Samhain Publishing is winding down and will close

[Rizla]

Deleted.

[Atunah]

Originally Posted by BearMountainBooks

@katsumani - I don't like it either. There are a couple of things readers can do to help publishers and/or authors: Buy direct whenever possible and leave reviews. Sadly, like it or not, the most valuable reviews for an author are still those left on Amazon because of the way their algos currently work, but ANY review helps, including just a star rating on GR or Leafmarks or other reading groups/forums.

Keep a list of your favorite authors on various forums or places like facebook (liking the authors or the series on FB actually does help because the more likes an author has, the more visibility the author has. FB algos will show posts to about 5 percent of the people following an author unless the author gets shares or likes or comments on a post. The more often a share/like/comment occurs, the more often that post AND the next post will show. Basically if people show an interest in an author's posts, they are seen more. This is why many, many companies have resorted to dog/cat videos. They will run a cute animal video. It gets LOTS of likes, shares and comments, especially if the caption says something like "If you think this is the cutest thing you've seen all day, LIKE and SHARE." At the same time, the company is likely to post something that is more product related.

Radio companies on FB have INUNDATED FB with these videos or little cute sayings and people share them all day long. Right underneath or on top will be the name of the company/radio station/etc.

Now and then, if you are a library-goer, ask your library to buy books by your favorite authors. Even if you have read them, always check out a book that you request as a show of good faith when the library orders books in for you.

Those are the easiest and most obvious things you can do for an author. I've probably left some out, but those came to mind.

I am done buying direct from any publisher anymore. I am sticking with Amazon. Look what happens every time a store or publisher closes, you are left scrambling having to download your library and figure something out. I might know how to get stuff into calibre, but only if they are not DRM'd. And those that didn't have DRM, like the Sourcbook romance club site, I now I am stuck with them in the doc section on any device I use and they have no covers. I can't figure out how to change that as I use send to kindle. I only use calibre to store stuff and that is my extend of that. Its too much work and complicated. Now Samhain's customers have to scramble to download their stuff. Folks have lost stuff in the past because the format couldn't be saved or drm cracked.
And I would never buy direct from an author. Giving yet another site my payment info and having another site that may or may not store my library.
My books would be scattered in so many different places, my head would explode.
And I even know about calibre, what about all those average users that don't know anything about it.
I might as well use a subscription service then, at least I know up front I'll not get to keep the book, or the license to read the books.

Reviews are such a pain in the behind to me that its stress. I am not a writer, it is so very very difficult for me to put my feelings into words. So I write some here and there. Although I do always star on goodreads as its my cataloging.

Facebook, I have no clue how to use. I admit it. I tried and tried and tried. I have an account, I can't figure anything out on that site. I don't know how to find anything, still haven't found groups which some say there are book groups. No clue how I would find an author and if I did what the heck am I looking at when I see those weird cluttered pages. Its the most confusing site I have ever been on. Goodreads on the other hand, is full of books. And books only. I have no clue what all that stuff on facebook is.

Makes me sad sometimes when I see facebook only promo's or extras or whatever. I can't use it.
I just really honestly do not want to be very closely connected to the authors I read. I don't want to be their friend, or pubic fan. I just want to read their books. I just don't have that personality to follow folks like that and engage in conversation. A lot of readers do I guess, but its not for me. I talk about books and authors with other readers, but that is about it. I read way to many authors anyway, I'd never have time to read if I'd follow all their social media.

I don't really think in the big picture that any of those things will make a difference. Stuff will keep merging and all I can hope that some publishers remain as its otherwise really difficult for me to find the interesting stuff to read. Thankfully some of the big publishers have started some nice romance lines, either reviving a old one or creating new ones, often digital only. Some great stuff has come out of there. LoveSwept, Carina, Zebra Shout which is a low priced imprint from Kensington. Intermix from Penguin. And of course Montlake. I am forgetting a couple that I am following.

I guess as long as the huge publishers still creating new lines and put out stuff like that, it will have to be enough. Not sure in the long run if the other smaller publishers still hanging on today can compete long term.

I am kind of curious to see how the book market will looking in the next 5 years or so. It changed so much since my first kindle in 2008.
As long as I can find books to read, I am good. I don't have enough life in me as it is to read all the books I want to read.

[Cinisajoy]

Originally Posted by Rizla

Are you suggesting that they have achieved that success with just a "few hundred followers?" Surely they enjoy a much wider reader-base than a "few hundred?"

I was just showing that indies can become successful.
Now I don't know about Ryk and Joe but I know Russell started with a few hundred and it snowballed.
As far as Boyd goes, I remember when he was trying to find his niche and was begging for readers. And yes, he became successful with just a few followers.

Now what all 4 of these indies have in common is they all work their tails off and invest in themselves.

[Rizla]

Deleted.

[BearMountainBooks]

Not to worry, Atunah. I know those suggestions aren't for everyone. (One note: If you buy direct from most authors you do so via paypal or square, etc. Most do not ask you directly for payment info. But then, very few authors actually sell direct.)

Do such things make a difference? Perhaps. They do make an author's day in the case of a good review, newsletter signups, new FB followers and so on. Publishers do watch "activity" to see if an author is gaining traction. So your GR tracking is a positive and helpful. Buying from Amazon is also helpful--buying from ANY retailer is helpful. All sales count and that is the biggest thing you do to help an author! Will any of these things keep a publisher or author in business?

The race is over for some and still being run by others. There will always be books. They will be more dear at times and less so at others. I don't think you'll run out of things to read any time soon!

[GtrsRGr8]

I didn't see this posted earlier. If someone did, I apologize.

Someone might have an interest in going to Samhain's website. Here is their website.

[cromag]

Originally Posted by BearMountainBooks

...
They do make an author's day in the case of a good review, newsletter signups, new FB followers and so on.
...

And most vendors will let you leave a "star" rating without the need for a lengthy review.

I read a lot of "Indie" works, and I try to leave some feedback. After all, I'm going to want to see something new from them in the future.

[Cinisajoy]

Originally Posted by Rizla

That's great. But you posted those examples in response to my question to f j torres' remarkable comment that an indie publisher can make a middle-class income with a couple of dozen books and a few hundred followers. Hence my confusion.

It is called I misunderstood your question so I just gave you indies that I knew were making a living and were not selling millions of copies. Why I didn't mention Hugh and Holly.

Now I do know one that is making a living with at last look 640 followers. His name is Wayne Stinnett.
He quit his job after his 3rd book came out.

Thanks for reminding me that I need to check on another author. Last I checked she was barely making a living.

[Waylander]

Given the fall in quality and quantity of output at Black Library (Games Workshop's book publishing arm) I'm worried about their state of affairs as well. This blog post voices the suspicions and fears I've had for over a year now. They're only rumours but they make a lot of sense:
http://thegoodthebadtheinsulting.blo...k-library.html

[MikeB1972]

Originally Posted by Cinisajoy

It is called I misunderstood your question so I just gave you indies that I knew were making a living and were not selling millions of copies. Why I didn't mention Hugh and Holly.

Now I do know one that is making a living with at last look 640 followers. His name is Wayne Stinnett.
He quit his job after his 3rd book came out.

Thanks for reminding me that I need to check on another author. Last I checked she was barely making a living.

Followers as in Facebook?

If so I don't think you can correlate followers with the number of people reading the books (I would expect the latter to be a lot higher).

I read books from a fair number of authors and you can count the people I follow on Facebook on one hand of a drunken chainsaw operator.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by MikeB1972

Followers as in Facebook?

If so I don't think you can correlate followers with the number of people reading the books (I would expect the latter to be a lot higher).

I read books from a fair number of authors and you can count the people I follow on Facebook on one hand of a drunken chainsaw operator.

Followers in this context is equivalent to "true fans", the people who pre-order an author's books, review them, spread the word, recommend them. It isn't about the number of people who buy the book (many of whom never get around to finishing or even reading) but about the author's core following.

It is how careers are built because they provide a floor, a lower limit on sales. Once that floor is high enough, the artist can consider quitting their "day job" metaphorically or literally.

The concept applies to books, music, and other artistic forms and it comes from this article:

http://kk.org/thetechnium/1000-true-fans/

The big name authors have hordes of true fans/followers as do a few indies. Most authors barely get to 1000 and a lot muddle through in the hundreds. In tradpub a few hundred won't sustain a career, in Indie it often is enough to maintain a high enough visibility for "drive-buy" sales.

[fjtorres]

The thing a lot of people don't get is just how low most author's sales are. Sure, the Kings and Pattersons sell tens of millions per title but for every one of those there are thousands that barely break 4 digits in sales per title. And that is in tradpub as well as indie.

A simple order of magnitude calculation shows how low the *average* goes:

Take the randy penguin: they make up half of the BPH US sales or a bit less than $4.5B a year gross. That is adding up hardcover, trade paperback, mass market, ebook, audio. They get there by putting out 15,000 titles a year. A handful sell by the millions... the rest? Well, the gross average works out to $300,000 per title which seems a lot but since it includes the publisher, distributor, and retailer cuts as well as the author's and it comes from all editions--from $9 mass market paperbacks to $25 and up hardcovers and audio books as well as $9.99 ebooks--the net take is a lot lower. (The publisher's net, for example runs around 11%. http://the-digital-reader.com/2014/0...ustry-numbers/ ) If we use a $15 average price across all the editions that $300k comes from 20,000 average sales per title.

20,000 is only from averaging the big name sales with the midlisters and the newcomers. The low end runs very low.

Bookselling is a Pareto-style business: a few books (and authors) sell a *lot* while the majority sells very little.

The BPHs make a lot of money because they deal in bulk and pay little to the majority of their "suppliers" of which they seem to have an endless supply of aspirants willing to work for what is, effectively, sweatshop wages. (Hence the wailing coming from the Author's Guild et al. Not unjustified even if they are complicit in maintaining that sad state of affairs.) Their business is low margin times high volume. Especially on the print side.

Indies can make decent money because they typically run lean operations and sell at lower price points. Their business is very high margin times low volume.

Lower margin times lower volume? Not good.

Books are a lot like sausages: if you look at how they're made you may not like what you find. It can get pretty ugly.

[MikeB1972]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

Followers in this context is equivalent to "true fans", the people who pre-order an author's books, review them, spread the word, recommend them. It isn't about the number of people who buy the book (many of whom never get around to finishing or even reading) but about the author's core following.

It is how careers are built because they provide a floor, a lower limit on sales. Once that floor is high enough, the artist can consider quitting their "day job" metaphorically or literally.

I get you, the quoted figure of 640 followers just seemed a bit exact.
Either way the actual sales should be at least 1 order of magnitude higher than this right?
1 in 10 people who read your book care enough to spread the word (Unintentional pun, but what the heck, I'll keep it in)

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by MikeB1972

I get you, the quoted figure of 640 followers just seemed a bit exact.
Either way the actual sales should be at least 1 order of magnitude higher than this right?
1 in 10 people who read your book care enough to spread the word (Unintentional pun, but what the heck, I'll keep it in)

It will vary but 1 in 10 of those who like it isn't a bad bogie for word of mouth. Reviews and ratings are a whole different kettle of fish.

Some stories/authors really hit home with an audience while others are enjoyed and draw followup sales but no passion.

Numbers are easy, people are hard...

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by MikeB1972

I get you, the quoted figure of 640 followers just seemed a bit exact.
Either way the actual sales should be at least 1 order of magnitude higher than this right?
1 in 10 people who read your book care enough to spread the word (Unintentional pun, but what the heck, I'll keep it in)

It's more like 1 in 100 who leave a review and/or spread the word, but it varies by genre. Romance readers, for example, tend to converse more about characters/books online than some other genres.

Reviews also vary by whether the book is paid for or given away (probably because most books given away for free are not read. Kobo did a study and based on what they could see of "progress" from e-reader data, it was less than one percent read for freebie downloads). So, for example, I recently gave away 1000 copies of Executive Lunch (approx) and 1000 copies of Under Witch Moon in a free run of each. So far I've gotten 1 review on GR and two ratings for Lunch (it's a mystery btw). No new reviews on Amazon. Moon ran two weeks after Lunch and I've gotten one GR rating so far, and no reviews.

This 1 review per 1000 given away matches other authors I checked with before I did the run so that I knew what to expect. For 1000 books sold the number of reviews was about double, but I'm not sure if that holds true over the last year. The GR ratings for books sold is about 5 to 10 per 1000 sold, but the reviews...that is closer to the 1 per 1000 for me.

Keep in mind that GR has only been popular the last 4-5 years or so, which means books released before that will have different data. Some authors I know report almost no activity on GR, but they have very good sales and lots of Amazon reviews. Some of that is genre and some of it is just a complete mystery!

I agree with MikeB and the facebook followers info--we authors do giveaways on FB and we get likes that have nothing to do with followers/buyers. When Amazon used to show the number of followers via the author profile, it was probably a more accurate count of "core" followers. Mailing lists or subscriptions to blogs are probably better at identifying core followers, but those can be skewed by giveaways as well.