A conversation with Ed Teja often turns educational. I wrote something about “marketing” and Ed responded very much like this:
Ed TejaThere are numerous discussions, blogs, courses and (of course) books on things writers can do to sell their work—both better and at all. They are comprehensive, exhausting and often contradictory. Partly the problem is that we confuse the activities that make writers more visible and their books desirable purchases. So, after hearing various comments from writers online, I thought it appropriate to help clarify what are becoming muddy waters.
Writers are supposed to be wordsmiths, so let’s start with some definitions.
Marketing activities are things we do to sell books.
Promotional activities are things to help with discovery of a product (yes, even a book.)
Publicity is work done to gain mind share…to ensure readers are aware of and think about the writer—the person.
We tend to blur these together, resulting in a great deal of confusion. They are quite different. Note that you can squish a bit of this or that from one category to another. I won’t quibble over specifics. The important thing is that an effective business plan must address all three aspects. Although they overlap, they do different things.
Short version: unless greater benefits roll in over time, I didn’t get anything from Story Cartel which I couldn’t have done just as well myself, without spending $25.
Stop the presses and hold everything. Fellow writer Libi Astaire pointed out a line in the drawing rules I’d missed:
Every reader who downloads a book gets one entry.
They are rewarded for downloading your book, whether or not they have any intent on reading it, any interest whatsoever.
This violates my primary principle of free: it is not a price, it is a strategy.
“Here, download this” is not a strategy.
The founders of Story Cartel are authors. And they may be good at marketing their service. But they have a long way to go to be good at marketing our books for us.
Long version:
Your genre or network may deliver completely different outcomes, so this isn’t a sweeping condemnation of the tool. It does what it claims to do. My book was exposed to a wider audience, and I got reviews. It just didn’t add enough value to offset the cost.
During the experiment, I got two 4-star reviews from Story Cartel readers. In the same time period I got two 4-star reviewsplus one 5-star reviewfrom my own network.
Some folks responded to my email to the 23 addresses Story Cartel provided. At least a dozen, more than half, didn’t participate in any manner beyond downloading the book. No review, no response to my two emails, nothing.
One old friend tried to download, couldn’t sort it out, and bought a print version instead. There’s a sale which may have been triggered by Story Cartel, but was consummated because he’s been a friend for 20 years. (I offered him a free copy, but he graciously wanted to reward me for my effort.)
When I read Richard Halliburton’s first book, The Royal Road to Romance it altered how I think about the process of living. Though it is as far from a business book as you can get, it is one reason I make a good living doing things I love.
Another reason (and, to contradict what I said above, even less of a business book) is Dr. Seuss’ unknown classic I Had Trouble in Getting to Solla Sollew. A youngster, plagued by problems, sets out for Solla Sollew, “where they never have troubles, at least, very few.” The lesson he learns, again, triggered new thinking and new actions, a different path in life.
At the other end of the spectrum, I own 3/4 of Donald Knuth’s indispensable The Art of Computer Programming and haven’t made it past the first few chapters of book one (the engagingly entitled Fundamental Algorithms, which I assure is dead sexy to Knuth’s target audience.)
I may be a people person, but I’m still a serious introvert. I need 51% of my time to be me, alone. At least 51%. (Best Beloved does not count because, for all practical purposes which don’t involve clothing, we are one.)
I’ve watched Grahl work with Dan Pink and David Burkus (as a member of their street teams for To Sell Is Human and The Myths of Creativity) and Tim is the goods, the real deal, the guy who does it right. Which is what his book is about.
You can even sign up to learn buckets of stuff completely free. But start by reading this article, because it’s pure unadulterated truth about why introverts can be stupendous at marketing.
Most authors think marketing is a scary deep dark hole. I think it’s filled with rainbows and possibly unicorns, so I’m writing a book to see if you can learn to be as goofy about it as I am.
You’ll be disappointed to find that Commonsense Zero-Cost DIY Marketing for Authors will not be a step by step marketing guide. Like all my books it’s a why to rather than a how to.
Writing to make a profit in 2013 requires either wild blind luck or choosing to write over-the-line sexual encounters. For this brief moment in history, books are a commodity: far more supply than demand.
Stick with it for 5 years, and the opportunists will have faded away or been pruned by market response.
For now, write because you have something to say. Word toward making a profit 5 years from now.
If you understand that self-publishing is a business which is connected to but not the same as the art of writing, you’re light-years ahead of many other authors.
The common perception is that a low price is hard to raise. It’s just not true.
It’s hard to resell the same thing to the same buyer at a higher price, sure. That’s why we whine about the price of gas, like that’s gonna do any good.
But if I sell my book to you for 99¢, and in a year when I’ve finished 5 of them and am famous for being Chandler reborn, do you really believe I can’t set the price of that selfsame book anywhere I like, and sell copies all day long to new readers?
In fact, would those early readers not tell everyone they know “I knew him when he was 99¢, and he’s worth every penny of ten bucks, go buy the book” ?
On Mon, Aug 5, 2013 at 9:04 AM, Cheryl Campbell <ccampbell.me@gmail.com> wrote:Hi Joel,
Hope you had a great weekend. It’s Monday and I’m armed with more questions, of course!
I got the book up on Amazon this weekend. That happened faster than I thought it would so that was exciting. I’m still working on the CreateSpace piece for printing, but I should have the proof review and all that done by the end of this week.
So my question…rather questions, are around taking the book to local brick and mortar stores. I can’t imagine just walking in with a handful of books and saying “Hi, I wrote this. Will you display and sell it for me?” is the way to go.
What do I need to bring with me when approaching a book store? A printed synopsis, flyers, something else?
I’m guessing I would talk to a manager?
Do I call ahead to speak with said manager before showing up?
Really quite clueless on this part. Figured I’d start asking now before I started this piece of the process.
I’ve been a web developer for almost 25 years, so this is not simply from the perspective of an author, though I have published 18 books so far and show no signs of stopping.
An author without a website and blog is like any other business without a website.
The first place people go for information these days is the web. If you’re considering a new mechanic, and this one has a good website and the other has nothing, don’t you lean toward the one you can find out about online? Continue reading “Why Authors Must Have a Blog”
A longer diatribe about marketing your self-published book. This is a year-long class, which I’d be glad to give if y’all are interested.
Publishing is in the greatest upheaval since Gutenberg. Supporters of traditional publishing will tell you it’s the only choice, or you’re not a real author.
Add these 4 to the 6 we already did, and you’ve got a good start.
When anyone asks “what do you do?” introduce yourself as “the author of [your book’s name.]” When you self-identify as a writer, it changes your own perspective. This is not the same as pestering every person you meet with “hey, I wrote a book, and I’m going to tell you about it whether you like it or not.” Just identify yourself as the author, and if they don’t ask, you don’t pester. But say it.
Ask your readers to write honest reviews at Amazon
Carry copies with you everywhere, so when an opportunity arises, you can talk about it and sell it.
Write your next book. A single-book author doesn’t stand out very much any more. “I’m working on my second book” is a good way to show you’re a career author, not a flash in the pan.
I love yard sales and garage sales. I avoided them during my life as a nomad, carrying everything we owned everywhere we went, but they still tugged at me. Now that we’ve settled (for a while) I’m itching to get out and find some beautiful wood furniture on the cheap, and maybe an old book I can rebind.
Yard sales have been corrupted by business thinking and the wrong why.
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