The new edition is available on Amazon and free July 4th-8th.
Part THREE
Formatting your eBook
These are the style guides to use for various eReaders/formats:
Smashwords Style Guide
http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/52- Metagrinder makes your eBook digestible in the most formats all in one place. It’s a great one-stop-shop, but you’ve got to be basic in your set up.
Here’s a template a writer friend SMJohnson sent me –
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1CuwxI9fxl39l4PzLvY6zbKgjXmRFcEBEIz1wthPmDBg/edit
Amazon Kindle Publishing Guidelines
https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&q=cache:gvh8L4zNpwMJ:s3.amazonaws.com/kindlegen/AmazonKindlePublishingGuidelinesV1.3.pdf+amazon+kindle+style+guide&hl=en&gl=us&pid=bl&srcid=ADGEEShTGyo30Ed55s2ouVC6hXzSbyrV5Wr2CnZTSIQH3NhKWX5EA1MvRgWmHw6oYU60W3Y66HG5GsPkx3fkuJgi–P2E5ziOC0LohT7QE_-rM6c6MjoX1S1EPfqvLwgaoo7uDMqa-pi&sig=AHIEtbQkI2FemmBGNIxY9quRLjjUuSUzOA&pli=1
Amazon template shared on Kindleboards -
http://207-171-168-158.amazon.com/kdpforums/thread.jspa?threadID=14065
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1EDUSttEsgrQ7ntpGEfF_2RXzU7NowVMd3BIylwMsyCU/edit
Amazon has several ways to support you as an author. Go to Author Central and set up your Amazon author page. You can link your blog, twitter feed, list your books, change the information about your books, and advertise your events.
https://authorcentral.amazon.com/gp/landing?ie=UTF8&%2AVersion%2A=1&%2Aentries%2A=0
Track your eBook sales with KDP -
https://kdp.amazon.com/self-publishing/signin
also get monthly reports
Here you can get a ranking snap shot with this -
http://tracker.kindlenationdaily.com/tracked-books
Become an Amazon associate where you can set up widgets, an eStore, and use Link to this page to earn some advertising pennies. It is pennies, but worth the effort and they have nice images you can use.
http://www.mywritingblog.com/2011/10/why-amazon-authors-should-be-promoting.html
PubIt! ePub Formatting Guide
https://simg1.imagesbn.com/pimages/pubit/support/pubit_epub_formatting_guide.pdf
Apple – Creating ePub File with Pages
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4168
Calibre – eBook Format Conversion
http://manual.calibre-ebook.com/faq.html#e-book-format-conversion
Getting Started with Google eBooks
http://support.google.com/books/partner/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=106169
The ABCs of eBook format converstion
http://www.teleread.com/drm/the-abcs-of-format-conversion-for-the-kindle-sony-and-nook-plus-some-calibre-tips/
eBook Formatting Tutorial
http://amalthia.mediawood.net/tutorials/ebooks/index.html
Publishing for kobo in ePub format
http://www.kobobooks.com/companyinfo/authorsnpublishers.html
From the E-book Revolution here are 20 tips when formatting your manuscript.
http://ebookrevolution.blogspot.com/2011/04/formatting-decrease-number-of-grey.html
EM CRAVEN’S TWENTY TIPS FOR LESS GREY HAIRS
1: You will make it ten millions times faster for yourself if you type up your creative prose in Microsoft (MS) word from the get go. Smashwords only accepts MS word docs (they must be saved as a .doc file –‘97-2003 word docs – NOT a .docx). Otherwise you must convert your novel into an MS word file before you begin. Smashwords (SW) do take one or two other types but they say Microsoft is the way. So stop making things hard for yourself and just do it!
2: Make a copy of your document first!! Do not make changes to your original document; if something goes pear shaped you want to have your original on hand.
3: DO NOT use the space bar or tabs for indenting the beginning of your paragraphs. Use the indent function in MS (See SW style guide).
4: Don’t hit the enter (or return) key more than 4 times. This creates blank pages in the e-book and will cause an error in the conversion system when you attempt to upload your work. We want to fill our books with words, not air!
5: Choose to either indent the start of your paragraphs or use block paragraphs. It’s one or the other, not both. If you choose to neither indent or use block paragraphs, all of your paragraphs will run together. A reader only needs to take one look at that and they will be running for the hills. Kindle also specifies one or the other. Within Kindle compatible products, the paragraphs indent automatically. However, if you want to specify how far they indent you can apply the formatting language as shown on the help board.
6: Don’t use fancy, non-standard fonts (for best results use Times New Roman or Arial) and keep font sizing at no more than 16pt in size. The basic rule here is keep it simple! Keep bold and italics to a minimum in the text. Otherwise you may find you do a bit more fiddling then you bargained for.
7: Columns and tables are not supported. If you really need tables put them in as an image.
8: Wrapping text around your images is a big no-no for both Smashwords and Amazon. Have the images on their own line and centred in the middle of the pages. It is very hard to attach words to a specific image, either make the words part of the image or get ready for some serious, frustrated hair pulling…
9: Smashwords only allows you to upload a file 5 MB in size. So if you have several images it would be wise to use the compression feature in MS word to shrink the size of the document. Don’t worry; it won’t affect the quality of your images significantly.
10: If you only have a print book copy of your novel there is hope! You can get the novel scanned by various companies and be sent back to you as an MS word document. They are generally very accurate but you should still carefully proof read the document before you begin to format.
11: In Smashwords if you want a front cover to appear in all formats, you need to have it as an image on the first page of your MS document. Only certain types of formats produced by Smashwords allow you to add the cover separately.
12: For all those budding poets, you need your poetry to either be left justified or centred, otherwise who knows what order your words will be.
13: Amazon asks that you use page breaks to separate your chapters. These can be inserted in MS Word. However in most formats in Smashwords these page breaks will not be converted, so it’s best to put one or two enters (returns) above and below the page breaks if you decide to insert them.
14: When noting your copyright use the word rather than the copyright symbol, it doesn’t convert well.
15: You need an ISBN number to distribute to Apple and Sony.
16: You need to include front matter in your book. Meaning a centred title page including your carefully thought out and intriguing title and your name (or nom de plume if you prefer). It is also recommended that you put a copyright statement in. Make sure this page is your most professional! It is the reader’s first impression and unless you are a html guru, skip the fancy stuff. It’s also recommended by Smashwords (who publishes DRM – digital rights management – free files) that you give a gentle reminder to customers to refrain from piracy. There are examples of this statement in the Style Guide.
17: If you’re keen on adding a little colour to your novel, you can add a simple glyph between paragraphs to indicate a change in scene.
18: For the non-fiction authors, you can also add a linked table of contents that allows a reader to jump straight to the chapter they wish to read.
19: To upload to Kindle you need to save your file as a filtered html file in Word as per the Kindle board instructions. You then upload this into MobiPocket Creator where you will add your front cover and convert your e-book to Kindle format.
20: Once your file has been accepted and converted check your work!!! Make sure it translates well in each format and doesn’t cause the reader to cross their eyes and fall sideways off their chair.
ePub is the standardized format for eBooks and is used by a wide range of programs. There is even a rumor that Amazon will be switching to the ePub format.
In my personal opinion, Indie books should be DRM free. You can hack the DRM on an eBook fairly easily and just like anything else on the Internet, if someone wants it, they’ll find it. That’s not to say that I support piracy, I don’t. What I want is to be able to use the product that I bought wherever and whenever I want. This is strictly my opinion, but I’m in good company – ReadersBillofRightshttps://readersbillofrights.info/- like libaries.
If you want to combat piracy, make your eBooks affordable. The economies of the US and UK are ‘honeypots’ not the standard. Think global economy. Now people who pirate reasonably priced eBooks and I’ve heard some valid complaints from Indie Authors about this = not good people.
I particularly like Cory Doctorow’s approach in his pdf listed in another section – The problem isn’t piracy, The problem is obscurity.
There is an option to click when you are uploading your eBooks, to make your book DRM free.
ePub
I came across this program. It is a web conferencing program called Adobe Acrobat.
https://www.acrobat.com/main/en/home.html
The nice thing is, once you sign up, you will be taken to your home page. There are two tabs under the Acrobat.com logo – Files and Web Conferencing. Click on the Files tab and you will have a word processor that lets you save your document as an ePub file. There is also this program – Free ePub Converterhttp://www.2epub.com/and you can always use Calibre. http://calibre-ebook.com/A new one out is HamsterSofthttp://ebook.hamstersoft.com/en/download
I own and read many eBooks on my Kindle Fire. I love it! But I do have a note about formatting that may fly in the face of all the styleguides out there. I like the block paragraph when I’m reading on my eReader. I’m looking forward to the day when eBooks are formatted in the optimal way for eBooks and not made to imitate pBooks.
Ultimate DIYer = HTML
Finally, stumbled or twitted into this guy – James Wallace Birch – and I have a crush on him because he wrote the best guide I’ve seen on how to do eBook HTML. The beginning of the guide http://dttla.posterous.com/e-book-formatting-101-part-1-introduction
He also includes all the links you need and some will sound familiar from this guide.
Take Pride in Your eBook Formatting is an exhaustive nine part series on formatting by Guido Henkel http://guidohenkel.com/2010/12/take-pride-in-your-ebook-formatting/
Uploading Your eBook
AMAZON
Amazon
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NMpiKDzNNO4- video courtesy of http://www.kindleexpert.com/
Kindle Direct Publishing
Amazon page, tags, categories, etc. http://alchemyscrawl.com/amazon-tags-as-pseudo-categories/
Since you only have two categories that you can manually assign to your eBook, you want to use tags to buy you into other categories, but what’s the best way to do that? And how do you determine what are the best categories for your story in the first place?
There is a way and it requires research!
First, find the categories you think your story fits.
I’m going to pick fiction.
And then horror…
Now, when I look at the category Horror and take a look at the bestsellers #1 and #100, here is their ranking:
#1 = rank #233
#100 = rank #3535
I also strongly feel my story falls under paranormal and when I take a look at the #1 and #100 bestsellers, here is their ranking:
#1 = rank 1017
#100 = 3535
These rankings tell me, as a first-time author, that I have about a snowball’s chance in hades of making it into the top 100 in these two categories.
So I look at a couple of others listed, ghosts:
#1 = 335
#100 = 26235
and occult:
#1 = 567
#100 = 12639
Now THESE categories I may have a chance of cracking because I don’t need to sell a HUGE amount of books to get into their top 100.
These categories are the two main ones that I want to list my eBook under when I upload it to KDP (you can edit your categories at anytime in KindleDirectPublishing).
What about the categories I don’t really have a chance of cracking? Those become the best candidates for tags!
p.s. And don’t be like me and forget to click the boxes next to the categories you’ve chosen and then click ‘save’!
How to tag:
When you upload a book in KDP you have the choice to put it into 2 categories. Pick those, but also look at 3-6 other categories where you think you’re book would fit. Write ‘em down. When you do the research for the categories you’ll have a pretty good idea of what tags you want to target.
So now your book is uploaded, lets go over your book page to see what all you can do with it.
At the top you and others can ‘Like’ your book.
Next across from the Editorial Review/Product Description you can Email/Tweet/Facebook your book. This is kinda cool because you can do this to start with and then lets say you upload a new version or book cover or change some information or you have a lot of great reviews, you can always tap those links again to give a quick shout out about it.
Then under your customer reviews, you have a section called ‘Tag this Product’
Hopefully, you’ve thought long and hard about what categories suit your book. I can tell you I didn’t… but I’m not worried on these first attempts of mine. 
You’ve added 1-15 tags. If you’re targeting a category, probably more like 3-8, and you will TYPE those in where it says ‘Your tags:”
When you are tagging someone else, you will see some boxes that can hold check marks. If you join a tag party like on KindleBoards then you’ll see something like the above picture. Now you’re done checking boxes (for someone else) and do you see that really faint text at the very bottom? Yea, I didn’t either. Press the “T” key twice to SAVE your tags. You’ll get this pop up.
Click ‘Save Tags’ and your tags are saved so you should not have that complaint that sometimes happens about authors not seeing their tag numbers go up.
Once more thing, look at the second picture above again and see ‘Agree with these tags?’ Let’s say someone misspelled a tag or put a negative tag. You can click that sentence and the screen will change and look like the picture below. When you cursor over the little arrows to the right of the word you’ll see the next picture. Click ‘No’ if you don’t agree and eventually, so I’m told, the ‘bad’ tag will go away.
Next, you can start or join in a discussion. Start one of your own, not really a HEY BUY MY BOOK but more of something that happened in your book that is controversial or mirrors some of your favorite authors. Give it a try. Then you’ll see suggestions of other forums that may fit your book. Join in the discussions there. And finally there are the active discussions that are just what’s the hot topic of the day.
Now here are the actual categories that your book has fallen under. I was satisfied with mine and will tailor my tags to fit these categories more closely next time around. And if a customer has gotten this far, they can search for more items by subject. This cloud grouping of popular Amazon tags may help as well – http://www.amazon.com/gp/tagging/cloud/ref=tag_dpp_pt_icld
Something new I just noticed, which I think would work well for non-fiction writers is this new Create a Guide.
In fact, I’ve checked and this option seems to come up ONLY if you’ve uploaded a non-fiction book. I didn’t find this option under my fiction books. I’m looking into it, but so far seems straight forward and useful. And… here’s the link to my guide.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/richpub/syltguides/fullview/R2X5A1A86B3DVT
You can find guides under ‘So You’d Like To…’ search option. You can write an Amazon Guide to share what you are an expert in here.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/richpub/syltguides/create?qualifications=&ref_=cm_syt_dtpa_c&title=
Last, but not least, is feedback. If you have any questions, or something doesn’t look write on your book page, talk to customer service. My experiences with them have been very positive. You should also be aware of what customers can give feedback on as well.
All thanks goes to Carolyn McCray and IBC – hook up with this lady on her blogs:
http://datingafter40okayhopingtodateafter40.blogspot.com/
http://writingnodrama.blogspot.com/
and websites
http://www.indiebookcollective.com/IndieBookCollective/Home.html
http://parayournormal.com/ParaYourNormal/Home.html
Kindle Boards is also a great place for information.
Amazon Marketing Message
http://alchemyscrawl.com/what-is-your-marketing-message-on-amazon/
So, today I’m going to talk about something that I found very exciting when listening to the IBC BlogTalkRadio Show http://www.blogtalkradio.com/indie-book-collective/2011/09/06/building-a-social-media-platformthe other day after the Indie Book Blowout and all the information has finally sunk in. If you’re a regular of the blog, you know I like to do posts so that I remember stuff, oh yea, and of course to share with you folks too! o.~ But mostly because I’m getting old and I have to write these things down and analyze them in order to remember and apply. Old teacher habits too…
OKAY! Let’s get started. First, pull up your book’s page on Amazon. By now, I’m hoping that you’ve realized it takes more than just slapping your book up on Amazon to start selling eBooks. What is there is sending a message. The message you WANT to project is that this is a safe, enjoyable, easy, no-brainer buy for the customer. How do you do that?
FIRST – cover art. It’s the first thing the customer sees. Does it reflect the subject matter in your book? Start thinking about everything from a thumbnail point of view. Can you see the images on the cover clearly (simple is better)? Can you read the title? Can you read the author’s name? Digital means thumbnail. The customer’s eyes shouldn’t strain at all when looking at your book cover to find the relevant information.
Extras – have a catchy book title. I have read some books that I liked the story, but HATED the title. I would never buy a book with a title that didn’t make me curious or appeal to what I like to read.
SECOND – reviews. You need them and you need at least ten. I would go so far to get those ten reviews (BookRooster.com and I’m still undercover, so stay tuned for news of other sites) BEFORE you ever advertise that book. Not all five stars either. That looks fake. Fours and threes work well and give it a balanced look.
THIRD – Likes, get at least 25. It is for those people that don’t want to take the time to write a full-blown review, but still like the book.
FOURTH – Tags are pseudo-categories that I covered in this post. And the magic number to get into a category is 25. KindleBoards has an active tag party in the Writer’s Cafe, but I’ve seen perfect examples of what not to do on books that I’ve been asked to Like and Tag. One book (not naming names) has one review and 100+ Likes and Tags. Just getting Likes and Tags will not magically do anything for you. You really need a comprehensive look and feel to your Amazon book page.
As you can see with my example, I’m still working on the Likes, but I should be there today with the tags. Oh and lets not forget to be flexible on the price. That needs to reflect an easy buy as well. I’m not saying it is $.99, I’m saying it is whatever works for you.
One of the reasons The Indie Book Blowout was such an important step for me was this… I am really happy with the list that this anthology is associated with. Part of this is due to the people who liked this genre during the IBB and so bought all the titles because of the low price of $.99.
If you do get a bad review and it happens to every author, so there’s no reason to feel persecuted, then there is something you can do about it. You can click (and have others) the Yes button for those reviews that are good and No for the ones that are bad. Even so there is a recap of the top review and the worst review if someone clicks to see all the reviews. So I wouldn’t worry too much about it, unless the bad review is really pointing out something you can work on and should, since it’s an eBook and easily fixable – just upload a new copy.
Here’s another example of Amazon’s Internal Recommendation System and how the IBB helped me get listed with other great Indie authors.
But since you’ve chosen to go Indie, your work is never done. Amazon rewards consistency in sales. We cracked the top 100 for the Ghost category and stayed there for several days. However, we would have needed to keep up an ad campaign in order to capitalize on the momentum.
KDP Select was rolled out the first of 2012 and has been cursed and praised. For me, it has worked wonders at getting exposure and sales for my books. Going exclusively with Amazon was a no-brainer for me because 95% of sales went through Amazon. Here are some ideas to help promote your ‘free’ days with Amazon – http://matthew-iden.com/2012/03/29/give-it-away-strategies-for-making-your-ebook-free/
BARNES & NOBLE
Barnes&Noble
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h9rinmvkGM4- video courtesy ofhttp://www.kindleexpert.com/
PubIt!
http://pubit.barnesandnoble.com
Barnes & Noble is a little, shall we say, less robust than Amazon. You’re pretty limited on what you can do there, but here are a couple of things. Well, maybe just one.
See in the far right side that faint check mark next to Like and number 1. Yea, you can share on FB. That not even integrated with Twitter!
Barnes & Noble also have a Community Boardhttp://bookclubs.barnesandnoble.com/where you can post and hopefully make friends. If you sign in, it will take you to the B&N homepage and you’ll have to back up to get back to the community.
SMASHWORDS
http://www.smashwords.com/about/how_to_publish_on_smashwords
Smashwords has a whole slew of social media tags and their own free guide
http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/305
and a blog post where authors help authors.
http://blog.smashwords.com/2011/09/how-to-self-publish-ebook-with.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Smashwords+%28Smashwords%29
ISBN numbers – Smashwords offers them for free. The only catch is it lists Smashwords as the publisher. If you’re an independent that may not matter to you. Here is a tutorial on ISBN -
http://www.thebookdesigner.com/2010/11/isbn-101-for-self-publishers/
Some nifty tools for authors across the pond and a Smashwords making .gif – try Russell Phillips’ Author’s Tools
http://www.russellphillipsbooks.co.uk/pages/tools.php
When you are uploading you may need to convert your file into different formats. GoogleDocs works well and I really like typing, editing, and critiquing using their program. These two sites are free as well: Free File Converter
http://www.freefileconvert.com/
and Convert Word to PDF (bottom of the page)
Here is Format Factory for audio, video and picture files.
New kid on the block is DocsPal which handles all kinds of files and formats.
CutePDF
http://www.cutepdf.com/products/cutepdf/writer.asp
Multi-media eBooks for iPad, iPhone, iPod, Nook Color, and Amazon Fire are also an option. Even for fiction. With all the free resources like Audacity and MS Movie Maker (uploaded to YouTube) that I’ve already listed, plus a little html knowledge, this should be a fairly easy setup. The most important thing to keep in mind is not to interrupt the reading experience. I became interested in this when I was teaching English as a Second Language and needed to enrich the books that my students were reading with pictures, graphics, pronunciation, and information so they would understand a story in a different language. I’m really excited about the avenues for non-fiction, but I think fiction will go this route as well. You can try http://www.epubbud.com/ but I’m waiting until they get some bugs worked out.
Bemoaning the fact that eBooks can’t be ‘autographed’? Don’t.
http://kindlegraph.com/books/new
Book Marketing/Promotion/Reviews
I’m sure that you have just browsed through the hyper-linked table of contents and nodded your head muttering “I got it. I got it.” and ended up here. So lets refresh the basics: write a great story (story trumps all), edit it until you will hurl if you have to read it one more time, hire someone to edit/proofread it, have a good book cover, have a catchy book description, find your audience, now *drum roll please* promote!
B&N PubIt! on Facebook has FB chats with successful eBook authors you may want to check out.
Their PubIt! Pro has marketing advice hehe sounds eerily similar to what I’ve been putting in here.
http://www.facebook.com/PubIt?sk=app_201143516562748
Define Your Publishing Objective
http://billwalker.com/define-your-publishing-objective/
Better yet, have a business plan.
Write a great story. Be sure to post your best review at the beginning of every promo piece you send out – press release, book trailer, guest post, etc. If you have a blog/website, and you should, be sure to include that with every promo piece you send out.
From your website, you should have a way to capcha emails. On a blog, WordPress does this as well. Promote your blog/website via social media – Twitter, Facebook, etc. Use the emails JUDICIOUSLY to offer free previews or eBook for a review deals. These people, hopefully, become your loyal fan base and will promote your work. I have a page called My Scrawl on my blog. During a promotion campaign which should be at least once a month, include a link to the current book you are promoting after each blog post.
Ideally you will have more than one book and new or popular blog posts to keep up the momentum.
What is on-line marketing? – 6 part series
http://www.writersweekly.com/this_weeks_article/003402_04262006.html
Publicity –
Best Book Publicity & Marketing Twitter Feeds
http://www.mediabistro.com/galleycat/best-book-publicity-and-marketing-twitter-feeds_b11627
Publicity Tips When Publishing Your Book
http://www.writersdigest.com/editor-blogs/guide-to-literary-agents/guest-columns/publicity-tips-when-publishing-your-book
How to Become a Published Author in 237 Simple Steps – tongue in cheek, but good!
http://splitsider.com/2011/05/how-to-become-a-published-author-in-237-simple-steps
How many books do you need to sell? This information was published as a comment on JA Konrath’s blog as a comment (while you’re there pick up A Newbie’s Guide to Publishing
http://www.amazon.com/Newbies-Publishing-Everything-Writer-ebook/dp/B003I6496Y
The information is a bit out-dated, but entertaining and will catch you up to speed on his blog, and has lots of good tips or any of his other fiction reads – good stuff!). I can not for the life of me find the direct link to it, but I did save the information:
Sullivan, a publisher, said – As to number of books…well I can say that I saw a 100% correlation between # of books written and sales.
1 book – 10 / month
2 books – 50-60 / month
3 books – 200-400 / month
4 books – 1,000 / month
5 books – 10,000 / month
From other Indie Authors I’ve kept track of, this seems to be really close. It is built-in advertising. If a reader likes one of your books, they’re bound to like the others and you start to build a – People who bought this also bought: – link on Amazon. Just today I looked at a post from an author on Kindleboards that reached the 50k mark in sales. She had fifteen titles. One book is not going to make or break you. You’re a writer. Be prepared to write and write a lot.
Speaking of using your eBooks as built-in advertising, here are some more suggestions from JA Konrath that I liked –
1) Remember when you finished reading a pBook and the back couple of pages were advertisements for other books by the same authors or different authors of the same genre? Good, because you should do that with eBooks as well. Place excerpts of your upcoming stories and/or maybe another author/friend.
2) Link, link, link – Do you have other stories for sale? Provide an easy link to that story so the reader can easily buy the next eBook from you.
3) I noticed that my blog took off when I started linking with other blogs, guest posting, having guests, doing interviews, etc. Everything you produce moves vertically, but when you branch out to connect with other authors, bloggers, readers, stalkers, then you start moving horizontally and that is a sign of growth. I know, sounds naughty, but it works!
4) Packaging your stories differently, but be careful about this. I know some authors have done it and it was just repackaging of old stories which ticked off some readers because they’d already bought that story. Be very clear about what stories are in your package and always make sure new content is available alongside the old.
5) Experiment with your writing. Was there some really cool characters in a story that you could branch off of to make into a series? Is there another genre that you love to read? Chances are if you love to read it and have studied that genre, then branch out and try writing in that genre.
6) Derek J Canyon also mentioned on his blog that doing exchanging forewards with other authors helped his sales as well.
7) Add links at the end of your eBook so your reader can add a comment to Twitter or Facebook.
You might consider posting your short stories for free with your stalker package attached at the end on some of these sites to get exposure. Unless you are an established author, no one knows that your writing is fantastic and worth reading. Some great short stories can do that for you:
These are my top favorite places to post my stories for free:
feedbooks
BookRix
wattpad
obooko
Smashwords
ABCTales
And here are a slew of others.
300+ Places for Free Books Online is the original list and I’ve narrowed it down for eBook authors:
http://www.techsupportalert.com/content/50-places-free-books-online.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+gizmosbest+(Gizmo%27s+Best-ever+Freeware)
http://www.e-booksdirectory.com/submit.php
http://www.talewins.com/percon1.htm
http://www.allbooksfree.com/submit.htm
http://ebookplanet.net/submit.php
http://freeonlinebookstore.org/AddedBook.php
http://www.getfreeebooks.com/?page_id=81
http://www.globusz.com/Guidelines.php
http://www.horrormasters.com/Submissions.htm
http://pdfbooks.co.za/index.php?option=com_content&task=section&id=34&Itemid=72
http://www.witguides.com/addlisting.asp?cat=
http://www.tor.com/blogs/2010/05/our-fictional-offerings-expanded-staff-new-procedures-same-old-quirky-fiction
http://www.virtual-ebooks.com/addabook.htm
http://www.ecourseweb.com/index.php
http://www.ebook2u.com/directory/add.shtml
http://www.jogena.com/ebookdir/ebookfaq.html
http://www.published.com/how-published-works.aspx
http://www.sharewarejunction.com/submit.html
http://books.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=43782
http://greatauthorsonline.com/submission_guidelines
http://www.fictionwise.com/AuthorInfo.htm
http://publishing.ebookmall.com/ebook-sales/index.htm
http://www.fictionfactor.com/markets.html
http://www.ebookjungle.com/submit.php
http://publishing.booklocker.com/submit.php
http://free-online-novels.com/submissions.html
http://ebookdirectory.com/cgi-bin/addurl.cgi?location=Root-Literature-Novels
http://www.free-book.co.uk/addurl.htm
Here are some places I’ve found to list your books for sale, linking to Amazon/B&N/Smashwords:
http://www.kindlemojo.com/contact-info/
http://www.book-junkies-library.com/
http://www.books2heart.com/author-submissions
https://sites.google.com/site/1500authors/
http://askdavid.com/free-book-promotion
A word about price.
As listed above, there are literally tons of sites to grab a free read. Yes, the quality is not consistent. However, IMHO, if no one knows you outside of a group of family and friends and you still need to build a fan base, then price does matter. Be flexible, be creative.
Some writers band together to cross promote their books, which is never a bad thing. It’s networking. I’ve read some of these authors and the quality is good and more importantly, entertaining!
These are promotions with a reasonable fee:
http://www.99-cent-network.com/www.99-cent-Network.com/Join_the_Network.html
http://www.indiebookpromo.com/
New site that sells our eBook on a sliding scale based on popularity – http://www.onlyindie.com/
Free sites to promote your eBook –
http://www.mediabistro.com/galleycat/free-ebook-promotion_b52130
The IndieBookCollective is also a great place to connect with other authors and cross-promote. You can find their list of ways to contribute here.
http://indiebookcollective.wordpress.com/2011/05/09/how2bibc/
You can and should also pursue e-zines and anthologies
(even other blogs) to either sell or submit your short stories. How to submit a short story – http://www.swantower.com/essays/business/subshort.html
This is just a sampling. You need to do a search for the genre(s) your writing fits best.
http://hubpages.com/hub/Places-To-Sell-Your-Writing
http://www.ervin-author.com/markets.htm
http://www.eastoftheweb.com/interactive/index.php?p=interactive/submissions
http://www.locusmag.com/News/2010/09/best-new-horror-call-for-submissions/
http://www.inreferencetomurder.com/html/magazines.html
http://www.pillhillpress.com/writers-guidelines.html
http://www.hourglassbooks.org/submissions.html
http://www.blogsbywomen.org/blog/womens-anthology-accepting-stories/
http://www.newpages.com/literary/submissions.htm
https://sites.google.com/site/lefthandwaving/
http://the-real-read.blogspot.com/
http://www.delmarvareview.com/
http://thewaitingroommag.com/Submissions.html
http://horror.fictionfactor.com/anthos.html
http://allinfohere.co.cc/2010/10/places-syndicate-content/
http://www.fuelyourwriting.com/write-on-6-sites-accepting-submissions/
There are on-line writing forums.
I have a hard time spending enough time on more than one or two, but these were recommended.
http://thewritersforum.proboards.com/index.cgi
http://forum.writersdigest.com/category-view.asp?p_PageAlias=Forum_redirect
http://www.accentuatewritersforum.com/
http://www.writing.com/page/writers_forum/writers_forum.html
Genre Specific Forums:
Specific eBook forums:
http://www.kindleboards.com/index.php?PHPSESSID=j0lch4gu9jq3003164kosfhhk4&action=login2
http://grou.ps/indiebookcollective
Beta Sites that look promising:
http://www.iwritereadrate.com/
All right – one way or another, by either giving your stories away or selling them, you’ve built up a good reputation. Now, you need to expand. Your full-length novel is hot-off-the-word-processor and ready to be shared with the world.
Book reviews/Interviews –
you need them, you want them, and sometimes they’re hard as heck to get as an Indie Author.
First, there are friends and family. But you know you’re going to get a good review there and people are more savvy now about that as well. I inwardly chuckle when I go to post a review and see six – 5 star ratings OMG THIS IS THE BEST BOOK EVER! – for an Indie Author (go back over Amazon Marketing Message). People can figure out that everyone has at least a half-dozen friends.
Sooner or later you’re going to need some independent reviews. I’m including a list of websites that have gathered together blogs that do book reviews. REMEMBER: read the guidelines!! Read them twice. Nothing will get you deleted faster than submitting a book to a site that is not interested in either the genre or in self-published authors or *gasp* doesn’t take eBooks.
How to get bloggers to review your book! aka Learn from my mistakes!!!
First off, if you are not stalking Novel Publicity, you’re [insert derogatory name here]. Emyln Chand is a TREASURE trove of reliable, sound, effective, all around good information.
So, I sent out close to 50 book blogger requests for a review of Amador Lockdown. I got maybe a handful of replies in the affirmative back. Some panned out because they were interested in doing something over Halloween. But, really, (give me a second to pull out my brand new Kindle Fire calculator app…) 10%? I thought it was low, but figured that was just the way of the book blogger world with so many books out there (I would know to choose from.
Then Novel Publicity shared this blog post “How to get bloggers to review your book: A very thorough answer to a very important question”
http://www.novelpublicity.com/2011/11/how-to-get-bloggers-to-review-your-book-a-very-thorough-answer-to-an-important-question/
It was an eye opener! I realized that my preferences for handling book review requests may not in the least bit be the norm (however my way is best hehe). I’m of the opinion that I don’t want to get too touchy feely with a an author that has requested a review. I want to be sure that I’m going to like the book before I get to know the author. That’s why my review request form may be off-putting to some. Sorry, just the way I operate. So I thought my terse, no-nonsense style would be good when sending out requests. Ummm nope.
Doubt it? Well I read Chand’s blog post and was not arrogant enough to think I knew best. I redid my requests, rounded up around 50 more willing book bloggers (according to their review policy) and… success! Very enthusiastic success! 20% success and I was offered a variety of opportunities.
So, learn from my mistake and read that blog post carefully. It works!
Note – there are more and more book review sites where you can pay for a book review. That is up to you, but you really need a mix between paid and independent. Honesty, in the long run, will get you farther. BUT HEY, if it was good enough for John Locke, you know, the guy who sold one million eBooks, then it should be good enough for you. http://www.15dollarreviews.com/ourwork.html
Here are the paid sites that I’ve gone undercover with to investigate.
BookRooster
My investigation –
http://alchemyscrawl.com/bookrooster/
http://alchemyscrawl.com/bookrooster-update/
My conclusion: So my undercover work is done! The price is reasonable, but they’ve already hinted this service will go up. I wouldn’t be surprised if it costs $100 by next year.
Note – there is some stirring that Amazon is cracking down on paid reviews and/or authors that post reviews. If you are interested in that sort of thing, I would have a separate identity as an author and book blogger.
The one thing I don’t like compared to my own reviews is that I don’t get to talk or interact with the author directly. I like retweeting/sharing my favorite new Indie authors and I like hearing from them. So I don’t know how many of these BookRooster reviews I’ll do. Plus, the review requests tend to come in spurts.
Hope this was informative and helps you make a decision on whether to use the service or not – reviewers, looks easy and enjoyable. Writers, do you have the bucks to spend?
This is the site that John Locke used for three of his books.
http://www.15dollarreviews.com/
I can’t get on as a reviewer there, so I have no information other than what is on their website.
Reader Spoils
http://readerspoils.com/authors.html
I tried to go undercover there, but this was really strange. You sign up and receive an email with a list of books that need reviews. The first email was horrible in that the book covers looked amateurish at best! So I didn’t pick any of those. The second email I did see a couple of decent book covers and story blurbs. You email the author directly and ask to review the book. I did so as soon as I received the email. I was in my inbox when I received the email and replied maybe five minutes later. The payment is a $5 gift card to Starbucks or Amazon. I never heard back from either one of the authors AND THEN I got another email with the same books/authors. I threw my hands up and said, Screw it!
Now for the interesting part. I received an email while all this was going on, asking if I wanted to get PAID $5 cash for my reviews. I accepted and was taken to a completely different set up where I was paid for my review. When I emailed the administrator to ask how an author got a gig like this, I received no reply.
Fiverr-
Now here’s the Indie trade secret that I think people have been keeping under wraps. People literally post what they will do for $5 and guess what, there are a LOT of people (book bloggers. reviewers, readers, marketing peeps) who will review your book for $5. The transaction is handled through PayPal and you can contact the seller directly through the website. To me this works with the Amazon Marketing Message. You have ten reviews set up to get the Amazon book page, along with likes and tags, in order BEFORE you start promoting and you’ll only spend $50. Then you can wait for overloaded book bloggers to get to your book and post their review.
Not sure? As always, I’ve done the undercover work for you. These are people that deliver.
http://fiverr.com/blogstargirl
http://fiverr.com/writer4hirenow
http://fiverr.com/jingerjarrett
There are plenty to choose from on fiverr if you search for ‘book reviews’.
Paid book review site that I have no personal experience with -
I started the process to become a reviewer here, but haven’t finished because I don’t know if I’ll have the time. They do pay well. And they offer promotional services (what you are paying for, not a review) for a fee.
http://www.allbooksreviewint.com/
And the granddaddy of them all (otherwise, expensive!) – ForeWord Reviews – Home of the Clarion Review
http://www.forewordreviews.com/services/
BookConnector
http://www.bookconnector.com/- tries to take some of the work off of you by letting you register and enter some categories and then they search for you and spit out a list.
Step-by-Step Self Publishing
http://www.stepbystepselfpublishing.net/index.html- Home of the Indie Book Reviewer Yellow Pages. They sell the Kindle edition for $5 and the PDF is $3. I would buy the cheapest version because the list changes yearly.
The Indie Book Blog Database
http://hampton-networks.com/- claims to have 300+ book review blogs separated by genre.
Long, wonderful list of book bloggers –
http://labotomyofawriter.com/review-links/
The Blog-A-Licious Directory 2012
http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/110718
This lady posts very popular giveaways with a linky to all the bloggers who participate. Great way to find some new, active book bloggers –
http://iamareadernotawriter.blogspot.com/p/giveaways.html
http://thenextbestbookblog.blogspot.com/p/indieself-published-supporters.html
http://www.theindieview.com/indie-reviewers/
http://bookbloggerdirectory.wordpress.com/
http://evie-bookish.blogspot.com/p/2012-tbr-pile-reading-challenge.html
http://www.armchairbea.com/p/2012-participants.html
Netgalley – http://www.netgalley.com/
What is NetGalley, and how does it work?
NetGalley is a service for people who read and recommend books. Publishers upload their galleys, plus any marketing and promotional information; then invite contacts to view their title on NetGalley. Readers can also find new titles through NetGalley’s Public Catalog, and request to review those titles from the publisher.
Who can use NetGalley?
Any professional reader: book reviewers, journalists, librarians, professors, booksellers, bloggers, etc. Anyone who reads and recommend books can use NetGalley for free. You can register here.
How can I register on NetGalley?
If you are a professional reader, you can sign up today by completing the registration form. If you are a publisher, email us at info@netgalley.com to learn how to get started.
Paco Media Group offers Indie/Self-Published authors a reasonable price to offer your book on Netgalley – http://pacomediagroup.com/netgalley-packages/
- if you review books
Some good advice – http://promo-ho.com/reviewers/
Blog Tours –
How to do a book blog tour:
http://www.helenginger.com/blogging_advice.htm
http://marketingfloozy.wordpress.com/2009/04/12/how-to-do-a-blog-tour/
http://futureperfectpublishing.com/2008/01/02/blog-touring-101-around-the-blogosphere-in-80-days/
http://www.ehow.com/how_2108825_do-virtual-book-tour.html
http://mjroseblog.typepad.com/buzz_balls_hype/2007/09/how-to-do-a-blo.html
http://yodiwan.wordpress.com/2009/06/11/whats-a-book-blog-tour/
http://www.squidoo.com/quickest-blogbooktourguide-ever
Places to pay for help with promotional tours:
Contacting separate book bloggers can be an ordeal and you have no idea when they will be posting a review, if ever. I have worked either worked with these book tours as a reviewer or heard good things about them from other authors.
http://www.novelpublicity.com/
http://nurtureyourbooks.com/vbtblog/
http://bewitchingbooktours.blogspot.com/
http://www.pumpupyourbook.com/
http://www.orangeberrybooktours.com/p/sign-up.html
http://crazybooktours.blogspot.com/
http://princessbookiearctours.blogspot.com/
http://www.worldliterarycafe.com/
http://iobooktours.blogspot.com/2012/04/jennifer-lyon-tour.html
http://cblspromotions.blogspot.com/
http://enchantedbooktours.eternalised.net/book-tours/tour-packages/
https://sites.google.com/a/myaddictionisreading.com/reading-addiction-blog-tours/packages-pricing
Prices and services vary from $2500 to $25.
Here are other sites that I have NOT worked with and know nothing about:
http://thebookishsnobauthors.blogspot.com/
http://blogbooktours.blogspot.com/p/blog-book-tour-services.html
http://business2blogger.com/promote-a-book/
What is The Indie Exchange?
The Indie Exchange is a collaborative project set up by Donna Brown, which aims to bring readers and authors together. Authors can offer guest posts and books for review, readers and book bloggers can share their book reviews and interview authors. The Indie Exchange offers a central hub where all blog posts can be published so you don’t need to run your own blog if you want to review works or get your ideas seen.
Website:http://theindieexchange.com/
Feed:http://feeds.feedburner.com/TheIndieExchange
Twitter:http://twitter.com/indieexchange
Facebook Fan Page: https://www.facebook.com/winwithebooks
Facebook Support Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/indieexchange/
We organize giveaways, contests, BlogTalkRadio Interviews, guest posts, Challenges, Events, #MentionMonday, #toppostthrusday, #sundayshorts, Full Moon Madness, and are open to ideas from authors on how to best promote your work. The author sponsors all the prizes.
Book Marketing tips and information
http://www.bookmarket.com/tipsindex.htm
http://liarsclubphilly.com/?page_id=731
http://bookmarketingbuzz.com/2010/05/03/how-to-promote-your-self-published-ebook-for-free/
http://publicityhound.net/promote-an-ebook-26-ways/
http://hubpages.com/hub/How-to-Promote-and-Sell-Your-E-book
http://www.ehow.com/how_4620808_promote-ebook-viral-marketing.html
http://www.ehow.com/how_2095583_promote-ebook-online.html
http://indiebookcollective.wordpress.com/2011/01/05/shy-explorer-series-asking-the-experts/
http://www.creativeramblings.com/best-ways-to-promote-your-articles-on-the-internet/
http://www.bookinitreviews.com/2011/05/message-boards-effective-and-proven.html
http://indieauthorgroup.com/marketing-direct-or-indirect/
http://badredheadmedia.com/2012/04/13/top-25-ways-to-sell-your-book-without-spamming-links/
http://monicaleonelle.com/author-equipment-list
Idea! Start your own store on CafePress –
http://www.cafepress.com/alchemyofscrawl
Marketing Ideas from Successful Kindle Authors
Randolph LaLonde, http://www.nightbynight.net/author of Spinward Fringe, over on the Kindle Boardshttp://www.kindleboards.com/index.php/topic,16798.0.htmlhas shared a nice list of promotional ideas that he’s used as an indie writer since 2004. He graciously said I could repost it here.
Reader bulletin boards like this one are good for a start and a good home if you want to start your own discussion thread for announcements or conversations with readers. (Mine is here: http://www.kindleboards.com/index.php/topic,13623.0.html)
Other bulletin boards I visit are those that reflect my own interests. For example, I’m a Star Wars fan and arm chair movie / TV critic so genre and entertainment BB’s are places I drop in on. In my signature I put a link to my website with a humorous little quote so there’s something other thanwww.randolphlalonde.com to look at. If people want to click on it, they do, and since the board members and I have similar interests, I get a high click through rate and a lot of downloads for my free material.
Speaking engagements. This is a lot easier now that a lot of people are doing mini-shows or podcasts online. You don’t need to hound news agencies for TV time anymore, though it does help, just find a creative or self pub podcast and inquire. There’s a very good one here, actually:http://www.staceycochran.com/id5.html
Go audio! If you don’t like the idea of grabbing images or editing a video, borrow / buy / steal a decent microphone (I have this one, great mic:http://www.samsontech.com/PRODUCTS/productpage.cfm?prodID=1810 and under a $100.00 w/shipping), and record a good reading of your story or book. Sometimes it’s best just to do the first few chapters and podcast them at a regular pace. If you do podcast, tell your listeners what to expect (how many chapters, what intervals they’ll be posted in, if, when and where they can get the printed edition or when it will come out, etc), and be sure to do several chapters in advance of the delivery date of the first so you’re ahead from the start. If you need audio editing software, there’s a really good free package called Audacity: http://audacity.sourceforge.net/ Having an audio version of your story out there will get you more readers / listeners, and most publishers don’t apply the negative connotation to audio presentations that they do to self published imprints. (There are a lot of free audio book places that you can spread your story or book around on too). Some indie authors are starting to post the first few chapters of their book in audio for free, and offer the rest for a price. My only real advice is to make sure your voice, the sound and overall presentation is on par with publishing house offerings otherwise you’ll find a lot of irritated listeners who tell you that you’ve dropped the ball on quality or silently walk away. Forever.
Review Trades / Blurb Trades: Find other authors (this is a good place to start), who have shorts / books out and ask them if they’d be interested in Blurb / Review trading. Blurb trading is simple. You read a piece of their work and say something positive about it on your blog / website and they do the same for you. These blurbs are often used as quotes on the front and/or backs of book covers. It’s been a common practice for a very long time in the publishing world. Review trading is the same thing only they post their remarks in the review section of say, Amazon, Smashwords or whatever other site you have your work hosted on. Those five star reviews are fuel for attention, trust me. (I have three Review trade remarks on this book:http://www.mobipocket.com/en/eBooks/eBookDetails.asp?BookID=104866)
Publish your short or novel as an eBook on Smashwords: Smashwords is a great home for free and indie offerings, since they only distribute indie authors and small publishers. Readers go there and know that they are not looking at titles from major publishing houses, so the stigma of self publishing (which is still very strong), is already bypassed. The readers tend to be generous and voracious. (http://www.smashwords.com) There are a ton of short stories there already, so you don’t have to worry about your short being a small offering in comparison. If your short or book is on Smashwords, you will probably be able to contact free eBook listing sites / blogs to get an entry there. They often have several hundred readers each if not more so you’ll see a boost in hits / downloads. If your book is not free, then that’s one avenue you don’t have open to you, but with Smashwords new distribution channels to the Sony, Barnes and Noble, Amazon and other eBook retailers, you’ll earn 42% royalties (this may change, make sure to check their documentation), on sales outside of Smashwords.com.
Your website / blog: One of my best strategies is checking Google Trends http://www.google.com/trends periodically and seeing if any of my interests (movies, books, tv shows), are trending, or being searched for a lot on the web. If so, I’ll take half an hour to do a fair review of the subject with a title on my blog that matches. Long time readers of my blog enjoy my reviews and new readers discover me that way as well. (example:http://randolphlalonde.blogspot.com/2009/10/sons-of-anarchy-review-without-spoilers.html) Another point to make about your blog or website is to be specific. Think of what you want your visitors to pay attention to, what public attitude you want to have towards whatever you’re discussing, and don’t junk up your blog with things that have nothing to do with its purpose.
Also, don’t talk about being a writer or the process. Your readers are there because they want to be entertained. They want to know when, where and how to get your current work and when your next is coming out. When George R.R. Martin was speaking at the World’s Biggest Book Store in Toronto this year, that’s one thing he actually brought up, and he’s right. If someone wants to know about your progress, or how to be a writer, they’ll ask. If your readers are other writers, then by all means, turn it into a writer’s advice column, but keep in mind that most readers of fiction are not writers, regardless of what many writers seem to believe.
Cross Blog Promo: This is the act of promoting another blog on your own web page or blog. It helps if this blog is more popular than yours. You can do this by reviewing them in a post, adding them to a list on the side of your own blog, or by using any number of tools offered by WordPress or Blogger to list blogs you visit regularly on your own site. Once the review is up, tell the site administrators that you reviewed them and where to find said ditty. This is also effective with podcasts and other web media. (Example: http://randolphlalonde.blogspot.com/2008/12/slush-pile-online-home-of-elizabeth.html)
Book Trailer / Video Presentation: I won’t go into the book trailer much here since there are many ways to do one, but going multimedia really works for some people. My first book trailer (here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GQiGjGaVOyM), was an experimental testimonial trailer for my science fiction series. My next one will be a cinematic trailer using footage I need to buy rights to and a voice actor. You can easily buy the rights to some photography (here’s a great site, one of the cheaper ones too: http://www.canstockphoto.com/), that go with your work. In a pinch Windows Movie Maker can do the job, but if you can get your hands on anything better I suggest you do. You will look much more professional if you actually do the leg work and find images / video clips that you can buy limited rights to or obtain usage permission for. If you’re writing science fiction, start with NASA and the JPL (EDIT: Jet Propulsion Laboratory).
In store appearances: This doesn’t really apply to publicizing a short story or most indie books these days, but it had to be mentioned. At one time, print and in-store was the way to go for indies, and I made appearances at major book stores, cafe’s and other establishments that would open their doors for a reading and signing. That sort of thing got expensive, and it was good for publicity, but with the arrival of the eBook (I had one out five years ago, but they only started selling about two years ago), and so much access to digital media, book signings and public readings are more of a financial millstone around the neck than anything. At least that how they are for me.
As an added note: If there are engagements that are willing to pay your way, or you can attend without spending any or much money as a guest, then go for it. Just make sure the topic you’re speaking on is one that you know exceptionally well. If you’ve never done a panel or spoken, go find YouTube videos of people doing exactly what you’ll be doing. There are whole books on presenting and panelling and dozens of blogs, so I won’t go into more detail here. One more thing: Make sure that the convention / event you’re speaking at suits your values and material. You don’t want to speak about your Historical Drama at a Dental convention, do you? It’s happened to someone before, it could happen to you!
Social Networking: This is more labour intensive and time consuming than most people care to mention, but I should bring it up. The key to using this as promotion is to not become a Marketer or billboard ad. Talk about other things, draw interest by having a question of the day (this is especially effective on Twitter), and have fun. If they take a moment to click on your profile page, THEN they get to see the link to your short story or book. If you’re already good at or enjoy social networking, then you’ve already won the battle. If not, then give it a try, but don’t expect it to drive a lot of hits, just slowly build a crowd so you’ll eventually have interesting people to talk to and a group of people who will look at your work as it becomes available.
The Non-Alternate Route – Submissions: Online and offline publications have their own publicity machines running. If you go the old route, the non-indie route, you’ll want to submit your story to every online and offline magazine / zine you can find. There are hundreds of online zines, so with a little patience and time you will most likely be able to get into one with your current or one of your later shorts. The problem with this is that it’s not fair play to self publish your story at the same time in any way. Just make sure that your web site is ready for visitors when your story gets picked up by whichever periodical is lucky enough to have you. As for you novelists, well, there are a few hundred books and thousands of sites with opinions on the best way to get an agent and / or publisher. Check this out for a start: http://www.therejectionist.com/
The Long Shot: This is one of the most fascinating and difficult to manage strategies I’ve ever heard. Here’s the skinny: Send a very kind email to local / national / international celebs (or their representatives), telling them that you’re a new writer and would like them to read a paragraph of your book / short into any kind of recording device and send you the audio. An online acquaintance of mine succeeded at this ages ago with Eugine Levy and a couple years later that audio block got his future agent’s attention. Long shots come in many shapes and forms, but they’re always worth trying if you’re not going to cost yourself a lot of cash, embarrass yourself, someone else, damage your or another person’s reputation, burn bridges, get yourself sued (Example: My acquaintance couldn’t use Eugine’s clip to make money or send it to a media outlet so he had to play it for people in person), or in any other way cause negative consequences. Keep whatever you do fun and don’t take it too seriously, it is a long shot, after all.
Blog Comments: Every time you visit a blog, post a comment. Make it positive and light if you can, and make sure that a link to your short / book / site is available and up to date. With the number of blogs we visit on average, which is surprising, the visitors that find you will eventually add up. Several readers of mine found me from comments on blogs like SciFi Wire and I09.
Be Active In Your Genre Community: You’ve written a short story or book, thus adding to the available media in a community or genre. You should make sure that you’re a part of that community! Find out what people with similar interests are doing online, and become involved by helping or commenting wherever you can. Posting a link to your short story, book or website as an afterthought will attract a lot of these people since you’re one of them. A quick note on promotion here: Be careful! If you go in slinging promo’s, you’ll be rejected from the group as a whole. Most readers still find authors who promote their own work very distasteful, especially if they do it in their own Bulletin Boards or Chat Rooms. Make sure the link to your site / story / book is either in your profile or signature and you interact with the community as one of its members. If you don’t feel like a member of the community, or like it’s a place you will enjoy spending time, then get out.
The Blog Tour: This is an increasingly popular style of publicity among authors. In a nutshell this is when you write for several other blogs as a guest. It’s most likely too early for you to try this, but you can always try to contribute a high quality on topic article to an existing blog, you never know, they might just post it, credit you and link to your short story. Here’s a great article with details on the hows, whens, and whys of the Blog Tour:http://yodiwan.wordpress.com/2009/06/11/whats-a-book-blog-tour/
Be About Your Next Work: This is a sometimes controversial approach with indies, but it works very well for some people. Complete another short or novel, work with people you trust to privately polish it and then don’t release it. Instead, begin publicizing it as the next thing you’ve got coming down the pipe. Build as much excitement as you can for at least two months, some people go for as long as a year. When you notice eyes turning in your direction, announce a release date. The release date shouldn’t be more than 2-4 weeks after the announcement. Keep building your audience, if anything you should work harder at that point. When the release date hits, be on time. Release it on that day at 12:01AM and you’ll get hits. You’ll sell copies. Your past work will get hits throughout the time you spend building a buzz for your next work as well.
Featuring Fan Art and Reader Contributions Again, this doesn’t really apply to helping you with getting a short story read, but it helps if you have an intellectual property that has gotten some attention. I’ve been fortunate enough to entertain some very talented readers, and I feature them on my blog whenever they contribute something I think others will enjoy. It’s good for your public image, makes your work seem more accessible and look more popular to potential readers. (Example: http://randolphlalonde.blogspot.com/2009/10/spinward-fringe-first-fan-art.html)
Audio Video Testimonials By Readers This works. If your site already generates hits from potential readers having several audio clips strung together with a musical back track (Here’s a great place to get royalty free, freely available music: http://incompetech.com/m/c/royalty-free/), with several readers talking about your work is a great hook to turn a browser into a reader. I went the extra step and bought rights to music, images and created a video, which cost about $11.00 US. (Here it is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GQiGjGaVOyM)
The Loss Leader – Playing A Bigger Publicity Game A loss leader is a book or short that you offer for free or below cost to attract readers to your entire body of work. There are masters at this tactic, people and businesses who do it much better than I do, but I have had some success. I offer an entire trilogy at Smashwords collected in a book called The First Light Chronicles Omnibus, and it has been downloaded over 4,800 times in three months. (Here it is:http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/3178) It’s been a great way for me to introduce my work to the US and multiply the number of people with that book on their devices by a factor of ten in very little time. Three months isn’t long enough to see the actual results, it takes up to a year to judge what kind of impact this kind of promotion has had, sometimes longer, but it’s looking good so far. (Note: The Omnibus is not the final edit of that book, it’s more like a preview edition. The final edit release has a promotional budget and roll out date like any other “earner” book, even though it will remain free).
There are a few other tricks I’ve used to get attention, here’s a short list of successes and relative flops:
The Spinward Fringe “Your Next Great Space Opera Is Right Here!” Television Campaign: http://forums.syfy.com/index.php?showtopic=2335588&hl=spinward+fringe This approach was in response to a rumour I heard about a television series being developed based on my work. I have no idea where it started, but it didn’t stop me from giving the SyFy network a fun loving nudge. It didn’t make the splash I was hoping for, but I did find a few dozen readers because of it.
Author Wikipedia Page: Terribly out of date and filled with inaccuracies. I’m still thankful a reader took the time to put it up, however:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Randolph_lalonde
Google AdWords: I received $100.00 worth of advertising with this service from a provider when I purchased my web hosting over a year ago and after reading up on the best ways to take advantage of this advertising strategy, I gave it a shot. After using that entire credit in ways suggested by Google and other advertising experts I may have sold about a dozen copies and generated 400 bouncing hits. My conclusion is, spend big with Adwords and be present for as long as possible or don’t bother. Others have had different results, but I haven’t actually met these “others”.
Operation eBook Drop: I didn’t list this with the main post because I don’t consider it promotion as much as doing the right thing. It also doesn’t apply to short stories. This effort allows us indie authors to provide our books to deployed Coalition Troops around the world thanks to Ed Patterson. More on that here:http://blog.smashwords.com/2009/09/smashwords-supports-operation-ebook.html
I’m sure I missed a few things. Six years on the indie scene is a very long time. I suppose the most important statement to add is that I’ve been writing full time, earning a living only from writing for over a year now. My free trilogy: The First Light Chronicles Omnibus, is currently number seven on Smashwords.com (here it is: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/3178), and as of today I have several of the top spots in the Science Fiction top 10 on Mobipockethttp://www.mobipocket.com/en/eBooks/Category.asp?Language=EN&categoryId=14&Name=Science+Fiction
Late Addendum: A word on print and Advertising Costs
Spend nothing.
I’ll elaborate a little. Setting your book up with a distributor or retailer who will make money on your book when copies sell and paying for it is a very old way of being an indie, and it’s not fair to authors. Sure, it costs money to distribute eBooks, but most distributors or vanity presses (the dreaded V Word!), who charge you up front for publicity and distribution services are there to do just that: charge writers so they don’t have to push the books they have on file. They make most of their cash from the authors and don’t actually care about selling your book. Smashwords, Amazon, Mobipocket (not accepting new authors / publishers), Lulu, Createspace, and many others will take your book for free and are concerned with making money from your book selling, not from raiding your wallet.
Paying for publicity and advertising space is also a mistake. Most readers disregard advertising before realizing what exactly they’re being pitched. You want to communicate with your reader, invite them to your space and make them comfortable. Get them ready to be entertained or informed instead of pelting them with advertising and they’ll be ready to have a good experience with your work.
The only thing I pay for are rights to media for trailers, covers and other presentations. In 2009 I spent a total of $17.00 US and outfitted four books as well as one 35 second testimonial trailer. You should spend as little as possible, there really is no need to go overboard with so many artists trying to get their work seen, most of them are just happy with credit. Just make sure they get the credit whenever it’s due.
Promotion as a writer can be difficult, since it can become a full time job on its own. The most important thing is to ensure that you never stop writing. That creative buzz and your craft will only get better as you develop more stories, lay down more prose and become more seasoned as a story teller. Don’t stop developing your next work or putting it into words, ever.
RL
David J. Guyton, http://www.davidjguyton.com/author of the Legend of Reason series, has also shared some ideas on Kindle Boardshttp://www.kindleboards.com/index.php/topic,16798.0.html
I started a thread on Amazon a while back with some of my ideas. I am reposting those ideas here:
- Offer books on both Kindle and in paperback
- Try different pricing with Kindle. When I lowered to $.99, sales skyrocketed
- Join kindleforums.com and post about your book there. They are very cool over there and love having authors join their discussions
- Offer free stuff with your book. I made a page on my website where readers can type in the UPC# from the back of my book to get freebies like audio chapters, a companion ebook, desktop backgrounds, chapter 1 of book 2, and some music downloads too.
- Keep your book price as low as you can (if you have control over that). I have noticed that many indies have high-priced books which are far more expensive than well-known authors. This is not always our fault, as many of our publishers set prices. CreateSpace is the best I have found for keeping books as cheap as possible. Mine is $10.99 for 400 pages. Not too bad
- Network with other authors and recommend their books to your own fans. Also, if someone asks for suggestions in a forum, and your friend’s book fits, recommend it. Don’t recommend your own book. People seem to hate that.
- Offer free ebook versions to people who will write reviews for you on amazon.com
- Think of ideas for contests to win signed paperbacks. I am still working on this one myself
- Send signed paperbacks to anyone who might be able to help you, and anyone who already HAS helped you on your way.
- Get a nice, professional website and make sure it’s search engine friendly (mine is www.davidjguyton.com although I am in the middle of redesigning it).
- Get as many reviews (professional and otherwise) as you can for your book(s)
- Join sites for authors such as authorsden.com. Also don’t forget about social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook.
- Put your book(s) on Google Book Search. People will be able to browse a certain percentage (10%-100%, set by you) and Google will provide Buy Links to your book. You also make money on advertising…not much though.
- Have everyone you know use the “Tag” feature on Amazon.com. Feel free to tag your own books if you’re a writer too. I don’t consider this a sin (like writing your own review). Tags are simply there to let readers know what the book is about. The more tags you get, the better it shows up on Amazon.
- Create Listmania lists. You probably shouldn’t put your book as the first book unless you’re really brave. A good rule of thumb is to list them by order of how many reviews each book has received. If all indie authors band together and do this for each other, we’ll be in good shape. (I still need to do this).
- Constantly update your bio page on Amazon.com. This gets fresh information to anyone who comes across not only your bio, but your sales page too.
- Ask for help. The last page in my book asks the reader to tell at least two other people about my book if they enjoyed it. Word of mouth is very important.
- Ask your local bookstore(s) if they will allow you to do a book signing. This can be tricky if your ISBN isn’t in their system, but you can work something out I’m sure.
- Blogs can help you drive traffic to your site. Keep it updated.
- Try using a banner exchange program. I have one running on my sales page on my website. I don’t know how many sales it has gotten me, but I get several hundred hits a month with it, all for free.
- Collect email addresses of people interested in your book. Drop them a friendly note when you have important news. Don’t bomb them with sales pitches and ads though. Let them know you are working on your next book and you will have it ready next month.
- Are you a member of a forum (of any kind)? I happen to be on a car forum (I love cars) and I have about 2500 posts on there. In my signature I have my website link. This gives me 2500 free “ads” people might come across looking for something online….24/7/365.
- Put a link to your website in your email signature. Are you SURE everyone you email knows you wrote a book?
- Send press releases to radio and TV stations. “Dave, you’re crazy!” I know, I know…it would be a really rare event to get invited on TV or radio. But you never know. Maybe some station wants to do a story about people struggling in the economy. Maybe they want an expert on whatever you wrote your book on. Maybe they want a local author just because it’s a cool idea. Maybe they want to fill a 3 minute spot and they have no other options.
- Submit your site to stumbleupon.com. It’s a site that drops off visitors to all different websites at random. This will get you some free traffic but your site had better grab their attention fast because they won’t stay long.
In addition to these, I would also advise AGAINST writing contests….at least ones where other authors do the voting. Typically, other authors are only there to promote their own work, and will only rip yours to shreds. I made the mistake of doing this once, and all the comments left on my page were just advertisements for other authors’ books. I found this unethical, and I refused to promote my own writing on their pages. I didn’t do well in that contest.
Ellen C. Maze talked to Book Buzzr and shared lots of good ideas about what worked for her. http://www.bookbuzzr.com/blog/author-interviews/how-to-become-a-top-ranked-book-on-amazons-kindle-store/
Press Releases
Great article on how to write a press release –
http://www.copyblogger.com/social-media-press-release/
http://www.publicityinsider.com/release.asp
http://www.mediacollege.com/journalism/press-release/format.html
http://www.clubdoconline.com/submit-press-release/
http://service.prweb.com/pricing/
http://www.worldbookandnews.com/submit-an-article.html
http://www.free-press-release.com/members/login.php
http://www.getblogs.com/directory/articles/article-1.html
Paid advertising (which includes a couple of PR links above)
Although I’ve done my best to give you stuff as free as possible, sometimes it’s good to just have a link flashing somewhere on a site to get your name out there. By no means, should it make up the bulk of your time or money.
http://www.online-literature.com/mediakit.php – for educational topics/essays
http://www.wordiq.com/advertise.html
http://www.kindleinthewind.com/
BookBuzzr
http://www.bookbuzzr.com/tour.phphas some interesting ideas and gadgets to try for a relatively low monthly fee
JoeyPinkney
http://joeypinkney.com/advertise-on-joeypinkneycomoffers advertising on his website for a nominal fee.
The Book Barista
http://www.bookbarista.com/ lets you post an ad for your book for free.
Evolved Pub
http://www.evolvedpub.com/ New kids on the block, but again, a group of Indie Authors banding together. Sounds good to me and I randomly won a free Kindle by promoting them. Can’t beat that with a stick!
Digital Book Today
http://digitalbooktoday.com/join-our-team/
And if you’re shy and new to all this? Got some writer friends? Have they written some good stuff? Band together and publish an anthology of your own.
Twelve Worlds
https://sites.google.com/site/twelveworlds/is the brain child of Derek J Canyon. Within four months he had a group of Indie Authors and by using Dropbox and a forum, the authors were able to collaborate and create this – Twelve Worldshttp://www.amazon.com/science-fiction-fantasy-anthology-ebook/dp/B004WT7OSQ
All profit from the sale of this eBook goes to the charity, Reading is Fundamental
JA Konrath also started a charity drive for several of his books and other authors have joined forces at No Trees Harmedhttp://notreesharmed.com/?p=331to support First Book
If you are interested in participating, send him an email.
On Sunday May 22, 2001 an EF5 tornado hit Joplin, MO. I lived there for 12 years. We bought our first house in Joplin. My daughter was born there. I worked in Carthage. I graduated from MSSU. Some of my friends lost everything. I wrote Peace on the Peninsulahttp://www.amazon.com/Peace-on-the-Peninsula-ebook/dp/B003YOSCEK/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2&s=digital-text&qid=1306271354&sr=1-1while I was attending MSSU. I know people can’t afford much, but almost anyone can afford a buck for a good cause. Including May, all profits from the sale of this eBook will go to rebuilding Joplin – however long that takes. After that, I will continue to donate to a Joplin based charity. Thanks in advance and my prayers and thoughts are with you.
A global phenomenon – eBooks and eReaders are going global. Right now the market is concentrated in the US and the UK, but Amazon alone is opening new markets in Germany and France. More are soon to follow. When you look for a translator for your story, make sure they are experienced in translating fiction, non-fiction, or literary translation. Linkedin is a good place to look for translation services.
http://www.linkedin.com/profile/edit
This sounds like a brilliant idea to promote your eBook from Dean Wesley Smith. And it’s cheap enough to try!
http://www.deanwesleysmith.com/?p=4154
How Writers Can Use QR Codes
http://problogservice.com/2011/11/28/how-writers-can-use-qr-codes/
Book promotions – I’ve done a few with the IBC and WLC and will continue to grab reasonably priced ones. However, I’ve gone out and done a couple myself and am now helping to organize winwithebooks.com for authors by authors. Any fees go directly towards prizes and advertising. Email winwithebooks@yahoo.com for more information.
Book/eBook distributors
BackMyBook
CreateSpace
lulu
List of Self-Publishing Companies and POD with information to read
http://www.everywritersresource.com/selfpublishingbookcompanies.html
You can reach me at http://alchemyscrawl.com – My take on the independent writing scene with book reviews, news, and resources… and the occasional rants…
Conclusion… maybe…
Because it didn’t seem to fit anywhere else, here is a fascinating conversation between JA Konrath and Barry Eisler for free at Smashwords, Be the Monkey – http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/48314 Do not YouTube that phrase BTW!
He’s since taken on the Big 6 again and their lawsuit with the DoJ.
http://jakonrath.blogspot.com/
Special thanks to Paul Davies – Graphic Designer who designed the cover. If you’re interested in his services, you can reach him at p_a_davies@hotmail.com
Also thanks to the many people who have been so willing to share their time, opinions, ideas, resources, and critiques with me. I’m really impressed with the writing community as a whole and couldn’t be happier to be associated with such a fine group of writers!
The three most important things you can do is write, write and write.
I hope this information gives you tons of ideas and helps you sell lots of eBooks! Good luck!
You made it this far! And your head didn’t explode? hehe Good for you! If any information in this book was useful, please consider Tweeting, Sharing, Plusing or a review on Amazon
http://www.amazon.com/almost-Complete-Guide-Publishing-ebook/dp/B0050080CK/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1310668660&sr=8-1
Thanks so much!
This book is also available as a Udemy class – http://www.udemy.com/diy-guide-to-social-media-marketing-and-ebook-publishing/