A little update on the recent happenings with The Adventures of Reztap and subsequent books:
I was looking for an actual editor (other than myself, who didn't do such a great job) to edit my first self-published novel, The Adventures of Reztap. Several people enjoyed reading it, but a few of my writer friends mentioned there were some bad editing errors. Lesson learned - don't edit your own stuff. There are multiple benefits from getting an editor, the primary ones are your work is 99% free of editing errors and the books are then eligible to be covered by large book reviewers (who will not review a book unless it has been professionally edited).
I had self-published my first book mostly to learn the ins and outs of self-publishing. I think I've learned many valuable lessons and felt ready to get book one professionally edited as well as book two (which I finished at the beginning of October). So, I contacted a person I knew thru my wife who was a freelance editor. My reason for going local was to get someone close who I could meet with if needed. I also had a good feeling knowing what this editor had done in the past, so I was pretty comfortable going with her. I thought it was good to try to hire locally as well.
I contacted the editor. She talked to me for about twenty minutes about the book before I sent it to her. Turns out, she was no longer doing freelance editing. She was now Director of Publishing at a small press here locally and their company would be interested in looking at my book and possibly publishing it. My initial thoughts on a traditional publisher were that it was a shot in the foot financially for a writer. Traditional publishers offer a 15% royalty on average for writers on book sales. She mentioned they did higher royalties and I was immediately interested. I haven't seen a contract offer yet, but it's still much better at first glance than a traditional publisher. It may be she's referring to ebook royalties and not print, but the royalties she mentioned sounded inline with the ones you get from Amazon and the ebook aggregators who publish to Apple and Barnes & Noble. I knew this since I'd already self published to both and those were the rates.
Now, they're not one of the big six traditional publishing houses, so it stands to reason they've got their eye on how to compete in today's market and offer an attractive package to savvy writers. Honestly, a 50% run on a print book is worth the investment if they're going to edit my book as well. I don't know how they would manage a 70% royalty to the writer on a printed title, though. There's more overhead with printing, even on a print on demand (POD) basis that would make that a very tight margin for a publisher, so I'm kind of guessing I won't quite be getting that. With a typical POD basis, I was looking at getting maybe 30% of the cover price. CreateSpace (a division of Amazon) gives a 37% royalty on books purchased thru Amazon (where most sales would likely come from) and a 57% royalty on print titles thru the CreateSpace estore. I'm thinking for a smaller publisher than CreateSpace, a 50-70% royalty would be a little high. Then again, maybe I'm wrong and they've really been able to bring down the actual physical costs of printing a hard copy of a book. But really, I think she meant ebook rates and not print rates. I need to see a contract to be sure, but if nothing else, something better than 15% is going to peak my interest.
The thing I'm chomping at the bit about is speed, of course. It's been a little over five weeks since I submitted book one to the publisher. I know, that sounds like a reasonable enough time to get an answer, but consider what route I would go thru with a traditional publisher. First, I would submit the book. The soonest I would get a reply from a large publishing house would be six to eight weeks, although it could reasonably take several months longer...and that's just to get what would likely be a rejection slip on what would be a 15% royalty (max) if they published. I've actually got the ear of the Director of Publishing. She doesn't mind hearing from me once a week and giving me an update on progress. I simply would not get that thru a traditional publisher - in fact, I'd probably be dependent on my agent for all correspondence and negotiations with the publisher. Well, I don't have an agent, so I'm already skipping one piece of the process with a direct line to the publisher. Of course, the biggest factor in all of this is I was just looking to pay someone to edit my book for me; getting an offer to have it published (and hopefully get some kind of advance on it), well, I can only say it sounds like something I've dreamed of since I was in high school. I think I can wait a few weeks to see how this all plays out.
In the mean time, I finished my second book in the series (also submitted that to the editor) and compiled a short list of the future books I have planned in the series also with a short synopsis of each book. One of the things that had interested her in my initial conversation was my intentions to write sequels. I think they're looking for regular writers who produce often. I'm only too happy to oblige! Of course, if they pass on publishing, I'm really not out too much except a little bit of time. I have another local contact I can hire to edit the books and still self publish if it comes to that. The bonafide credentials of being a published writer (as opposed to self published) has its advantages though, so I'm hopefully it will work out.
Have to be honest here. I've also been pursuing a copywriting business venture, but I've been rethinking the whole thing since I've really gotten back into writing. I think I may just have to let it go. It's a shame, especially since I've put quite a bit of money into it, but the more I heard from my copywriting guru, the more it sounded to me like I should be writing novels and screenplays as opposed to doing copywriting. I'm going to take that gamble and run with it for a few months and see if it gets me where I want to go. I'm only a small advance from a publisher away from convincing the family to let me give it a shot! Copywriting business is still an option, but I'm putting it on hold right now. Kind of feel this is my best opportunity to pursue a real future in writing. Best I grab it while I can.
Felling optimistic. Hope you are too.
Artemus
Monday, October 20, 2014
Wednesday, July 17, 2013
Pro Edit funding campaign starts today!
I've done it. I'm admitting my editing skills leave much to be desired. Check out my fundraising campaign for a professional edit of The Adventures of Reztap here: http://fundanything.com/en/campaigns/pro-edit-of-the-adventures-of-reztap
Really, check it out! I tried to make it as humorous as possible so it would be at least entertaining to anyone who comes across it. I don't want to ruin the surprise, so give it a quick visit.
Been in a bit of a writing funk lately, but that's turning around and I'm resuming work on the sequel even as I type (this line will appear in the sequel). Seriously though, I'm energized, jazzed and altogether optimistic about the next couple of months. Hopefully the fundraising campaign will actually take off and The Adventures of Reztap may get a review by a national reviewer. It can use the exposure, nut only after it's been edited and edited well!
More to come soon.
Regards,
Artemus
Really, check it out! I tried to make it as humorous as possible so it would be at least entertaining to anyone who comes across it. I don't want to ruin the surprise, so give it a quick visit.
Been in a bit of a writing funk lately, but that's turning around and I'm resuming work on the sequel even as I type (this line will appear in the sequel). Seriously though, I'm energized, jazzed and altogether optimistic about the next couple of months. Hopefully the fundraising campaign will actually take off and The Adventures of Reztap may get a review by a national reviewer. It can use the exposure, nut only after it's been edited and edited well!
More to come soon.
Regards,
Artemus
Tuesday, March 19, 2013
Intriguing
Here it is, almost two months after I've pulled the eBook from circulation, and I've received notification of an eBook sale of The Adventures of Reztap. OK, maybe that doesn't sound strange to you, but consider this - it is through Amazon where the eBook isn't even listed on my Dashboard of books! Evidently, it really is difficult to remove a publication from the internet once it's been posted there in one form or another.
For those keeping track (I think there are about five of you, maybe?), I've been writing both the sequel and revising the original. Neither of those very fast, I might add. I have other projects I'm working on as well, and all of them seem to have suffered the same fate. Just not concentrating as well as I used to on writing. Maybe it's the new grandson that is distracting me more than anything else.
So, back to concentration and focus. Would that writing were a full-time occupation for me, it would be easier to justify the number of hours required. As it is, it's still a part-time endeavor. The full-time job still occupies a vast chunk of time - 11.5 hours a day including commute if there is no overtime. Finances being what they are, there is also the part-time job which consumes an additional chunk of time on the weekends. Time left over for writing is very sparse. I have less of it now than I did this same time last year. Not a positive prospect to be sure.
However, now I have an additional array of tools at my disposal. During lunch time, I can easily access my writing documents and add a little here and a little there. That could be another 2.5 hours of writing a week. It's not the best, but it's better than a kick in the pants. Given the circumstances at home with the new grandson, it may actually behoove me to devote a couple of hours away from the house to writing rather than try to cram it in with the distractions there. I'm going to try a four-hour window every weekend and see what I can accomplish away from the home office.
Enough musings! I hope your own personal pursuits are more fruitful than mine have been of late.
Regards,
Artemus
For those keeping track (I think there are about five of you, maybe?), I've been writing both the sequel and revising the original. Neither of those very fast, I might add. I have other projects I'm working on as well, and all of them seem to have suffered the same fate. Just not concentrating as well as I used to on writing. Maybe it's the new grandson that is distracting me more than anything else.
So, back to concentration and focus. Would that writing were a full-time occupation for me, it would be easier to justify the number of hours required. As it is, it's still a part-time endeavor. The full-time job still occupies a vast chunk of time - 11.5 hours a day including commute if there is no overtime. Finances being what they are, there is also the part-time job which consumes an additional chunk of time on the weekends. Time left over for writing is very sparse. I have less of it now than I did this same time last year. Not a positive prospect to be sure.
However, now I have an additional array of tools at my disposal. During lunch time, I can easily access my writing documents and add a little here and a little there. That could be another 2.5 hours of writing a week. It's not the best, but it's better than a kick in the pants. Given the circumstances at home with the new grandson, it may actually behoove me to devote a couple of hours away from the house to writing rather than try to cram it in with the distractions there. I'm going to try a four-hour window every weekend and see what I can accomplish away from the home office.
Enough musings! I hope your own personal pursuits are more fruitful than mine have been of late.
Regards,
Artemus
Monday, January 21, 2013
eBook Pulled
As some of you may have realized from the publication of The Adventures of Reztap, it has been an exercise in marketing for a self-published book. I've learned many things in the last nine months. I'd like to share them below:
1. People will complain about price, no matter what it is, and changing it to something lower will not affect sales. In fact, it's more likely to impact them.
2. A professionally edited book has more avenues to be marketed. There are some book reviews sites that will not review a book unless it has been professionally edited. Anything that reduces your opportunity for exposure is bad, especially if you don't have a large marketing budget to advertise but depend on the reviews of others to get the word out about your book.
3. Many have commented that the book was not long enough. It was not even something I'd considered when I published it, but people have an expectation for a book that it be a certain length. I think my book was about 75% of the length people expected.
4. Word of mouth is hard to build. Many of the successes you've seen in the self-publishing world (those books that got picked up by a large publisher) built a large fan following before ever being published. A lead time of one to three years would go a long way to building an audience for the book ahead of it being published.
5. Many self-publishers have a dedicated web site to the book (or books) and you can buy the eBook or hard copy through a link directly on the site (not many actually sell it directly, but point to a major retailer's web site for the book).
6. Pushing the book at conventions requires a lot of pre-planning and an outlay of money for a table to hawk your wares. I don't think there's anything wrong with this, but I was definitely not prepared for the financial outlays, especially just to push a single book.
7. The act of publishing the book and eBook is actually fairly easy now with the tools available on the internet.
8. Marketing is NOT easy.
9. Actual publishers want a built-in audience for your book - it is a plus when approaching a publisher and sometimes a requirement. Catch-22 - if you already have a built-in audience, why do you need a publisher? You can get additional exposure through the publishers web site, promotion through retail outlets, and prestige that gets reviewers to look at your book and review without you even asking. Ok, maybe you still have to ask, but it's easier to get them to do it when they see it was published by a major publisher.
What does this mean for the future of The Adventures of Reztap? I've pulled the book because it does need to go to a professional editor. I thought I did a bang up job editing it, and many normal readers may only notice one or two errors, but it is riddled with errors mostly due to a rewrite from third person to first person. I missed point of view changes in many places, even after three very thorough editing reviews.
I figured if I'm going to send it to a professional editor, I might as well address additional issues with the book. Length being the primary one. I will be adding an epilogue and an appendix with information about the universe according to Reztap. Where appropriate, I may add some passages and information within the story itself, but it will remain the same overall story. I won't introduce any major plot changes or anything like that. As I'm halfway through writing the sequel, I have a better insight into areas where I may be able to expand the original story where it makes sense to.
For now, the hard copy of the first edition of The Adventures of Reztap is still available from Barnes & Noble, Amazon/Createspace, and The Book Patch. I will likely leave them there for now.
I will continue to write the sequel and the third book in the series. After making changes to the first book and completing the next two books, I will approach some major publishers to see if there's interest in publishing the books.
As a complement to the books, I will be investing in a dedicated web site to the books and intend on putting blog posts and short stories with the characters on there, as well as some book reviews of other authors. I hope I can build a decent audience over the space of a year or two and bring the world back to readers. Until then, grab a first edition hard copy if you can. I'll probably pull those after a few months as well.
Thank you for your support and attention!
Artemus Withers
P.S. Keep tuned to this blog for updates on the aforementioned web site, sequel(s) progress and other news.
1. People will complain about price, no matter what it is, and changing it to something lower will not affect sales. In fact, it's more likely to impact them.
2. A professionally edited book has more avenues to be marketed. There are some book reviews sites that will not review a book unless it has been professionally edited. Anything that reduces your opportunity for exposure is bad, especially if you don't have a large marketing budget to advertise but depend on the reviews of others to get the word out about your book.
3. Many have commented that the book was not long enough. It was not even something I'd considered when I published it, but people have an expectation for a book that it be a certain length. I think my book was about 75% of the length people expected.
4. Word of mouth is hard to build. Many of the successes you've seen in the self-publishing world (those books that got picked up by a large publisher) built a large fan following before ever being published. A lead time of one to three years would go a long way to building an audience for the book ahead of it being published.
5. Many self-publishers have a dedicated web site to the book (or books) and you can buy the eBook or hard copy through a link directly on the site (not many actually sell it directly, but point to a major retailer's web site for the book).
6. Pushing the book at conventions requires a lot of pre-planning and an outlay of money for a table to hawk your wares. I don't think there's anything wrong with this, but I was definitely not prepared for the financial outlays, especially just to push a single book.
7. The act of publishing the book and eBook is actually fairly easy now with the tools available on the internet.
8. Marketing is NOT easy.
9. Actual publishers want a built-in audience for your book - it is a plus when approaching a publisher and sometimes a requirement. Catch-22 - if you already have a built-in audience, why do you need a publisher? You can get additional exposure through the publishers web site, promotion through retail outlets, and prestige that gets reviewers to look at your book and review without you even asking. Ok, maybe you still have to ask, but it's easier to get them to do it when they see it was published by a major publisher.
What does this mean for the future of The Adventures of Reztap? I've pulled the book because it does need to go to a professional editor. I thought I did a bang up job editing it, and many normal readers may only notice one or two errors, but it is riddled with errors mostly due to a rewrite from third person to first person. I missed point of view changes in many places, even after three very thorough editing reviews.
I figured if I'm going to send it to a professional editor, I might as well address additional issues with the book. Length being the primary one. I will be adding an epilogue and an appendix with information about the universe according to Reztap. Where appropriate, I may add some passages and information within the story itself, but it will remain the same overall story. I won't introduce any major plot changes or anything like that. As I'm halfway through writing the sequel, I have a better insight into areas where I may be able to expand the original story where it makes sense to.
For now, the hard copy of the first edition of The Adventures of Reztap is still available from Barnes & Noble, Amazon/Createspace, and The Book Patch. I will likely leave them there for now.
I will continue to write the sequel and the third book in the series. After making changes to the first book and completing the next two books, I will approach some major publishers to see if there's interest in publishing the books.
As a complement to the books, I will be investing in a dedicated web site to the books and intend on putting blog posts and short stories with the characters on there, as well as some book reviews of other authors. I hope I can build a decent audience over the space of a year or two and bring the world back to readers. Until then, grab a first edition hard copy if you can. I'll probably pull those after a few months as well.
Thank you for your support and attention!
Artemus Withers
P.S. Keep tuned to this blog for updates on the aforementioned web site, sequel(s) progress and other news.
Saturday, December 1, 2012
Price - Not Such a Factor in Sales
It's been an interesting discovery. Perhaps it was the lack of pushing the product or maybe it just doesn't matter, but when I dropped the eBook pricing for The Adventures of Reztap to $2.99 I didn't sell a single one. Whereas, in my inital push to get the book out there, I had priced it at $4.99. I sold several at that price, but perhaps that was because of the newness of the book. I really can't say.
I do believe that my marketing leaves much to be desired. It would not appear the price of the book means one wit to whether or not someone will actually purchase it. History suggests if someone has been reached, noticed the book, was interested in that subject and willing to pay a fair price for it then there is a sale. I don't know how else to quantify the results.
I will leave the eBook at $2.99 through the holiday shopping period. After that I will raise it once again to $4.99. It will be interesting to see what the results of this post will be before and after the price is raised.
For your ease of purchasing frenzy which I'm certain will occur after this post, I'm putting the links to both the hard copy and eBook of The Adventures of Reztap below:
Kobo
Amazon (Kindle eBook & paperback)
Diesel
Sony
Barnes and Noble (Nook eBook & paperback)
Apple (iTunes)
Smashwords
Happy purchasing! Merry Christmas/Hanukkah/Kwanzaa/WinterSolstice/etc.
Artemus
I do believe that my marketing leaves much to be desired. It would not appear the price of the book means one wit to whether or not someone will actually purchase it. History suggests if someone has been reached, noticed the book, was interested in that subject and willing to pay a fair price for it then there is a sale. I don't know how else to quantify the results.
I will leave the eBook at $2.99 through the holiday shopping period. After that I will raise it once again to $4.99. It will be interesting to see what the results of this post will be before and after the price is raised.
For your ease of purchasing frenzy which I'm certain will occur after this post, I'm putting the links to both the hard copy and eBook of The Adventures of Reztap below:
Kobo
Amazon (Kindle eBook & paperback)
Diesel
Sony
Barnes and Noble (Nook eBook & paperback)
Apple (iTunes)
Smashwords
Happy purchasing! Merry Christmas/Hanukkah/Kwanzaa/WinterSolstice/etc.
Artemus
Wednesday, October 3, 2012
Facebook, other progress
Over the weekend, I embarked on another marketing experiment. I created a page for The Adventures of Reztap (http://www.facebook.com/TheAdventuresOfReztap?ref=hl). I set a start and end date for the campaign as well as a daily budget. Essentially four days for a budget of $40.
The ad would display on the targeted audiences pagem in the right hand side of the screen like other ads. My targeted audeince for this campaign was those who liked Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Firefly and The Stainless Steel Rat. These were all comparisons one reviewer ,ade for the book, so I thought that would be a great target audience.
I failed to put a link to buy the book on the Facebook page until a day after I started the advertisements. Obviously, I need to make a checklist for future campaigns with different books. I also failed to monitor the campaign to make sure it ended on the date it was supposed to. Guess what? Sure enough, I log in two days after it is supposed to have ended and see that my budget is continuing to climb because the campaign is still going. Frustrating to be sure. I thought I'd been very meticulous on when the campaign was to end, bu the status was still active and looked like it would remain so for a full month, not just four days. luckily, I was able to "pause" the campaign. I'm only in for another $12 and some change, but that was more than I wanted to spend on the experiment.
The page now has 40 likes. I also implored my friends on Facebook for their participation, and probably half of these likes are from them. Any increased sales from the marketing campaign? Not a single sale. In fact, sales appear to have dropped off considerably to a trickle of zero. All in all, the book was well written, has been enjoyed by nearly everone who has picked it up, but without a strong marketing push, no one will hear about it and pick it up.
Lesson learned from this endeavor? The self-published novel and requires a hefty amount of self-marketing. Creating the book isn't the problem. Getting people to hear about it is the problem.
undeterred, I have continued writing on the sequel. I'm somewhere near the end of the second chapter, having completed the synopsis. Part of my time has been spent figuring out who does what on the ship now that the crew has expanded from two humanoids and one android to a crew of around one hundred. There are plenty of surprises still in store for our heroes - I can hardly wait to see what they are.
Marketing hat still on,
Artemus
The ad would display on the targeted audiences pagem in the right hand side of the screen like other ads. My targeted audeince for this campaign was those who liked Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Firefly and The Stainless Steel Rat. These were all comparisons one reviewer ,ade for the book, so I thought that would be a great target audience.
I failed to put a link to buy the book on the Facebook page until a day after I started the advertisements. Obviously, I need to make a checklist for future campaigns with different books. I also failed to monitor the campaign to make sure it ended on the date it was supposed to. Guess what? Sure enough, I log in two days after it is supposed to have ended and see that my budget is continuing to climb because the campaign is still going. Frustrating to be sure. I thought I'd been very meticulous on when the campaign was to end, bu the status was still active and looked like it would remain so for a full month, not just four days. luckily, I was able to "pause" the campaign. I'm only in for another $12 and some change, but that was more than I wanted to spend on the experiment.
The page now has 40 likes. I also implored my friends on Facebook for their participation, and probably half of these likes are from them. Any increased sales from the marketing campaign? Not a single sale. In fact, sales appear to have dropped off considerably to a trickle of zero. All in all, the book was well written, has been enjoyed by nearly everone who has picked it up, but without a strong marketing push, no one will hear about it and pick it up.
Lesson learned from this endeavor? The self-published novel and requires a hefty amount of self-marketing. Creating the book isn't the problem. Getting people to hear about it is the problem.
undeterred, I have continued writing on the sequel. I'm somewhere near the end of the second chapter, having completed the synopsis. Part of my time has been spent figuring out who does what on the ship now that the crew has expanded from two humanoids and one android to a crew of around one hundred. There are plenty of surprises still in store for our heroes - I can hardly wait to see what they are.
Marketing hat still on,
Artemus
Friday, July 27, 2012
Tracking the Oiled Ferret (Sales)
With all this discussion about pricing and effects on sales, a sobering thought entered my befuddled brain. These are barely real-time statistics I am referencing for my conclusions.
Amazon and Smashwords are relatively on-time with their notifications of sales and how much that will put in my account. I recently received a nice little sum of money from both of them for sales in May and June. That was the end of the second quarter.
The next payments, no matter how many I sell, won't com until the end of October. I can still track sales for those two sites, but the long-term result is still a quarterly payment.
The real challenge will be tracking the sales for the Premium Distribution channel. All those web sites report sales roughly quarterly. My fancy little price change for testing won't yield any measurable results for those channels until October. That's a very long waiting game.
Advice to the other self-publishers out there - just be ready for a long game - this is not a quick one-handed poker challenge, it's a long yacht voyage around the world.
We'll table the discussion of where the book ranks in sales for another day.
Artemus
Amazon and Smashwords are relatively on-time with their notifications of sales and how much that will put in my account. I recently received a nice little sum of money from both of them for sales in May and June. That was the end of the second quarter.
The next payments, no matter how many I sell, won't com until the end of October. I can still track sales for those two sites, but the long-term result is still a quarterly payment.
The real challenge will be tracking the sales for the Premium Distribution channel. All those web sites report sales roughly quarterly. My fancy little price change for testing won't yield any measurable results for those channels until October. That's a very long waiting game.
Advice to the other self-publishers out there - just be ready for a long game - this is not a quick one-handed poker challenge, it's a long yacht voyage around the world.
We'll table the discussion of where the book ranks in sales for another day.
Artemus
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)