Picking and Choosing

March 31^st. 2018

I’ve come across a lot of Q&As this week about which is the best way to find readers? Which advertising platforms? Are stand-alone authors fighting a losing battle? There are answers to all these questions, right answers too if you happen to make the right choice. But what is the right choice? One best-selling author whose interview I read on Nick Stephenson’s 10K forum advised focussing on a single strategy: one that works for you, and binning everything else. Don’t waste time writing a blog was one of her suggestions; they achieve nothing. Nick put a little note in at that point about the value of blogs. I remember reading of two writers, both women: one American and the other an English writer, who found success by writing a kind of diary of their daily routines. One, I think, was about cooking and just keeping up generally around the house, and the other about trips to the hairdresser and that kind of thing. In both cases they were encouraged by their ‘readers’ to put the work into book form. Then bingo! Best sellers.

So what works for me? I wish I knew the answer to that. One query on the Mark Dawson’s SPF community today was about the difference between stand-alone authors and those who write series novels. The answers were mixed: some authors were enjoying success with their stand-alone books, while others found the opposite. The answer to any question about finding the right audience has to be promotion and marketing. Of course, you could become instantly famous by attempting to attack a public institution with a gun, but the future would be very bleak. I was going through my old contracts the other day and came across my first royalty statement from Macmillan in 1980. I sold 2000 books in the first nine months of publication. For an unknown first time author, that was good. And it was unexpected according to my publisher. Macmillan didn’t keep me on though, but that’s life. And in those days it was more or less down to the publisher to push the book. I was too naïve to know any different.

The other suggestion I’ve seen is to write more books. I don’t see that as the answer though. I have eleven books in print, which should be plenty for my readers to get their teeth into, but not all of them want to read stories set at different times and in different places. It’s a real challenge, and the increase in sales, even when they are marginal, are always pleasing and always puts a smile on my face. I’ll be advertising on Amazon from tomorrow and hope to see that rise which will make me smile. Seeing my bank balance go down as I pay for the ads won’t though, unless I get a decent ROI.

I met up with an author friend of mine during the week: Paul Asling. We talked about the speech recognition software, Dragon. Paul showed me how it worked. I was impressed, but knew that if I bought the software, there was no guarantee I would use it. It isn’t expensive, but then I could spend the money on promotion. So while we’re all struggling to come up with the answer, I don’t think there is a right or wrong way; it’s all down to being prepared to spend and wishing for a good dose of luck.

Remember, April 1^st. tomorrow — April Fool’s Day. I wonder what made-up stories will hit the newspapers tomorrow? Of course, it could be: Michael Parker hits the one million sales on Amazon. Who knows? Wish me luck!

Happiness and Busyness

March 24^th. 2017

Had a lovely disruption to my usual time for blog writing: my grand-daughter came over with Orin, our No.3 Great Grandson. It’s always lovely to see them. I also had a fairly busy week one way or another. I managed to dig out some effort and began work again on my WIP. Trying to come up with a crime novel is far more difficult than I imagined. I’d be hopeless as a serial killer: wouldn’t have a clue. Sure, I can write good stuff, but it all has to come together seamlessly in the end, otherwise I’ll get found out.

During the week we had an on-line Zoom meeting: three of the directors (me included), trying to thrash out some sensible way to go with the Chindi group. We are attracting more self-published writers, which is a good thing, but we have to take care that the group doesn’t become unmanageable. As the treasurer, I can see the workload increasing, cutting into time spent on writing, social media, promotion & marketing etc. Oh, and doing the usual domestic stuff too: sleep, eat, breathe, walk the dog. My, my, what a busy boy am I.

My sales are slowly increasing on Draft2Digital. Although I am not making any money, I expect to break even with my current progress. My main concern is that the advert on BookBub will run out of steam and I will have to come up with another, something I’m loathe to do while I see those numbers going up. I’m currently studying the Mark Dawson video on AMS advertising because my sales on Amazon have slumped dramatically. I’m not alone with this situation, I’m sure. I often see posts on some of my author FB forums from authors complaining about their poor returns and asking the inevitable question: what am I doing wrong? The chances are, they are probably doing nothing wrong, but maybe not spending enough money on advertising.

I watched a podcast on which Ernest (Ernie) Dempsey explained how he cracked the mystique behind attracting readers, and one thing he suggested, which I think is worth trying, is to produce a short video of yourself answering the kind of questions readers might ask. He uses his iPhone, but it’s possible to do this with the desktop PC as well. I must admit I’m tempted, but might feel silly asking myself questions. It’s worth a punt though. We will be trying something similar on our Chindi website. We’ll be having an “Author of the Week” slot. There’ll be short video clips, media promotion and tweets for the author. Our first slot is for children’s author, Christopher Joyce (Creatures of Chichester). He’ll be coming up on April 9^th for a week. You can see his books on Chindi-authors.co.uk

I’ve put my name down for a table-top sale in July on our small, residential estate where I live. There will be a dog show, charity stalls and a BBQ. The lady who will be judging the dogs is also the lady who comes round picking up the money for the ‘Bonus Ball’ competition each month. The dogs love her because she always has biscuits in her pocket. She reckons that on the day of the dog show, all the dogs will be flocking round her for a biscuit. How can she pick a winner? We’ll be putting Tuppence in, all prepped and smelling nice for her walk round. Should be good. I’ll be trying to sell books too. Wish me luck!

Mere technicalities

March 17^th. 2018

St. Patrick’s Day today, and it always reminds me that I should have been called Patrick. Seventy six years ago today, my mother was sitting in a field on a sunny day, surrounded by daffodils at a cottage hospital in Cuckfield, West Sussex, expecting me, knowing that she would call me Patrick because of our Irish heritage (she never mentioned what she would do if I turned out to be a girl). But I arrived the following day, the 18^th., so in a fit of pique she called me Michael. It’s Irish I suppose. My wife’s name is Pat, so it’s a blessing really, otherwise we’d have been known as ‘Pat & Pat’. So to all my Irish readers — Happy St. Patrick’s Day. He was English by the way, so I’m told.

It’s always good to read of success stories in the Indie publishing world. Yesterday I watched the podcast on Mark Dawson’s SPF group with Earnest Dempsey as the star. It often transpires that these success stories are down to hard work, perseverance and the essential element, talent. Dempsey (who is known as Ernie) said it was necessary to find a balance between writing and marketing. He described it like keeping spinning plates rotating on their poles while writing at the same time. I’ve always said it’s necessary to keep the balls in the air, which is a similar analogy. I have already been thinking of trying my luck with Amazon Ads, but still keeping my BookBub ads live. I can see a moderate growth with BB, but Amazon isn’t keeping pace, which is probably not surprising considering the vast number of writers competing for readers; so I need to keep those plates spinning and the balls flying.

I haven’t touched my WIP this week. Just looking at my social diary (i.e., my calendar), there have been too many opportunities to procrastinate, and in the world of procrastination, I think I would top the best-seller list. Or should that be the ‘best time-wasters’ list?

I began the task of updating my profile on D2D by making an author page. You can see it at https://www.books2read.com/ap/xog1mx/Michael-Parker. Any comments? It looks like D2D are making big strides in attracting indie writers to use their services, which doesn’t surprise me because of the positive comments I’ve seen on various author forums.

I had to set up a new landing page on MailChimp last week because, for some reason, my usual one was no longer available. I used MC’s FAQ page for an answer, but I needn’t have bothered. As a result of making a new page, I brought my two subscriber lists together, which brought the numbers down to 1200. According to MC’s figures, I lost 400 subs. I’m not too bothered about that, because I can always use Facebook Lead generation ads if I wanted to increase it. I’ll let it grow organically for a while, although there is a caveat to that: I have started an email promotion campaign with Books Go Social, which means I need to send an email to my subs each week or so with a recommended thriller. The trouble is, every time I send something to them, I get about ten unsubscribes, so I could end up losing more than I’m gaining. I hope not. Anyway, we’ll see. Wish me luck!

The learning curve steepens

March 10^th. 2018

This is the Chindi book group at the UK Southern Book show — the ‘Worthing Event’. There were mixed feelings about the day, but for myself, I was happy to be there, meet other authors, talk to readers and sell a couple of books. The day went on too long, meaning some early departures, including our group. I was scheduled to give a fifteen minute talk at 5.15pm, but it was obvious that I would be speaking to myself by then. We had authors and publishers from all over the United Kingdom, which surprised me because I expected the majority to come from the southern part of the country. Fortunately the bad weather had subsided by then, which meant just about a 100% show from everyone. As for the foot traffic, the visiting public, it was hard to quantify the attraction the show had, despite being inside the theatre on Worthing Pier.

The organiser of the event was Natasha Murray (nmurray.moonfruit.com). It was the first time for her and she did everything herself, which was an amazing and tremendous effort. She has asked for feedback too, and I know there are a few of our group who have shown a reluctance about doing this again next year, but I expect to turn up if Natasha holds the show again. She has already promised changes to the date (later in the year), and maybe a change of venue. My own feelings about these kind of events is that it’s more about marketing, networking and meeting people rather than selling books and making a lot of money.

I’m now leaning towards an extended effort on promotion and marketing. I don’t mean I’m going to spend more money, but I want to consolidate links with potential readers and other author forums. I watched a podcast yesterday about a new writer who gave up her job and spent three months developing a community relationship with potential readers before even publishing a book. The amount of work she put in was remarkable, but the results proved worth the effort. Within twelve months she had tripled what she would have earned had she stayed at work. Now I don’t pretend that I’m about to do anything like that, but it does highlight the need for some serious effort in the P&M department for results to flow. I’ve no idea yet how I’ll improve my social media skills, but it’s something I have to work on.

My WIP has been modified for the umpteenth time now. Something tells me I should give it up and write fairy stories or something, but I’ll persevere and aim for a completed novel by the end of the year. Because I’m writing what is essentially a crime novel, I have to keep going back in the story to drop something in that gets picked up by the main character later in the story. I’m finding it difficult because crime writing seems a little bit specialised to me now. I’ll probably start sending teasers out to my subs list, see what they think maybe.

I am seeing improvements to my BB ads sales. I have overtaken the February figure already, but still have a long way to go and, probably, much tweaking to do. I might have to run a second ad, just to get some kind of comparison.

On the domestic front, Tuppence just about scraped through on her weigh-in, and is now back under our control. Let’s hope she manages to stay slim. Wish me (us) luck!

Challenging Times

March 3^rd. 2018

This week, the weather has put a damper on the country and affected all walks of life. Accidents, people killed, motorists stranded for hours on end, trains and buses cancelled, emergency services stretched to the limit, and the military called in. The homeless have been particularly hard-hit, and so too have those pensioners who need home delivery of much of their vital supplies. So what has been my worry? I’ve been hoping that the UK Southern Book show on Sunday — tomorrow! — will not be affected. Big deal, eh? I took a drive along the coast to Worthing last Thursday to check on the venue and local parking. The sun was shining, there was no snow on the roads, which were bone dry, and everything looked great. Never mind about the rest of the country struggling; my patch was OK. Thoughtless or what?

But we know that’s not the case, is it? I wish the whole country was enjoying sunshine and good weather. And I wish the whole country was out shopping and buying my books. We can dream, eh? The Mystery & Crime book talk at Portsmouth Book Fest today had to be cancelled because several of the writers who were scheduled to attend couldn’t make it because of the weather, so I’m hoping the snow will disappear and people will brave the cold weather to come along to our event at Worthing.

I found myself having a chat with my son about my WIP yesterday, and the struggle I’m having in trying to write a thriller within the constraints of developing a ‘Series character’. In my case it’s Marcus Blake, who has been the central character in two of my books — A Covert War and Where the Wicked Dwell. I’m in a literary straitjacket because of it: self-inflicted, I know. My son suggested I write a pulp fiction thriller and put Blake in when I’ve finished. I threw the challenge back at him and asked him to give me a substantial plot-line so I could write without prevarication and bang out my next, mind-boggling thriller. I don’t know if he’s up for it though, not being a writer. But he’s an intelligent man and, who knows? He might get the bug and become a better writer than me. He can beat me at darts and snooker any day. And if I played golf he’d hammer me, but this might be something on which I would leave him standing.

My BookBub ads are making some kind of progress. I can see some increase in sales compared to last month, but my latest advert seems to be struggling, so I’ll probably have to dive in and have a major re-think about which way to go with this. I actually raised the daily budget and increased the author keywords, hoping it would give me more relevance, but it seems to be having the opposite affect according to my latest figures. So, it might be a case of “Less is more”, and I need to reduce both budget and keywords.

On the domestic front, Tuppence still doesn’t know she’s on a weight-loss programme (I like that phrase). She still wants to eat anything we do, and keeps sitting in front of you, looking up with those lovely, Cockapoo eyes, waiting for you to give her some of whatever it is you’re eating. It’s difficult, isn’t it? Wish me luck!