Amazon Mum On Authors Fears of Book Sales Skimming

Posted on October 16, 2012 by Emily Hill

A canned reply is all that Amazon brass is handing the literary community on why thousands of high-performing authors book-sales dashboards have frozen.

In the past month over 22,000 Amazon.com eBook authors have scrambled to the giant online retailer’s kdp Amazon Community Board to catch up on complaints about the appearance of lost book sales on the part of this Global Goliath.

Visit https://kdp.amazon.com/community/forum.jspa?forumID=7 for details. (Are Your Sales Figures Updating Normally Now?)

Note: With a fresh dialogue thread started on this same ON-going problem on 23 October at https://kdp.amazon.com/community/thread.jspa?threadID=50498&tstart=0

“My sales figures screen has frozen,” has become a common complaint among thousands of independent authors who have flocked to Amazon’s book distribution platform in search of an explanation of sudden, and dramatic, lost revenue.

According to Emily Hill, owner of A.V. Harrison Publishing, “The most recent glitch in sales reporting seems to have begun on 14 September.”

On that date, Tasha Harrison posted this message, which has received 22,635 viewings:
“When the reports glitch happened 2 weeks ago, my sales figures froze for several days. Before this, my novel Package Deal (which I uploaded to Amazon back in February) had grown steadily to sell about 5 copies a day.

Since my sales figures started updating again, I’ve only been selling about 1.5 copies a day. I emailed KDP about the problem who apologised for the glitch and said they were still working to fix things. Then I emailed again yesterday, asking when, roughly, could I expect to see my figures return to normal, and they replied saying everything was now fixed and my sales figures were already back to normal.

… is anyone else experiencing a similar problem?”

Ms. Harrison’s query out to colleague authors started an avalanche of sympathy messages and an outpouring of the retelling of similar experiences from the IndieAuthor community.

“Usually authors keep their royalty figures under their hat and take it on the chin if book sales plummet. In this case, authors are screaming for an explanation, and the silence from Amazon has been tomb-like,” observed Emily Hill, who writes about the after-life.

Ms. Hill contacted kdp Amazon yesterday asking for an explanation of why her sales dashboard had frozen, but her Amazon Rank was climbing. “I did receive a response to my query from kdp Amazon rather quickly. The Amazon representative responded that there was no problem – everything checked out. Although immediately after my query, my Author Ranking dropped 21,000 points,“ she added.

Ms. Hill has had been in contact with several authors whom she knows personally who have experienced an inexplicable drop in sales. One California high-performing author who contacted Ms. Hill has sold twenty-five books a day over the past year. This prolific author’s sales have dropped to ten books a day since 14 September. An author from Australia reports to A.V. Harrison Publishing that she usually sells thirty copies a month of her leading book, but that her book-sales dashboard indicates only two book sales this month. “In both cases, that’s quite a drop. Especially in the case of these two well know authors, whose marketing experience is extensive.”

Ms. Hill is collecting similar stories of affected Amazon authors at her Facebook site, go to https://www.facebook.com/pages/AV-Harrison-Publishing/166115093450329?ref=hl for updates.

She offered these personal statistics in her curiosity over her own frozen US book-sales dashboard:

“ Yes, my US sales (usually over 200 a month, has been frozen for four days – since I ran a KDP freebie last Friday) ~ I usually sell at LEAST four times as many books in the UK, but this month, thus far, I’ve sold 8 (eight).

Although my weekend news release has enjoyed 802 hits in TWO days, it has resulted in no sales. Visit http://www.prlog.org/11999016-seventh-haunted-house-located-by-seattle-author-this-one-in-the-wallingford-district.html for details. My Facebook fan weekly total-reach for the past TWO days has been 572, although that reach resulted in no sales. I use Twitter extensively and my TweetReach hits 7,984 Tweeters with an ‘impressions’ range of 109,000 but, according to kdp Amazon, there have been no sales to record on my US dashboard.”

If you would like to comment on this blog, you may contact Emily Hill at info@avharrison-publishing.com

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Selling Your Books From the Back of a Car?

Posted on October 10, 2012 by Emily Hill

Self-Publishing For Smart Cookies ~ Available on Amazon

As most of you know, I attended the City of Edmonds ‘Write on the Sound’ conference this past weekend. I hugged, hung out, gossiped, and giggled. I can’t think of any annual event I enjoy more than ‘Write on the Sound’ (WOTS).

Carla Neggers was the keynote speaker for this year’s session – strike that! – Carla Neggers was the stand-up comic for this year’s session. Lordy, is she funny!! East Coast funny, there’s a difference.

For my supernatural predilections there was also Neil McNeill – and for my ‘How the heck do I sell my new paperback?’ questions there was Shari Storm, a Hometown Edmonds Gal, and author of “Motherhood is the new MBA”.

Oh. My. Goodness! The back row was in rare form for Shari’s presentation. I sat with Raymond Hutson, physician and writer from Spokane, and Janette Turner, feature writer for My Edmonds News. While Shari spoke we all sat up and took copious notes. What Shari had to say about closing-the-sale on one’s book grabbed my attention and spun me around.

Backstory: Shari’s first title, “Motherhood is the new MBA” both earned out, and sold out on its first run of 5,000 books. Knowing that she had many more miles to go with her Motherhood = MBA message Shari made a deal with St. Martins Press to self-purchase 2,000 copies of her title at $5.00 each in order to continue up the road to success. (Yes, you’ve done the math if you realize that she spent $10,000 to ‘invest’ in herself.)

With her self-purchase of Motherhood = MBA she became ‘near-Indie’, except, of course, that she had the experience gained from her publishing contract and ties with an agent.

Here’s where the clever part comes in. When Shari realized that she would be selling 2,000 books basically from the trunk of her car she was clever enough to make friends with the folks at https://squareup.com. Check it out! If you have an iPhone you’re an instant Visa (or other plastic) merchant! Cool, huh?

Would I do it? For $.03 (three cents) on my Ten Dollar ‘The Ghost Chaser’s Daughter’ paperback I can sell my newest scare tactic at conferences, book club meetings, ghost tours – Anywhere! And you can sell YOUR paperback book in the same manner. Why miss that ‘in-the-moment-magic’ when someone realizes they are talking to you – an author?! (I think my editor would frown on the question mark paired with the exclamation mark.)

Every month there is a new innovation being shared, a fresh platform that makes ease-of-publishing the standard. I think that I am going to grab one of those little ‘SquareUps’ and apply the A.V. Harrison Publishing motto, “Taking Traditional Publishing Into the Future” – with a little help from my (new) friends.

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A.V. Harrison Gives Adobe’s ‘InDesign’ a Shot

Posted on September 22, 2012 by Emily Hill

How Dachshunds Came To Be Book Cover

NEWS RELEASE ~ 21 SEPTEMBER 2012

How Dachshunds Came To Be: A Tall Tale About a Short Long Dog, was released by A.V. Harrison Publishing of Edmonds, Washington this week.

Written by Kizzie Elizabeth Jones, and illustrated by Scott Ward, the new book is intended to foster “The values of honoring community and diversity, and working in collaboration”, according to its author, a resident of Edmonds, Washington.

“The 30-page book-delight reached Top Twenty ranking in Amazon’s eBook market by Day Two of its release. Calibrated hourly Amazon bases its book rankings on sales, a book’s favorable reviews, and traffic being driven by well-wishers to an author’s book pages on Amazon, demonstrated by ‘Likes’ campaigns,” says publishing consultant, Emily Hill. Hill adds, “we were proud to have the opportunity to add ‘How Dachshunds Came To Be’ to the line up of books available from our micro publishing house.”

Visit http://www.amazon.com/How-Dachshunds-Came-Be-About/dp/1479280755/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1348234462&sr=1-2&keywords=how+dachshunds+came+to+be for details.

The full-color fable was designed by Kathi Humphries Design & New Media, of Seattle, using InDesign technology, one of the newest innovations in publishing. Introduced quietly to the publishing world thirteen months ago, InDesign is a software program used for page layout and page elements.

Emily Hill describes the process used, “For ‘How Dachshunds Came To Be: A Tall Tale About A Short Long Dog’ thusly: The designer, Humphries, layered the story-line written by author, Jones, onto the breathtaking illustrations of Scott Ward, adding creative and colorful font designs to advance the warm-hearted fable.”

InDesign software allows creative font styling to complement breathtaking illustrations never before seen in eBook publishing.

“The result was a seamless panorama of sparkling color, dancing fonts, with a read-again story line,” continues the publisher.

“How Dachshunds Came To Be” is available in both soft cover and eBook formats. ‘Because InDesign (for eBook publishing) has not been out of beta-testing for very long there were challenges in producing the Kindle edition of the title,” admits Emily Hill. “By contrast, the soft cover publishing process was flawless!”

“And, it’s the perfect size for a child’s hands. We designed the book at
8.5” x 8.5” and were delighted when we previewed the galley proofs,” said Emily Hill. The publisher touted the book’s dimension by adding that size was considered because it is so ‘packable’ for backpacks, visits to Grandma’s house, and airplane travel.

“How Dachshunds Came To Be: A Tall Tale About A Short Long Dog” is intended for dachshund lovers, dog owners, children building friendships, families considering adding a pet to their family, as well as public and school librarians, counselors and those in the ministry. The book is available through Amazon’s extended distribution channels under ISBN 978-1479280759.

It is made available, by Amazon, to the United States book market, as well as the UK, Germany, Spain, France, and India (through Junglee.com) markets.

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“The Ghost Chaser’s Daughter” Supernatural, With A Dash of Depravity.

Posted on September 4, 2012 by Emily Hill
The Ghost Chaser's Daughter ~ Amazon

‘The Ghost Chaser’s Daughter’ eBook 5-story collection NOW AVAILABLE! Amazon.com

A.V. Harrison Publishing is pleased to announce the release of The Ghost Chaser’s Daughter, by Emily Hill. This is Ms. Hill’s fifth title written for fans of the supernatural, and folklore. She has written eight books in total, including her debut novel, Jenkins: Confederate Blockade Runner.

For inspiration for her supernatural series Ms. Hill draws on the writing of Patricia Highsmith and Alfred Hitchcock. For inclusion in the eBook edition of The Ghost Chaser’s Daughter, the author has selected five short stories. The expanded paperback edition of The Ghost Chaser’s Daughter represents a compilation of all of the author’s short story offerings. The following stories (which are new to Ms. Hill’s readers) are included in the eBook edition of The Ghost Chaser’s Daughter.

Checkmate! How feverishly brutal can one marriage become? Charles and Clare, an elderly Seattle couple, provide us with the answer to this riddle in Checkmate! Charles, with his failing eyesight and frustrating deafness parses with Clare, his beauty-queen wife of past, as she plots her escape from the richly appointed manor which has become her prison. Checkmate! When is a marriage worth more than a thirty-six dollar check, but less than a successful chess move?

Lightning Strikes. Poor Dennis Sheridan, Florida-native. Considering what he has been through he does not need a suspicious officer of the law on his doorstep asking about his wife of twenty-eight years; particularly as he brushes the dirt from her grave off of his hands.

To Kill Ivan Gorsky. Written as a salute to the Hungarian revolution attempt of October 1956. Who is Ivan Gorsky and why would even angels want him dead? Tour the Budapest Opera House and spend the night in the company of this Russian intelligence agent as he faces performance hall angels, and his own devils. You’ll soon see why the mission was always, To Kill Ivan Gorsky.

Chunya And The Hungarian. Witch. “Oh! She’s so ugly!” And, at this exclamation from neighbors, the new mother beamed at her newborn daughter. Learn why – from the beginning of all folklore and legends – little girls from the Hungarian village of ́Opusztaszer are so. . . “Chunya!”

Ms. Hill is a proponent of global marketing, and as such, makes The Ghost Chaser’s Daughter available to readers in the UK, and India. UK readers can find her stories available at the following website:

UK readers may visit http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Ghost-Chasers-Daughter-ebook/dp/B0094JJ388/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1346758546&sr=1-1 for details.

French Translations: Asked what is next for the prolific writer, Ms. Hill responds, “I am looking forward to having my Amazon Kindle best-selling mysticism title, Ghost Stories And The Unexplained: Book One translated for the French-speaking book market.” A.V. Harrison Publishing has hired Catherine Bedeski, Seattle translator, to work with Ms. Hill on her latest project.

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Saying Farewell to Hungary

Posted on August 29, 2012 by Emily Hill
Victorious Hungary

Victorious Hungary

What a beautiful country. . .Hungary! Within three days my husband, ‘The Maestro’, and I will be leaving on a jet plane for a four-city stop on our way home from one of the most extraordinary travel experiences of our lives.

Hungary – and Budapest! – is nothing like I expected; and everything I hoped for. Our bank warned us against fraud and the black market, our travel friends warned against pick pockets and gypsies. Nothing! Nothing could be further from the truth about my Hungarian experience.

From our very first moment in Budapest every Hungarian we met, socialized with, made friends with, did commerce with kept their promises, laughed heartily, made friends easily and credited their homeland by knowing Hungarian history and honoring its future.

Hungary is a country of vibrant color – the reds of paprika, the whites of billowy clouds, and the greens of fresh-cut grass in the countryside. Everything holds promise for a bright future for this bread-basket country. The music! Literary arts! New business! International relations! Hungarian music is as traditional as it is cutting-edge.

Among the young people I met, Hona David was exceptional.

https://www.youtube.com/user/honadav?feature=results_main

A Hungarian rapper, and member of the Championship water polo team, David is stunning on a rap stage. Hungarian is a lyrical language and rap stars take on the personae of ‘Godfather-styled’ gangsters. I sat next to David (a tall, lanky gentleman) at a dinner party and was so taken by this young man who smiles so easily and expects so much of himself.

Book news? There was plenty! I hope to one day represent author Lakatos, Levente – the author of ‘Love Club’ as the breadth of his titles cross the Atlantic. Meeting over coffee a couple weeks ago we (and two of our mutual friends) discussed the very real possibilities of bringing ‘Leve’s’ writing to the Kindle market. A journalist by trade, Levente has begun a series of spine-tingling intrigue – and he’s one author I know I will NOT have to beg to do marketing! His sincerity, and that of his colleagues, is heart-warming.

http://olvasas-dina.blogspot.hu/2012/08/lakatos-levente-loveclub.html

New business is thriving in Hungary, no more so that in Budapest where I watched as a young woman in my neighborhood opened her second Budapest restaurant. Hungarians have a ‘The future couldn’t be brighter!’ attitude that drives them forward. So! Now with Dobozka Deli ‘Little Boxes’ open for business at 14 Raday Utca, ‘The Maestro’ is relieved from cooking while we defrost the refrigerator and pare down our food stocks.

http://www.facebook.com/DobozkaCsomagoljMagadnakEbedet

Having ‘Little Boxes’ next door for take out gives me a ‘hopping downstairs’ reason to get away from books, books, books. But Hungarians, I’ve found, are as eager to make friends of those across the ocean as those in the neighborhoods. International commerce and international relations are an integral part of the psyche of young Hungarians. I’ve made the acquaintance to the most humorous, prankster of an architect while in Budapest. Fun, laughter-filled, language-play awaits you if you are adventurous and smart enough to choose Hungary as a European get-away.

During our last days in Budapest, we took an admonishment in stride and went to visit the House of Terror museum at 60 Andrassy Utca. This is the location of hundreds of murders, and thousands of bone-crushing torture sessions during the paranoid and brutal Nazi and Communist regimes that enslaved the Hungarian people. The location has become a testament to the resilience and glory of all that is Hungarian. In spite of its ~fifty years of dark-days oppression, Hungary pushes its children forward, and honors its ancestors, with the realization of its strength of character, and humanity. We survived! Is their national cry. Rightly so, theirs is the pride that includes flag-furling national vanity during the Olympics, and appropriately placed anticipation when the Nobel Prizes are announced. Hungarians are among the innovators, inventors, and leaders in The Arts. In general terms, they are prideful, without being boastful; make their point using entendre, not volume; laugh often, and make friends easily. Here’s ‘A Toast’ to Hungary!

So, fare well Hungary! And, Thank you! I couldn’t have had a nicer time.

********
This blog post is dedicated to my adopted-niece, AnnaMaria Winters, whose family lives on the Hungarian-Romanian border.

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A.V. Harrison Publishing To Offer French Translations

Posted on August 26, 2012 by Emily Hill

A.V. Harrison Publishing is pleased to announce its upcoming entry into Amazon’s French translation market. This business-forward move is made in association with French-English translator, Catherine Bedeski, who has joined the Edmonds, Washington micro-publisher as a consultant.

Catherine Bedeski is a professional editor and translator in English, French, Japanese and Chinese with over ten years experience. She lives in Seattle, Washington.

Ms. Bedeski has lived in many different places including Canada, Taiwan, Japan, and the US. She was born into a multi-lingual household, and grew up with both English and Mandarin Chinese. She attended French schools between the ages of three and nine, while living in beautiful Ottawa, Canada. She studied French throughout her academic career. Catherine also lived and attended elementary school in Japan when she was twelve years old. Catherine earned an MBA from the University of Victoria, in Victoria, Canada. Catherine loves traveling and exploring different countries, especially those countries that put her language skills to good use.

The first title that will be released in French by A.V. Harrison Publishing is Ghost Stories And The Unexplained: Book One. This title, which originally released in the United States and the United Kingdom during the Halloween 2011 season, has maintained a Top Ten rank in Amazon’s ‘Mysticism and Folklore’ category of books every weekend since publishing.

In testing the French-language ghost stories market Emily Hill, owner of A.V. Harrison Publishing states, “My mantra this past year has been, write locally, market globally. This move to French translations fits perfectly with my passion to move forward in publishing as a futurist. And, I see a bright future for publishing to a global market.”

Ms. Hill continued with a discussion of what she sees as a stumbling block for authors who might not realize ‘the bigger picture – the global picture’. “I see too many emerging authors, and struggling book marketers, beating themselves up to get a local bookstore signing, when the global market is gobbling up books like crazy right now. The same amount of time it takes trying to convince a bookstore owner that your independently published book is worthy of their shelf space could be put to much more effective use marketing to the British, German, Italian, and Spanish markets.”

In making her point regarding the promise of a global book market Ms. Hill references Amazon’s announcement that it is expanding its book market in India by making the Kindle available to avid readers in that country. “Amazon has made print books available to the India market through its Junglee.com shopping service for several years. Making ebooks available to the India market was simply a matter-of-time issue that came to fruition this week. I’ve been waiting for the formal announcement for weeks after noticing signals on my Amazon Author Central dashboard.”

A.V. Harrison Publishing expects to continue to monitor global market opportunities and will expand its global ventures after the release of its French translation by Catherine Bedeski who promises, of Ghost Stories And The Unexplained: Book One, “This is my first, but quite possibly not my last, French translation of ghost stories.”

A.V. Harrison Publishing to Offer French Translations

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News. Flash. Ready to Welcome The India eReader Crowd?

Posted on August 23, 2012 by Emily Hill

Self-Publishing For Smart Cookies ~ Kindle and Nook

Dateline: 12:50PM – Thursday, 23 August
BUDAPEST, HUNGARY

This news is WAY TO IMPORTANT – and exciting – for me to stay in ‘Vacation’ mode.

This morning trend watchers in the publishing sector were treated to the break-out news that Amazon has opened its Kindle market to consumers in India. India! An English-speaking country! Get It? Connecting the dots? Got eBooks you’re trying to sell?

Amazon was wise enough to purchase, in 1998, Junglee which became (certainly by 2010) the India arm of Amazon’s book selling business. However, Junglee.com only sold soft cover books – until . . . soon!

About six months ago I noticed a reference to Amazon’s book market in India and followed a series of links to Junglee.com.

I found that the on-line book store had available for sale ‘Jenkins: Confederate Blockade Runner’. Not many India residents are taking an interest in America’s Civil War – but I was heartened to know that there would be one more hard market for my soft cover books. So I set to work:

http://www.junglee.com/Self-Publishing-Smart-Cookies-Emily-Hill/dp/1469968959/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1345717852&sr=8-1

My Civil War novel doesn’t have much appeal in the India market, and my self-publishing guide is not written with the-man-on-the-street in mind. But, how about ghost stories! So the concept of offering my eBook ghost stories series in soft cover format was developed. Titled, ‘The Ghost Chaser’s Daughter’, and timed for a Halloween 2012 release, my first soft cover book in two years will soon be available in the USA, UK, Italy, German, Spain. . . and India.

Then, as I was updating my ghost stories in eBook format this past week, I noticed an interesting ‘thing’. Amazon’s kdp dashboard was offering an option for eBook pricing to the India market with royalties paid through kdp Amazon USA. I immediately checked the ‘I’m in!!’ box. So at that point I was just waiting for the announcement that Amazon was expanding its turn-the-pages book market to the eReader market and getting its inventory ready for the expansion.

TaDa! The NEWS was announced by www.engadget.com this morning with this headline:

“Amazon Launches India Kindle Store, swap rupees for Good Reads”

http://www.engadget.com/2012/08/22/amazon-launches-india-kindle-store

Now, if you’re following my advice you are ‘writing locally – and marketing globally’. That is, you attend your local writer’s workshops, and conferences, but sell to the global market! Your Twitter posts should POINT TO your Amazon books that are in soft cover format in EACH country they are available – including Junglee.com [India]. And each of your eBooks should NOW be designated on your kdp Amazon author’s pricing dashboard for the India market! It goes without saying that your Twitter posts should already be pointing to your Amazon UK, Amazon Italy, Amazon Spain, Amazon Germany, and Amazon USA product pages.

So, what are you waiting for? A new global sector just opened up! eBooks in India! Get going!

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Gifts, GiveAways, and Games and How They Sell Books

Posted on June 12, 2012 by Emily Hill

Self-Publishing For Smart Cookies ~ Kindle and Nook

It seems that I am seeing more and more blog posts about ‘engaging’ one’s readers and TweetMates. Make true friendships. ‘Encouraging customer loyalty’ is what authors should be engaged in as they construct their platform veteran book marketers advise. “Be pithy!” “Show a little of your personal side!” ”Keep your readers entertained, have fun, and realize that a deep, loyal following is better than a shallow, broad following.” My advice? ENJOY the people you are writing for! Being an author is a whole lot more fun if you look forward to checking in on, engaging, and trading jokes with readers.

I can tell a writer who is inexperienced in building on-line relationships from a veteran author by the volume of their ‘Buy my books!’ pitch. An emerging author usually screams one sole frantic message, the more experienced author is actually engaging their readership. Then, of course, there is the mute author, oh well.

So how do I build fun into my social media friendships? Simple! With Gifts, GiveAways, and Games. The point isn’t to employ these three concepts so that I get an immediate book sale. The point is to employ these three concepts so that I make a long-term friendship with someone who will take an interest in each of the books I write.

Here is how Gifts, GiveAways, and Games are managed – the Smart Cookie way:

Gifts
Of course you’re going to want to take advantage of Amazon’s ‘Give As A Gift’ option! When one of your books go live “Tag it!” and “Bag it!” A book will not sell to the general window-shopping public without a ‘tag’. (Yet I see so, so many books that are not tagged – and haven’t been for months.*) Once you tag your new release, bag your new release.

My book designer, Kathi Humphries, always gets a hot-off-the-press copy of my books. So does my editor, Gretchen Houser, and anyone else who has cheered me on (Dorothy Beecher, for instance), or helped me along the way. My gift copies are purchase-timed for the first two days of my book’s release. I budget ten to twelve gift copies into my marketing budget (fifteen dollars for this line item).

Additionally, you will want to gift a book to anyone on your ‘book reviewer’ list.

GiveAways
Do you use ‘Free Day’ Kindle Select to give away your books? I’ll bet you generate some pretty impressive numbers while shouting ‘Free!’ ‘Free!’ You realize, of course, that there is absolutely no way to track-back individual-book-grabbers for (1) book reviews, (2) a Facebook ‘Like’, or (3) any other spin-off benefit a reader might give an author, right? Why not? Because those wholesale ‘My eBook is free!’ kdp Select exercises are designed to be totally anonymous. Bets on that you never, ever, hear back from even one per cent of those folks who grabbed your wares. Say that you give away 1,000 ebooks on a kdp Select ‘free’ day. I’d be surprised if you net even ten ‘Likes’ and/or worthy book reviews. Although you do risk 1-star reviews – I’ve been there! (The chutzpah of someone who grabs a free book and then 1-stars the author astounds me.)

Instead, why not target who you volume-give your books to? If I ask my 320 Facebook friends + 2500 Twitter contacts if they would like a free eBook and one per cent of them say ‘Yes!’ I know exactly who I am giving my books to because they forward their eMail addresses so that I can fill-in the Amazon ‘gift’ template. I then have their eMail address for down-the-road book release announcements; I can ask for discrete feedback and also ask for ‘Likes’ (if not a supportive review).

Wholesale giveaway are like letting the horses out of the barn. Once they’re galloping away, rounding them up again can be pretty wearisome. One might hope that readers of free books will refer their friends to one’s work – but most of these readers are deal-chasers. And they don’t owe you anything because you haven’t taken the opportunity to pre-Ask them for anything.

My opinion: kdp Select (now that I’ve tried it) does a whole lot for Amazon and Amazon/Kindle readers, and not much for the author.

Games
Yes, I use games to engage my readers – in the way of contests, quizzes, and surveys. If you go to my ‘Ghost Chaser’s Daughter’ webpage http://www.emilyhillwriter.com/ghost_hunters_page.html you will see how I employ quizzes fashioned by BookBuzzr/Freado’s marketing team and surveys from SurveyMonkey and ProProfessor. On Facebook I use the ‘Ask a Question’ feature to get feedback on book cover design and pre-release aspects of my books.

Readers want fun! They want an escape into another world! They are smart and they want their smarts tested! You can banter your posts on Facebook and Twitter, but mix it up, Smarty! Try games for those spells in between book releases!

I recently produced two YouTube book trailers to boost interest in ‘Ghost Stories From Beyond The Grave’, each one with slight variations from the other. What’s more fun than a ‘Compare the Differences’ contest? Entrants sent me an eMail contrasting the two book trailers, vying to win a $20 Amazon gift card emblazoned with my company logo. I received the usual one per cent interest for my efforts (23 people responded to my contest) and the avid reader who won the gift card is my totally Fave Follower – Dorothy Beecher! She’s such a favorite of mine that I dedicated my most recent eBook to her. Think about THAT!

Gifts, GiveAways, and Games can be your recipe for building an audience that looks forward to the fun of hearing from you – and isn’t that what you want, Smart Cookie?
~~~~~~~

*Books with no tags at blog time: ‘Hammy’ by Kiraya Kestin; ‘Noon Moon’ and ‘The Shores of Tomorrow’ by Mark Vincenti; ‘Continuous’ by Dee Brierly-Jones and on, and on.

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Star Charting Your Way to A Best-Seller!

Posted on May 26, 2012 by Emily Hill

TOP TEN ~ BEST SELLER

Occasionally I am asked ‘What does it take to get an eBook into the Kindle Top Ten?

This collection of Stars put ‘Ghost Stories and The Unexplained: Book One’ over the top — for seven months running — This collection PLUS (1) Goodreads, (2) BookBuzzr (3) Self Publishing Review, the information from various blogs and, of course, my own blog entries.

Wishing you The Best of Literary Success! ~Emily~

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Are You Sizing Up The Competition . . . In Order to Become The Competition?

Posted on May 25, 2012 by Emily Hill

Self-Publishing For Smart Cookies ~ Kindle and Nook

Let’s say that you are an author who is about to self-publish. You’ve worked long and hard on the manuscript that you are about to upload to Amazon and Barnes & Noble, am I right? You yearn for recognition and a respectable level of financial success from your efforts. . . again, am I right?

Are you aware there is one element that is going to stand in the way of your achieving your goal of being a richly rewarded, highly recognized author?

What is that one element? The Competition.

Have you been examining new titles that are releasing in your genre as you nudge your manuscript down the publication assembly line? Do you track the pricing, the design, and the product promotion pages of your fellow authors?

If so, possibly we have noticed the same thing: Over the past year the competition, even in the world of self-publishing, for best-in-show for newly released books is getting pretty stiff. Of course one expects quality and top-drawer presentation and promotion from Hachette, St. Martins and the other Big Six publishing houses, whose customary charge for an eBook is $12.99. But increasingly even the $3.99 indie-authored books are looking pretty spiffy! You see fewer and fewer text-box cover design, typos, grammatical errors – slush pile quality is melting away. But, why is that?

Where did this season’s authors learn the maxim that in order to grab the limelight one needs at least (a) knock ‘em dead designs, (b) classic-quality reading experiences, and (c) loyalty to following? I’ll tell you. . . these authors learned it from the publishing houses that formerly distributed their work! Hundreds, if not thousands, of various-sized publishing houses have gone out of business in the past two years, leaving agency-represented authors whose ambitions are to continue publishing one option: To ‘Go Indie!’ . . . of course, while keeping an eye on legacy publishing opportunities.

If you think that the competition for your piece of the $3.99 royalty split is coming from a founding member of Self-Publishing Review or The Starved Writer – think again. Not only are authors who are no longer contracted to publishers crossing over to self publishing; but many experienced, sophisticated authors – with agency and publishing house background – have decided to try their hand at publishing independently. Barry Eisler, Nathan Bransford, Lisa Gardner, Kevin Myers, Nancy Naigle, and most recently Jacqueline Collins are leading thousands of former publishing-house-authors to Amazon, with its 70% royalty rate.

You don’t think these publishing-trade experienced authors are cutting and pasting their book covers, do you? Or using clip-art to sell their wares? They most certainly are not foregoing peer review, editors, and book designers. Hop on over to Amazon Books and peruse the book designs – do the sharpest designs have the highest rankings? How many clip art book designs are in ANY genre’s Top Ten?

I wager that the new ‘volume-sales model’ will be ebooks that sell NOT because they are free (and/or $.99) but sell because they are the smartest, sexiest looking product! Remember: Self-Publishing does not mean DIY! Self-Publishing means smart design, smart product, smart publishing decisions.

Here are my tips: Start your book marketing – horn blowing, making new friends – six months before your book is published; Invest in a book cover designer; Have your work peer-reviewed; Hire/barter with an editor who is NOT someone you sleep next to; Plan out your next three books and your next 10,000 words.

Pay attention to the competition – in fact, why not. . .BECOME the competition? Smart design, smart product, smart publishing decisions make long-term authors.

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