Ten Tips for Self/Small Publishing

[jaxx6166]

I like you guys. Seriously. And I am kind of bummed to hear about low sales, dynamic hits, or any of the other things that get authors down. But sometimes it's a fact of life. I've heard rumblings here and in some other places. Everyone wants to know what they're doing wrong, or what they should be doing right. Here's some of the things that I've discovered through my limited experiences. Most of these may seem like common sense, but you know. Everything is easier said than done, but here's some advice I've heard or come up with over the years. This article is long and I apologize for whatever eyestrain I may cause, or hearts I may break.

Disclaimer: I'm a nobody. I have been for a while. I've never been paid for anything I've ever written. I've also never submitted to any paid markets or done more than limited marketing/public relations work. I'm the farthest thing from a "PRO" that you can find on here.

(01) Be yourself.

There's an old adage: Write what you know. The best fiction blurs the lines between reality. Everyone is different. We've all got our own strengths and weaknesses or experiences that we've learned and grown from. Use what you know in your writing and your marketing. If you're a former astronaut and happen to write space opera, that may be kind of an important thing to mention. Sure, you sell your stories and your characters. But, you also sell yourself. You are your own best character.

Think of what sets you apart from every other self published or small press author out there. Take that and use it to your advantage. Sell yourself, your work will follow. There's a reason that so many authors have huge blogs that attract thousands of unique visitors. Communication and interaction with your audience is huge! Some people love the voyeur and the allure of getting in their favorite author's head.

But, that doesn't mean that everyone should blog or podcast or whatever, though they're part of the new social media. If you're more of a closeted weirdo, like Alan Moore, then be a closeted weirdo. If you're a super outspoken feminist and you write books with strong female leads, then there's an in for you.

(02) Don't be a hero.

Face it. You can't do everything yourself. It's just impossible. There's a reason that publishing houses have cover designers, marketers, editors, proofreaders, typesetters, and everything else.

Writers should write. It's what we do. In a perfect world, we'd all have our own press agents and everything else.

While it's cool and cheaper to have all the control yourself, you need to accept your limitations. There are some amazing authors who are pretty terrible graphic artists or web designers. There are some amazing authors who are terrible graphic artists and web designers.

Which brings me to...

(03) Exploit your friends.

I don't mean tell Aunt Mildred that you wrote an awesome book and suggest that she buy 30 copies for her sewing circle. But, that could work....

Basically, what it comes down to is you need to network. Go to a writing seminar, a convention, something. Get out in the sunlight. Talk to people. Make new friends. Friends aren't there to buy five autographed copies of your self published, unedited work.

This goes back to my first point. Everyone has their strengths and weaknesses. Suppose you have a friend named John who's a terrible author, but he's a brilliant plotter. He comes up with amazing ideas and stories, but they never translate well to the actual work. And maybe you're a terrible plotter, but you have a way with words. One day John tells you he has this amazing idea for a story. You ask John if you can coauthor with him. He does the plot, you do the narration. You've just taken two weaknesses and made them a strength.

Suppose your grammar's a mess, but you happen to be friends with Grammar Girl. Maybe you can ask for a hand every now and then...

Or you have a friend that works reading slush piles all day. He doesn't write, but he reads an awful lot. That's someone that you may want to talk to and pass your book to. Have them check it out as if it was a slush submission. Take their feedback and apply it to your work.

Or your friend Gina just so happens to be another self published or small press author. Don't be afraid of advertising. Ask her to blurb your book, or even include a small excerpt at the end of hers. You do the same in return. Now all of her readers are exposed to your work. Obviously, if you write a historical fiction that is pretty much dead-on-period piece of the 1400's, and Gina just wrote some crazy vampire bloodfest - you may not want to mix with that.

But maybe Gina has some friends who write period pieces.

(04) Have a plan.

Your job does not end when the book is in print. In fact, it's just begun. Some may take this as a freevite to spam. It's not. Believe it or not, there's more than just blind posting on a message board or spamming a chat room, or whatever. Think outside the box.

Everyone here lives somewhere. Generally, where you live there are other media outlets. If you're lucky enough to be able to score a book signing at a B/N, then make it known!

When there's a new release, there's always a media blitz. This is why actors go on late night and daytime talk shows. There's press releases sent out, advertisements made, all sorts of things. Consider pitching yourself to your local radio station. This goes back to tip #1. Sell yourself, not your work. But, you have to tread carefully here. The radio station or television channel is going to need to get something out of this in return. That's usually ratings.

Be dynamic, be engaging. When you pitch to a local media affiliate, you're pretty much selling yourself. Maybe you'll get lucky and have an instant chemistry with the person sitting across from you. Then you can be dynamic and engaging and at the same time sell your work to other people that may be interested that don't generally look for these things. Which brings me to...

(05) Know your market.

Vampires are hot right now. So are zombies and werewolves. The market's almost getting to the point where it's over saturated. But they sell. Like crazy. You're always going to be behind the eight ball, that's just the nature of the beast. Entertainment is a dynamic field. What's hot one day is old hat the next. So, you can pretty much give up trying to predict the trends, unless you can find something in the news or whatever that appears to be where things are going.

But that doesn't mean you can't take advantage of the market you've already established. If you write great sweeping epic fantasy in the tradition of Terry Brooks or Tolkien, you probably enjoy these things too then (unless you're Terry Goodkind,) then you may want to frequent places where other fans congregate. Then it's a matter of walking a thin line and interacting with the community until you can get to a comfort level to start pimping hard.

But, that's not the only way to market yourself. Suppose you write this great new western novel. You've been rejected by every publisher known to man. But your book is good (Aunt Mildred told you so) and is of a professional caliber. Also suppose you happen to have a country/western radio station in your market. Call over to the radio station and try your luck. See if you can get booked on one of their drive time shows. Hell, you can even be ballsy and try to send something to CMT or GAC TV.

Or you've got this perfectly misanthropic angst ridden tale of love between a vampire and a slayer. Consider going to your local rock radio station, college newspaper, or whatever. Start small. Work your way up.

Same thing applies if you're a world renowned neuroscientist and you just wrote an excellent medical thriller. Try to get booked on a science-centric media outlet. Which brings me to...

(06) Don't be afraid.

You're going to get rejected. You will get bad reviews. That's just what happens. If you don't have thick skin and the guts to go out there and try again and again, then you're probably in the wrong business.

But every yes is paved with a path of no's. When I worked for Phoenix Media we tried to get James Van Praagh on Oprah. It took about six months before she finally said yes. And then he ended up with his own talk show for a brief time. You know where we started booking him? AM Radio at 6am in Omaha, Nebraska. Seriously, I think it was actually a Christian talk show with like a 100 watt antenna.

But, it was a ten minute interview. A ten minute commercial on James Van Praagh....and his "Talking to Heaven" book.

There's a place for everyone and everything. Find your niche. Exploit it and don't be afraid of rejection.

(07) Set personal goals.

Start small. No one becomes a NYT Bestseller overnight. It takes an awful lot of blood, sweat, and tears to make it. But, sometimes it also takes dumb luck. Start small. Think big.

It's just like when you're writing. You don't craft the whole MSS overnight. You build it slowly over time.

Maybe your goal for the month will be to get your book reviewed on a blog. Find a blog that fits your needs and your market and pitch to them. If they say no, thank them (Don't be mean!) and move on to the next. Maybe if you're lucky enough, there's a chance you can build a rapport with that blogger. Try again next time with them. If you can get lucky, you may end up building a rapport with that blogger. And maybe they have a connection at a big house, or know how to draw really well, or whatever...

Don't get upset. Don't be sad if you don't meet your goals. If you fail, suck it up and reassess everything that happened. Was your pitch good but the timing bad? Is there something that I could do differently next time? Why am I not selling like I should be? I only sold one copy this week when I should have sold five.

Check your webpage, your storefront, your whatever, and try something new. I think there's a couple authors on here who are doing that with new covers, new launches, titles, or whatever.

(08) Be professional.

We're getting towards the end here. These three are probably the most important. Writers have a proud tradition of being assholes. Or snobs. Or party animals...or whatever.

Every genre has its cliches and its horror stories. Don't be a horror story. Don't be the author that responds to a particularly damming amazon review or blog write up. Thank them for their time and learn from what they said. Maybe it's true that the person who wrote it is an absolute piss ant and doesn't know a sword from a scimitar. Or he's jealous. Or whatever.

Forget about it. Move on. It's not worth it. I still say the most important character an author creates is the character of their self. Don't be THAT GUY. Don't be creepy stalker guy or spambot. Or anything else like that. Because once your character is shot, it's pretty much shot. You'll be blacklisted and alienated in a heartbeat. There's always someone else. Someone better, someone nicer, whatever. Don't forget that. If you alienate your audience, they'll simply find someone else.

If you make a public appearance, don't go there looking like the unibomber. Try to project a professional appearance no matter where you go or what you do.

If you're a self published author and don't want the stigma of being a self published author, then work your ass off to shake it. Get professional grade editing, cover design, web page, blurbing, whatever.

If you're really sensitive to that stuff and incorporate a "publishing house" to be your company (Not Bob's Books) then do your best to look like a publisher. Jeremy Robinson did this with Breakneck Books when he decided to self publish. Sure, it meant that he had to sell everything and buy an offset printing press. He had to work his ass off to get distribution in book stores (Do you know how expensive shelf space is?) and accept returns.

I'm not telling you to do that. But suppose you write so blazingly fast that you'd make Max Brand's head spin. You produce on average in your free time, approximately 15 titles a year. You wrote all of them. But do they all have to be "by you?"

Consider a pseudonym or three if you have multiple characters, brands, whatever. That way your "author publishing house" looks like it has a backlist of titles by OTHER AUTHORS WHO ARE NOT YOU.

There's something weird about it, but people tend to trust "Big Awesome Book Company" over "Bob's Books." It's like a stamp of approval. It says someone else with money likes this! I should too.

(09) There's no such thing as bad publicity.

Pretty much self explanatory.

I once heard the phrase "Controversy Creates Cash"

There's a buzz there. People are talking about it. Even if they're talking bad, they're still talking. Maybe you did write absolute drivel. And all the critics that are slamming it are dead on accurate. But, there's a chance that somebody may be stupid enough to say "There's no way this is that bad." Then they spend $1.99 to buy your book, just to read how bad it is.

Is it a longshot? Maybe.

Advertising is something you pay for. Publicity is something you get for free. You want the freebies. What you pay for cuts into your bottom line. But sometimes, you have to spend money to make money.

Don't go out and be stupid and get arrested in hopes that it will get you press. Sure, it will. But, you know...was it really worth it?

There was a guy going around my city basically getting into fist fights to promote his new advertising company. He was arrested twice and got his ass kicked once. I don't think he's made any money yet, but he's been the jackass of the night on the news for like a month straight.

Be smart. Not stupid.

(10) Have Fun.

Probably the most important bullet. And rather self explanatory. Don't let whatever happens get you down. Take it all as it comes and enjoy your ride.

[lmpreston]

Wow! This is great, thanks for putting it out there in this ordered format. Checklist are quick and dirty yet satisfying.

[dadioflex]

Edit.

[Joebill]

I like the list, but none of us has actually, that I know of, driven a starship. Yet, people do write about being starship pilots.

[Moejoe]

Originally Posted by dadioflex

I like tip 1. Be yourself. I'm an arrogant prick whose delusions of grandeur have delusions of grandeur. I cherish the rare bouts of anger that actually make me creative.

During 2009 I submitted for publication three times and was accepted twice, once for "pay", once for free.

This year, all things being equal, I'll be published in two collections, through no fault of my own.

I can't write worth a damn, but I'm convinced that if you keep telling people you're a writer, they'll start to believe you. People are idiots.

Be yourself. I agree. Surrender to the madness, embrace the pain and share your suffering.

You know what really hurts? That third story that got rejected last year... assholes.

Is that you, Harlan?

[Valmore Daniels]

Very good list. I think point 10 should be first - if you are not having fun doing this, you won't be very effective with the other points (IMHO).