Effect of MR Promotion, or not?

[mr ploppy]

You could also ask permission to use a sig for that purpose in whatever introductory forum they have.

[jaxx6166]

David Farland calls what you guys are talking about "resonance"

With novels, most buyers will purchase a book because it resonates with some other book that they dearly loved. For example, in fantasy a young reader who first read a Tolkien novel will often look for books that are similar. He may define his tastes by saying, "I like books with dragons," or "I like books with elves." The reader is attempting to duplicate his experience.

As he grows more sophisticated in his tastes, begins to grow in his tastes and widen them, he begins to look for something different; he will recognize that he likes more than books with dragons and elves. He might even say, "I'm tired of elves. I wonder what other cool things are out there?"

So he goes searching for something different, but not too different.

If he began with Tolkien, the chances are excellent that he will stick with medieval fantasy. He will yearn to escape to a world that made him feel the way that he did when he first visited Middle Earth. ....

How do you drive sales and interest? Resonate with the reader with something more successful that they are familiar with. It could be everything from familiar tropes to plays on names to book titles, whatever. I think David Dalglish does this with his "A Dance of Cloaks" book and so forth, plays on GRRM's writing. Dalglish writes gritty epic fantasy with orcs and stuff.

I kind of wish Shawn Speakman didn't drop off the face of the earth after he tried to sell his book here. I would have been interested in hearing about his success or failure. Speakman spent several years as Terry Brooks webmaster and forum moderator. His name was pretty widely known and he wrote Brooks style fantasy.

If you're friendly enough and actually try to be a part of a community, I've been more apt to purchase someone's book, CD, or independent film.

[ASparrow]

Originally Posted by jaxx6166

David Farland calls what you guys are talking about "resonance"

If you're friendly enough and actually try to be a part of a community, I've been more apt to purchase someone's book, CD, or independent film.

Well, 'resonance' is certainly a kinder way of saying 'formulaic' or 'copycat' and the basic psychology at work here is pretty obvious. But not all readers look for stuff they read before. I sure don't. But maybe I'm just weird.

I can't tell you how many times I've picked up some very popular epic fantasies (indie and otherwise), start reading the initial pages and experience that sort of deja vu that happens you see a character described the same way a hundred other characters have been described, and that's that. I can't read any further, no matter how much the reviews rave. That's not resonance I'm experiencing when that happens, its more like nausea.

What excites me are situations and experiences I've never witnessed before.

Same thing goes with regard to buying books from "friendly people." Friendliness is not necessarily a sign that someone is a particularly good or interesting writer. I find extreme personalities more intrguing and am quite likely to check someone's book out if they seem eccentric.

To end with a disgusting cliche, I suppose, there's more than one way to skin a cat.

[kennyc]

MR is not the world. It takes a full-fledged marketing effort/team to promote any publication to its fullest.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by Steven Lake

I've treated all my promotions on MR as just "one small stone on the road to success". There is no "one thing does it all" promotional method. In fact, there's so many that you are required to exploit that it becomes rather difficult to keep up with them all, or in some cases even do them. It used to be that there were only a handful of things that you could do to get noticed, and those were usually all you needed. Now the list is hundreds, if not thousands of items long and growing.

This.

[jaxx6166]

Originally Posted by kennyc

This.

And that.

[jaxx6166]

[QUOTE=ASparrow;1220601]Well, 'resonance' is certainly a kinder way of saying 'formulaic' or 'copycat' and the basic psychology at work here is pretty obvious. But not all readers look for stuff they read before. I sure don't. But maybe I'm just weird.

I probably shouldn't have taken his post out of context and copied just a few parts of it. We'll probably end up agreeing to disagree on this topic, but I believe that David was discussing certain stylistic cues that you take for each particular genre or what have you. In other words, you won't find many epic fantasies where the main character is named Bob and he's discussing his horrible day at the office because his computer crashed while he sits in a bar with friends and watches football.

He went on to explain that most successful romance novels have spelled 'gray' as 'grey' because it became almost like a welcome friend within the genre based on the Jane Austen spellings.

I think resonance is more of taking a subtle familiar aspect of something and applying it in a way to introduce new readers.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Whiny whiny whiny whiny whine!

(Now, go buy my books.)

(Hmm... not working yet...)

But seriously... I've tried to make connections with various SF sites over the years, with promotion in mind. Unfortunately, almost all sites had that mind-set against ebooks, all of them concluding that the authors couldn't have been any good or they'd be Big-Pub published. In each case, I gave up on the berating I was getting, and faded away.

Of course, I'm overdue to give it a fresh shot...

[ASparrow]

[QUOTE=jaxx6166;1223351]

Originally Posted by ASparrow

Well, 'resonance' is certainly a kinder way of saying 'formulaic' or 'copycat' and the basic psychology at work here is pretty obvious. But not all readers look for stuff they read before. I sure don't. But maybe I'm just weird.

I probably shouldn't have taken his post out of context and copied just a few parts of it. We'll probably end up agreeing to disagree on this topic, but I believe that David was discussing certain stylistic cues that you take for each particular genre or what have you. In other words, you won't find many epic fantasies where the main character is named Bob and he's discussing his horrible day at the office because his computer crashed while he sits in a bar with friends and watches football.

He went on to explain that most successful romance novels have spelled 'gray' as 'grey' because it became almost like a welcome friend within the genre based on the Jane Austen spellings.

I think resonance is more of taking a subtle familiar aspect of something and applying it in a way to introduce new readers.

Actually, I agree with you. I just have a bad attitude about it because I am an irascible old beast.

Some people are really into the whole "resonance" mimicry thing, but it makes me think of toddlers who cling to security blankets. I'm going after the niche of reader who want to try something different. Give me that epic fantasy about Bob's horrible day at the office over recycled Tolkien any day. In fact, a red Toyota Prius actually has a cameo role in one of my novels set in a medieval world. Resonate that.

[altworld]

Occasionaly I will bump up my promotion thread here on MR, usually when I have some news about my novel. I've found the best thing to do is not talk plug your book, just join in with the community in threads you are interested in. MR for me is a place to look at, and talk in for eReader news and other related stuff. I just wish I had more time in my day to do more than a quick breeze through...

[bobavey]

I feel your pain, Joyce.

[queentess]

[QUOTE=ASparrow;1231734]

Originally Posted by jaxx6166

Some people are really into the whole "resonance" mimicry thing, but it makes me think of toddlers who cling to security blankets.

Why is there something wrong with going after more of what I like? I'm not a fan of the same old story over and over and over, but I do have certain genres that I tend towards.

I haven't purchased your books, but given your description the type of reader you're looking for, I won't ever be purchasing your books. That's fine by me (I don't think you want me reading it and giving it a negative review because I didn't like it), but you can hardly complain about waning sales when you're targeting such a small and specific subset of reader.

Then again, I also find it very narrow to define 'resonance' as 'formulaic'. It's not the same.

[neilmarr]

I learned long ago that there is no point in promoting books here at MR if you're aiming for a general and buying readership. Of course it's a great place to share books freely and maybe word-of-mouth vital promotion will kick in. Maybe not.

But let's not lose track of the fact that MR isn't here to promote titles and authors and publishers. It's here to promote the ebook-dedicated reading device in general and to help those new to the concept of digital reading and technology involved.

For those wishing to sell buggy whips (like me) first make sure you help sell the buggy.

Cheers. Neil

[ASparrow]

[QUOTE=queentess;1234317]

Originally Posted by ASparrow

Why is there something wrong with going after more of what I like? I'm not a fan of the same old story over and over and over, but I do have certain genres that I tend towards.

I haven't purchased your books, but given your description the type of reader you're looking for, I won't ever be purchasing your books. That's fine by me (I don't think you want me reading it and giving it a negative review because I didn't like it), but you can hardly complain about waning sales when you're targeting such a small and specific subset of reader.

Then again, I also find it very narrow to define 'resonance' as 'formulaic'. It's not the same.

There's nothing wrong with it, whatsoever. It's a great big world of people out there, and you're probably in the majority when it comes to reading patterns.

If you enjoy variations of the same sort of story, nothing's stopping you from doing so. Enjoy.

You simply don't happen to be my kind of reader. There's nothing superior about one way or the other. Some people thrive on digging deep holes in one spot, exploring subtle variations in the texture of the soil, while others like to go somewhere else and dig a new hole.

I take it you're the kind of reader who only reads books written by nice people? Sorry if I offended. I can't help it. I'm cranky and antisocial.

As for not reading my books, you're making a good decision. You probably wouldn't enjoy them. Not that I flinch from a bad review. I love bad reviews. They reveal so much to me no matter what attitude or perspective the reader brings to them.

As for sales. I have no sales. My books are free. And downloads are not waning, they're actually increasing. I was just commenting on how mentioning my books here on MR doesn't seem to affect that anymore. That's hardly whining. Although I'm certainly capable. Let me tell you about this pain in my shoulder.

[Vintage Season]

Although I haven't been checking in as frequently here as a few months ago, I would say that there is definitely a "MobileRead effect" that can help an author. (My strong suspicion is that I have also benefited from those "word-of-mouth viral promotions" Neil mentioned.)

That said, there is also a sort of saturation level that occurs regardless of venue, beyond which point your downloads are likely to become self-sustaining. The closer you come to the top of the chart, the more likely people will be to check out your material, simply because it is near the top of the chart. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, because it means that some folks you wouldn't normally consider part of your target demographic might wind up giving your story a chance... and they might even like it.

Of course, the hope is that those same readers will then keep an eye out for your name, and seek out other, new stories as they become available.

- M.