Category Archives: Blog Series

Self-Publishing Journey: Week 8

Freebies, Discount Promotions, & KDP

Well, I’ve gotten a bit off my schedule over the last couple of weeks, but my blog pretty much always takes a back seat to other work. It certainly has recently. I did make my word count goal for February, and Pen-L Publishing has two more books done with my proofreading skills. Sadly, however, I wasn’t able to attend the February meeting of the Ozark Writers League (OWL) due to a nasty ice storm that hit the night before. Travel on my mountain roads was out of the question, but in Branson they were able to pull together some workshops in the hotel and then pick up around noon when things started thawing out. Tomorrow I will be attending the Northwest Arkansas Writer’s Workshop meeting in Fayetteville and will hopefully get to see the friends I missed at OWL.

There’s not much left to wrap up on my self-publishing journey evaluation, but one area is really important so I don’t want to let it slide: freebies and sale promotions. Any self-publishing author has got to evaluate the benefits of giving away her work or offering discounted prices. It’s just part of the game. Readers of indie books expect it, but you don’t have to let yourself or your work be taken advantage of. You worked hard to write and publish that book. Freebies have their time when they can get your book into potential readers’ hands.

If you have a series, doing a freebie on Book 1 can result in sales on the other books in the series. That’s the biggest motivation out there, and I have personally found this to be true. Around here, we call “Why Kimba Saved The World” our sacrificial lamb. Doing free promotions on that book have led to increased sales for the other two. Not everyone who downloads your freebie will ever even read your book, but some of them will. Some of them will even like it. Some will purchase other books in the series. Can you hear the field narrowing down as it goes along? So make sure you get enough downloads to have those numbers at the end of the stream be high enough to make a difference.

If you are exclusive with Kindle Direct Publishing in their Select program, you can run 5 free promo days every 90 days. I use those free days pretty consistently for Book 1 in my series. Two or three days at a time is the most productive. The times I do it without much advertising it still gets hits, but when you can loop a free promo with a significant (but not super expensive) advertisement you will do even better.

Example: I was able to get a BookBub ad for a free promo on “Why Kimba Saved The World.” If you don’t know about BookBub, click on the link to find out more right now. This site is key for indie ads. I tried several times before I was accepted, so be persistent. When that ad ran, 14,000 copies of “Why Kimba Saved The World” were downloaded for free. Did you catch that number?? That gave me a big wide field, and yes, the numbers on Book 2 and Book 3 sales rose afterward and there are still months where those two are higher than Book 1.

BookBub is the only ad site I can speak to with the authority of my own experience at this point. Tweeting about a freebie offer has had limited results. @KimbaBaby often tweets about sales because the vast majority of her followers are cats or cat people. This number has doubled since our last promotion, so I will find out soon if I have any takers among her new friends. There are many sites that will ask you to pay for an ad for your freebie. Unless you expect huge results, I wouldn’t try those. Losing money is never the goal.

On March 20-22, “Why Kimba Saved The World” will be on free promo again. I will also offer Book 2 and Book 3 for 99 cents each as incentive to pick them up right then and there when making the free download. This promo will be advertised through The Fussy Librarian. The cost of advertising with this site is inexpensive, but it remains to be seen if the ad will make a difference. I’ll do a specific blog after this sale to let you know where I ran ads and if any of them worked.

Another kind of free promotion I have coming up involves the release of a new book: “Max’s Wild Night.” Through my newsletter, I will be offering a free ebook of “Max” to anyone who has published amazon.com reviews of all three of my Cats in the Mirror books. This is a new strategy for me, but I have heard it suggested by more than one indie-pub helper book. I will lose some guaranteed sales to my fans who follow my newsletter, but I also stand an even better chance of gaining good reviews on amazon.com. That is totally worth it. Maybe they will still want a paperback copy of “Max” as well. I’ll let you know how it goes. Does it sound like an offer you’d like to take me up on? Sign up for my newsletter in the right hand column next to this article (right at the top of the web page) and you can!

Are there downsides to freebies? Of course. The biggest one I have found is that people will download your book who would never buy it and, frankly, it is not anything they should have ever read. Their reviews will be bad and odd and ones you could have done without. As long as this stays within reason, and your other reviews are good, you can weather the storm. It will help get your final amazon review numbers up, and this is good thing. Discerning readers can take the reviews/comments for what they are worth and compare them to the dozens of good reviews you have.

There is also the very real chance that these freebie takers never pay for books. I mean never. They just troll freebie sites. No matter how much they enjoy Book 1, they are never going to pay even 99 cents for your other books. Those are the middle of the field. You don’t really lose anything by them getting your book, you just don’t gain anything either.

Goodreads giveaways must be paperbacks, so you are already losing money. I have done several of these. It gets you on people’s “to be read” list, but I don’t know that it has led to any sales. Tread lightly there.

I have also found that offering a book for free during a blog tour to promote it just means that no one will buy a copy then and there. If they can enter to win a free copy, why would they buy one? By the time the contest is over, they have moved on. You can give away a prize of some kind, but don’t make it that new book you hope to promote. Make them buy it if they want it.

Just a note for those who have been in the game for a while: success in free promos does you absolutely no good in your ranking at amazon.com once the promo is done. This didn’t used to be true. There used to be some carryover. If anything, it might hurt you because you won’t have any sales credited to your ranking for the days of your promo. As far as your number ranking is concerned, free days are just days with no sales. Your numbers will slide. Just be aware of that. You will be listed in the “free book” rankings, which is where those folks who like freebies go, so it’s not all bad, but it all ends with the promo. This could change tomorrow, but that’s where it stands now. I still think it’s worth it. Rankings vary and are affected by many things I can’t control. I don’t worry about them too much in the scheme of things from day to day, as long as they stay reasonable over time.

Discount prices can help boost sales a small amount. 99 cents seems to be the big price point for the most bang, and sales on these discount or “countdown” promos do count toward your ranking. Again, you are going to have to run some promotions if you want it to make a big difference. I did a BookBub ad (yes, I qualified for two, whoot whoot) for Book 2, “Vacation Hiro,” during a 99 cent promotion and sold roughly 380 copies. It was enough to send me to the #1 spot in my category for three days (beating out those Warrior books, finally!) and earn me “best seller” status forever. Totally worth it.

I had talked about KDP select wrapped into this blog, but all I can really say about it is that it works well for me. I tried having Book 1 up at Smashwords and Kobo and Barnes and Noble. Never sold a copy. When you stay with KDP select, you get the free and sale day promo options to help get the word out about your sale just on amazon.com itself. For me, this is the only way to go.

I hope all of that helps you as you make decisions for your own possible free days or sale promotions. It is still an area we are toying with. I’ll continue to let you know what I learn along the way.

Next Week: Week 9 and the wrap up to this blog series on my self-publishing journey.

If you’re in the area, join me Saturday for the Northwest Arkansas Writer’s Workshop event. It’s free!

My winter newsletter goes out in a few days, so make sure you sign up to get that free “Max’s Wild Night” ebook offer. The details will only be in that newsletter!

My writing goal for the month is fairly low: 5,000 words on “Slinky Steps Out.” I have been moderate with that because paperback formatting for “Max’s Wild Night” is well underway with the ebook formatting on the horizon and these require my attention. I also have another editing project coming from Pen-L before the end of March. You will notice, however, that I don’t get a pass for the month or a zero word count goal. Book 4 is not going to write itself.

Just Keep Writing!

Self-Publishing Journey: Week 7

Week 7: Book Releases and Production Scheduling

I have learned to approach a book release schedule in self-publishing rather like a wedding. Pick your date and then start planning at least six months in advance. This is if you self-publish and the book is already complete. Traditional publishing is more like a one year or more timeline. With only one book to focus on, you can move things along faster.

Since it is the book I have in production now, I can use “Max’s Wild Night” as an example. The story was finished in November. That was a deadline I set because I wanted to officially launch the book on Max’s 10^th birthday: May 1, 2015. I have done that same type of thing with the books in the cat series, and I do lots of sales around the character’s real birthdates. It serves no purpose but being fun, and it makes me happy. You may have other things that drive the dates related to your book release. I really had to push myself to get the final draft done (a retreat was involved), but I’m glad I did. The rest of the process would have fallen behind otherwise.

Here’s basically how I have the self-publishing production process scheduled.

Book draft done by end of November.
Revision and editing done before Christmas vacation.
Beta readers doing their work over the vacation.
Time to let the book rest until mid-January. (Really. You need to step back.)
My final revisions/edits done by end of January.
Pause for income for guest house season to begin so I can pay contractors. This is important!
Manuscript to the editor by mid-February (already on her radar).
Cover design begun mid-February (already on her schedule).
Formatting & CreateSpace set up begins by the start of March.
Do newsletter offering free “Max” ebooks for reviews on Cats in the Mirror books & promoting new book as soon as cover is ready.
All drawings/photos done and in place by mid-March (spring break end).
Formatted book to ebook designer by late-March (after spring break).
Set up mini blog tour schedule by late-March.
Have paperback proof ordered from CreateSpace by first week in April, at the latest.
(Will there be a spring War Eagle Fair? Paperbacks will need to be ordered by second week in April to make it in time!)
Ebook versions ready for reviewers by second week in April.
Everything on amazon.com set up and ready to roll by April 24^th.
Create book release online event through Facebook by April 26^th.
Official book release on May 1^st. Happy Birthday, Max!

You can certainly give yourself exact dates if that helps motivate you. I have just learned that some things along the way can slow plans down. Book cover design is a big one. If you have a good designer, chances are pretty high that they will have other projects going. You won’t just be able to get yours back in two days. There is also some back and forth that may take a week or more once your project is started. We ended up having to delay the promotion of “Why Kimba Saved The World” by a few weeks because the designer we wanted was involved in another project. We had to wait our turn.

Getting your cover design going early is also important because you will need that cover to promote the book. It’s much more effective to say “Here’s my next book” and show a cool cover than it is to just talk about what the book will be. Your cover is your best marketing tool. That’s another reason to make sure it is awesome.

So far I am on track for “Max’s Wild Night.” I had been in touch with both the editor and cover designer to let them know when I was expecting to send them their part of the book so I could get a note in their schedule and find out if there were any conflicts. That helps everyone involved if you have definite release dates in mind.

That being said, you don’t have to make any special release dates. Odds are good you are not planning a physical book signing tour that needs dates set up months in advance. Linking to a holiday or personal event is just fun. It helps get you and others excited about the new book.

As far as the book release itself, don’t go overboard. If you have a party, you will mostly get your friends and family, and they will probably buy your book anyhow. Facebook live events can be fun. Give away prizes, but I would steer away from giving away copies of the new book. If folks think they might win a copy, they won’t buy a copy. By the time winners are announced, they will have moved on.

For the release of “At the Corner of Magnetic and Main” in September, we will be having a live event here on our property. First, I just want to have a party with my friends and fellow writers to celebrate. Second, the book is set locally and we have contacts in the business community. An event is a good chance to get the word out, get an article in the local papers, and sell some copies to people I might not have a chance to otherwise. I will also run an internet event that evening with video from the afternoon, including my live reading. That’s a chance to spread the love to friends and family who cannot possibly attend the live party. I’m sure I’ll be blogging about that when the time comes.

Just keep in mind that you are a very small publishing company of one. Don’t throw lots of money at an event unless you can be sure it is worth it. Blog tours are a less expensive and easier way to spread the word about your book, as mentioned in an earlier post.

Celebrate sharing your book with the world!

In Two Weeks: Freebies, KDP, & Discount Promotions

I won’t have time to blog next Monday because I’m attending the Ozark Writer’s League quarterly meeting on Saturday

and the Oscars (also known as a high holiday in my home) are on Sunday. It doesn’t really seem like anyone is reading these anyhow, so who will notice? I may blog about the OWL conference and some books I’m reading, but it won’t be part of the series.

I am on track for my writing goal for the month of 10,000 words on “Kimba’s Christmas,” and editing, cover creation, and artwork are underway for “Max’s Wild Night.” So let it snow. Just don’t let us lose power. I’ll keep writing.

Self-Publishing Journey: Week 6

Week 6: Live Events & Blog Tours

So now we are looking at the dreaded side of self-publishing for most writers: self-promotion. Writers didn’t used to have to deal with this. Your publishing company would toot your horn, promote your book, and you could show up very humbly and sign for adoring fans. Those days are gone, even for 99% of traditionally published authors.

I have a bachelor’s degree in public relations, so I know what needs to be done in this field. I’ve read some good books and follow some blogs of other authors and their journey. Some things have worked for us, some have not. What I can speak to specifically is promoting a book for elementary and early middle school age readers. It is a very specific market, and what may work for an adult book won’t work for me. I have done dozens of live events and set up blog tours for my first two books. Here’s what we have learned so far.

Blog Tours

Blog tours are an entirely separate beast from live events. When “Why Kimba Saved The World” released, I spent hours (I mean DAYS) setting up a blog tour. I screened carefully to make sure that the blogger wrote about children’s books and posted reviews consistently. Nearly everyone who agreed to take part in the tour did their part. I think there were about 10 of them. I made some great connections that I still keep in touch with, and we cross-promote each other. As far as all of that goes, it was a success. However, I don’t think any sales came from any of those posts. For “Vacation Hiro,” I set up a smaller blog tour, mostly of the sites who had already posted on “Kimba.” For Book 3, I did very little blog promotion. My big targets then were already established readers through social media and my newsletter.

I did get many, many reviews posted to amazon.com from those bloggers, especially for Book 1. That’s nothing to sneeze at (more on that in a later blog), but that’s not really the goal of a blog tour. You are supposed to be getting in front of new readers. I’m not sure blog tours, especially for kid’s books, work that way. At least not the ones you can set up on your own.

Paying for someone else to promote your books is an option on the blog tour front. The Mother-Daughter Book Review site has very reasonable packages, and they have a fantastic reputation. But it does feel rather like paying for a review (something I avoid), so I have not tried their services yet. That may change in the future.

When “Max’s Wild Night” comes out in May, I will definitely be in touch with bloggers, but the goal will be for reviews. The same will be true of “At the Corner of Magnetic and Main,” but it will be a whole new set of bloggers because this is an adult book. How much time I devote to finding them is questionable. I’ve made many connections through LinkedIn with those type of bloggers because I knew this book would come out one way or another. As long as it doesn’t become overly time consuming, I’m sure I’ll be working on connecting with them. I’ll try to coordinate the posts around the release date, but I’ll know more what to expect this time. If there are some sales, excellent. Mostly, I’ll be looking for reviews.

If you think a blog tour would be fun, go for it. There’s no harm, but you have to judge the amount of time you devote to it.

Live/Face-to-Face Events

Live events are by far our best sales venues for me, but it matters where we go and how much we have to spend to be there. We have learned, the hard way, that spending too much for any booth or table space will leave us disappointed. If we are going to have hotel costs involved, we are not going to make money. Promotion is all good and fine, but if you don’t sell enough books to cover costs you are not making money. That is our goal. This is a business for us, not a hobby. My time comes at a price. If I’m busy with something else, I’m not writing. That’s one of the things that has to weigh into every decision we make about events this year. Some goodwill and getting yourself in front of the right people is okay. Just watch how much you put into that. After the last two years of live events, we have reached some conclusions.

The War Eagle Fall Craft Fair was by far our most successful event. You can read my blog about it at this link. We sold nearly 100 books over the four days we were there, met lots of new and excited readers, and didn’t have to pay an arm and a leg for the space. We made a nice profit. Perfect. But it is only once a year. There is a much smaller spring fair (and we did reasonably well there too), but it may not be held this year. Large craft fairs like this are big on our agenda for 2015. I’ve kept my ears open and made notes on ones within driving distance. There are a couple in Fayetteville I will be investigating and maybe taking part in. People coming to these events are ready to buy something and are looking for unique items they can’t just find at their local store. Indie books are a great fit for them.
Targeted events can be successful—events that have some connection with your book. My books are about cats, so I got a booth at a local Cat Fancier’s competition event. Click here to read about that one specifically. Sales were very good and it was fun to be a part of, however, I paid for two hotel nights so all profits were sucked away. When it is held this year, I may go again, but I’ll have to suck it up and spend four hours on the road each day. This is one the CFO across the hall and I will have to debate. If he can come with me, that may make it worthwhile. There’s also the question, though, of whether it will be all the same people again. I sold a set of books to over half of the vendors with cats in the show. If they are all there again, I have a smaller new audience. These are the kind of things you have to consider before you dive in to something a second time, but targeted events are good to explore as long as the booth fee is not excessive.
Big conferences like the Arkansas Reading Association and the Association of Arkansas Librarians were major flops. It’s not so much because I didn’t sell any books, but the huge overhead costs and hotel stays sucked any profit away and cost us more than we made. My hope with both was that I would stir up interest in school visits. Just one would have made the cost worthwhile. That may still happen, but none so far. Librarians are also mostly interested in hardcover books that are on the AR list. My books don’t fit either category. These events were not worth the time and money involved. Big companies like HBJ can throw money at events like this (and they did, believe me), but we cannot.
Author events at libraries are mostly a waste of time. Folks go to the library for free books. I’m not knocking this. I am at my local library every other week with books and DVDs for fun and research. You might meet some new readers. That’s a bonus. You might sell a few books. That’s a great goal. The table is usually free. That’s always a good thing. You just have to decide how much your time is worth. I have sat at library events for hours and not had a soul even walk by. If we do any this year, we will make sure the library is big enough to draw traffic and be worth using time I could spend writing or doing other promotional work. At the end of this blog I’ll share an exception to the rule from a couple of days ago. Library events are on the “maybe” list.
Anything that has a mass garage sale feel or fundraising for something where folks are hoping to get treasures for a dollar are not worth the time. They want massive deals. They don’t want books. I’ve done a couple. I did sell a few books, but mostly to the other vendors. It’s not worth the time.
Book store events were a waste. I did one author signing at an indie book store when “Why Kimba Saved The World” released. No one came. Along with consignments (I’ll cover that massive waste of time/money in another blog), don’t bother with book stores unless you have a significant local connection. I may try to set up something at a local book store when “At the Corner of Magnetic and Main” comes out because it is set in our tourist town and has that draw and connection. Otherwise, don’t bother with bookstores. There are better ways to spend your time and money.
School book talks are in our hopeful pile. I haven’t chased this line of events too much because self-published books are not going to have a big pull with public schools. Early in 2014 I spent a day at a private school where I had worked in Houston. I was already in town for a family visit, so no hotel cost. The students and faculty know me. We had a great time, I talked to separate age groups and could focus what I had to say, and they sent home a flyer that resulted in excellent book sales. It was very successful, but every element to help that along was in place. Just to wander into a public school where they don’t know me or my books would probably not result in much. I have been invited to speak to the 5^th graders at our local school where I substitute teach a day or two a week (though only with the prek – second graders). That talk would be totally about community goodwill. I doubt many of the kids would go out and get my books. Frankly, I’d probably donate copies to the classrooms. I already did that for one first grade classroom where I’ve spent a few days and there are advanced readers who are ready for them. This is definitely not on the “business” side of things, but it is personal and I think it’s still worth the time because it’s only a few hours and makes for community goodwill—and it’s just nice for the kids involved. Doing this beyond my own community would really take some consideration. As I’ve read from many other kid lit authors, don’t let schools take advantage of you. If you are a professional writer, your time has some value.
Workshops where I am a speaker is my big goal for 2015. I am actually a well-trained public speaker and have presented full-day conferences all on my own. As I continue to write and publish, I am starting to get some areas where I have knowledge and experience to share in this business. You know, like about self-publishing. I’ve become more involved with two groups in the Ozarks who bring speakers in for local conferences, so I’m watching how they make their choices. Speakers send them proposals. Who knew? Getting a packet of my own together and looking for appropriate small conferences to start out with is on the agenda. These events can pay well or not so much, but you will nearly always have a chance to sell your books. I’ve watched people come out of talks and go right to the speaker’s book table to make a purchase. It’s a personal connection. Again, big goal for 2015. Stay tuned!

One kind of live event we have not tried yet is an actual book release party. I will be doing a live book release event/party for “At the Corner of Magnetic and Main,” along with a Facebook/Twitter release event that evening. Again, because this book has a local connection I think we can have a fun party, and I can invite local friends, authors, and business connections we have in town from our Chamber of Commerce (we run a guest house too). We can have it right here on our property in our pavilion. Sales at the event would be great, but it’s more about goodwill and celebrating a book that has been in the works a few years and is set in our town. As long as we keep our goals (and costs) reasonable, it will be worth it. I’m sure you’ll hear more about all of this in September, when the big day comes.

Kimberling Library Author Day

Here’s a specific example of a live event that was worth the time, even if sales were not amazing. On Saturday the 7^th I took part in an Author Day event at the Kimberling Area Library (near Branson, MO). This was the first time I had done it, but I knew they were hosting 40 authors, having guest speakers (including Roy Rogers, Jr.), and doing lots of promotion. I also knew other authors who were taking part. There was no table cost fee, and it only took us 45 minutes to get there, so there was very little risk if it was a complete bomb. I’d still have fun hanging around with my author friends. This event also was the kind of local goodwill that is worth taking the time for. I know people on the planning team and wanted to help make the event a success. We also learned that this library, which is really nice and well kept, is totally run by volunteers and gets no tax money. Definitely a cause worth supporting.

Kimba and Hiro’s travel reps pose with the library sign. They were happy to get out and about after a few months off.

I shared a table with my friend Gwen, so that make the day even better.

I shared a table with my friend Gwen, so that made the day even better. Check out her book, “Letting Go Into Perfect Love” at amazon.com!

There was a nice turnout!

As far as library events go, this one was very successful. Dozens of people wandered through to shop for books. The speakers were well attended and enjoyed. I sold 11 books total, but that was more than many of the other authors there. We also had the oddness of three different people buying only Book 2, “Vacation Hiro,” because they liked the cat on the cover. That’s never happened before!

She is a beautiful cat!

I can only hope they will love it and want to read the whole series. I got names for my mailing list. It was all good. We made a donation of a part of our sales back to the library. It wasn’t much, but it was something.

Now, will I do this event again next year? I don’t know. I understand that they want to have a variety of authors participate for the same reason I may not do it again right next year—there will probably be mostly the same people attending next year and they want to see new authors. I will have two new books out by then, so that may weigh into our decision and whether they want me back. It was certainly worth having done.

Book Festival Events

One kind of event I have my eye on is something like the Texas Book Festival. The booth costs are high, but people coming to that event have one goal: to buy books. That’s where authors want to be! I was all set to attend the Texas Book Festival in 2015 and share booth space with a writer friend who has done it before. Our books would line up well together. It was all planned. But then they changed the date to be the exact same weekend as the War Eagle Craft Fair—our biggest sure-thing of the year. It was just too hard to justify missing it, and we might upset the organizer and have her give our booth space to someone else—they are hard to come by—, so I had to back out of the festival. But I still have my eye on it for 2016. I’ll have seven books to my name by the fall of 2016, if all goes as planned and the creek don’t rise, so it may be worth getting my own booth. I have family in Houston and Austin, so no hotel fees. This is one we will have to wrangle with in the future. I can envision Scott’s brow furrowing already.

Is there a Missouri Book Festival? I’ll have to look into that. The Arkansas Book Festival is more by invitation only, so I’ll have to find out whose eye I need to catch for that one, but that would involve a hotel stay. That alone may take it out of the running. This is another area to “stay tuned.” I’m sure more events will present themselves this year that we will have to weigh and decide on. No waste of money is our 2015 goal. We will be taking fewer chances, but we also may miss out on some good stuff. It’s a very fine line to walk, as it is with any business. Promotion is good, but it has to have a valuable outcome to make it worthwhile. We have learned a lot so far. We may have a long way to go.

Any thoughts to share on what has worked for you as far as blog tours and events? Share with everyone in the comments section!

Next Week: Book Release and Production Scheduling

I kind of skipped over this one because I had a live event to talk about, so we’ll circle back to that one—a subject I am up to my eyeballs in right now for “Max’s Wild Night”—next time.

Self-Publishing Journey: Week 5

Week 5: Where to Publish?

My answer to this is easy: CreateSpace and Kindle Direct Publishing (which are both amazon.com). There are other places (LightningSource and BookBaby are the two main others), but after we here at Serenity Mountain Publishing have evaluated what we have done over the last few years I see no reason to go anywhere else. I did have “Why Kimba Saved The World” up on other sites for a while, but I saw very little in sales (if any) from places like Smashwords and Kobo. Where you sell your book is different than where you handle the publication process, of course, but I am happy just having all of my eggs in one simple, manageable basket at amazon.com.

Many people, especially authors, are all into hating on amazon.com these days because it has such a corner on the book market. It is the big, hairy elephant of book sales. But why hate? My feeling is that I need all the help I can get as an indie-author, so I’m just gonna jump on that big elephant and ride it around until it no longer serves my purposes. We are always poking at other options, I read what other authors are learning in their own journeys, but so far nothing has been compelling enough to drive me away from amazon.com.

Amazon.com publishes two kinds of books as two separate entities.

Let me be clear: CreateSpace = print books Kindle Direct Publishing = ebooks

My husband still has trouble with this and asks me questions about one when he means the other or calls it all amazon (maybe just to see the look on my face). They are linked, but they are separate files and book covers and set up.

Once your print book is formatted and ready, all you have to do is create a PDF and you are ready to roll. Setting up an author account at CreateSpace for your print books is not difficult. Block out a couple of hours and just go through the steps one by one. It’s better to start this set up before you format your book because there are set book sizes that are easiest to work with, and you’ll want to know what size you are going with before you start formatting. That’s one of those hundred decisions you are going to have to make. I made this error with “Miss Fatty Cat’s Revenge,” and even being off by a few bits of an inch made things a mess that I had to go back and redo. Major time gobble I could have avoided. Things also get tricky with the book cover size and how to format that cover PDF so the spine fits just perfectly and the back text is centered. My cover designer has this art figured out, and I leave it to her.

The ebook account at Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) is a separate step. You only need a JPG file for the cover (there is no back of book like in the print version), and the book file will be a totally separately formatted MOBI or PDF file.

With both of these formats, you can update the files as often as you like. When I have put out a new book, I add the name to the “also by” section at the front of the book and “buy” links to the new books at the end of the kindle version. This new ebook won’t go out to people who already downloaded, but it will be available for those who get it from that time forward (or who specifically ask for the new version through customer service).

There is one exception to this. If you discover that there is some MAJOR error in your ebook, KDP may resend it to everyone who has purchased it. Yes, I discovered this the hard way. I made a minor edit to part of the “Kimba” ebook. Somehow, someway that was never quite explained, in the editing process the ebook designer managed to drop the first paragraph of EVERY chapter in the book. I only checked what I asked them to change and then ran a BookBub free promo where 14,000 copies of this awful version were downloaded. It was a few months later when I was going through to update all of the black-and-white photos to color ones that I noticed something wasn’t quite right. I’m sure you can imagine the horror when I realized what had happened. I think there were some tears. Yep.

Fortunately, this is such an egregious error that I was able to contact KDP customer service and they agreed to resend it. This took six weeks. All that time those nasty, missing-text copies were being read (and, amazingly, reviewed well). Sigh. Yes, this is a lesson in always double and triple checking everything, but it is also a lesson in the fact that amazon.com is willing to work with authors when the unforeseen, major errors come into play.

At this time, I’m a big fan of KDP Select. It gives me promotions for my free or discount days, and I get 70% commission on sales. I can also do some free days if I want without trying to trick the system. I do see some activity through the Prime lending library at about the same price that my normal commission would be, so it’s all good for now. Being a part of this program does mean that you cannot list your book for sale anywhere but amazon.com, but I’m okay with that. I never saw any worthwhile activity from other sites anyhow. This could change when we reevaluate again, but for now I’m happy.

I also love CreateSpace’s “print on demand” feature. I can order one copy or 400 copies or 4,000 copies. It all depends on what I need for upcoming events or sales through my web site. No more do you need to order 1,000 copies to start a print book. You can order and fix errors along the way (you are sure to find some) and then order more later on.

I’ll leave the how to make the most of your set up at both CreateSpace and KDP to other sites. I still go in and tweak stuff and add review notes and change categories on KDP to see if it changes my sales numbers. There are whole books devoted to how to make the most of these setups. Mostly what we have learned with that is don’t try to play it too much. Call your book what it is. Put it in the right category. My biggest problem with having a children’s book about cats is that I have the whole “Warrior” series and all of its forms ahead of me in the rankings at all times. They take up around 30 slots. I did, however, beat them all when I did a 99 cent sale on “Vacation Hiro” through BookBub.com and hit #1 for three days straight. Yay, best seller status! Fight it out fairly and sell your book for what it is, not something that has fewer items in the category because it might get you a higher ranking. You may show up earlier, but if you are not what those readers want, they will ignore you.

Be sure you set up an amazon.com author page, claim your books so they show up on your page, and link your kindle and print copies so they show up together on searches. Here’s mine, so you can see how it works. If the thought of all of this freaks you out, one of those book guides we talked about in an earlier blog will be happy to help or talk you through it.

Where to publish has been the easiest part of our analysis of this self-publishing journey. We are thrilled with where we are and have no plans of changing that. For now. It can all change in the blink of an eye, so we stay alert.

Next Week: Live Events & Blog Tours

I’m going to move this one up in the list because I have a live event over the weekend and can share that experience too.

Writing Notes:

Winter is supposed to be my productive time while the guest house and book events are quieter. A book I’m proofing for Pen-L Publishers is ready for the final go-through this week. “Max’s Wild Night” is heading to the editor next week and book cover creation will start mid-month. So exciting! I’ll begin formatting by the end of February. Max will have his day on May 1^st.

I have also submitted my MG/YA biography on Betty White to a local publisher. My goal for a busy February is to reach 10,000 words on “Kimba’s Christmas.” I don’t have release for that scheduled until Octoberish of 2016, but there are plot points between that and “Slinky Steps Out” (April 2016) that need unwrangling. I am also working on vocabulary activities for all three Cats in the Mirror books for homeschool and classroom use. I’d love to explore creating audio books for them as well, but time may get away from me. Things just keep moving forward. Never stop writing!

And I’d love to have you join me at the Kimberling Area Library on Saturday, February 7^th for their annual Author Event. With over 40 authors, speakers, and fun activities planned, it should be an outstanding afternoon. Come on down!

Self-Publishing Journey: Week 4

Week 4: Publish Your Book Like A Professional

There are two kinds of self-publishing authors: those who slap it together themselves for cheap and throw it at an unsuspecting public and those who treat their book as professionally as a traditional publisher would. I stand with both feet firmly planted on the second strategy. I take this publishing step as seriously as I took the writing step. Otherwise, what was the point of working so hard on writing it?

When I made this leap into self-publishing, it wasn’t without serious consideration. What I came to understand was that “Why Kimba Saved The World” was never going to appeal to a mainstream publisher. I just had to face up to that fact. The real photos in the book (which some readers love and others don’t) made it different. I’d never published a book before, so that made me an unknown variable. Without an agent to bang down doors for me, I could spend years submitting and getting nowhere. Probably not even getting read. If I wanted “Kimba” to ever see the light of day, I was going to have to do it myself, but I had no idea where to start.

It was now mid-2012, and self-publishing had become the easiest and least expensive it had ever been. I don’t remember the exact train of events, but I had connections with publishing experience from my years of freelancing. Through conversations with other writers and former editors, I was hooked up with a “book guide.” This is an individual who has even more connections, knows how the self-publishing process works, and can walk you through and help you create a book. I had never met Carol Hohle, but I had rubbed shoulders with her husband during the time I worked in Boston doing research and compiling “Blessings of Forgiveness” for the Writings of Mary Baker Eddy. Her help guiding me through the process was invaluable.

Self-publishing is rather like building a house. I remember my sister griping about having to make a billion little decision on the house she built years ago. “I don’t care what kind of hinges are on the kitchen cabinets!” Creating a book is the same way. You need to be clear on exactly what you want the final product to look like and make lots of little decisions along the way.

What size will the book be? What size font are you going to use? Which font? How large are your margins going to be? What will the chapter beginnings look like? That’s not even touching on what the cover will look like. Don’t forget the text on the back of the book. Hugely important! Then there’s the whole process of getting the book set up on CreateSpace and KDP—just the business end of things. It can be overwhelming, but it has to be done right. A good book guide can walk you through the whole thing.

As we have evaluated the costs associated with the production of my first three books, we have already made some changes to move things in-house. That can save on cost, but I would only do this if I felt the end product would look as professional as it did in other hands. There were MANY discussions, and Scott and I didn’t always agree. There are some corners I refuse to cut, no matter how much he sighs.

Carol was heavily involved in both of my first two books, but by Book 3 I was ready to take on some of that on my own. Frankly, I had to. Formatting using InDesign is a time-consuming process, so it’s expensive to pay someone else to do it. Knowing that we are in this for the long haul, we decided to get a subscription for the whole Creative Cloud package (which also got us the invaluable AdobePro system). As a teacher, I can get it at a great price. I also use InDesign to create flyers and table toppers and ads, so it is a really useful program for the business of creating books and marketing them.

There is one point in the process I will never take in-house. You will hear it said from one end of self-publishing to the other, and I won’t be any different. DO NOT CREATE YOUR OWN BOOK COVERS!!! Unless you have serious cred as a graphic designer and artist, do not do it yourself. This is self-publishing suicide. Readers absolutely judge a book by its cover. It’s what attracts them and gets them to pick it up (click on it) instead of the million other books wafting by. I will pass up a freebie if the cover is for crap. And, sadly, I’ve done this more than a few times. To me, it sends a message that the inside will be for crap as well. That may not be true, but I’m a consumer, just like the rest.

I could write a whole blog on cover design, but that’s not my goal here. You can do your own search on that. My point, for my purposes in this series, is that we are not considering taking cover production in-house even though it is now the most expensive part of the production process for us. It is just too important to take a risk on. Scott is not always in agreement on this one. He really wants me to learn how to use all the programs I now have access to through Creative Cloud. For me, it’s not worth my time – also suspecting that I’ll just end up back with my cover designer to help me clean it up.

As I said, what I have started doing is formatting the text through InDesign on my own. This cuts $1,500 to $2,000 off the production costs. It takes weeks to do, and I messed up the book size on “Miss Fatty Cat’s Revenge” and had to go back through the whole thing. Lesson learned. For me, this was still worth it because the CFO across the hall was ready to put on the brakes on Book 3 for a while. I had to do whatever I could to keep that from happening.

There are lots of ways you can format a book. Word documents can be downloaded to amazon.com. Scrivener has its own system of ebook formatting. Writers I know sing this program’s praises to the moon. Be sure you check it out. I’ll be looking into that more myself in the future. I spend a few hundred dollars having someone create my ebooks, so that program might be helpful. Here’s where the books I am specifically creating are different than adult books or some kids books. I need genuine formatting.

For my Cats in the Mirror books (and Max’s companion book, now in the works) I wanted specific fonts and have fancy chapter beginnings with an icon photo next to the number. There are photos inserted throughout. My books need to be genuinely formatted in a system that will make them look exactly how I want them to look. This was beyond important to me. I wanted to sit on the shelf next to a traditionally published book and look just the same, if not better. Do a “look inside” at amazon.com to see what I mean.

For example, when we first got the ball rolling, Carol asked me what books I thought my books were like. Which books did I want them to look like? After doing some research, I settled on the Humphrey the Hamster series. The cover was like what I had in mind—a real photo mixed with cartoon elements—and it was for the same reading level. That decision drove everything else from the size of the book to the font we used. It helped my cover designer know what style I was looking for.

Can you see how similar the style is??

Lesley Hollinger Vernon worked on the cover for “Kimba” with Carol as our intermediary. I never talked directly with her. For “Vacation Hiro” we talked directly to save on time/money. For Book 3, Carol was not involved, but I still went right to Lesley. Developing that relationship and understanding of the style of a series is HUGE! Book 1 went through several stages of cover design and changes to background color and animation. Book 2 had a few changes from the first proof to the final. Book 3 was almost perfect from the first draft. We just tweaked it a bit for color and minor details. We have developed a style for the series, and it never occurred to me to go with anyone but Lesley for Max’s book this spring. Finding that person for your cover design is huge. Don’t skimp on it. I absolutely know that I have sold paperback books, often all three as a set, without the books even being opened. I can talk about the plot, but the covers sealed the deal and sold them. That’s what you need!!

So, in our final analysis, going with a book guide was right for us. Carol saved me tons of headaches and redos, especially in dealing with CreateSpace. But as we have learned and progressed, we were able to take on everything she was doing for us. You may be happy to leave all of that in someone else’s hands. That’s okay too. For us, it was really financial. Carol was worth the money, we just didn’t have it to spend. And, I have to admit, I enjoy doing the formatting myself. I am a proudly professed control freak. I love making little final tweaks to the text as I move it from Word to InDesign. I’ve even changed words so they fit on the page better (never hyphenating words is a decision we made on Book 1). I can end up with everything exactly how I want it. That’s a move I’m glad we made.

Over the next year, I’d really love to learn more about the ebook formatting process and making changes to what is already done. I love the ones I have, and it’s not terribly expensive, but making updates when a new book comes out can add up. It’s also somewhere that design is not really an issue. I’ve already done that. There’s just technology to be learned. I doubt I will have the time to do that before “Max’s Wild Night” is ready to go, but I’ll be poking at it to update the Cats in the Mirror books with links to the new book. Maybe I can figure it out!

There are a hundred ways you can produce your book (ebook or paperback or hardcover). Plot it all out well. Consider everything along the way. Again, are you hoping to make money from this process? You are going to have to take it all as seriously and professionally as a traditional publisher would. You are establishing your reputation as writer and as a self-publisher. Give it 100%.

Do you have a book guide or a cover designer you would recommend?

Next Week: Where to Publish

Self-Publishing Journey: Week 3

Week 3: Set Your Goals And Expectations

So now you have honed your writing skills (week 1) and written a fantastic book (week 2). Here’s where you need to decide what your long-term goals and expectations are for this masterpiece. We did that at the start, but instead of goals they were really more like hopes and dreams. We hadn’t taken the time to do research and determine what we could realistically expect. Most of the stories writers hear are the “lightning in a bottle” ones. If your goal is to be that writer, you will end up highly disappointed 99.9% of the time.

You need to be clear about what you are doing, why you are doing it, and what you hope will come out of it. This is where the creative hat needs to be set aside and you need to become a publisher—assuming you want to make any money. A business person. I have run my own business before, so I had some experience with this. My husband has been a CFO, so he rules with a loving-but-practical fist from the office across the hall from me. We weren’t just publishing a book or a series of books. We were creating a business, and it needs to end up being profitable at some point. Otherwise, I can just write articles for magazines.

So, in this new business of self-publishing, what are your goals?

Traditional publishing is still an attainable goal. Maybe you want to exhaust that option first. But it isn’t what it used to be. If you think you really want to go that route come hell or high water so you can have a book tour and tons of money and publicity pouring into the promotion of your book, think again. Obviously, publishers have a vested interest in promoting and supporting every book they produce, but, unlike in decades past, they are going to expect most of that work to come from the author. Publishing staffs are limited. Funds are limited. Only the top few books that come out of that publishing house that year will get most of that staff and financial support.

This is why it is increasingly hard to get the attention of a traditional publishing house. They only want bonafide, sure-thing success. I did attempt that route for a bit with “Why Kimba Saved The World,” but I don’t have an agent to fight for me (and I’m not sure that would have helped). I don’t have proven main-stream success. My book is different and has personal pictures in a science fiction story. What’s a traditional publisher to do with that? The odds were highly stacked against me.

Self-publishing is a fantastic way to go, but you need to be clear about what you expect from the experience. What kind of book have you written? Does it have mainstream appeal? Have you written an autobiography so your family can know your history? Do you think you have the next amazon.com bestseller? Who is your target market? How many books a year do they buy? Where are you going to sell and market this book? How padded is your checkbook?

There are literally millions upon millions of books listed on amazon.com. A larger and larger percentage are self-published (31% was a number I saw recently), with varying levels of skill and talent. It is possible, with very little difficulty, expense, or computer literacy, to self-publish your life story. That’s outstanding, unless you expect to make a million dollars selling it. Expectations here are everything. Set realistic goals.

This is where reading up on self-publishing is a great idea. I’m in the middle of reading Write, Publish, Repeat, written as a team by well-experienced self-publishing authors. They are hilarious to read, first of all, but also able to share their success and failures—rather like I’m trying to do now. You need to know what you are getting into. I’ve read a bunch of books on the subject. Some are helpful, some are pie-in-the-sky.

My hopes and expectations for self-publishing were that I could get my books into reader’s hands, cover my costs in the first two years, and actually make a profit after that so I could quit my day job, so to speak. My long-term goal is to have writing be my sole income source. That may not be how seriously you are looking at diving into it, but, as I said in past weeks, I have been writing and making income from writing for years. I was ready to kick it up a notch.

However, I must admit that I’m glad I had not read the statistic that self-published middle grade level books are the absolutely hardest to sell when we started this journey. My husband would have certainly put on the brakes. I didn’t intentionally write a book for that audience. That’s how the story evolved. You have to go with your heart, but when you are setting goals it’s also good to know what you are up against. I guess. But I’m glad we didn’t.

I know it sounds like I’m contradicting myself, but that has happened a lot over the last few years. When those hopes and dreams are bubbling out of you, it’s hard to even hear the realities of the business side of things. Do your best to find out the facts, but don’t let them govern your whole experience. Just let them help make your goals attainable so you don’t end up heartbroken and frustrated a few years down the pipe.

While we have had good years so far, my dream is still a twinkle in my eye. The realities of it all have helped us to adjust those goals a few more years out, but we haven’t let them go.

Just to give you an idea, here’s my sales numbers for “Why Kimba Saved The World” for the last two years.

I’ve sold 424 paperback copies, mostly by hand/face-to-face at events.
I’ve had 46 copies borrowed through the Kindle Owner’s Library system.
I’ve had free downloads of 14,800 copies through amazon.com promotions.
I’ve given away 122 copies to reviewers, contests, and giveaways (like at Goodreads.com).
I sold many, many more copies of “Kimba” in 2014 than in 2013, which means sales are increasing. Ding! Ding!

Yay, Kimba!

If you have researched self-publishing, especially for middle grade children’s books, you’ll know that those are actually fantastic numbers. Many self-published books never sell more than 100 copies. But my sales have come at a price. “Kimba” cost around $3,000 to produce between editing, cover art, paperback formatting (which I now do myself), and ebook creation. The book has yet to break even financially. Don’t even get me started on the cost of some of that booth space for those face-to-face contacts. That will be a whole blog installment on its own. That doesn’t mean, however, that “Kimba” isn’t out there building a name for me, winning awards, and gaining a loyal fan base of readers who pick up my next book without question. That kind of book establishes you as a true writer. This is where writing a series, or at least more books, comes into play. Yes, those free downloads drive the sales of Book 2 and Book 3 in the series. More on that another week.

Sadly, I have not seen all of my goals come to fruition yet. I’ve adjusted some along the way. Yes, it will be a couple of years before I can hit up Scholastic to do a boxed set of Cats in the Mirror books. That dream is still a twinkle in my eye, but it is still a twinkle. You have to have dreams! Dreams and goals can intersect, but the goals should be more practical.

What do you really hope to gain from this self-publishing journey this year alone? In the next five years? Will you stick with it, no matter what? (I have a YES on that one in my heart, but financial reality is another thing.)

There are folks out there living off an income from self-published books, but it didn’t happen in a year. As I am doing, those folks wrote and wrote and built a reputation. Traditionally published authors have to do that as well. I know writers who give away their books all the time. Some just write because they love it, don’t ever hope to see a dime, and just want to share what they have done. Others are hoping to attract fans through those free books. Again, it’s all about your expectations.

Before you jump off the self-publishing cliff, take some time to write down exactly what you hope to gain from the experience. Will you just publish this one book? Are you clear on who it is for? Are you willing to set up booths at craft fairs, pay for advertising, accept honest (maybe bad) reviews, talk at conferences about your subject (non-fiction books require this), and step outside your comfort zone to get your book noticed?

There are many ways to go about this process of self-publishing. We’ll talk about the ways to actually create the book you can sell next time. Being clear on what you hope to gain from the process can help you decide what steps are next. Don’t care if you make a dime? Don’t spend $3,000 on creating the book. Easy-peasy. You want to make this a career? You are going to have to pay some folks along the way, buy some computer systems (like InDesign and AdobePro), and put some cash into it. I don’t regret a penny that we spent on “Kimba” because it looks fantastic and I learned so much in the process. I can do much of that work on my own now, but I would have had no clue without the help and support of the book guide I hired (thank you, Carol Hohle Communications!). More on that later too.

If you are hoping for that writing career track, spend a good chunk of time researching. Know the market for a book like yours. Make sure the title is unique. Make sure the book has something unique to offer. Find where you fit into the world of books and set your goals clearly. Be ready to adjust (I certainly have), but it help to know what road you are running down before you set off on the journey.

Next Week: Publish Your Book Like A Professional

Self-Publishing Journey: Week 2

Week 2: Write the Best Book Possible

For the second installment in my self-publishing reflective journey it only seems prudent to start with the most logical but often overlooked part of the business: You have to write a good book. It would seem like this goes without saying, but from what I have found out there in the indie-pub world it is a major problem. Just because you wrote it and love it does not mean it is good enough for publication. I’m not even talking about technical stuff and proofreading. Write a good story. Readers still want a good story. As I take stock of the projects Serenity Mountain Publishing has going forward, this is still our number one goal.

As with anything that becomes easy and inexpensive to accomplish, like self-publishing, not everyone doing it should be doing it. My husband and I have a running joke that at every event we attend selling my books someone will stop at our booth and tell us how she has a great book idea…if only she had the time to write it. Being a writer and producing a good book is not a matter of having some spare time. Actually, most writers can tell you stories about what they gave up to find time to write. Writing is an art. Writing is a craft. Writing is a business. As with anything else under those banners, someone who has never even dipped his toe into the medium and magically thinks he can produce a good book simply because he has a good idea is living in a fool’s paradise.

Writers don’t just write, they go to workshops to perfect their craft. They go to conferences to network and learn from other writers. They have their writing critiqued and edited and listen to beta readers and redo and rewrite until they think their heads will explode and maybe their hearts will break. Double that effort if the manuscript has potential to be really good.

If you have never published your written words (your blog doesn’t count), start out with some articles or short stories. Submit to literary magazines. Find a writer’s group in your area. Go to local and regional conferences and enter their annual competitions. Get genuine feedback on your writing. Mom and Dad don’t count. If you have an idea for a book, by all means write it. Work on it. But you should probably wait to publish it and put it out into the world until you are sure it is the best it can be.

I’ll use “Why Kimba Saved The World” as an example because it’s the best one I personally have. Week 1’s blog already established that I had the first part of being a writer in hand. I had been edited and critiqued and published substantially. I was a genuine freelance writer. I had the foundation I needed to take this story idea—about my cat being part of an alien race that communicate with the mother ship through the mirrors in our homes and maybe want to take over the world—and turn it into a book. This was also not my first stab at writing a book for children. I have a few still in my drawer waiting for the right time and story evolution to publish them. A picture book idea was declined “with regret” years ago, which depressed me at the time, but now I know that it should have been encouraging. I got a personal answer at all!

“Kimba” started off as an early reader book in 2011. With over a decade as a reading-focused teacher and tutor, I saw a big hole in quality reading for first and second grade kids who are ready for chapter books. That’s what the first draft of “Kimba” was aimed toward. Simple story. Simple writing. Story wise, it was okay. There’s only so much you can develop at that level, but I was happy with it. Submissions began and went on for over a year. “Nice, but not right for our list” came from the two or three publishing houses who even bothered to respond. One agent agreed to read it but then didn’t feel it tickled her fancy quite right. None of this is uncommon, even for books that end up being huge traditionally published successes, but I was running out of options. Most publishers are closed for non-agented submissions.

So I revisited the manuscript and pondered its future. One idea that niggled at me was that maybe I should kick it up a notch for older readers. That would allow for so much more story development. A few weeks later I got back the critique results for “Kimba” from an agent at the SCBWI conference in Brazos Valley, TX. (If you write books for kids and do not know about the Society for Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators, stop reading this now and click on the link to find out more!) She thought it was a cute story but suggested that it might be a good idea to develop it more for older readers. Ding, Ding.

My tweenage daughter wanted to take a couple of friends to Dave and Buster’s for her birthday party, so I armed them each with a prepaid game card and set them loose. Then I tucked myself in to a booth in the bar area and began to “what if” for Kimba and her story. This is a tried and true method for breaking writer’s block or helping a story progress. For over two hours, I just made notes. I imagined all kinds of side stories for Kimba’s character and developed what other characters she would need around her during those adventures. I filled pages of a yellow legal pad. When we walked out of Dave and Buster’s, I had ideas not only for a more developed version of “Kimba” but also for other books in the series. The titles for “Miss Fatty Cat’s Revenge” and “Slinky Steps Out” came quickly afterward. Months of revisions and notes and rewriting followed. I got inspirations at conferences. My beta readers gave me ideas. It sat in the drawer now and then and rested. My editor got her two cents in.

By the time it was published, I felt that “Why Kimba Saved The World” was in the best shape it could be. That doesn’t mean it is the best book ever published, or that I wouldn’t tweak a few things now, but it was ready. It has been rewarded with predominantly good reviews (which is the best you can hope for), won a Bronze Moonbeam Children’s Book Award as “Best First Book” in the chapter book category, earned a Silver Mom’s Choice Award, and is Story Monster Approved by kids. Over 15,000 copies are out there in the world on kindle or in paperback. All that tells me that I’m on the right track, but that doesn’t mean that I didn’t go through all the same dramas with the next books along the way.

Writing well should always be the first goal, and it’s a never-ending process.

A good book doesn’t just leap fully developed from the head of Zeus. Okay, there’s always that one example of lightning striking that everyone loves to hold to. I’m not saying it has never happened. What I’m saying is that I have attempted to read many, many self-published authors who THINK this is what happened for them. They are absolutely wrong.

Learn how to write. Get writing experience. Become a writer. Keep becoming a better writer. Professional actors still take acting lessons and have coaches. Professional singers continue to get training and work with teachers. Professional writers are exactly the same. Every book, every story, is a new adventure, and it needs the best you have in you.

Here’s the thing. If you are not really interested in being a writer and learning the craft, you are wasting your time publishing a book. It only gets harder and more demanding from there. We will talk about goals and target market later. If you are just doing a family memoir that no one but your kids will ever read, whatever. I’m talking about a genuine book. One that could be sold at Barnes and Noble on the shelf next to traditionally published books. If that’s what you want to produce, write the best book that you can.

I’d love to hear who supports your writing! My husband and family are always my first readers—and are happy being totally honest with me—and I pay editors along the way. Currently, I am a member of SCBWI, the Ozark Writer’s League, and an honorary member of the Northwest Arkansas Writer’s Workshop. I’ll make it to a critique session one of these days! Find the other writers and readers who can support your journey. Write the best book that you possibly can.

Do you enjoy face-to-face critique groups? Do you use beta readers? What associations, groups, and conferences have been most helpful? Who has supported and is supporting your writing journey? Share in the comments section below.

PS: My Word of the Week video for Stanley and Katrina is live. Max joined me for this one since his book is up next. Click here! It’s a great program to follow for kids at home or in a classroom setting!

I also just finished proofreading a book called “Depraved” for Pen-L Publishing. Excellent! I’ve seen the cover, and it is fantastic too. An alternate title might be “Bitches Be Cray-Cray” because the characters in this book need some serious therapy. I’ll post the link once it is up.

Next week’s blog: Set Your Goals and Expectations

Self-Publishing Journey: Week 1

Week 1: Introduction

Starting off 2015, I’m taking some time to review the self-publishing journey that we have been taking here at Serenity Mountain Publishing over the last three years or so. When thousands of hours and dollars are being invested in any venture, sometimes you have to stop and take stock of the situation. What worked? What didn’t? What REALLY didn’t? As my business partner (my husband, Scott) and I makes notes and regroup, I thought I’d share what we have learned and hopefully help others who are in the middle of the same journey or wondering if they should make the leap. This is not going to end up as a book. There are enough of those. You can just be a part of our mental download and evaluation sessions after the whirlwind that started in 2012 when we decided to self-publish my first middle grade book, “Why Kimba Saved The World.” It is now Book 1 in a best-selling, award-winning series, so I think we made the right call!

The Cats in the Mirror trilogy.

In case you have just stumbled on my blog, I’ll give a brief resume of what I brought into this journey. I’m not just someone who decided to write a book and throw it out into the world. I have been writing, well, for as long as I knew how to put sentences on paper. In 5^th grade, a picture book I wrote won a contest at the University of Illinois. I can still remember sitting at my school desk and writing more adventures for those characters while friends waited to read them. I journaled and wrote poems (one was even published when I was in high school) and majored in Public Relations because it was in the Journalism Department and had the most writing-related classes. I really wanted to be a teacher, so I returned to school at the graduate level and earned my certification and Master’s Degree in Education, but I continued to write freelance and published dozens of articles in newspapers, magazines, and on web sites while I was teaching. For a year I wrote a column for www.religionandspirituality.com called “Spiritually Significant Cinema” and had the opportunity to interview some major celebrities. I love doing interview pieces! I’ve won first place in regional writing contests, and my self-published books have won international honors.

What I’m saying is that I came into this self-publishing world as a professional writer with some street cred, but that doesn’t necessarily prepare you for the business side of being your own publisher. We have stumbled along, very blindly at times, and taken advice that was both excellent and terrible. Based on the statistics and averages, we have actually been successful. Our hope is that by really taking a look at what has worked for us specifically we can have an outstandingly productive 2015.

I hope that you’ll sign up for my blog (on the right side bar) and follow along. I would also love to hear from you. What questions and concerns do you have? I’m not going to be researching and sharing what other folks are saying. This is all going to be my experience in the trenches and what I have found to be true. I must say, it rarely matches up with the “expert” advice we have gotten.

In 2015, I will be self-publishing a companion book for my Cats in the Mirror series as well as having an adult book traditionally published. I’m sure dealing with those two different ways of creating a book will spark many more blog posts for next year.

So stay tuned! I’ll be posting every Monday for the next several weeks. Blogs already on the agenda are:

Write the Best Book Possible

Set Your Goals & Expectations

Produce Your Book Like A Professional

Where To Publish/CreateSpace

Online Presence & Networking

Reviews

Contests & Awards

Book Release & Scheduling

Live Events & Blog Tours

Freebies, KDP, & Discount Promotions

Book Stores/Consignments

Keep Writing/Book Series Benefits

Best Resources & Support I’ve Found

What would you like to hear about? I’d love to have you share your experiences too, but let’s wait and add specific anecdotal comments to the post on that subject so it can stay focused and others can benefit more.

However, feel free to introduce yourselves and where you are on your own self-publishing journey in the comments section this week!