Tag: reviews

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 Four

Posted on by Ian Dawson

Yes, yes.  I’ll admit it.  Yesterday’s post was pretty technical.  Metadata. Pricing.  Websites.  While they aren’t exactly sexy topics, they are important parts of the self-publishing puzzle, which is why it’s a good idea to know about them.  So, today, let’s talk about a few more exciting topics.

So, you’ve submitted your manuscript, your cover, and input all the important info needed to launch your eBook on various sites. Well, while you’re toiling away at your website, a busy group of people in another part of the country are converting your Word doc or other files into a polished and professional-looking eBook.

The nice thing about Book Baby (and I’m sure other self-publishing sites do it, too) is that they constantly email you to let you know the progress of your book.  You can also check the status of your project on their website as well.  I was very excited to get the email announcing that my proofs were ready for me to view.  I will confess that when I opened the file for the first time and started to go through the pages I jumped up and down (I really did this, I’m not lying). It was an exciting feeling to finally see what I had written converted into a format for others to read and enjoy on their tablets or phones.

That part done and approved, I had to wait for the book’s official release onto Amazon and other sites in order to move on to the next step: reviews.

Readers’ Favorite (https://readersfavorite.com) is a site that works with Book Baby and allows you to do a number of helpful things with your book.  You can sign up for their Press Release program, you can participate in their Book Exchange Program, and you can have your book reviewed.  Now, you have to pay for the reviews, but I found this was a helpful way to get new eyes on my book and to get some legitimate reviews to use on my Amazon page and website.  I paid for three reviews, having no clue what I would get.

About a week later I got all three reviews back and they were all very positive, five-star reviews!  But, me being a skeptic about things, I did do some digging to find other reviews written by these particular reviewers and they weren’t just handing out five-star reviews across the board.  That added to the legitimacy of their reviews, which was a good thing!

I set up a profile on Readers’ Favorite, and then took the time to add myself to a few others as well.  I worked on my Amazon Author’s Profile and my Goodreads Author Program Profile (https://www.goodreads.com/author/program?rel=nofollow) to get my name and book out there.  The more ground you cover the better.

The Field by Ian Dawson was officially launched as an eBook on July 4, 2018, and I was pretty excited.  But other than my family, friends, and co-workers, how could I get others to buy the book?  In a word: Publicity.  In more words, stop by for tomorrow’s post!