SFFMP 173: From Indie to Hybrid, Six Figure Audiobook Advances, and an $80,000 Kickstarter for a Novel

Author Interview, Podcast

On today’s show, we had the honor of chatting with Michael J. Sullivan and his wife and business partner Robin Sullivan. These folks were self-publishing right at the beginning of the movement (before the kindle even became a thing), and have seen and tried a lot over the years. After finding indie author success, they accepted a deal with Orbit, and Michael is now a hybrid author, taking the best from both worlds.

Here are some of the specifics that we discussed:

    • Finding success as a self-published author in the early days of the Kindle.
    • Whether it was a hard decision to switch to a traditional publisher and if giving up some money up front was worth it in terms of reaching a larger audience and growing the fan base.
    • What indie authors signing traditional contracts should watch out for, especially if they want to keep self-publishing on the side.
    • Understanding non-compete, indemnification, and limbo clauses.
    • Why it’s hard (but not impossible) to get a Big 5 publishing deal that doesn’t give up ebook, print, and audiobook rights right now.
    • Why they’ve done three Kickstarters and how they’ve had such tremendous success with them.
    • How Kickstarter can be a form of advertising and potentially bringing in new readers who weren’t already in the fan base.
    • Whether there are any drawbacks to having a super successful Kickstarter.
    • What Michael and Robin do for marketing and how that’s changed over the years.
    • Why Michael is a big fan of Goodreads.
    • Doing AMAs on Reddit.
    • Why they say you shouldn’t feel you’re going to relinquish all your marketing to your publisher if you take a trad deal.
    • How audiobooks have become a big source of income for them and what kinds of advances are potentially achievable out there right now.
    • Why they believe audiobooks are becoming what ebooks were in 2010 and that there’s lots of room for growth.

You can visit Michael on his website, and if you’re interested in his books, you can buy the latest, The Disappearance of Winter’s Daughter, (as well as the rest) directly from his site.

He’s also releasing books in his Legends of the First Empire series, with Age of War coming this summer.

 

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SFFMP 172: Making It as a Newer Author, Marketing YA Fantasy, and are Vampires Still “In”?

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Like many new authors, Caroline Peckham‘s first series, a YA fantasy adventure, The Rise of Isaac, didn’t sell as well as she’d hoped. For her second series, she did a lot of market research and switched to a more popular type of YA fantasy, vampires in a contemporary paranormal setting. She also adopted some more effective marketing tactics and had a successful launch last fall. She’s since released a second “V Games” novel and is editing a third, and the series continues to do well, months after the initial launch.

Here are a few of the details that we discussed on the show:

  • Some of the challenges of marketing young adult fiction as a self-published author.
  • What made Caroline decide to switch from one type of YA fantasy to another.
  • Concerns about finding readers when one’s target audience doesn’t have credit cards and doesn’t shop on Amazon.
  • Why Caroline has had more success targeting adult audiences who happen to enjoy young adult fiction.
  • Whether vampires are too crowded a niche to get into or there are still opportunities.
  • How Caroline first found reviewers by seeking out readers in her genre who had reviewed books similar to hers.
  • Finding reviewers on Goodreads and then moving them over to an easily manageable Facebook group.
  • Why Caroline makes her ARC reviewer Facebook group public rather than private and lets people who find her through the platform in to get free review copies.
  • Using the Werble App to create animations that can be used on Facebook to help with promotions.
  • Pricing a Book 1 at 99 cents or 99p in KU to keep it higher in the rankings and bring in readers for the rest of the full-priced series.
  • Which social media platforms Caroline uses and why she didn’t do much with Wattpad, despite it being a popular destination for younger readers.
  • Caroline’s experiments with Facebook advertising and how she found out that the clicks she got weren’t converting that well.
  • Whether vampire stories seem to do better in the US or the UK.

You can visit Caroline on her website or Facebook, and check out her books on Amazon.

 

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SFFMP 171: Lindsay’s Launch Numbers (Earned vs Spent), Targeting International Sales, and Increasing Mailing List Open Rates

Group Discussion, Podcast

Our three hosts were by themselves today and answered some listener questions that had been stacking up. They ran the gamut and included selling more audiobooks, selling more paperbacks, selling more in international markets, increasing newsletter open rates, and what you should do to start gathering a mailing list of interested readers before you launch your first novel. Lindsay also shared her numbers from her recent fantasy launch.

Here are a few more of the specifics that we covered:

  • What it takes to get a KDP All Star bonus these days.
  • Whether Lindsay found Bookbub CPM, Facebook PPC, or Amazon CPC ads more useful for her epic fantasy/sword and sorcery launch, and how much she spent overall on advertising, cover art, and editing.
  • Jeff’s foray into audiobooks — can you have a narrator that speaks too slowly?
  • Jo’s experiments with reworking some of his old newsletter bonus material and publishing a short story a month (are ebooks published at 99 cents worth it?).
  • Tips for increasing open rates with mailing lists and what’s considered a good rate.
  • What kinds of subject lines work best with newsletters.
  • How ACX users can promote their audiobooks (we forgot to mention getting codes from ACX for giveaways, but you can email for those and use them selectively with new releases).
  • Tips for getting more sales in the UK, Australia, Canada, and other English-speaking (and reading) markets.
  • Tips for selling more paperbacks.
  • Whether Wattpad is worth it for a marketing platform.
  • Whether a pen name needs its own Facebook author page.
  • If an author in the UK needs to make a special edition for American English readers.
  • If it’s okay to publish shorter novels so you can get stuff out more frequently.
  • What’s the best way to start your writing/publishing career if your number one interest is gaining a steady readership?
  • Your hosts share which of their characters are most like them and what the hardest things for them to edit out were.

Want to see what the hosts are up to?

You can check out Jo’s new 99-cent prequel novella, Beta Testers or preorder the Book of Deacon short story collection he mentioned in the show.

Jeff’s latest release is one of his mystery novels, Case of the Pilfered Pooches (Corgi Case Files Book 4).

Lindsay’s short sci-fi story “Bearadise Lodge” is up for free on her blog.

 

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SFFMP 170: Keeping an Older Series Selling, Nebula Awards, and What SFWA Can Do for You

Author Interview, Podcast

On this week’s show, military science fiction author and retired Marine colonel Jonathan Brazee joined us. We talked about the wisdom of sticking to one genre and writing a series and spinoff series all in the same universe, and how that can help with marketing. It doesn’t hurt to be prolific, either! We also talked about SFWA, where Jonathan is the Chairman of the Education Committee and doing a lot to help indie authors inside of the organization.

Here are some more specific details of what we covered:

  • Jonathan’s road from his first published short story in 1978 to being a full-time indie author of more than thirty novels of (mostly) military science fiction.
  • Why he recently decided to accept a traditional publishing contract.
  • The wisdom of focusing on one genre, for the most part, and building a universe where multiple series intersect with each other and can each work to lead readers into the universe as a whole.
  • Some tropes in the military SF genre that authors would be wise to pay attention to.
  • Whether it’s harder now to break into military SF than it was a few years ago.
  • How Jonathan got involved with SFWA and why authors may want to consider joining if they qualify.
  • The networking benefits of going to conventions and getting involved as a panelist.
  • Being nominated for the Nebula awards.
  • What forms of advertising Jonathan is using now that are working for him.
  • What he’s doing these days when he launches new books.
  • The importance of setting realistic expectations and realizing it’s probably going to take more than two novels if you want to make a career of writing.
  • The types of covers Jonathan likes for his military SF and why he’s thinking of redoing some of his early ones.
  • How he keeps his older series selling years after he’s completed publishing them.
  • Advertising older books in a series when it’s time to release a new installment.
  • Keeping in touch with one’s fans and realizing how much your work can mean to some people.

As we mentioned in the show, Jonathan is one of the nebula award finalists in the novelette category with his story, “Weaponized Math.” If you’re interested in reading it, you can find it in the 99-cent Expanding Universe: Volume 3. You can also find the rest of his titles on Amazon.

If you’re a member of SFWA and want to vote for the nebulas this year (or if you just want to read the stories), you can find the list of the 2017 nebula award finalists here.

 

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SFFMP 169: Writing Across Genres, Getting New Books to Stick, and Epic/Military Fantasy with David Estes

Author Interview, Podcast

This week, David Estes–author of dystopian fiction, children’s fiction, and epic fantasy (with more genres on the way)–joined us to talk about jumping into epic/military fantasy last year, how he managed to launch well into a new genre, and how he’s kept his books in the category top 100s on Amazon for the last year. We also discussed how he got his books picked up by Podium Publishing for audiobook versions and some of the challenges of marketing audio.

Here are some of the specifics that we covered:

  • The various subgenres of fantasy and science fiction that David has written in and whether it’s been harder or easier to find success when he’s been “genre hopping.”
  • The relatively recent addition of “military fantasy” as a category on Amazon.
  • Common tropes or what readers expect from military fantasy as a subgenre.
  • Having audiobooks produced through a publisher verses producing your own through ACX.
  • Some of the challenges of marketing audiobooks and the importance of finding a good narrator.
  • How much better longer books often do when it comes to audiobooks (due to the Audible credit system).
  • Why David rapid released his first three epic fantasy novels and if he’ll do it again for his next series.
  • Keeping the momentum and publishing regularly even when you’re working a day job and writing long novels.
  • The advertising and group promos that helped David with his launch into a new genre.
  • How much he’s spending on advertising and what’s working best for him (hint: Bookbub’s pay-per-click ads) to keep his first book in the Top 100 for epic fantasy month in and month out.
  • Whether people are willing to tolerate a higher price point on longer novels.
  • Adding bonus content such as short stories to the end of novels (especially those in Kindle Unlimited) rather than selling them as 99-cent stand-alones.

Visit David’s website to see what he’s up to or check out his books on Amazon. You can also visit his Goodreads fan group, which he talked about during the interview, or follow his progress with his new Patreon page.

 

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SFFMP 168: Mailing List Tips and The Three-year, No-bestseller Plan for Making a Sustainable Living from Your Fiction

Author Interview, Podcast

Return guest Patty Jansen, who continues to make a great income from her fiction without being a mega seller, joined us today (live from Lindsay’s office) to talk about different types of mailing lists we can run as authors, organizing group promotions, and using a global approach to marketing that will gain you fans on all the platforms and all over the world. (She may be one of the few of us with a big fan-base in South Africa!)

Here are some of the specifics that we covered:

  • How Patty invests more into her series that are proven sellers with an 80% read-through rate.
  • What kinds of advertising she’s doing to keep a steady stream of new readers trying her books and signing up for her newsletters.
  • The Kboards post that led to her writing three books for authors, talking about the tactics she’s used to grow to a full-time income even without being a huge seller on Amazon or “sticking” there with new releases.
  • How she has found luck targeting markets that most people don’t advertise to because the countries don’t have Amazon stores (she specifically mentioned South Africa and sending people to her newsletter signup page where they could get free books).
  • Gauging trends and what’s working when you have more of a “long tail” approach.
  • How Patty is going to approach selling ARCs on her site of a series she will later release into KDP Select/Kindle Unlimited to give that a try.
  • Whether she is worried about pirate sites or not.
  • The different types of mailing lists Patty has (one is her author one and one is more of a promo mini-Bookbub style list) and how she goes about acquiring subscribers and making both profitable.
  • Which mailing list host you might want to consider — if you’re going to grow a list as large as you can, perhaps with group promos and Instafreebie, you’ll definitely want to get set up with a provider that’s cheaper at higher numbers of subscribers (she recommended MailerLite).
  • Some common mistakes that authors make in regard to mailing lists.
  • How she gauges success with her mailing lists (open rates, link clicks, etc.).
  • Whether authors need the mailing list hosts with higher tiered plans that offer more bells and whistles.
  • How often authors should email their subscribers.
  • Different types of auto-responder series that Patty has tried.
  • Using the WooCommerce WordPress plug-in for managing sales and email.
  • Whether it’s a good idea to ask questions and invite fans to email back.

You can visit Patty’s website for information about her books, the promo page there to be notified when she does her big 99-cent multi-author promos, and join the SF/F Cross Promo Bulletin Facebook group to link up with other authors wanting to do newsletter swaps.

If you’re interested in her non-fiction, the first book in her series is Self-publishing Unboxed (The Three-year, No-bestseller Plan For Making a Sustainable Living From Your Fiction Book 1).

If you want to try out her fiction, check out the first book in her scifi Ambassador series or fantasy fans can check out the first book in her Icefire Trilogy for free.

Also, check out the earlier shows that Patty was on:

 

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SFFMP 167: Encouraging News from the Author Earnings Report and What’s Working at Kobo

Author Interview, Podcast

The new Kobo Writing Life director, Christine Monroe, joined us to talk about the strength of indie publishing, new features relevant to authors at Kobo (including the upcoming ability to upload audiobooks via the KWL dashboard), and some positive news from the recently released Author Earnings Report.

Here are some of the specifics we covered:

  • How Christine came to be the new head honcho at Kobo Writing Life.
  • How time of year doesn’t matter that much when it comes to ebook sales (per the Author Earnings Report), so the “summer slump” is largely a myth. Christine said the week after Christmas and the month of July are big selling times for Kobo.
  • That, despite rumors to the contrary, indie publishing is doing better than it ever has. The AER posted the Top 50 earning authors for US sales and noted that many are newer names, so possibly authors that had early success and didn’t adapt have seen fall off, but others are carrying the torch.
  • 75% of science fiction and fantasy book sales come via ebooks and audiobooks.
  • Kobo getting into the growing category of audiobooks and opportunities for indie authors who have the rights to distribute their audiobooks.
  • When does it make sense to invest in creating audio versions of your books?
  • Some best practices of successful authors on Kobo.
  • Taking advantage of the fact that there’s no cap on the 70% royalty and putting together giant full-series boxed sets.
  • Going direct with Kobo versus going through a distributor.
  • The kinds of advertising that are proving effective for selling books on Kobo.
  • Tips for authors who write stand-alone novels or only have one or two books out.
  • Pricing suggestions for novels on Kobo.
  • Languages that do well with them when it comes to foreign language translations.
  • Whether rapid releases and/or consistently putting out titles are effective strategies for building an audience on Kobo.

If you’re not already uploading direct to Kobo, you can do so through the Kobo Writing Life dashboard. Make sure to subscribe to the KWL blog and podcast to get tips from successful authors. They recently had one of the Bookbub representatives on their podcast, so you’ll definitely want to check out that episode.

 

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SFFMP 166: Best Price Points, Does Book Length Matter, and Tips for Selling More Books Wide with Mark Coker

Author Interview, Podcast

One of our earliest guests on the podcast, almost 150 episodes ago, was Mark Coker, the founder of Smashwords. We had him back on this week to talk about some of his predictions for the coming year and marketing tips derived from the 2017 annual survey of the Smashwords sales and distribution data.

Note: we had some technical issues so weren’t able to stream live, but we hope to be back at our usual time of Tuesday 6pm PT/9pm ET next week.

Here are some further details of what we discussed with Mark:

  • Changes in Smashwords over the last three years.
  • How much more successful authors are on iTunes, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, etc. when they make use of pre-orders.
  • Mark’s new podcast Smart Author (check out the episodes on analyzing best practices of bestselling authors and how to sell more books with pre-orders for starters).
  • Being careful about being too dependent on one retailer and helping to ensure other retailers stay relevant.
  • Data showing that, despite people forever talking about short attention spans, longer books sell better.
  • Some sub-genres of science fiction and fantasy that are doing well — but Mark advises that you should write what you love rather than following trends.
  • Which price points are most effective, and data showing that $4.99 has become more viable (if you’re charging $2.99 or $3.99, you might not lose sales by going to $4.99).
  • Pricing for boxed sets, whether by individual authors or as multi-author collaborations.
  • How many of the bestselling Smashwords authors are using free series starters.
  • What to do with a $500 launch budget.
  • Tips for selling in the Smashwords store itself.

If you want to hear more from Mark, check out the first episode he did with us: SFFMP 25: Marketing, Pre-Orders, and Distribution with Smashwords Founder Mark Coker.

Here’s his blog post from last year that includes his slides covering the 2017 Smashwords survey data.

You can visit Mark on Twitter or on the Smashwords blog. You can find more information on his Smart Author podcast here.

 

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SFFMP 165: Relaunching a Series, Bookbub Ads, and Does Podcasting Help Authors?

Author Interview, Podcast

A return guest joined us on the show this week, Bryan Cohen, non-fiction author, podcaster, and author of fairy tales and superhero fiction. We talked about the fairy-tale-writing pen name he launched in 2016 and the big relaunch (including edits, new covers, and new ASINs on Amazon) he did of his first fiction series in 2017, where he turned it from a sort-of-urban fantasy series to something clearly in the superhero genre. We also discussed tips for getting the cost per click down on Bookbub ads and whether podcasting can be useful for authors.

In the end, Bryan told us about the Sell More Books Show Summit, a conference he’s helping host the first weekend of May in Chicago this year, and what prompted him to start a new conference for authors. If you’re interested in going, tickets are still on sale (with the Early Bird price good through January 12th this week).

Here are some more specific details of what we talked about:

  • How Bryan’s foray into fairy tales and a new pen name went.
  • What he learned from launching into a new genre.
  • How organizing and putting together a fairy tale anthology with some other well-known authors helped earn a good amount through Kindle Unlimited and also drive readers back to his novel.
  • Some things he wishes he had done differently when launching the pen name.
  • How he juggles writing fiction, hosting a podcast, and working in the author services industry with having a family.
  • Whether it makes sense to be a podcaster as well as an author — ie. will it sell any books?
  • What kind of podcast would make sense if an author was interested in starting one?
  • Current events in the publishing world that authors may be overreacting to.
  • What made Bryan decide to not only relaunch his series with new covers, blurbs, titles, and in a new genre, but also why he went back and did some major editing on the early books.
  • Budgetary and time concerns to think about with a relaunch.
  • Whether to keep your existing Amazon ASIN and book reviews or to start from scratch.
  • Whether it’s necessary to clear a relaunch with fans or if Bryan dealt with any blowback from readers upset by the edits.
  • Bookbub ads and ways to tinker to get the CTR up (and the cost per click down).
  • Whether Bookbub ads are more effective in some genres than others.

If you enjoyed listening to Bryan chat, you can also check him out on two of our earlier episodes:

SFFMP 15: YouTube Marketing, Facebook Events, and Increasing Mailing List Sign-Ups

SFFMP 84: Creating Better Book Descriptions (Blurbs) to Improve Your Sales with Bryan Cohen

Also, make sure to visit his site, check out his books if you like superheroes or fairy tales, and the Summit if you’re interested in going.

 

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