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You can put links to the mailing list in the back matter of your books. Also, if you do a promotion with a blog (say, a book giveaway) people can get more opportunities to win if they sign up for the list.
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Sep 5, 2015 16:51
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Yeah, link the list in your books. Link the list in your webpage. Link the list in your promotions. Maybe offer freebies to get people to sign up (opinion there is divided). But basically, link the list anywhere you're doing something market-y. For the first few books, really the goal is "use writing to get interested mailing list members", not "use writing to get the moneys".
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Sep 5, 2015 17:31
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Do you guys do anything on Goodreads? What's that about?
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Sep 6, 2015 22:10
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magnificent7 posted:Do you guys do anything on Goodreads? What's that about? I made myself a Goodreads account for my stuff, it's all basically automated after a certain point, although you will probably still have to add in your books by hand (mainly by pasting the Amazon URL, it's not too difficult). I don't know overall how popular the site is but I don't see a lot of traffic from there myself. Then again, I am still basically just starting out due to the circumstances that destroyed my productivity for over half a year. I'd say it's probably worth setting up a profile if only because it runs itself once you plug in your twitter and website. Then all you gotta do is add in your new books every time you release one, which is a cakewalk even if it takes 'em a while to double-check it exists.
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Sep 6, 2015 22:49
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Thanks for the info.
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Sep 8, 2015 04:29
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Good news for book promotion. Pixel of Ink is now accepting submissions again, and they've partnered with BookSends. I once got picked at random to be on Pixel of Ink, and it was a great sales spike. They just took my submission for my literary/contemporary novel, so we'll see how it goes. Always nice to have another option for promotion.
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Sep 9, 2015 17:13
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I need some help.  Every book I publish comes through at 230-270 words per page in terms of KENPC. I just published a 329,225-word book that STILL came through at only 1,385 KENPC. Based on the earlier discussions we had in this thread, I'm losing about 30% of my KU royalties as a result of this, across the board. I have reached out to Amazon and been told that the KENPC number does not take any formatting into account and that all my books are calculated correctly. On the other hand, I have multiple series that don't add up whatsoever. (For example: Book #1 = 365, Book #2= 416, 1&2 Boxed Set = 665. WTF where did my 100+ pages go?) For this most recent 1,385 KENPC book and all my super-romance, I currently upload a DOCX using 12-point Garamond, 0.25" first-line indent, 10pt spacing post-paragraph, and 1.15x line spacing (multiple). Section breaks are hard breaks, etc. Margins are 1" all around. What's missing here? What's the secret formatting that gets you a good Words-Per-Page value for KENPC?
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Sep 10, 2015 00:48
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Sundae posted:What's missing here? What's the secret formatting that gets you a good Words-Per-Page value for KENPC? Just scroll up to the post where you told me I was wrong?
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Sep 10, 2015 01:08
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Jalumibnkrayal posted:Just scroll up to the post where you told me I was wrong? Sorry about that. Got a bit too big for my britches.  Just downloaded Scrivener, will transfer the text and see how it compares. Sundae fucked around with this message at 01:12 on Sep 10, 2015 |
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Sep 10, 2015 01:09
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Sundae posted:Sorry about that. Got a bit too big for my britches. No worries. Sorry for being snippy right there. quote:Just downloaded Scrivener, will transfer the text and see how it compares. Double carriage return between paragraphs and export as a .mobi. Try that as a baseline export and you should see vastly improved KENPC. My 180K omnibus is 1185 KENPC.
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Sep 10, 2015 01:24
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Jalumibnkrayal posted:No worries. Sorry for being snippy right there. Thanks for the advice, and the snippy response was totally deserved.
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Sep 10, 2015 01:35
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Jalumibnkrayal posted:Just scroll up to the post where you told me I was wrong? lol
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Sep 10, 2015 02:34
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Holy poo poo that's a terrible system where formatting and font choices are relevant to how much you get paid. I bet there's some way to really break it.
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Sep 10, 2015 03:24
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So following Sundae's advice I threw all my old poo poo into a bundle and published it. It's made $1,000 in a week lol
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Sep 10, 2015 03:33
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newtestleper posted:Holy poo poo that's a terrible system where formatting and font choices are relevant to how much you get paid. I bet there's some way to really break it. Hey, it stands for Kindle Edition Normalized Page Count, so of course it varies based on completely arbitrary things!  quote:So following Sundae's advice I threw all my old poo poo into a bundle and published it. It's made $1,000 in a week lol Congratulations! I hope it keeps going well. My big bundle goes into overdrive tomorrow. I'm officially off the shorts train now, and just trying to squeeze a few more grand from the catalog before the end.
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Sep 10, 2015 03:56
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newtestleper posted:Holy poo poo that's a terrible system where formatting and font choices are relevant to how much you get paid. I bet there's some way to really break it. doing this will probably continue to have an impact.
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Sep 10, 2015 03:57
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just gonna write books like i write posts now
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Sep 10, 2015 05:08
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EngineerSean posted:just gonna write books like i write posts now
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Sep 10, 2015 05:09
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EngineerSean posted:just gonna write books like i write posts now Ain't nobody paying for punctuation.
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Sep 10, 2015 05:13
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Pinky Artichoke posted:Ain't nobody paying for punctuation. I alternate Oxford commas between character POVs, what of it?
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Sep 10, 2015 05:33
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D2D + single-line spacing on the document, then uploading the resulting MOBI increased the page count to 1,743 pages (189 wpp). Thanks for your help.  Oh, and gently caress Amazon's arbitrary normalized page count.
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Sep 10, 2015 21:03
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its normalized, it even says it right in the title
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Sep 10, 2015 21:19
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I am using CreateSpace to make a physical book and to transfer files over to KDP. Has anyone printed out a bunch of their own hard copies to sell in order to get a bigger profit margin? What was your experience? To go along with books, has anyone ever made stickers, t-shirts, or other promo items? (I have seen people mention some merch on the podcast forum.)
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Sep 11, 2015 18:47
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I've found it's pretty difficult to sell hard copies. Chain stores won't touch self-pubbed work for the most part. Indies often will have a consignment program but you have to buy into it and I don't think I've ever made all my money back. Right now I only have physical copies in one store, which is in a tourist town that I visit a few times a year and where I'm on friendly terms with the owners. That said, I always do print editions of my books, largely because I'm a dinosaur and print still feels more "real" to me. It's also handy to have print editions to hand out to reviewers, to use as prizes in raffles or giveaways, or to give as gifts to people. But it's a wee part of the profits. Ebooks are where I make all my money. Also, some books lend themselves more readily to print editions. I always sell a few copies a month of my movie review book (most of it through extended distribution so I get hardly any money), as opposed to once-in-a-blue-moon for my novels. As for merchandise, I make bookmarks featuring my covers, and give those to the indie bookstore that stocks my books. I also include some with giveaways, review copies, etc. PrintRunner is my vendor of choice. They have lots of templates to use (I am design-challenged) and the prices seem reasonable.
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Sep 11, 2015 20:43
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I don't know how common this is but does anyone else feel lonely in publishing/writing. I read something from some author I don't remember the name of (possibly from On Writing, possibly not) about how writing is you locked away in a room with yourself for months and sometimes even years. And you find out if you're an author when you know you can stay locked away without going crazy. I was thinking earlier I'd like if I had a publisher, or an agent, someone to reassure me during all this. Really I don't know how useful they'd be. My novel is getting good reviews, four and five stars on Goodreads and Amazon, and people are talking about how they couldn't put my book down once they started. Buy all this has an effect that barely lasts minutes. I want that KDP graph to hit the hundreds, but even still I'm wondering if that will make a huge difference. I have my social life. I go out for beers and meet friends for coffee so its not like I'm bring denied something or sacrificing anything. I think it's that with writing you really are all on your own. Theres always the next blank page.
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Sep 12, 2015 03:35
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Go to a convention that has authors in your genre. You'll make friends. If you can afford to rent booth space, even better, you'll make fans.
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Sep 12, 2015 15:38
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angel opportunity posted:So following Sundae's advice I threw all my old poo poo into a bundle and published it. It's made $1,000 in a week lol I decided to take my own advice with a boxed set since I'm done with the shorts. 88,095 pages read so far this morning. 
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Sep 12, 2015 16:04
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So I'm having something really weird happening with my KDP, and I was wondering if I was the only one. I published something last night, and instead of showing up as "In Review" like normal, there's just a white bar between the New Title Checklist and my list of titles that says: "Your Bookshelf will auto-refresh once we finish updating your changes. You can continue working while we update." Okay, I figured it just needs some time to update and things are getting swamped. I was sure it would fix itself in the morning. Except today, the bar is still there and my new story is nowhere to be found. And three very strange things have happened: 1) My newest story has apparently been published - I can see it on Amazon, even though I can't see it in KDP 2) My most-recent story before that has disappeared, and is now back to "In Review" status on KDP 3) The story I published before THAT one (so two stories ago) now shows "Publishing - Updates Pending" What gives? I pulled up the other KDP account that my friend uses to publish our shared world poo poo, and the same thing is happening on that one, (minus the first issue because we haven't published anything in a few days). Is this happening to anyone else? edit: okay, after looking at some self-pubbed forums, it seems like this is a known issue that's happening to a bunch of folks. Hopefully it sorts itself out in a day or two. Popular Human fucked around with this message at 17:54 on Sep 12, 2015 |
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Sep 12, 2015 17:48
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Sundae posted:I decided to take my own advice with a boxed set since I'm done with the shorts. 88,095 pages read so far this morning. drat dude
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Sep 12, 2015 18:18
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Holy poo poo. Okay, I'm definitely taking all the old poo poo I wrote on my OG penname and bundling it. How much are you guys putting the bundle price at? 99c, since all of the money is coming from borrows?
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Sep 12, 2015 18:28
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Popular Human posted:Holy poo poo. Okay, I'm definitely taking all the old poo poo I wrote on my OG penname and bundling it. How much are you guys putting the bundle price at? 99c, since all of the money is coming from borrows? I'm thinking of doing this too, but at 9.99. I still see good money from sales and don't want to lose that to earn a bunch of page reads. The price won't matter to KU readers, and at 43 books it's still a steal for someone who buys it.
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Sep 12, 2015 21:01
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Mrenda posted:I don't know how common this is but does anyone else feel lonely in publishing/writing. I read something from some author I don't remember the name of (possibly from On Writing, possibly not) about how writing is you locked away in a room with yourself for months and sometimes even years. And you find out if you're an author when you know you can stay locked away without going crazy. I relate to this big time. Whether you succeed or don't succeed as an author, I don't think it eases the feeling of loneliness when you write. No matter how enthusiastic your readership is, there's this kind of cold reality that nobody has the same passion for your worlds and works as you do. There's not really anyone to share intimately about your stories without coming off like you're telling your coworkers around the water cooler about a dream you had. I got a little bit of comfort out of reading Robert McKee's Story, because he says that exact thing in the intro. You have to write for the passion of it, because there's a certain reality of loneliness to being a writer. Just seeing an industry pro confirm it somehow made me feel as if I wasn't alone in that feeling. I think ravenkult has the right idea, but cheaper and more accessible than cons are online author groups. I mean, good luck finding any that probably aren't filled with 16-year-old fanfic writers, but I'm sure they exist. Go on the lookout, make at least one other author friend, share in the excitement of writing with them. You'll feel better about it.
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Sep 12, 2015 21:19
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I got a few friends in publishing that kinda help with that, mostly by chatting on facebook about stuff. One is a review blogger, the other a publisher. Hop on to our IRC channel when you're feeling lonely.
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Sep 12, 2015 21:28
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I think most people here haven't written a book that people will buy at ten dollars but if you really want only page reads then you can always price at a hundred ninety nine dollars.
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Sep 12, 2015 21:30
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I meet with friends to do writing time a couple times a week, sometimes we go all day and just hop from coffeehouses to bars. Always gets me motivated to write more! It is a lonely gig, but the upside is you never have to put on pants.
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Sep 12, 2015 21:31
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The Fuzzy Hulk posted:I'm thinking of doing this too, but at 9.99. I still see good money from sales and don't want to lose that to earn a bunch of page reads. The price won't matter to KU readers, and at 43 books it's still a steal for someone who buys it. Mine is priced at $9.99 but is currently free until 6PM or so tonight. It's up to 125,987 pages read so far today, which puts it on pace to be my best single day ever by like 7PM. gently caress you, Amazon. gently caress you so hard for trying to destroy the erotica market when there are clearly ungodly numbers of people who want to read it. The 'getting out with other writers' thing can help a lot if they can stay motivated and not just turn into chatting sessions. My wife and I are headed out to a local tea shop tonight now that we've found one open in the evenings, so hopefully we'll have a productive (and delicious) evening.
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Sep 12, 2015 21:33
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I think what triggered all this was releasing my novel, after a huge amount of work then being hit with a big wall of nothing. I'd get excited about good reviews but it'd fade and I'd just be left thinking "That's it? This is what I've done all this for?" And at the same time I met an author at a poetry night a few days ago. She was the guest poet, but she's published some novels as well (including romance) and it was so good to be able to talk to someone who just instantly appreciated the whole thing of writing. Especially as she was someone who treated writing with the relevant severity, but she wasn't a tortured artist working on a manuscript for four years without showing it to anyone.
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Sep 12, 2015 21:53
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Got my megabundle down to rank 525. I'm priced at $0.99 though and I'm wondering if it should be $2.99 instead. Yesterday I moved 280 copies and barely covered the promo cost. Today it looks like it will be less than 80 copies so it will quickly plummet in rank.
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Sep 12, 2015 22:16
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Sundae posted:Mine is priced at $9.99 but is currently free until 6PM or so tonight. How many stories are in it, out of curiosity?
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Sep 12, 2015 22:19
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56, I think? I left it 50 on the sales page and called it a day. Edit: 175,125 pages now... 314 more! COME ON, 314 MORE! Edit 2: DONE! $1,000 DAY!
Sundae fucked around with this message at 03:14 on Sep 13, 2015 |
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Sep 12, 2015 23:28
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