Is this a horrible time to be a writer?

[Moejoe]

Originally Posted by ficbot

Fwiw my dad has written a non-fiction book and he told me that in the first year, he sold 500 copies of it---and his publisher was very happy with this result and considered the book a success.

I had someone tell me that they resented being told they were greedy for expecting a greater slice of the pie of their own book. I responded that I absolutely did not think they were greedy---but I did think they were being perhaps a bit unrealistic if they truly thought they could pay their bills off a handful of indie books. I think the real threat is not piracy, it's that not enough people read very seriously. Part of that is competition from other forms of media part of it is that it's a much larger time commitment. Even someone who reads one book a month (which is a lot, comparatively) is only looking at a dozen books a year...

I'd love to see something on Smashwords (for example) where every author who uploads a book is given a screen of choices---check up to 3 boxes for genre, up to three boxes for mood, up to 3 boxes for best adjective to describe your book etc. And people could run a search for things like 'mystery AND humour' or 'paranormal AND NOT vampire' to see various choices. It would help readers find new authors and books they might enjoy.

That system exists on Feedbooks by way of 'tags' and 'categories'. Shame everyone goes on about Smashwords when Feedbooks is so much better.

Here are the tags/categories of one of my favourite indie authors, Moxie Mezcal.

Categorie(s): Fiction, Technological, Thrillers, Literary, Mystery & Detective, Occult, Psychological, Suspense, Visionary & Metaphysical

Tags: symbolism, abstract, Magic, mystic, surreal, Sex, gender, alienation, reporter, journalism, Identity, dot-com, ceo, technology, Corporate, noir, pulp, postmodern, thriller, murder, mystery

[jaxx6166]

Originally Posted by Moejoe

That system exists on Feedbooks by way of 'tags' and 'categories'. Shame everyone goes on about Smashwords when Feedbooks is so much better.

You know, I tried playing around on Feedbooks and found it really difficult to navigate. Maybe they've updated things since then. But, I think the whole "tag" system was what turned me off. I think I just wanted to search for like epic fantasy and found everything from erotic fiction to comic books.

I've also played around on Smashwords and found it too fat to be healthy. Seriously, the server was so overloaded that it took 10 minutes to browse the categories.

[Moejoe]

Originally Posted by jaxx6166

You know, I tried playing around on Feedbooks and found it really difficult to navigate. Maybe they've updated things since then. But, I think the whole "tag" system was what turned me off. I think I just wanted to search for like epic fantasy and found everything from erotic fiction to comic books.

I've also played around on Smashwords and found it too fat to be healthy. Seriously, the server was so overloaded that it took 10 minutes to browse the categories.

Erotic fantasy comic books, can't go wrong with that, surely?. Personally, I don't use excessive tags on my own publications, just Short Story and Creative Commons. But the tags system has become much more robust and usable on Feedbooks of late. Worth another go at any rate.

[pricecw]

Originally Posted by Scott Nicholson

I've made all my books DRM-free at Amazon (except one that accidentally went through automatically before I understood what it was). I trust my readers and respect their right to be able to move the work between different devices. I give away quite a bit of stuff and throw articles and blog posts and fiction samples all over the Internet. I give and I get back. To me, it's all about community.

I foresee a day soon when ebooks are valueless of themselves--writers will need to make their money through ads and sponsorships and donations and other means yet devised. I'm not worried a bit. This gig has never been easy, and life has never accommodated writers. Readers win this round.

Scott

I hadn't heard of your books before, and went to check them out. The rundown and reviews of the first one seems interesting, but I could only find it on Amazon, not using the kindle, and having no desire to use kindle software on other platforms (I prefer something like epub that is handled in my readers native format), I am locked out of your books as effectively as with DRM.

I think this is another learning to be had for authors. Every time you make a choice to limit your work to a format, and not all of the main formats, you will lose potential customers.

For me, you broke the big barrier, I have now heard of you, and you broke the second barrier, your book looks somewhat interesting, and I feel I might enjoy it, but then I hit the one where I can't read it. I won't look for a torrent of it, it isn't worth the time, just end up not reading it.

--Carl

[dadioflex]

Edit.

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by NickSpalding

Can it ever truly be someone's motivation for writing?

I'd find it hard to maintain enthusiasm over the course of 80,000 words, if all I was thinking about was how many Aston Martin's I could buy at the end of it.

True story: Astrid Anderson had a school assignment involving a science fiction book, with the goal of "explain why the writer wrote this story."

She turned in a one-line answer: He wrote it for the money.

Teacher gave her an "F."

She returned the next day with a note from her father, Poul Anderson, saying, "I wrote that book because Astrid needed braces that year."

[jaxx6166]

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

True story: Astrid Anderson had a school assignment involving a science fiction book, with the goal of "explain why the writer wrote this story."

She turned in a one-line answer: He wrote it for the money.

Teacher gave her an "F."

She returned the next day with a note from her father, Poul Anderson, saying, "I wrote that book because Astrid needed braces that year."

Thanks Elfwreck. I love hearing that one.

[DaringNovelist]

Originally Posted by starrigger

Amazon is both a blessing and a curse to the midlist author. The availability of used books is great for readers, and for making it easier for new people to give your stuff a try. But it has killed the reprint market. And for books that are in print, it cuts into new book sales. It's hard to say whether the benefits outweigh the costs.

Honestly, it seemed to me the reprint market started drying up LONG before Amazon. It seemed to me that when they added used books, I saw more people getting their old books revived than I had before - they had proof of an audience.

But I suppose it's a cycle anyway. And certainly not nearly as much as we'd like to see.

Camille

[Steven Lake]

Originally Posted by Lemurion

I haven't read every post in this thread, but I have an answer to the original post:

I've been a major SF fan for over thirty years: I've read every issue of Astounding(Analog), Galaxy, and Worlds of If published in the fifties. Ive been to conventions, I've even shown up in costume.

Before I joined MR, I had never heard of Steve Jordan. That's a much bigger problem than piracy. No one is going to buy a book if they don't know it exists. Once that's solved, then we can worry about piracy.

OMG, give this guy a Nobel or something. Steve, I understand your frustration, but I think Lemurion is right. Your issue isn't how good your stuff is, or piracy, or anything even remotely like that. Your problem is lack of exposure. Yes, I realize that you're doing the digital only thing. That's fine, as I'm doing digital marketing as well. However, you need to get out to these big cons and show yourself off, including your books, your skills, get to know your fans, meet people and make new fans, etc.

I've actually found that my popularity has exploded since starting to do cons vs when I was doing digital only. Yes, everything helps, and digital marketing is no exception. But there's also a LOT of people, and I do mean a LOT, who want a hands on, tactile author to interact with. In some cases the only way you're going to reach certain groups of people is if you sit down and do physical signings and physical books and get them into the hands of people.

Yes, again, I know you're an all digital guy, but ~70% of the book buying public is still into dead tree novels. Why do you think I invest so much energy into printing and distributing them? Because they sell, and they sell in considerable numbers. Right now I'd say that my print book sales outnumber my digital sales 100 to 1, and not because I haven't been doing digital marketing and stuff. It's because only about 1 in every 100 people I encounter actually want digital copies. The rest want physical paperbacks.

Now once I get a slightly better market penetration on ebooks that number might change, but I don't see it changing *that* much. Especially since the book market is something like 70% dead tree books vs 30% digital, and I'm likely being generous on the digital books, since I've seen the figures as high as 95%-5% paper to digital. So expand your horizons, try other avenues, explore paper books, and go to conventions and signings for crying out loud. You may not like it, but by golly it's one of the most awesome ways I've actually found to market books. If you need help getting a good list of shows to go to, just pm me and I'll give you a list of the ones I've already lined up.

[pietvo]

Originally Posted by Steven Lake

OMG, give this guy a Nobel or something. Steve, I understand your frustration, but I think Lemurion is right. Your issue isn't how good your stuff is, or piracy, or anything even remotely like that. Your problem is lack of exposure. Yes, I realize that you're doing the digital only thing. That's fine, as I'm doing digital marketing as well. However, you need to get out to these big cons and show yourself off, including your books, your skills, get to know your fans, meet people and make new fans, etc.

His problem might well be that he doesn't have fans.

Originally Posted by Steven Lake

Yes, again, I know you're an all digital guy, but ~70% of the book buying public is still into dead tree novels. Why do you think I invest so much energy into printing and distributing them? Because they sell, and they sell in considerable numbers. Right now I'd say that my print book sales outnumber my digital sales 100 to 1, and not because I haven't been doing digital marketing and stuff. It's because only about 1 in every 100 people I encounter actually want digital copies. The rest want physical paperbacks.

70%?? I would rather think it's more in the neighbourhood of 95% that still buys pbooks only. And of the remaining 5% some also buy pbooks. The people that are ebook only are a tiny minority. That looks more in line with your 1:100.

Now getting a publisher interested in producing a print run may not be easy. But if he wants to do it all himself he could start with POD, for example at lulu.

[Steven Lake]

Originally Posted by pietvo

His problem might well be that he doesn't have fans.

Well, if that's true, then that's a lack of marketing on his part. Or possibly a lack of proper marketing.

70%?? I would rather think it's more in the neighbourhood of 95% that still buys pbooks only. And of the remaining 5% some also buy pbooks. The people that are ebook only are a tiny minority. That looks more in line with your 1:100.

Exactly. As I said, I've seen surveys and studies quoting numbers between that 70/30 number, and 95/5. But it wouldn't be at all hard to believe that 95/5 would in fact be the more correct number. But either way, that's water under the bridge compared to the more detrimental number of readers vs non-readers these days. That's a ratio that's disturbingly going in the wrong direction, with the number of people who no longer read increasingly regularly.

But with that aside, of the readers who are out there, even if the 70/30 number is accurate, Steve Jordan has limited himself too severely by doing *only* ebooks. I'm not saying he should abandon ebooks in the slightest. But he most definitely needs to move to offering his books in dead tree format (aka print format) and pushing them at shows, conventions, signings, etc. He could advertise on the radio (be aware that you had better have print books on hand, and quite a considerable quantity at that, because you'll get mobbed the day the ad comes out), put up a billboard (not quite as bad a mobbing, but you still get hammered), take out a newspaper, web, or tv ad (much lower return on these, but you do get some, but the exposure rate needs to be much higher), or any of a variety of other things.

98% of being known and selling your books is marketing. The less you're known, the worse you'll do. And yes, marketing is a royal PITA, as I speak from personal experience, but it's necessary. No publisher, no matter how good, is going to be able to get you the same level of exposure you can get yourself. I've seen guys who write complete crap sell millions of copies of their books. Why? Excellent marketing, exposure, and face time with fans. So if an author who writes complete crap can hit it big, what does that say to someone who's good who uses the same system, and goes out and does the same marketing? Well, if experience is any clue, their novel should easily sell 10-20 times more copies.

Failure to market, or improper marketing is the single biggest reason authors fail. Well, in most cases anyways. There is always a niche for every book, even if it sucks completely. I say, if you're really serious about getting your books into the public, and you suck at marketing, then *HIRE SOMEONE*. Tell them what you want, have them interview you to get an idea of what your book is and where it should go, and where you'd like to go, take whatever advice they give you for changes or suggestions, and then run with it. Either way, to go back to the original starting topic of this thread, it's not piracy or "theft of rights" that's the issue here. It's failure to market, and failure to give the reader (who is also your customer) what they want.

Take a lesson from the failings of the music industry. Don't treat your customers like dirt and/or criminals. Treat them like you'd treat your best friend, or your mom, or your most beloved person. You wouldn't stab your mom in the back, would you? (if you would, you've got issues) So listen to their wishes, and then grant them to the best of your ability. Do that (as well as the other suggestions above) and success will find you, rather than you finding success.

Now getting a publisher interested in producing a print run may not be easy. But if he wants to do it all himself he could start with POD, for example at lulu.

Well, if he's self published, I actually have a better idea. Lulu is fine, but if he's already got the ISBN for his book, and the copyright, he doesn't need Lulu. All he needs is a local printing company who does perfect bound books, an EAN number (you can get that from any of several different software packages available out there), insertion into Bowker, and submission to Ingram or any of the other major book distribution networks. If he can't get those on his own, then yes, he'll need to go with a publishing house that can. And if he needs to, I'd recommend using my publisher, 2 Moon Press. They'll gladly take guys who are already published and help them get everything they need to be successful.

[Worldwalker]

Originally Posted by Steven Lake

And if he needs to, I'd recommend suing my publisher, 2 Moon Press.

I'm pretty sure that's not what you meant to say.

[Joebill]

I have seen a number of authors at the local sf convention.

A few old time authors came by, we kinda expected them to wear suit and tie part of the time.

But most of the new young authors dressed casually and sold books in the merchant room.

One guy never seemed to sell much, he wore an expensive, well it looked like it cost around $200 dollars, suit and he sold few books.

Most who go to that convention wear jeans. Nice, clean, untorn jeans would have been good for him, but with that suit, he seemed out of place. More a bank president than an author.

So paying attention to what is worn by the other authors and the convention members is always a good idea.

[DaringNovelist]

Originally Posted by Joebill

I have seen a number of authors at the local sf convention. ....

One guy never seemed to sell much, he wore an expensive, well it looked like it cost around $200 dollars, suit and he sold few books.

Well, if he wanted to go formal at an sf convention these days, he should have worn a top hat. (Steam punk rules!)

Speaking of authors who are unprepared for what they experience on SF conventions - I just jumped over and saw that "Bimbos of the Death Sun" is available on Kindle!
http://www.amazon.com/Bimbos-Death-S...dp/B000FA5QSG/

(It's a mystery about a poor academic whose publisher forced that awful title on his serious speculative fiction book, and sent him to a convention where he has to solve the mystery of the murder of the con's writer guest of honor. It's most fun for people who know what cons are like - or were like in the seventies.)

Camille

[starrigger]

Speaking of cons, if anyone's at Readercon near Boston this weekend, look me up! I'm signing Saturday at 3.