So when I started this, I knew nothing about the self-publishing process (Indie authors). And this blog was designed to document process for me so I had a roadmap to repeat the steps over and over again. I’ve made mistakes, some things you learn only by doing, gotten good advice and gotten bad advice.

The createspace print book process definitely works better than the Kindle process. I can hold the actual product in my hand, review it, before I release it. You can only see a finalized version of your Kindle work after it’s released. The Previewer doesn’t always display exactly how your eBook will appear, especially from device to device.  I bought the first download of my eBook and displayed it via the app on my iPad. It didn’t look anything like it did in the previewer under iPad. I’m now getting a Kindle to see if that appears differently on the device as it does in the previewer.

The boxes to cut/paste your book description are small and that makes it easy to miss an error.

Being use to everything digital being able to happen nearly instantly, with changes made and displayed online in seconds, I was surprised to find out that so simple of a thing as changing a single word in the book description took anywhere from 12-24 hours to go live.

Things I would never do working with Kindle:

1.       Use the createspace kindle conversion for my eBook: this I learned when another author wanted to send me his kindle file for a BETA read. It had all kinds of strange characters in it. They weren’t there in his preview file, but they were in his eBook for sale.

2.       Never trust again that my kindle files will display online as they appear in the creation space of Kindle.

3.       Never think that visual format of your book doesn’t matter: I read a sample yesterday from a book from an author who has had success in self-publishing and is a very good writer. The sample was engaging and I might have read on. The format was a nightmare, so irritating to my eyes that I didn’t want to go on.  Paragraphs were not justified, there was no indentation of first line and no spacing between the paragraphs. A visual mess.  It just looked like words thrown on a page that I had to decode. The visual presentation does matter!

1 Smart tip I did hear on the author forum, that wasn’t fully explained, but now makes sense:

1.       I would create a dummy book file for my Kindle upload. This is a file with a fake book title, priced at zero, with a fake pen name. I’d load my files there 1 time to review before I sent my files for release through my office Kindle book title. Things can sometimes magically change from WIP to final release. It’s better to find any inconsistencies in the dummy account or verify that there are not any prior to official upload.

With the description boxes being so small, it’s difficult to proof the content well or find errors.

If I purchase/get sample of this eBook I can see how the formatting transfers to the readers before I go live. And believe me: Format is different in every type of reader regardless of how it looks in your Kindle file Preview!

It’s better to delay, rather than release, and then wait, wait, wait, as the necessary changes are made to your Kindle site.

While error free is the goal for your work product, or zero defect, it is a goal. Will every upload be error-free? Probably not. But should you attempt it? Absolutely. Every effort should be made to minimize negative impressions of your work by readers.

Things I learned the hard way:

1.       The format guide for Kindle is somewhat good, but it is so easy to miss things even with the format characters displayed. A simple *dot* at the start of a sentence puts in an extra space and the alignment out. A missed return marker at the end of a paragraph will ruin the alignment of the next paragraph.

These errors are easier to see in the cloud reader or on your kindle or iPad device.

2.       I still haven’t figured out why the format is different from Kindle to iPad app, but I’m pretty much resolved that I won’t ever figure that one out. So long as the format is visual pleasing in both delivery devices and the work as error free as humanly possible [for me] then I have to be satisfied with the result.

Did I make some Mulligans? Oh golly, without a doubt. That’s why I’m documenting my steps. I want to know what I did well and what I learned only by doing. And I’m sharing them in hopes that others get through the process easier.

Now, we start with the different recommended means of online book promotion. Let’s see how well those work. Then, time to repeat all my really fun steps to publish in other content delivery channels. Won’t that be fun? I don’t think so…

I've been writing all my life. In 25 years, I've completed 26 books. I've never shared my work. It's just something I do. I have a hurry up and wait kind of job. Lots of time waiting on people. I've amuse myself by jotting down dialogue, notes on storylines, etc., but then I always did that, even in school, because everything was so not stimulating there for me!

Then my daughter from another mother(that's what I call the close girlfriends of my daughters) asked if she could read one of my books. I thought it would be nice to get it printed in a pretty book copy so I signed up for a create space account to see what that would entail. Then, last January, I received the email for the ABNA contest and thought: I just started something that might fit into that contest. So I finished that novel and entered February 16th. I should have taken the class on query. Crashed and burned in the query round. But I still had the book, and thought, this is the one I'll give to Alyssa. And the forum for ABNA is full of chatting self-published authors and I thought, I'll do that. See how it works. See how to build it into something fun for me.  Trust me. Trying to save California Air Quality one vote at a time isn't a lot of fun! So here I am.

As a business idea, if someone brought a self-publishing business model to me, I'd say run. The economics are not a good structure for profitability. Even if you sell a book to a publisher, the likelihood of the big bucks is really slim. I look at all publishing, self and tradition, like the stakes at a California Indian Casino. The odds are slim and the payoff low if you win. There is unlikely to be a big power-ball payoff at the end. The goal is not to lose money doing it.

So why put so much effort into something that won't be monetarily rewarding. First, a promise is a promise. I did promise to give Alyssa a book and I was finishing one anyway! Second, I write because I have to, but there is always that fascination with the hope that I could write something and have it read a country away. That's the thrill of it all for me.

I was really happy the first time I saw foreign sales on my kindle account. Many of the abbreviations I didn't know. I had to look them up. I guess I must be just a tad a thrill junky because it was a thrill the day I looked and knew there was someone in the UK and Mexico, maybe sitting somewhere with my book and taking a journey on a story written by me.

That's why I released via self-publishing. Tell me your story...\

Getting ready to send my next book out for editing: The Signature. Something different from me: a fun, silly little romance frolic. But of course, being by me there is always a twist. And the plot twist isn't in the book. Curious now?

Should be released in August. That is, if I've learned anything along the journey of Print/Kindle self-publishing to make it less of a grueling experience!

OK, I know I'm old, so I would prefer not to get comments about that, or that the good old days of my looks are behind me! That said, I'm trying to figure out what people are trying to accomplish with their websites and blogs. I'm not confused by the horror, paranormal, vampire, and all things in-between. Most of the sites I've seen integrate their market presence beautifully and are reader experience focused.

No, this really applies to everyone else in the 'won't ever get a Pulitzer' genres. The first place your book will be placed is on your website. Good Product Placement Is essential to business success. And yet, many pages I've reviewed really confuse me.(I reviewed hundreds in the process of trying to figure out how self-published authors build a market and media presence).  I also reviewed what bestselling authors did with their online sites. For some reason, there is a disconnect between Indies and published.

Most indie sites cater to other authors, wanting to be literary, or look like resumes online. The first objective should be to sell your book. Your media presence should be consistent across all forums and designed to appeal to readers not other authors. The actual act you want to achieve, buying your book, should be obvious and easy to find.

Now, I'm not support the design of these sites, but the strategy.
Colleen Hover: I know what she's selling, I know what she's offering, and I know how to find it. Jeez, Colleen even sells stuff. If that isn't an indication that books are a business nothing is!
http://colleenhoover.com/

Kerrelyn Sparks: I know what she's selling, I know what she's offering and I know hot to find it.
http://www.kerrelynsparks.com/books_current.html

And for the romance writers, this is especially important for your success in selling. And if you have beauty, use it. I see too many author photos that look like someone is trying to look literary! Jeez, you write romance. You should look sexy or at lease fun! Or bios that say, I enjoy knitting and baking and a really good book. Romance readers want a readily identifiable experience. They want romance. Do readers want to trust valuable hours of reading to someone who looks literary and enjoys baking?

Think about it. In every product I've ever sold, I've always held one belief: I am the product and the product is me. I am The Girl on the Half Shell, and The Girl on the Half Shell is me.

I just wish today that I looked like I did in my 30s. It's hard to look fun and exciting in your 50s. Oh well, I just have to work it a different way!

It is amazingly difficult to get accurate information on sales counts to achieve high print and Kindle seller's rank, so I watched how the ranking responded to sales. A project objective is to get at some point a top seller's rank, so I can market it.  A continued benefit if one wants to sell books.

But how is it calculate? Is it an achievable number of sales? Well, after testing and monitoring yesterday I would say yes to achievable and that I've modified my process plan for future releases. This first release is more of learn, analyze and redevelop strategy launch.

I really don't know why this isn't a discussion topic on my author's forum. Learning how to best achieve and utilize ranking would seem to me to be an important discussion topic.

I've done no formal promoting of my book because initial sales numbers are not as important as constructing a viable, successful working model for future launches. I'm also finding that Kindle formatting doesn't always work out like it does in the previewer before release. So I want to get that perfect before I push ahead aggressively.

Rankings on Amazon are inverse. You start with an A and lose it over time. I figured it was constructed that way, but I wanted to know how many sales were needed to get in the top 100. It's so comically few it ain't funny. Readily achievable if it's structure with a promotion plan at launch.

So, what did I learn with this book launch. Front load promotion to roll out on launch date. The value of getting a top seller's rank is most easily achieved at launch, and can assist in future promotion of your book. With well constructed times lines there really are free/low cost methodology to achieving valuable promotion.

This may not seem like a great ranking, but I could have debut at 1.4 million( 1 being best seller). Hope those of you kind enough to purchase my New Release enjoy the book! Thank you all!


Product Details

File Size: 787 KB
Print Length: 370 pages
Publisher: Susan Ward (May 13, 2014)
Sold by: Amazon Digital Services, Inc.
Language: English
ASIN: B00KBK4S98
Text-to-Speech: Enabled
X-Ray:
Not Enabled
Lending: Enabled
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #59,821 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)

http://www.amazon.com/Girl-Half-Shell-ebook/dp/B00KBK4S98/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1400081793&sr=1-2&keywords=the+girl+on+the+half+shell

I never really thought about self-publishing or ABNA contest(This is the one contest I would do. It's free. It helps with your Amazon sales and you get 50K prize a pretty good year's earnings for any writer!). I've never shared my work. I got the contest entry form by surprise, did it on a whim, crashed and burned in the pitch round. Then I started reading the threads and thought, why not self-publish?

The BETA reads was the hardest thing to get through and enormous thanks to Morgan, Jerrie, Kiss the Poet(Kathleen), Davonne Souza(fingers crossed for next round of contest) & Tracy Ball. Big thanks even to my BETA read who hated me(Name redacted). That was the most important read of all--it's when I knew I wasn't afraid to do this anyway.

My Amazon store front is a mess, my kindle and print book show up on different pages, I still haven't gotten my pricing thing right, I need to work on my author page, and the learning curve on this is enormous, but I move slowly, one step at a time.

Niche quote:"He who would learn to fly one day must first learn to walk and run and climb and dance; one cannot fly into flying. "

The Girl On The Half Shell (The Half Shell Series)

So, I decided to do what I always do: retain the information I thought worked with my strategy, shit-can the rest, and do things my way. I'm too old to chase elusive goals and believe in faery tales: Prince Charming(agent or publisher) isn't going to ride in and save Cinderella(my book) and we are not going to live happily every after( making gobs of money adored by thousands of readers worldwide!).

The day I spent my first dollar finishing my book, it moved from hobby list--climbing volcanoes and making lava rocks, riding in gondolas in Venice, insulting French shop owners in Paris, reading, dogs, horses and writing-- into my business enterprise lists. I've spent capital. Now it's a business. So, I made a business plan, set a development timeline, a milestone calendar, a budget and a marketing plan. Not sexy, not fun. Reality. If you spend money without the objective of getting it back, then you lose money. Who wants to chase a dream that bankrupts you? I write instinctively. I invest strategically. If I invested instinctively I'd be broke now. Don't want that. Too old to be broke!

I can't make rhyme or reason of what most Indie Authors are trying to accomplish. The author forums make me sad. In the threads there is always someone talking about how they have to make more money to write more and self-publish. There are lots of ideas and techniques to market books. I have yet to see an overall plan. They want agents or publishing contracts. Some think self-publishing will get them there. Some want literary validation: I won this award or that award. In reality, most of us are not writing literary fiction, our readers aren't going to care what awards and credentials we have. And darn, winning those awards cost money and I don't see a return. Unless, it's a Goodreads recommendation: that translates into exposure, readers, sales and profit. That one I understand. But the rest of them: totally don't get why authors want them.

You know that annoying girl you all went to school with? The one who always asked why? And when you answered she said, but why not this? Well, that's me and I'm pretty much hated on my authors forum. I approached it as a learning process, and part of learning is to question, challenge, think outside the box. That's how you develop a success business strategy: utilize the things you know, gather industry information, question why, think outside the box, and put it into a structure.  Alas, they don't like me.

Here's one of my why's: why is a publishing contract  or an agent a goal for anyone? Publishing is a declining industry. Self publishing is cheap and easy. There is no layer between me and my readers. I can take my passion(writing) turn it into a business and a brand, and make money. Where does the publisher fit in? I can do that myself.

But what I'm doing makes sense to me and it's part of my wheel house of experience and success. I did the real world market testing of my book because it was an essential part of achieving my next project milestone. My product(book) placement. The first placement of your work that readers are likely to see is your website. A million books are published each year. My book will be adrift in an enormous Amazon catalog. It's first meaningful placement is on my website, so I needed to know what would appeal to readers likely to purchase my work. The test marketing gave me the demographics of my best target markets. Knowing that, I created an online presence for my book series that is in line with expectation: Modern, clean, and really easy to find the buy button. My demographics doesn't want to spend time to spend money. So as I prepare to release my book and my business, I'm investing time in product placement. It's a lot of steps. Hopefully, they pay off.

HERE'S A SHOUT OUT TO INDIE AUTHORS DOING HORROR, PARANORMAL, FANTASY,EROTIC,  and all those other genres not likely to win a Pulitzer.  I have such respect for you. You seem to inherently get this. Because many of you are enthusiasts of your genre, you are a part of your genre and you make your online presence a total experience. These Indie authors are getting the hardest step right: product placement and branding, turned into a total reader experience!

Don't get me wrong: I would be thrilled to get a publishing contract(mostly because self-publishing is a lot of work and I'm old!), but I am amused at the threads I've been reading about how to sell yourself to a publisher or an agent. "I'd put my literary awards and why I'm qualified to write this book on my query. Oh, they want to know something about you..."

I know exactly how my meeting would go if I stepped through the door of a publisher's office and they asked me what qualified me to write this book and why should they want me? Simple answer: I've sold X number of books, with a product line of 26, My reader multiple purchase(how many different books by me they've bought) is X, my marketing budget is X, and I've made a profit of Y, and I get 50K hits a month on my websites. Oh, and you get me.

Never forget if you want a publishing contract, Publishing is a business! Never forget, once we've invested that capital that is so hard to earn, you are a business. It is so much easier to sell a successful business than an unproven product(your book) .

Tomorrow's blog post. You are a part of your product(your book). Why don't romance writers get that?

You've finished writing your novel. You're excited. You want to rush to release. I recommend slowing down...
I've written 26 books, but the book I've decided to be my first release is one I'm not exactly sure who my target market would be. It's romance, but not formula. I have edgy characters, an edgy storyline, and an unexpected end. Markets and trends are  living thing. They evolve. Who would my book appeal to? I wasn't sure.

Two of the industries I've worked in--garment and software--taught me long ago that you can never be sure who your consumers will be without testing your concept in the real world.

I went through the standard Indie author processes for book finalization: BETA reads and edit. I did not share my work with friends or family. I didn't want that input. I wanted blind input.  BETA reads and edit didn't get me to the information I wanted, so I added a 3rd step. Contained market testing.

My thoughts on BETA read: Here's a few thoughts on the BETA read. Other authors are wonderful and critical to the writing process. They are good at critiquing structure, plot development, and overall story. I've generally found that you cannot rely on them for thorough edit and a professional editor should be brought into the process. Even though my BETA readers are people unknown to me, they are authors. I was concerned that the critical review wouldn't be as thorough as need be. Really, being an author do you have it in you to be as harsh as you need be? And while I kept a log of the age-sex-education-geographic location of my BETA readers, I wanted reader information, to know what readers my work would appeal to.

I wanted to test the viability of this book before I released it. I invested two months finalizing, editing, formatting, uploading, and reviewing proof copies. During this time I also read the threads on the author's forum I participate in. I was hearing from lots of author upset with horrible reader reviews about: work not being polished; stories not well constructed. I was also hearing that, even though the author thought the reviews at time unfair, that there was no way to get an awful review from their Amazon page.

I didn't want to miss something critical in the development of this book and be saddled with an online review forever that would damage the overall brand of my book series.  Now, I know there will be bad reviews. There's no way to stop that as a writer, but I didn't want to invite them by creating a poor first release or  product. And I wanted to have an idea of where the market for my work really was so I could fully integrated my online presence in a way appealing for the market of my book.

In March when I started to test the formatting of my book, I got my first print version proof copy. I reviewed for errors, format changes, overall appearance. Once done, I had this proof. I paid $5 bucks for it. Not a lot of money, but it was time for my proof to go to work for me. I calculated that through the finalization process I would get probably 10 proofs before I was ready to release. It was time to use these proof copies in a contained way to figure out if the book was marketable and get a clearer idea of who my market was.

To get real world market testing is REALLY a simple thing. People want to help. You're working on finalizing your book. Why not work on understanding your market. So I turned each proof copy into what I call "sisterhood of the traveling book" sample tests. Each book I wrote a note inside: Dear Reader, I am market testing a new book line. You assistance in the development of this product is essential. Please read and send review to susan@email.com.[ I made unique emails for each book copy so I could chart its movement] Please share this book with a friend. The more input the better for this project.

I just handed the proofs to people while I was out in my ordinary day, showed them the note, they read and responded.
I kept a log of where each proof started its journey:location/first name/ approximate age/ sex/ education/economic status. Every first reader given a book responded. Not only did they email me, they were willing to engage in email correspondence so I could retrieve from them information necessary to determine my market and how to construct my online presence.

Some proof copies have gone on long journeys of reads. Others shorter journeys. But that helped me to refine my reader demographic. The proofs were just going to lay around my office. I had already invested the money. Why not put them out as samples for market testing. I can't get the same information about my readers from an Amazon review or on Wattpad or Goodreads. And I sure as heck can't engage them in meaningful dialogue to better refine my business and product.

And yes, once you decide to release a book, you are an author, but you're now are a business too! Is this the end all, be all of the market testing you should do? Of course not. Research, writer's groups, online forums all are essential. But it is a way to blind test a book, contain potential damage to your reputation, and to be able to engage in email exchanges with real world readers of your work. Your readers can teach you much on how to make your publishing endeavors profitable. Learn from them!

OK, now I know I am a newbie to self-publishing. This will be my first release. But I find that concept to be true: trust very few and follow your gut. Everyone has their own process to writing a book, finalizing a book, and marketing a book. Everyone thinks their way is correct.  In the real world, there  rarely is one path to success. I tested my concept on another writers blog and got poo-pooed. My methods are so not how Indie author's do things.

I decided to follow my gut and my own knowledge base. I've spent 30 years in product design, development, market concept testing, marketing and reaching consumers, from industries ranging from sportswear to software. During the 3 months I invested post completion of my novel with BETA reads and editing, uploading and proofing, I invested time into making the product(yes that's how I think of my book) the best product I can make and market testing it. Why?

Simple, one of my favorite axioms: You only get one chance to make a first impression. Indie authors often release work that isn't finished and then are shocked when their reviews come in and are bad. The time to finalize the product is before you hit that release button. The time to test and fix it is before it goes on sale. I tried Wattpad and some other online things, but what I really wanted was a low cost real world type of product testing.

In every industry I've ever worked in, releasing samples to consumers was a way to test a product and contain brand damage. Control the group you release to, you contain injury to your first impression to your readers. You have an ability to fix or adjust the product before it goes live. Lots of indie authors fix and adjust their product after it goes live. But it seemed to me that damages your reputation with readers and it's harder to fix that.  I wanted a nice test sample, in different demographic areas:  minimum of  200 reads of my book. I didn't want it to cost a lot. I wanted to get blind sample testing feed back.

I got more than  275 reads in 60 days. I received blind sample feedback. I have a mailing list for  the second book of my series. I'm a little more confident that my book(product) is in ready for release shape.  And it cost me  $50.00. So, here's how I did it.

I utilized a 3 step process to test my book before I released it. It's based on 2 axioms and one of my favorite quotes:

1. You only get one chance to make a first impression
2. It's harder for people to say no to your face
3. "I've always depended on the kindness of strangers."--A Streetcar Named Desire.

So, my blog entry tomorrow will be "how to put the time you use finalizing your book for release" to work, utilizing the basic concept of sample testing. Oh, and without spending a lot of money to get useful results!

I don't know if I'm a good writer. This will be my first release. But I do know, I'm an excellent business woman!