How to Push Your Book Without Pushing Your Book?

The tricky part of long form (e.g., Substack) marketing is to disguise the fact that you're marketing. I'm terrible at it. I understand that an author wants to go for the "soft sell"; intrigue the reader; not hit them over the head with a blatant ad, but how? I've got a Substack account that I rarely use; initially I thought it would house my newsletter, but it was far too cumbersome and confusing, so I switched over to MailerLite. (Now I no longer send a newsletter.) Thus, my Substack is mostly forgotten. There's also the blog feature on Goodreads, which again goes neglected unless I'm pushing a new work. I suppose an author newsletter falls into the long form advertising category as well. 

So, I have three avenues available to me and not a clue how to utilize them. I suppose these options scream out for "behind the scenes" content, but what would that be? Specifically, what about the back story would be interesting to potential readers? The makeup of my novel is really only interesting to me ~ how the Paula Barnes character came to life (it was by accident), why Leah suddenly fell for her guitar player (uh, because it just seemed like a natural progression?). Nothing in this novel was planned. Well, I was busy writing along and the words just fell onto the screen. Oh, okay. Thanks for sharing.

I'm a big fan of this book, but it's hard to infect others with that enthusiasm. And that would be the goal, after all. The soft sell.

I love the series Mad Men, mostly for its retro vibe, but frankly, the ads the characters create are pretty lame. Yet we are supposed to believe they're a mark of creative genius. See? Even Don Draper rarely got it right, so how can I?

It's not that I don't enjoy ruminating on writing, but that's because I'm a writer. It would be like listening to a plumber wax poetic about the different diameters of pipe. It's fascinating to him, sure, but I just want my drain unclogged. Even he, though, would be better at talking a customer into the more expensive fixture, whereas I can't even get someone to shell out two bucks for an ebook.

Add to that dilemma the embarrassment factor. It's far easier to write a piece of fiction than it is to put myself and my inner thoughts out there. It's bad enough to over-share, but if I'm going to do it, it had better at least be interesting.

Since paid marketing hasn't worked for me, if I want to keep trying, I'll need to employ those other options. I've spent all I'm going to spend on useless advertising. 

I wonder if there's a book titled, "How To Be Fascinating". I'd even pay two dollars for it.

 

Surrender

I think I'm done. The sales of my new novel remain stuck at three after ten paid promotions, and I've done all I can do, short of buying Facebook ads, which seems at this point like just another losing proposition.

I've researched ways to promote women's fiction specifically, but my search didn't yield any results. Apparently, no one knows. It can't be that no one is buying it; some authors produce best sellers, plus a lot of movies are adapted from WF novels. It appears, however, that those best selling authors began their careers years ago, when trade publishing was the only way to go, whereas now I wouldn't say the market is flooded, but any tripe can be self-published. There's no longer any discernment.

I'm not claiming I don't have any responsibility in my novel's failure. I made a deliberate choice to include the word "Nashville" in my blurb, which is perhaps a turnoff, but I was determined not to mislead anyone. If a potential reader hates country music, I'd rather they know what the novel is about before they plunk down money for it. (And it's not as if the story itself is niche; country music is just the backdrop I chose.) 

My blurb could possibly be better. I can revisit it if I have the energy to do so, but blurbs are hard and I don't know if I can improve on it. It would likely turn out worse in the end.

But maybe there is no rational reason; maybe it's just a matter of luck, something I've never experienced. That hardly gives me anything to go on, sadly. Every problem should have a solution, but I can't come up with one for this problem, no matter how hard I try, and time is running out. If a book doesn't catch on right out of the gate, all hope is lost.

That thought is almost a relief. Once time runs out, I can stop thinking about it.

It'll soon be time to move on.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Briefly Considered an Audiobook

A few promo sites send out regular emails with links to articles pertaining to the writing/publishing process, and I usually scan those to find if any contain useful info. Yesterday there was an article about ElevenLabs and its audiobook capabilities. It uses AI voices, which I've always found to be less than desirable, but because I had nothing better to do, I auditioned its female voices. They're not bad at all. I isolated about ten that I would consider using. And overall, the pricing is not bad, although a bit confusing. One plan provides 500 minutes of narration per month, which according to Google equals roughly 65,000 spoken words, so I would need to double that in order to have my entire book narrated. But does one only get 500 minutes per month? And have to wait until the next month to continue? That said, even if I needed two months, my cost would only be $200.00, which is very cheap for audiobook narration.

Right now, though, it's all too confusing for my exhausted brain to decipher, and why, pray tell, should I even try to figure it out? I've already thrown too much money away. 

Having an audiobook would be "cool", just like having a paperback is cool, but there's really no point to either. These things, for me, are like pretending to be an author. Hey, I've got an audiobook, too! I must really be someone!

I've come to the conclusion that publishing is a money suck. Sure, the mechanics of publishing are free (at least the way I do it), but you've gotta compete if you want to play the game, and competing costs money. Money for advertising, money for various book formats, the psychic expense of degrading oneself to push your novel on social media. At this point, I've completely given up on trying to engage with people on social media; I've just posted my marketing material and clicked out of the app. 

So, while the "what ifs" are fun to contemplate, I'm not going to pursue the audiobook option. But for anyone who is, check out ElevenLabs. It does seem like a nice alternative to paying a voiceover artist thousands of dollars.

 

A Disappointing Week

I don't know; would ten copies be too much to ask? I wasn't expecting my book to set the world on fire, but I hoped for at least a middling result ~ not even middling; an "okay' result would suffice. I don't consider three copies sold to be okay.

I don't believe I did anything wrong. I marketed my novel the same as every other author markets a novel. I bought promos (albeit, I refused to spend $100.00 on any one ad), I pasted my wonderful review to my Amazon author page and to Goodreads. I linked to it on X and Facebook and LinkedIn. I created an Instagram story or whatever the hell it's called. I'm out of ideas. 

While I've still got seven promos yet to run, I'd be nuts to expect a different outcome. Maybe I'll just stop looking at my sales report.

The world is awash in spamsters (my original term). I received two instances of engagement ~ one via my website's contact form, from a guy named Willie, who really loves my book (that he hasn't read) and wants to be hired to promote it. It's "neat" how these people grab lines out of a book blurb and (in this case) an author's bio in order to flatter her into laying out more money. Does Willie not think I noticed that he referred to me as "growing up on the prairies of North Dakota"? I guess great minds think alike. A woman contacted me via one of the promo sites, and again, she loved my book (that she hasn't read) and offered me her services. My rule is, anyone who needs to solicit authors must be really bad at what they do.

I'm going to withhold my opinion regarding most promo sites for now, because it's pretty harsh. I'll wait until every promo runs its course. But the fact is, creative types are desperate to latch onto a dream, no matter how far-fetched that dream is; and that's where promo sites rope them in. I knew damn well when I was purchasing some of my ads that I was wasting my money, but I couldn't shake the "what if" question. What if this one actually works? It could happen. (It can't.)

I also take some responsibility for my failure. I refused to price my book at ninety-nine cents or free, but I also have a good rationalization for not doing so. Lots of people are quick to grab a deeply discounted book, but they never read it, much less leave a review. Where would that get me? And frankly, a sparkly new novel deserves respect. What I won't blame myself for is my self-designed book cover. It stands out; it looks great; far better than most professionally designed covers I see. My blurb? Maybe I could improve on it; maybe not, but it has an intriguing opening line. Other than practically (or literally) giving my book away, I did everything right.

There's nothing more I can do.

 

 

Book Promo Sites That Don't Work ~ A Running List

I want to say there's a reason why some promo sites are inexpensive, but that's not necessarily true. It's mostly true, but an author can also pay a pretty penny for an ad that also gets no results.

With my new novel I spread my meager advertising dollars around. I scoured lists of "best" promo sites, and if the price was right, I went for it. I also took into consideration audience size and whether a site had a women's fiction category. In sum, I did my research.

Rankings can be misleading, because they're dependent on genre. Some genres will do well, regardless. (I wish my marketing was that easy.) However, I think my overall results are pretty typical, and thus I'm starting a running list of the sites I've used and their outcomes. Because I scattered my marketing days, I've been able to get a true picture of how well or poorly those sites perform. 

Thus, my list of sites used, units sold, and purported ranking per "experts":

eReaderIQ ~ 0 (Weirdly, David Gaughran recommends this site, and I generally trust his advice. (B+ ranking)

It's Write Now ~ 0 (B- ranking)

BookRaid ~ 3 (not even ranked!)

Awesome Gang ~ 0 (A- ranking)

BookDoggy ~ 0 (C ranking, but it was cheap)

LitNuts ~ 0 (not ranked)

Discount Book Man ~ 0 (admittedly, not ranked high)

BookReader Magazine ~ 0 (not ranked)

AuthorsXP ~ 0 (B+ ranking)

LitRing ~ 0 (B- ranking)

 

No results yet: 

Fussy Librarian ~

The Kindle Book Review ~  (B+ ranking)

Book Goodies ~

Bargain Booksy ~

 

Other non-time-sensitive promos (which will be impossible to quantify results for):

onlinebookclub ~ (free, but simply a listing on its site)

Readers' Favorite ~ (free, but just a review "sometime")

Independent Book Review ~ (free; review only)

Book-Shelfie ~ (awesome reviews!)

AllAuthor ~ (featured for 6 months)

BookBuzzr ~ (lots of promises of results "per month")

I've used other recommendation lists besides the one I linked to, but I did lean heavily on that particular list.

As for social media, I haven't used it (either paid or simply "me". I did post my great review on Facebook and X, but I'm skeptical of social media's influence. Two of the paid sites I looked into seem to push the same three or four books continually, which tells me they don't get a lot of business. 

Truthfully, I wasn't expecting much in the way of results, which is the correct mindset for marketing. But perhaps future promos will prove me wrong.

 

 

 

 

Not a Runaway Bestseller

I knew it wouldn't happen, but there's always that little spark of hope delusion. One morning I would pull up my sales report and find out that my novel had taken off. I had no plan as to how that would happen; just miraculously, I guess.

I've invested far too much in an illusion, but I had to at least try. I had to expend some effort. With no marketing my book would sit there on Amazon's shelf, lonely; an orphan. It's not that I don't understand the game ~ discount your book, or better yet, make it free, and your sales report will be overflowing. Except a brand new release deserves to be more than a throwaway freebie. Did I really pour my heart into this novel just to say, "Ehh. It's not worth anything"? I'm not a romance author who can pump out two novels a week. All told, Running From Herself took about a year just to write the first draft. And it's not paint-by-numbers. It's a full-bodied story.

Regardless, I've only managed to sell three copies. Don't get me wrong; three is better than zero, and I've "only" run four promos so far. But Book Raid was my biggie, and now it's done. (I have a very firm suspicion that my three sales came from them.) That means I can stop holding my breath. I've gotten all I'm going to get. 

My takeaway from marketing is that it produces no more than no marketing. As an example, I never marketed Find My Way Home at all and I still sold eight copies. I could buy the most expensive promos out there and still do worse than if I'd bought none. I could say that's a good lesson for the future, except there is no future, which is the primary reason I went as far as I could with promoting this book. 

I've got eight more promos to go, and the majority of them are minor players in the marketing game. After this week, I'll shelve my dream and move on.

I doubt that I'll ever make this novel free. What does that get me? Freebie hogs who load up their Kindles with a hundred free books, but never read them? No, I want to be read. It's either be read or nothing.

 

Just as I Suspected

Yesterday's promos started off with a bang. My reports show zero sales and zero KENP reads. For some reason, David Gaughran recommends eReaderIQ, but it certainly did nothing for me. It's Write Now is pretty low-rent, so I expected nothing from that site. I suppose one has to start somewhere. 

I won't keep throwing good money after bad, so I will soon exhaust all my promo options (the ones I can afford), and I'll retain my record of being the worst-selling author in history. 

Sure, a price point of $2.99 is high in comparison to other books being offered on these sites, but on the other hand, my writing is better. Of course, no one will know that if they are reluctant to hand over a whole $3.00 to find out. I don't know; what benefit is there for me to practically give away my book? Would I feel better if I discounted it to ninety-nine cents and still no one bought it? There's something to be said for pride. 

I've scoured reviews of promo sites, and the opinions are all over the place. Some people swear by one, while others say it's a complete waste of time. Even "professional" rankings are unreliable. Some that get an "A" rating I've used before, and they were duds. Even BookBub gets mixed reviews from authors, and my experience with them hardly met my expectations, given how it's supposedly the best site out there. 

I think the supply of books exceeds the demand. Millions of authors are out there pushing their work, and if one writes in a genre that's not in high demand, advertising is basically a lost cause. 

I'm not going to take it personally. My one big push is this week, and then it will be over. Maybe one day I'll get up the nerve to buy a Facebook ad, which (again) is supposed to really, really work. (I'm skeptical.) Other than that, sure, I'll dump my book in the bargain bin at some point. What else am I to do with it?