Tag: final thoughts

My Publicity Experience – Part Five

Posted on by Ian Dawson

One of the things I liked best about working with Smith Publicity is that they don’t just drop you like a hot rock once the three weeks is done.  If they receive requests for the book after your time with them has come to an end, they forward the requests on to you.  They also gave me a list of 25 media outlets that they sent inquiries to but had not heard back from for me to follow-up with on my own.  I really appreciate this type of service and am glad I chose them for my marketing blitz.

I had my final wrap-up call with my publicity team and received more requests that day and throughout the week. I had also received a request for a review copy of the book from Finland.  Yes, Finland.  I know, I know.  Did I send a copy of the book to Finland?  Yes, I did.

So, at FedEx, to send a copy of my book from the United States to Finland would have cost $156.  I am proud to say that I did NOT pay that amount to send it to Finland.  However, I did walk over to the post office in the same strip mall, and to end it via USPS was only $24.  The Field is now on its way to Finland!

I also got a couple reviews on NetGalley.  One was five-stars; the other three-stars.  What was interesting about the three-star review is that she thought the book was good but it wasn’t her favorite.  I’m okay with that.  My main takeaway was that the reviewer liked the book, and maybe she has a harder star-grading-criteria than other reviewers. 

I’m still waiting to hear back from KRCR-TV in Redding.  I’m sure the producer wanted to read the book prior to doing a story and having me trek up to Redding, so I hope to hear from them soon.  If not, it’s okay.  I have plenty of other opportunities in the works.

And that’s the bottom line with all of this.  A book isn’t a movie that has to make millions its first weekend or the industry sees it as a flop.  With a book, especially one that’s self-published, it takes time to gain traction and get the word out.  The book is now in the hands of over 60 people.  Over the next few months, I hope that even a half or even a third take the time to read it and post about it.  As I said in a previous post, this is a marathon not a sprint. 

I’m just excited to finally be on the journey and am grateful to Smith Publicity for helping me get the word out about my novel.

If you have any questions about my experience with Smith Publicity or want more details about anything I talked about, please feel free to leave a comment. 

The Field – From Word Doc to Paperback, Part Seven

Posted on by Ian Dawson

Here are a few takeaways and final thoughts I have about self-publishing The Field:

It’s important for your own creative sanity that once you make the leap from your novel being your baby to publishing it either as an eBook, a paperback, or both, it is now a viable, marketable product.  This means that you have to put distance between you the author and you’re the person trying to market and sell what is a now a viable commodity.

This distancing will also help you in the event your get a negative review or criticism you don’t like.  The person may not have liked your product, but they still bought the product and you reap the benefits either way.  By taking this more objective and business-like approach to each work, you can then free up your mind to write the next book, and the next, and the next.

Distancing yourself emotionally from your completed project will also help you think more clearly when it comes to the marketing and sales aspects of your work.  It’s not at all helpful if you get wrapped up in a minute detail that occurs during the publishing process and your obsess over something that in the end has an easy fix. Case in point: I talked in a previous post about the paperback being priced at $14.63 due to production costs. I agonized over this for half a week, sure that my book was now doomed for failure because it was too expensive. Then, a Book Baby rep suggested I create a promo code to decrease the price.  Boom.  Problem solved.

I had I been thinking like a salesperson and been more pragmatic than emotional, I could have solved the problem without the needless drama. Leave the drama for the page not the publishing.

Know that if you are self-publishing that you are going to have to do almost everything yourself.  Yes, there are sites like Book Baby that will guide you, but when it comes to getting the word out to a wide swath of people, just know that you are the best marketing tool there is.  So use social media, your own website, co-workers, family, and friends to get the initial word out.  If you want to, you can enlist the aid of a marketing company – like I did with Smith Publicity – to spread the word farther.  But again, while they will be assisting with press releases and other aspects, the project is still driven by me and my knowledge and passion for the project.

There are also dozens of videos on YouTube as well as blogs that can give you insights into how to market your book either inexpensively or for free.

Also, make sure that you have the means to afford all the aspects of doing this yourself.  There are inexpensive and even free alternatives if you want to publish your eBook on Amazon or even on your own blog chapter by chapter.  Don’t go into debt or sacrifice eating or bills to do this. And if you do, make sure you budget and keep track of all your expenses.

So, what would I do differently.  Well, for the next book I will definitely publish the eBook and paperback as part of the same project.  The reason: it’s cheaper.  I could have paid 50% less if I had gone with one of the packages offered through Book Baby that allows you to do both.  But I thought just an eBook was easy money.  As of this post I have sold more paperbacks than eBooks, so that shows what I know!

I also learned that the best strategy is to budget your time in an efficient manner, especially if self-publishing is a side business and not your full-time occupation.  I work six days a week at my main job, so everything involving the book is like having a second job. It’s important to give yourself some downtime and not burn yourself out with everything that now needs to be done on top of all your other responsibilities.  Your novel won’t get published any faster if your agonizing over pricing at 4am.  Trust me. It’s not worth losing sleep over.

And that’s my self-publishing journey.  It was definitely worth all the time, effort, and expense, and I will definitely be doing it again soon.  If you have any questions, comments, or further advice you’d like to share, please feel free to leave a comment.  I look forward to hearing from you.

Thanks for reading!