Marketing and Promotion

So, I finished my book, had my edits, made my revisions, found a cover image, and uploaded everything successfully to where it needed to go. Now, comes the dreaded next part. Marketing and Promotion.

I hate this. I really do. Because I don't know how to do it. I spent years learning how to format correctly (hell, I spent YEARS just learning how to use WORD.) For my Regency romances I had a small following, so that when the next book came out, I really didn't do much except announce the book on the blog, once or twice on Twitter, and voila, sales.

However, trying to gain traction as a "new" author is a little daunting. I had thought about publishing this new book under my Anne Gallagher name, but if I did, then I'd lose the few reviews I'd garnered on REMEMBERING YOU. I didn't want to do that.

Believe it or not, I have a marketing plan in place. I've been thinking of this for several months. Problem is, I don't know if it'll work. And you say, "Go ahead, try it. You won't know if it succeeds until you do." I know that. But...what if it doesn't?

When I'm cooking for a large crowd, I like to use my tried and true recipes. That way I won't mess up and everyone will say, "Oh, that was so good."

I'm kind of feeling that same way with this new book. I don't want to try anything new, afraid that people will say, "Oh, that just sucked." Or worse, I've just spammed them to death. I love Twitter, but it's just so full of crap these days, I don't want to be "one of those people".

Right now the book is up on Amazon for 99 cents until Christmas. I'm hoping some people will buy it and write a few reviews before I change the price. I'm also going to post some excerpts on the Robynne Rand blog and link those to Twitter. If you'd like a copy, I have epub, mobi files, and PDF that I can send you. If you'd like to write a review for Goodreads, that would be swell. If not, that's okay too.

Ads are not my thing, so that's out. I'm still unsure whether or not to do a FaceBook page. However, a friend said that the demographic I'm trying to reach is on FaceBook, so...we'll see.


Tell me -- What do you do for marketing and promotion? Any tried and true tricks? Any advice? Please share.

Anne Gallagher (c) 2015

The Phenomenon of Bad Reviews and Being Number One

And first, let me just say, this is NOT an April Fool's joke.

Last week, I mentioned in my post on Responding to a Negative Review about this crazy phenomenon that is happening. Because of my bad review, I decided to check out other books in my genre and price range. And what I found is mind blowing. (And this is only on Amazon.)

Now, I have a couple of novellas that are priced at 99 cents. I also have one at $1.29, and one at $1.49. I like to stagger them this way because, well, I do. Stores use this tactic all the time. They lure you in with the cheap, then offer you another item at a slightly higher price. Then they give you the big gun at the even higher price. I call this Good, Better, Best.

Anyway, because of my bad review, I went searching to see if this reviewer had left other reviews on other books. (And no, my reviewer was not listed among any of these bad reviews.) However, in the midst of my searching I nearly had a heart attack. Because what I found time after time was that the books with the most bad reviews were ranking in the top 10. Which means they had more sales.

WTF? No seriously. W.T.F.?

Nearly every single book in the top 20 of my genre (Regency romance) in the short story category were these books with sometimes 10 or 12 bad reviews. And they were selling a lot. (You can tell how they're selling by the rank in which they hold, right under the product description.)

#607, #1,235, #58, #362. In order to have numbers like that, you have to at least, AT LEAST sell around 40-50 copies per day.

My rankings are no where near that. I hover generally, between the 25,000 - 70,000 mark. Which is good. On really good days, I get back into the teens. And I can honestly say, I don't usually go over the 100K threshold. So I'm lucky.

But after reading all this, and all the reviews, I couldn't help wonder what it was that made these books sell. ALL of the reviews, ALL OF THE REVIEWS, on ALL of the books I looked at (25 at least)  were written by different people, but they all said the same thing -- bad editing, typos, crazy plot, bad characters, no research -- so my question was, why did they bother to read them? (And those that had a single five star, you know were written by the author's mother or BFF.)

I'm likening this phenomenon to a bad car crash. You know, you're cruising down the highway at 70mph and then BLAM, cops everywhere, you have to slow down, and as you drive by the wreck, you can't help but look.

So all these readers decided they HAD to read the book to see if it really was as bad as the first reviewer said it was? And this in turn prompted them to write a bad review? And so on and so forth.

There is this little thing on every book called "Look Inside". It gives you a preview of what the first few pages look like. Allows you to make an informed decision on whether or not you'll like it and then buy it. So these people just didn't do that? Or they did and bought the book anyway?

What is up with that? Do these people have money to burn? Or are they trolls? (You know those parasitic reviewers who are actually authors out to trash other authors in their genre.)

However, even still, it doesn't account for the ranking. Obviously, someone, actually a LOT of someones are buying those books and reading them. And the more people who buy them, cause that author to move up in rank, and the higher in rank you are, the more exposure you get. The more exposure you get, the more money you make.

I don't get it. I really don't. I bust my ass (as you saw last week) to put out a quality product to entice readers to read my stuff. I price my books accordingly. I think I'm fair. I have a Good, Better, Best attitude. I strive to make my books the best that they can be. So why am I not in the top 20? Hell, why am I not even in the top 100?

And you know, I won't even get into the discussion on the covers of these books either. They were all "hand-made" and some were just plain awful. What is up with THAT? I'm no cover expert, but I designed my covers with a particular idea in mind. I don't do my own, I have an awesome designer, but I have done covers for other people, and I know how to do lay-out and composition. And the stuff I do produce isn't "professional" (there's a subtle art to design) but the covers I do make don't look "home-made". Let's call them "semi" professional. (If I had the right program I could make them even better.) But that's neither here nor there.

The only way I think I can wrap my head around all this is that, when you're on a book page, there is the scroll of "People Who Bought This, Also Bought..." with page after page of other books. Amazon makes it easy to click and buy, so perhaps these other people were duped into buying. I don't know.

So, in summing this all up, what I've found (in my genre anyway) is that it doesn't really matter what you write. Someone, somewhere is going to buy your book. Even if it's bad. Even if the cover is lousy. Even if all your reviews are 1 star. And you will become the next #1 bestseller.

Makes me wonder if I made a mistake taking the time to rewrite my novellas. Makes me really think of chucking every thing I know about writing out the window, and writing a bad book. Just to see what happens. A kind of social experiment maybe. Who knows, maybe I'll make it to #1. (Wouldn't that be really something?)

So how about you? Do you bother to read a book with more than 2 bad reviews? Or are you in the rubbernecking category? Do you "Look Inside" before you buy?

Anne Gallagher (c) 2013

Responding to a Negative Review

Okay, if you've self-published, we've all heard, NEVER EVER respond to a negative review. And as someone who's gotten more than her fair share, I never did. I was lucky enough to get reviews in the first place so I just figured any review was better than none. And it's true for the most part. People who buy books, look at reviews as a gauge. First it's the reviews, then it's the price.* (more on this phenomenon next week, because it's a fascinating topic.)

A couple of weeks ago, I received a review that was more like a rant and picked apart every single thing I did wrong in my stories. Now, I don't claim to be the next Jane Austen, and my critique partners don't read Regency romance (except mine and I like it that way) so the things the reviewer picked apart were - I hate to admit - dead on.

(Truthfully, this review had my blood pressure through the roof because she also claimed I didn't do enough research. OMG this tore me up inside. I have spent countless hours on research.)

These were not editing mistakes, or typos, or formatting, these mistakes were within the context of the story that Regency writers should know. (Which I did, but chose to ignore because, well, actually there are too many excuses to list. Suffice it to say, I wanted to write my books MY way and not be like everybody else.) Which I will never do again.

That being said, I decided to tackle the monumental task of rewriting all of my novellas. It's not so much using "find and replace", it's the task of rereading every single word and changing what needs to be changed. I spent three 12-hour days doing this. Because as you know, once you revise, then you have to republish.

(And if you want to know what's actually involved in that enterprise, take a look at my Anne Gallagher blog, because I've spelled it out quite concisely. For those of you who are thinking about self-publishing, you might want to read this because it will tell you that you really really really need to make sure you have an excellent copy to publish on the first go-round.)

For those of you who have a publisher behind you, you know what it means to have copy edits and galleys, and other revisions you need to do to get the book perfect before anyone sees a word of it. For a self-publisher (on a budget) I rely on my critique partners. I have one for grammar and punctuation, one for overall story content, and one I rely on as a copy editor. As I have stated, they are totally made of awesome and I wouldn't change them for the world.

Anyway, I revised all the stories. Then I republished them. Then I wrote a disclaimer and tacked that up front and center on my Amazon author page as well as the book pages and into every single book I revised.

To My Readers ~

In writing any kind of book, research is needed. In writing an historical romance novel, research is critical. In all my books, I have done exhaustive study into the era known as the Regency Period. I strive to make the historical facts I intersperse throughout my stories interesting for you. That I sometimes take liberties with those facts is my right as an author, because, after all, this is fiction.

That said, I do not hold strictly to the more formal aspect of addressing titled characters with their proper designation. Nor do I firmly adhere to other elements of the period – clothing, food, rank, or architecture. For some purists of the genre, they find this unacceptable. I find it makes for easier reading. However, I try to keep as much to the era as possible.

My books are meant to entertain and written with that purpose in mind. I hope you like them for what they are – and what they are intended to be. An enjoyable diversion from your everyday lives.

Now, because I thought this was kind of a drastic measure, (this review was hurting my sales, and no one is going to mess with my sales) I wrote to one of the leading professionals in the business to see if this was a stupid idea or not. She said it was a ballsy move, but thought it might work. "Try it and see what happens" was the response. (I also spoke with a few other friends and they agreed.) What could it hurt.

I also decided to "comment" to the reviewer and tell her what I'd done. Another thing you should NEVER EVER do. And she responded kindly, and said that she didn't mean to rant about it, but it was driving her crazy. Which, when I read some big authors out of New York, the stuff they throw in their books makes me fling them across the room. So I know how she feels.

I'm trying my best to put out a quality product. That said, in this new publishing world, with the ability to revise and republish, hey why not. New readers come along every single day. And if I can snag a few more fans, then 36 hours work to rewrite them is a drop in the bucket.

And some of you may ask, "Well, why didn't you put out a quality product in the FIRST place?" And my answer is -- I thought I had. I don't know about you, but after reading a manuscript 10,000 times, the only thing I want to do when I get it back from my critters is make the changes and upload it. I'm sick of looking at it and I want to move on.

When I first saw this review, I thought seriously (for about an hour) to write to you all and ask for your help, either writing your own reviews and posting them, or clicking on the "does this review help you" button at the bottom of the review and saying no. But that's just childish. I mean, yeah, this review was devastating, but I'm not in high school anymore. I can fight my own battles.

Now, I also know, what I've done might not help you. Some people are going to leave bad reviews no matter what you write. One 2 star reviewer of mine insisted I wasn't anything like Mary Balogh. Yeah, and? I'm not her and don't write like her, nor will I ever write like her. I'm me. Other 2 star reviewers have complained my novellas are too short, that they should be turned into novels. Uh, no. They're called novellas for a reason. And then I have the people who say "same old same old, boy meets girl, they fall in love, so what..." Makes me want to scream, "Well why did you buy it if you KNOW how it's going to end?" So, you have to take the good with the bad. But the upside to this post is, if I didn't respond to this reviewer, I never would have gotten the stories revised and who knows how many other readers I'd have lost because of a few simple mistakes.

So, the old "rule" of not responding to negative reviews, in my case anyway, worked. I think. I hope. I pray.

Tell me -- What do you do about negative reviews? Do you go back in and change your stories? Or do you just leave them the way they are and hope for the best -- because they're YOUR stories and no one is going to tell you how to write? (I dealt with this anguish as well. It was not pretty to admit I dropped the ball.)

Anne Gallagher (c) 2013

Reviews -- Not Just for Breakfast Anymore

Good Morning. I used to know a man, a college professor, who read book reviews every morning while he drank his coffee. I asked him once if he would ever read all those books. He said, "No, I don't generally read ANY of these books." And I asked, "Then why do you read the reviews?" His answer, "So I'm informed. When I'm out with friends and the discussion of books comes up, which it always invariably does, I can report what I've read and I don't feel stupid."

Once upon a time, in this man's world, that was the sentiment. EVERYONE read book reviews. If you made it to the TIMES, you were golden. Nowadays, even the TIMES won't necessarily warrant a best-seller list.

In today's world, one book review is worth a thousand of your friends talking about your book. In today's world, a good book review and a half dozen sales in one day on Amazon will shoot you up to #10 in a best-seller rank. Sometimes even allow you to get to #1.

However, in today's world, even if you wrote the best book in the whole world, and sold a zillion copies, if you don't have a review on Amazon, you end up languishing in publishing hell. Amazon has changed their algorithms yet again, and for all my ranking of #1 Sunday and Monday with the free promotion of REMEMBERING YOU, because I don't have any reviews, no matter how many copies I sell per day, I have no rank on any list. It's all gone. (As of this posting, I do have one review. And my rank has gone up.)


Before Amazon offered the KDP Select program, people who sold merely 5 copies a day of any book they had could shoot up the best seller lists like nobody's business. I did. I maintained several top ten lists for quite a few weeks, depending on how many copies were sold, and who else had copies sold on the same day.
Heady stuff for a newbie pub like me. Especially with no reviews.

However, with the advent of the KDP Select program all that changed. You could now offer books for free, and in a market filled with authors vying for all the attention they could muster for their books, free became the new black. People were downloading faster than you could say 50 Shades.

But in that gluttony, having a free book out there also brought the attention of those less-than-5 star reviews. Mean reviews, stupid reviews, I-hated-this-book reviews. (Amazon has since changed their view on book reviews and has been taking down the mean spirited ones.)

All that said, this monster called Amazon rules our world, whether we like it or not. It's the biggest and fastest way to get a book out there. More people use Amazon for books (reading or publishing) than any other venue out there.

And in doing so, book reviews are king if you want to get anywhere in publishing. Of course, there's a problem with all 5 star reviews (see Anne R. Allen's post). But one or two 2 stars in a pool of 4 and 5 stars isn't such a bad thing. I should know, I have my fair share across the board.

And I know how exciting and exhilerating it is to offer up your first book into this self-publishing world. Some of you have networks and friends and have all kinds of blogposts and hops and tours lined up. You have no problems getting reviews.

However this lesson is for those of you like me, who don't have that kind of network. Before you upload anything to anywhere, have a couple of reviews in place, ready to go before your launch. I know, I should have, but I didn't. (I tend to go off half-cocked when I'm excited.)

Ask your mother, your friends, your Aunt Alice, the librarian in your hometown. And you know, those people who say those reviews don't count? Well, guess what, they do now. If you want to get anywhere on Amazon, you need a review. And hey, just one counts too. It's all about the rank. No, it's not about sales, it's about your ranking. And one review, even a 3 star will get you ranking on some list.

Tell me -- Do you write reviews of books you like? How about books you don't? Do you write reviews for friends? If not to any of those questions, why not?