommended by a lot of fellow writers. I'm still wading my way though all this myself, but then my book's only been out two days at time of writing. My only remaining advice is to get creative.
We're writers. Creative is what we do.
Friday, January 31, 2014
Adventures in Self-Publishing Part 2: The Fellowship of Self-Publishing
A wise man once said, "One does not simply walk into Mordor." He went crazy with lust for the One Ring and died full of arrows at the hands of orcs, but his general point more-or-less stands, especially when it comes to self-publishing. In this case, walking into Mordor is the process of getting your book from that really snappy manuscript you have to the even snappier hard copy or e-book, minus the hordes of orcs, the Dark Lord, and having the fate of the entire planet resting in your hobbity little hands.
With traditional publishing, the only person you have to contend with is the publisher's editor or an agent--the gatekeeper to get into the land of published authorship. You impress them with your work, and you're in, for certain values of "in". Traditional publishers have a whole horde of people whose job it is to make your book look awesome enough to be purchased, so that all you have to do is sign the contract, and then sit back and let them work this magic.
With self-publishing, however, you have to do a lot of this yourself, obviously. You need your own little fellowship of companions who take care of the various jobs involved in making your book look awesome enough to be purchased. Now, you might be able to take care of some of these jobs yourself--but that will be a hell of a lot of work. Let us look at your fellowship, shall we?
Developmental editing sounds like one of those things you can do yourself, and if you're patient it's possible that you'd be right. This part takes detachment, though, and the discipline to chainsaw out whole swaths of your manuscript and/or rewrite them if need be. If you want to take care of this yourself, you must be willing to let your manuscript hang out (in whatever format) until you have the proper detachment to perform some truly invasive surgery on the thing. This is someone who must show no mercy towards the manuscript. They must take out everything that doesn't contribute to the story. If you can't find the detachment to do that, you'll be better off hiring someone to edit for you.
The beta reader is the person you give your manuscript to once it's out of the crappy rough draft stage, the person whose job it is to give the thing a second eyeball check and a second brain check to make sure that everything fits together. You absolutely cannot do this one yourself. I can't emphasize this enough. The beta reader must be at least one step removed from the manuscript. They can be a friend whose opinion your trust, or a colleague who is interested in your writing career and wants to give you honest help. He should be able to tell you if something doesn't work, or if he finds a continuity error, or even if the story doesn't work at all. He will be your peek at your potential readerbase.
The proofreader needs to have sharp eyes, because not even Word's spelling and grammar checker will find errors like misused words, or words misspelled so they become other words. The proofreader needs to be a fresh pair of eyes who is able to go through your manuscript with a fine-toothed comb and look for all the tiny errors that even an experience writer might miss. My proofreader has picked up things like misused commas, wonky capitalization, continuity errors (yes, again), and vocabulary derps that my mind told me afterwards that I should have seen, but I didn't. Why? Because I knew the manuscript like the back of my hand. (Or thought I did.)
Unless you have Photoshop, a fair talent for graphic design, and hours to kill, you'll want to farm this one out. And honestly, if you had hours to kill, you be spending it writing. The cover artist's job is to make an eye-catching cover for your book that reflects what the story's about. I've seen some truly awful covers at the library where I work, and a lot of them came from professional publishing houses. Since you're doing this yourself, you have a bit more freedom to work alongside your artist to get the cover you want.
The formatter's job is to take your really awesome manuscript and make it play nicely with whatever template your self-publishing company uses so it doesn't look like ass in the finished product. CreateSpace (the company I'm using for Sheep's Clothing) offers a downloadable template for Word, so that you can just copy and paste your text in there and let it do the rest, but be prepared to actually look through the result to make sure everything looks right, or else you'll have more work later on.
Unless you have a publisher-grade printer and all the equipment you could possibly need to make a book (not likely), let someone else handle this. Seriously. Print-on-demand sites allow you to acquire as many books as you need--no more and no less--so this part shouldn't be all that hard. Let their army of professionals assemble your book.
This last role should on no account be neglected. Without proper marketing, your really awesome book will just fall by the wayside because nobody can freaking find it amongst all the big-name, big-publisher titles. This role also requires a lot of decisions: How will you get the word out? Who will you tell? What marketing materials do you want to offer? How will you reward readers that are willing to give you a shot. If you are self-publishing, you will also be self-marketing for the most part. If you're lucky you might be able to link up with a local marketing firm to take care of this for you, but this can be expensive. Telling people about your book is the best way to make sure it gets bought, and that often requires talking to complete strangers. (Dun-dun-DUNNNNN!) Just keep in mind that the more you get the word out, the better your chances of selling copies of your book.
So there you have it--the Fellowship of Self-Publishing. You can do a lot of these things yourself, but bear in mind that it will take time away from the real point of this whole exercise, your writing. With work and patience, however, you will be able to get your book out there where people (read: future fans) can read it without having to rely on a traditional publisher.
As a final note: I sincerely apologize to the J.R.R.Tolkien estate.
With traditional publishing, the only person you have to contend with is the publisher's editor or an agent--the gatekeeper to get into the land of published authorship. You impress them with your work, and you're in, for certain values of "in". Traditional publishers have a whole horde of people whose job it is to make your book look awesome enough to be purchased, so that all you have to do is sign the contract, and then sit back and let them work this magic.
With self-publishing, however, you have to do a lot of this yourself, obviously. You need your own little fellowship of companions who take care of the various jobs involved in making your book look awesome enough to be purchased. Now, you might be able to take care of some of these jobs yourself--but that will be a hell of a lot of work. Let us look at your fellowship, shall we?
Developmental Editor
Developmental editing sounds like one of those things you can do yourself, and if you're patient it's possible that you'd be right. This part takes detachment, though, and the discipline to chainsaw out whole swaths of your manuscript and/or rewrite them if need be. If you want to take care of this yourself, you must be willing to let your manuscript hang out (in whatever format) until you have the proper detachment to perform some truly invasive surgery on the thing. This is someone who must show no mercy towards the manuscript. They must take out everything that doesn't contribute to the story. If you can't find the detachment to do that, you'll be better off hiring someone to edit for you.
Beta Reader
The beta reader is the person you give your manuscript to once it's out of the crappy rough draft stage, the person whose job it is to give the thing a second eyeball check and a second brain check to make sure that everything fits together. You absolutely cannot do this one yourself. I can't emphasize this enough. The beta reader must be at least one step removed from the manuscript. They can be a friend whose opinion your trust, or a colleague who is interested in your writing career and wants to give you honest help. He should be able to tell you if something doesn't work, or if he finds a continuity error, or even if the story doesn't work at all. He will be your peek at your potential readerbase.
Proofreader
The proofreader needs to have sharp eyes, because not even Word's spelling and grammar checker will find errors like misused words, or words misspelled so they become other words. The proofreader needs to be a fresh pair of eyes who is able to go through your manuscript with a fine-toothed comb and look for all the tiny errors that even an experience writer might miss. My proofreader has picked up things like misused commas, wonky capitalization, continuity errors (yes, again), and vocabulary derps that my mind told me afterwards that I should have seen, but I didn't. Why? Because I knew the manuscript like the back of my hand. (Or thought I did.)
Cover Artist
Unless you have Photoshop, a fair talent for graphic design, and hours to kill, you'll want to farm this one out. And honestly, if you had hours to kill, you be spending it writing. The cover artist's job is to make an eye-catching cover for your book that reflects what the story's about. I've seen some truly awful covers at the library where I work, and a lot of them came from professional publishing houses. Since you're doing this yourself, you have a bit more freedom to work alongside your artist to get the cover you want.
Formatter
The formatter's job is to take your really awesome manuscript and make it play nicely with whatever template your self-publishing company uses so it doesn't look like ass in the finished product. CreateSpace (the company I'm using for Sheep's Clothing) offers a downloadable template for Word, so that you can just copy and paste your text in there and let it do the rest, but be prepared to actually look through the result to make sure everything looks right, or else you'll have more work later on.
Printer
Unless you have a publisher-grade printer and all the equipment you could possibly need to make a book (not likely), let someone else handle this. Seriously. Print-on-demand sites allow you to acquire as many books as you need--no more and no less--so this part shouldn't be all that hard. Let their army of professionals assemble your book.
Marketing
This last role should on no account be neglected. Without proper marketing, your really awesome book will just fall by the wayside because nobody can freaking find it amongst all the big-name, big-publisher titles. This role also requires a lot of decisions: How will you get the word out? Who will you tell? What marketing materials do you want to offer? How will you reward readers that are willing to give you a shot. If you are self-publishing, you will also be self-marketing for the most part. If you're lucky you might be able to link up with a local marketing firm to take care of this for you, but this can be expensive. Telling people about your book is the best way to make sure it gets bought, and that often requires talking to complete strangers. (Dun-dun-DUNNNNN!) Just keep in mind that the more you get the word out, the better your chances of selling copies of your book.
So there you have it--the Fellowship of Self-Publishing. You can do a lot of these things yourself, but bear in mind that it will take time away from the real point of this whole exercise, your writing. With work and patience, however, you will be able to get your book out there where people (read: future fans) can read it without having to rely on a traditional publisher.
As a final note: I sincerely apologize to the J.R.R.Tolkien estate.
Thursday, January 16, 2014
Adventures in Self-Publishing: Part One - The Journey of a Thousand Miles
Hello readers! I apologize for not having updated my blog lately, but I have resolved to stay more on top of things this year.
Before getting to the meat of this blog post, I have a couple of updates. Since writing here last, I have finished my science fiction romance novel Heart of Steel and at the time of this post I am trying to publish it traditionally. More recently, I also finished a Weird West novella entitled Sheep's Clothing, and this year I will try to self-publish it, which will be the focus of the Adventures in Self-Publishing articles.
Why do I want to publish Sheep's Clothing myself? A couple of reasons:
First, I found a grand total of six publishers on Duotrope that publish Westerns. Not exactly encouraging, especially when you realize that out of these, only one or two accepted Weird Westerns. Bleh.
Second, I'm starting to become a bit discouraged with traditional publishing and want to try a different tack. I really want to get my book and my name Out There, and a lot of the trad-pubs seem to focus more on what they know will sell. (See my first point above.)
Third, I want to be able to see my book on the shelves of the library where I work. Yes, the Western section is tiny--like the Western section of any brick-and-mortar bookstore--but seeing my name on something I wrote available for checkout in the library would just be Really Really Cool.
Seems simple enough--but the truth is that I won't be able to bang out whatever and expect to just churn out a high-quality book on my own. Typos happen to everyone, even me. Editing services, cover designers, marketing plans--a lot of it will cost money, and I will have to get a good grasp of how much.
By this point I've been working alongside a marketing firm called Response! Targeted Marketing that I met via the St. Louis Writer's Guild (member since Nov 2013), and they're working on redoing my Author Website and working up a cover design for Sheep's Clothing, and I have a lead on a proofreader to give my manuscript one last pass for typo hunting. Based on my research, I've chosen CreateSpace for both print and e-books, as well as distribution through Amazon.
With this series, I will describe my journey through the Land of Self-Publishing as I work to get Sheep's Clothing to see the light of day. Wish me luck!
Before getting to the meat of this blog post, I have a couple of updates. Since writing here last, I have finished my science fiction romance novel Heart of Steel and at the time of this post I am trying to publish it traditionally. More recently, I also finished a Weird West novella entitled Sheep's Clothing, and this year I will try to self-publish it, which will be the focus of the Adventures in Self-Publishing articles.
Why do I want to publish Sheep's Clothing myself? A couple of reasons:
First, I found a grand total of six publishers on Duotrope that publish Westerns. Not exactly encouraging, especially when you realize that out of these, only one or two accepted Weird Westerns. Bleh.
Second, I'm starting to become a bit discouraged with traditional publishing and want to try a different tack. I really want to get my book and my name Out There, and a lot of the trad-pubs seem to focus more on what they know will sell. (See my first point above.)
Third, I want to be able to see my book on the shelves of the library where I work. Yes, the Western section is tiny--like the Western section of any brick-and-mortar bookstore--but seeing my name on something I wrote available for checkout in the library would just be Really Really Cool.
Seems simple enough--but the truth is that I won't be able to bang out whatever and expect to just churn out a high-quality book on my own. Typos happen to everyone, even me. Editing services, cover designers, marketing plans--a lot of it will cost money, and I will have to get a good grasp of how much.
By this point I've been working alongside a marketing firm called Response! Targeted Marketing that I met via the St. Louis Writer's Guild (member since Nov 2013), and they're working on redoing my Author Website and working up a cover design for Sheep's Clothing, and I have a lead on a proofreader to give my manuscript one last pass for typo hunting. Based on my research, I've chosen CreateSpace for both print and e-books, as well as distribution through Amazon.
With this series, I will describe my journey through the Land of Self-Publishing as I work to get Sheep's Clothing to see the light of day. Wish me luck!
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