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My Struggle-Not to Be Confused With Mein Kamph 8/27/2005 11:20:31 AM
The following are a few observations I've made as a first-time author. I will venture to guess that well over ninety percent of the authors signed up for Authors Den membership have done so in the hope that he or she will further their book sales, or at the very least, make those who surf cyberspace aware of who they are and what they have created. I know I certainly fall into this category. My first novel, Reunions, was published in March, 2005, by a POD outfit known as Outskirts Press, located just outside of Denver.
Way back in my high school days in the 1970's I was told by teachers and counselors alike that my ability to express myself on paper was far above average. Those achievement tests we took, filling in oval-shaped markings with our Number 2 pencils, revealed that I was a free spirited person with an untapped potential for creativity. Around a decade or so before, I first saw the Beatles on the Ed Sullivan Show and for the time being decided to pursue the dream of becoming a rock and roll star. I didn't get my first guitar until I was around fifteen, and as a result, when my teachers were praising my writing ability, I was focused on putting together a band that would rival the likes of Kiss,Ted Nugent, Led Zeppelin, and the Rolling Stones. I had long, scraggly hair, which my dad described as resembling that of a witch. In those days the selection and fit of contact lenses was much more limited, and my eyes would become bloodshot within a couple of hours of putting them in. Add to this a slow, deliberate speaking voice undoubtedly inherited from my parents' Oklahoma upbringing, and what you had was a teenager that everybody assumed was perpetually stoned. I freely admit that I closely resembled Sean Penn's character in Fast Times at Ridgemont High. Over the next thirty years I dabbled in writing from time to time, never pursuing it seriously. By the time I was around thirty, I finally conceded that I was not going to retire comfortably on a musician's income. I never got past playing covers in dumpy bars, and quite frankly most musicians don't. In the fifteen or so years that I actively played, I estimate that I made perhaps $10,000.
I still have my guitar and amp, but it has been stored in a closet for the most part since Bill Clinton was President. I rekindled another interest of mine, Volkswagen cars, at the beginning of this century, and in 2002, joined a local Volkswagen Club. I made many new friends quickly and to this day enjoy the camaraderie. The club has a monthly Newsletter, and one day, about a year and a half ago, I decided on a whim to contribute an article. The Club officers were so impressed with the piece I wrote that soon afterwards, I became the main writer. I continue to hold this position today. The compliments and positive feedback I received from club members inspired me to take the advice of my mentors from three decades ago, and I quickly finished Reunions, having started it some three years before, and had it published.
I was a greenhorn to the whole business of writing and publishing. But what I learned quickly was that 98-99% of authors that submitted manuscripts to conventional publishing companies were rejected, and of those lucky 1-2% that were accepted, 70% would lose money. I was forty-five years old. The contact lenses had been replaced with bifocals some four years hence, and I wasn't about to spend the next fifteen or twenty years collecting rejection letters. I wanted to become a published author, and right now. My reasoning was simple. I would be farther ahead than a rejected author, even if I sold only one book. I also reasoned that a Print-on-Demand publisher made more sense than going with a printer that required a large minimum order of books, most of which would probably collect dust in my garage, not to mention the cost to aquire the aforementioned collection in the first place. The main drawback to choosing POD publishing is the negative perception among already established authors, conventional publishers, editors, reviewers, and physical bookstores that anybody with money can have a book published. This much is true. Just as a lousy rock band with the right software can make a CD, certainly a lousy writer can pay someone to publish his or her book. This creates a paradox of sorts. POD is often the only way for an aspiring author to make the transition to being a published author. There are thousands of talented writers who would otherwise never have a chance at seeing their work in print. I have read excerpts from many others' books published through the POD outfit I chose, and there is talented writing in abundance. I firmly believe that POD publishing is the wave of the future. It is still in its infancy, but as more of the population logs onto the Internet, the perceptions of this type of publishing will eventually shift and the discrimination will cease. There is an increasing number of authors who have enjoyed success despite employing this method of publishing.
I confess, however, to wishing I could contact them to unravel the secrets to selling books. I have slowly learned what works and what doesn't. The biggest mistake I have made with my first effort at a novel is failing to pinpoint my audience before releasing the book. It is a work of fiction, and in being so, I assumed that everybody reads fiction, regardless of genre. I also assumed that by being listed on bookstore websites such as Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Borders, etc., the book would sell itself. I chose a low 20% retail margin and therefore a low retail price under the guise that nobody would want to pay seventeen or eighteen dollars for a book by an unknown author. As a consequence, no brick and mortar bookstore will give me the time of day. Another potentially fatal mistake was to go with one of the POD publisher's generic covers as opposed to a unique custom design. It has been said that a book cannot be judged by its cover, but try telling that to the average consumer.
My book, Reunions, although officially published in March, wasn't released until April, and so I had no First Quarter sales. I sold a whopping 3 books online during the Second Quarter, and 31 on my own as of this blog. A sane person would perhaps cut their losses, say "to hell with it," and pursue a different career. There's one problem. I love to write, and I look at my disappointing first effort as a learning experience. I am still quite clueless when it comes to marketing, but I have nevertheless learned a bit of what works and what won't. One of the first sites I looked into was Marketability.com. Some of their advice has helped, and some is completely infeasible. The helpful hints I've utilized have resulted in more hits to my site here on Authors Den. I've written some pieces for EZine articles.com and linked them to Authors Den. I also have a tendency to receive more hits each time I write a blog such as this. Whether or not these have resulted in increased sales remains to be seen, but at least more people out there are finding out who I am. I also am hopeful in my belief that, just as someone such as a hairstylist needs time to build a customer base, so it is with a first time author. With that in mind, I fully expect to lose money on my first book, and thus far, I am meeting those expectations quite well...............
Here are some of what I believe to be totally useless suggestions from Marketability.com, in fact so much so that they border on insulting the intelligence. One of the first things I read from them is that the "typical" marketing budget for a book should be between $10,000-$20,000. Are they out of their mind? I struggled to spend $399 to publish my book, let alone ten or twenty grand! Should I become the next Stephen King or Dean Koontz, then we'll talk about spending $20,000........... Another suggestion they came up with was to make yourself available for radio and TV interviews. First of all, if you read above, my speaking voice leaves a lot to be desired, and although thirty years have passed since I took on a resemblance to Sean Penn in Fast Times at Ridgemont High, and with perhaps the exception of no longer referring to others as, "dude," I still talk the same way. Secondly, I have a sneaking suspicion that Oprah isn't going to surf Authors Den and pick me out of the blue for a phone call. I would be lucky to get a slot on my local Public Access station that nobody watches, let alone national TV. Get real! They also suggest attending Book Fairs and Seminars two thousand miles across the country with about two weeks' notice. What I'd like to know is if these events are included in the $20,000 marketing budget...Sheesh! Another worthless marketing ploy is "pay-per-click" advertising. With a book royalty of $1.24, mathematical projections have revealed that I would end up spending around twenty times what I would net.
Reunions is a fast-paced story of a man who discovers a previously unknown past through visions in the early stages of sleep. What he finds directly affects his future. With the exception of one person who simply "couldn't get into the story," my book has been well received by those who have bought it. My second novel is in the works, tentatively titled, Silent Sanctuary, a story of a persecuted middle school student injured in a motorcycle accident who goes into a coma. While in the coma, he experiences an existence where the past and present are juxtaposed in a very unusual fashion. When he comes out of the coma, his personality has been totally transformed. Look for it in early 2006. Whew! This blog gave me typer's cramp!
