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Online Paperback Giveaways: Amazon versus Goodreads

We’ve long been fans at SkipJack of giving away paperbacks on Goodreads to create impressions on the cover, title, and author, as well as to increase “to-reads” and potentially drive reviews from the winners, but we’ve yet to try the new Amazon Giveaways feature.

First, Goodreads. Goodreads allows authors to give away paperback copies of their new releases. The author sets the length of time the giveaway is to run, how many copies to give away, and what countries entries can come from. Fulfillment is up to the author. This is good, because it allows the author to send signed copies and a letter asking for an honest review. Here’s what the giveaway screens look like:

Screen Shot 2015-08-04 at 10.36.06 AMScreen Shot 2015-08-04 at 10.36.12 AM

 

We’ve found short (one week) giveaway periods for small numbers (five) of books to be effective. We run them one after another after another until the entries taper off. We’ve been running back-to-back giveaways on Heaven to Betsy, for instance, since March, and so far the entries are staying solid. We’ve also had a pre-paid ad campaign running alongside it to encourage clicks, and we’re finding it helps tremendously and at the same time costs very little. We spend less than $5 per giveaway on these ads, and we can target them to potential readers by their favorite genres and authors.

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So, for Heaven to Betsy, giving away 45 copies to date has resulted in 1409 adds to the “to read” shelf, 71 ratings, and 36 reviews. We’re happy with that.
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For the sake of transparency, here’s the numbers on the giveaways we’ve run, including the current one that is ongoing at the time of publication of this post.

 

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Note that Goodreads is a reader community site, not a sales site. It influences readers, however, and we see sales correspond with the rising number of ratings and reviews on Goodreads, the same as they do on the sales sites.

But Amazon Giveaway we have not tested. Here’s how it works. Amazon lets you give away paperbacks that you are selling on Amazon. You are prompted from the paperback’s sales page, near the bottom, to run the giveaway.

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Then you set it up, selecting how many copies to give away and how winners are selected. Amazon lets you require that they follow you on twitter as a condition of entering, but so far that’s the only criterion I’ve seen them allow. Amazon quotes the price, and you agree to pay it.

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Amazon lets you write a message that winners receive (where you can ask them to write an honest review), and to losers as well. You get the title/author/cover impressions with potential readers, and you have the potential, mentioned in the terms and conditions, of Amazon choosing to promote your giveaway (note: their promotions occur when it makes them money to do so, so if you make them money already, you stand a greater chance of their engines picking your giveaway up for promotion). Then potential readers are only a click or two away from becoming potential buyers, which is the clear advantage over Goodreads. You also get a set price that’s not dependent on postage and materials, or your time. Amazon downside: you pay the Amazon price for the books. While you get a royalty back, it doesn’t come out to as good a deal as shipping your Ingram or CreateSpace-purchased inventory,

Sounds pretty good . . .

So, who’s tried it? What did you think?

Just for fun, we’re trying it for Heaven to Betsy. In fact, you are eligible to enter the giveaway, and/or share the details of the giveaway in any way you want (Facebook, Twitter, email). If you, do, here’s the text to use:

See this #AmazonGiveaway for a chance to win: Heaven to Betsy (Emily) (Volume 1).https://giveaway.amazon.com/p/7f54c0cd0c4112f2 NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. Ends the earlier of Aug 11, 2015 11:59 PM PDT, or when all prizes are claimed. See Official Rules http://amzn.to/GArules.

 We’ll report the results back here, along with the final results of our pre-order campaign for the Earth to Emily (Emily #2) e-book, which includes record-breaking sales months for the author (one after another), the details of which will be laid out step by step.

You’re going to want to stay tuned for these. Meanwhile, please share your online paperback giveaway experiences in the comments below with your fellow authors.

Eric

SkipJack post up on Fiction University

 

fiction university blog banner

 

Be sure to check out SkipJack author Pamela Fagan Hutchins’s post on Voice and Deep POV over on Fiction University. We’re pretty excited about the feature, and that Writer Unboxed tweeted it.

Access the post, HERE, and be sure to check out their many other helpful author posts on craft while you’re there.

Congratulations to SkipJack Author Ken Oder: #57 on Amazon

Congratulations to SkipJack author Ken Oder. His debut legal thriller, The Closing, hit #57 overall on Amazon, and #1 in the legal thriller category. Ken’s next novel, Old Wounds to the Heart, comes out this summer.

The Closing Cover

Ken achieved his bestseller status with a ten-day promo blitz modeled off SkipJack’s strategy (here) for past bestseller-run-promos that included:

1. OHFB

2. Bookbub

3. ereader IQ/Book Sends

4. Freebooksy

5. Books Butterfly

6. Kindle Nation Daily’s ebook of the Day

In order to be selected by Bookbub, which Ken considered the anchor of this promotion, Ken focused for a full year on reviews and contests. He has a 4.7-star rating on Amazon and had over 70 reviews at the time he applied for Bookbub. He also had received a nod as a Mystery/Thriller IndieFab finalist. Note: Bookbub selected The Closing on its FIFTH application. If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again, right?

Ken priced at 99 cents during the duration of the promotion. Since the promotions, which more than paid for themselves in royalties, his sales at his original price have remained up and profitable overall.

Good strategy, Ken!

 

Selective Quality Control Courtesy of KDP?

Interesting. I’d heard people were starting to get threatening emails from Amazon about pulling their books down for spelling errors. I’d even heard some had their books pulled. I just hadn’t received any emails myself. I use multiple layers of professional editing and as a result, my books (not my blog posts; they are not edited!) often contain the phrases “Well edited” or “Well written” in their reviews.

Last week I got one of the emails, about Saving Grace, my biggest selling book, and, now that it is permanently free in ebook form, the highest downloaded. Together, the result is that over 500,000 people have this book in their hands. It is the driving force behind the $75,000 I estimate I make per year from Amazon, based on sales in the last six months. And if I make $75k, Amazon makes about $30k. (I did that in my head. I’m an author, not a mathematician, so I don’t give a flying flip what the exact figure is, in case you wondered.) Anyway, that’s considered very successful in Amazon terms. The books has over 1300 reviews and a 4.4-rating. Recently I updated some common sections in all my books and reuploaded them, including Saving Grace.

And I got one of “those” emails from Amazon. They found “spelling errors” in it and a forced page break. They didn’t specify what the “spelling errors” were, but the KDP upload page has a spell checker, and it identified one, only it wasn’t an error. The page break had existed in that book for three years, but I consulted with tech support for Pressbooks, and we fixed it, and I reuploaded it.

I was unsettled, but I’m always happy to fix a problem. Here’s the actual string (read from the bottom up, like you would in real email):

***

Screen Shot 2015-05-12 at 11.11.20 AM

Hello Pamela,

Thank you for your response.

Based on the information you provided, this content will remain live and available for sale.

Once you make the necessary corrections, please resubmit the content for review. Please follow the steps below to upload the updated content and replace your previous submission:

1. Log in https://kdp.amazon.com and go to your Bookshelf
2. Find the book you want to edit, and in the ‘Other Book Actions’ column, click “Edit Book Details.” (If you see a gray ellipsis (“…”) button, click there first, then select “Edit Details.”)
3. Scroll down to Section 6 and under the text “Book Content File,” click “Browse.”
4. Find the revised file of your book’s content and select it.
5. Click “Upload Book.”
6. Click “Save and Continue.”

You’ll also need to reconfirm Content Rights and click “Save and Publish.” The new file will overwrite the old file within 24-48 hours. The “Look Inside” sample should update within a week of republishing your book.

Once you upload the updated content, please write back and let us know, so that we can assist you further.

If you’ve any issue or need further clarification, please don’t hesitate to contact us. We’re happy to resolve the issue for you.

Thanks for using Amazon KDP.

………………………………………………………
Did I solve your problem?

If yes, please click here:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/survey?p=A3TMDYCYUUZQVQ&k=hy

If no, please click here:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/survey?p=A3TMDYCYUUZQVQ&k=hn
………………………………………………………

Regards,

David M.
Kindle Direct Publishing
http://kdp.amazon.com
=============================
Connect with KDP and other Authors and Publishers:
Like us on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/KindleDirectPublishing
Follow us on Twitter http://twitter.com/AmazonKDP

—- Original message: —-

I just double checked for “spelling errors” generated by the KDP system. Here’s a screen shot. This is NOT a spelling error:

Screen Shot 2015-05-08 at 9.40.45 AM

I am in touch with Pressbooks.com to see why the extra page is being introduced. However, I just looked at the file, and it is ONE blank page. I will get it fixed, but, as you can see from my 1300+ 4.4-star reviews, people think this book is well written, well edited, and well formatted. I beg you, it is critical to my sales (which Amazon benefits) from, and I have a bookbub promotion running TODAY, please leave this file up while Pressbooks fixes the one forced page break in the entire file. It is possibly the ONLY ERROR in the entire file, which is far better than 99.9% of the books for sale anywhere.

Thank you for bringing this to my attention, and for working with me to resolve the page break.

Pamela

 

Subject: Kindle Quality Notice: [Saving Grace] [B009FZPMFO] [0036245254 ]
Date: May 8, 2015 at 7:33:41 AM CDT
To: Pamela Hutchins <[email protected]>
Hello,Thank you for resubmitting your content to us! We have reviewed the new content, but some of the problems we notified you about previously still exist:•     There are some words in your book that our spell check dictionary could not identify. If any of the words are not spelled the way you intended, please update your content. You can also email us at [email protected] to let us know that the words are spelled correctly. Here are the words and their locations.•   A forced page break appears in the middle of the body text. This can be confusing to readers, who may think that content is missing from the blank section. Please remove any similar breaks and resubmit your content. You can see this issue at location [62, after the text “events is just a lucky coincidence….”]After you’ve made the correction, please upload your revised content through the ‘Book Content’ section in your KDP Bookshelf. If you have further questions, please reply directly to this email and we’ll get back to you as soon as we can.For further information regarding specific book errors (including why some errors are more critical than others), please see the Guide to Kindle Content Quality Errors at https://kdp.amazon.com/self-publishing/help?topicId=200952510.Thanks for using Amazon KDP!Best Regards,Best Regards,Amazon KDP
http://kdp.amazon.com

***

Note text in bold in their original email above. Don’t see the words that threaten to pull down the book? That’s because they’re not there. The threat is implied. They are telling you to fix your book. And I know personally of authors I am friends with on Facebook that had their books pulled, so I take any contact from Amazon very seriously.

Today I got another email, this one accusing me of failing to fix the spelling errors from the original email. Only the original email didn’t tell me what the errors were or how many there were (see bold above, my reply, and their response), just directed me to find and fix any. I replied that the one identified error in the KDP system was not an error, and they responded positively.

But this email did specify the spelling errors. There were TWO. Two in the WHOLE BOOK.  I’ve never found a book, ever, that had that few errors. But I got a threatening email. Here’s the email string:

Begin forwarded message from May 12, 2015 at 8:42 a.m.:

 

The errors had not been specified to me before, so thank you! I strive for perfection. They have been corrected and the file re-uploaded.

On May 12, 2015, at 5:23 AM, Amazon.com <[email protected]> wrote:

Hello,

Thank you for resubmitting your content to us! We have reviewed the new content, but the problem we notified you about previously still exists:

•     There are some words in your book that our spell check dictionary could not identify. If any of the words are not spelled the way you intended, please update your content. You can also email us at [email protected] to let us know that the words are spelled correctly. Here are the words and their locations

Error Description: “on his check” should be “on his cheek” / Error Location: 1085

Error Description: “mosty empty” should be “mostly empty” / Error Location: 3520

After you’ve made the correction, please upload your revised content through the ‘Book Content’ section in your KDP Bookshelf. If you have further questions, please reply directly to this email and we’ll get back to you as soon as we can.

For further information regarding specific book errors (including why some errors are more critical than others), please see the Guide to Kindle Content Quality Errors at https://kdp.amazon.com/self-publishing/help?topicId=200952510.

Thanks for using Amazon KDP!

Best Regards,

Amazon KDP
http://kdp.amazon.com

See bold text above.

Now, I want a perfect book, so I was elated to learn of errors I could eradicate. I fixed the two misspelled words and reuploaded it as requested within five minutes of reading their email. I just find it extremely odd that a book with two editing errors in 85,000-words would merit attention, and that if they truly wanted them fixed and the book to remain available that they wouldn’t identify them from the beginning.

Oh well.

I’m waiting now to hear from them on all my books. It would be great to get rid of that last .0002% of error that I assume exists in my professionally edited books, like in all professionally edited books. I just don’t want to be targeted, and I can’t help but feel that way over being pursued for two misspelled words out of 85,000 when I read books from Amazon every week with five, ten, twenty, even 100 times that many, books that I know have not been threatened with removal. Even if Amazon didn’t use those exact words.

We’ll see, I guess.

What about you guys? Have any of you heard from Amazon? What do you think of their new policy and how they are enforcing it?

Pamela

Pamela Fagan Hutchins writes award-winning and bestselling mysteries 10006025_10152294921092604_1598429323_oand hilarious nonfiction, chairs the board of the Houston Writers Guild, and dabbles in employment law and human resources investigations from time to time. She is passionate about great writing, smart authorpreneurship, and her two household hunks, husband Eric and one-eyed Boston terrier Petey. She blogs on writing, publishing and promotion at Skip the Jack and on her beleaguered family, and much-too-personal life at Road to Joy. She also leaps medium-tall buildings in a single bound (if she gets a good running start). Check out her USA Best Book Award winning novel, Going for Kona, her permafree mystery (and series lead), Saving Grace, her writing/publishing/promotion Bible, What Kind of Loser Indie Publishes, and How Can I Be One, Too?, and her newest mystery, Heaven to Betsy.

SkipJack Announcements

Heaven to Betsy final ebook cover

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In this post:
1. USA Best Book Award
2. Giveaway!
3. Release of Heaven to Betsy; discounted through April 8th
4. Updated Content: What Kind of Loser?
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1. Yippee, USA Best Book Award!

Going for Kona (Michele #1) was a 2014 USA Best Book Award Winner, Honored as a Cross Genre Fiction Finalist. The e-book, paperback, and audiobook are available everywhere online.
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2. Winner, winner? Only if you Enter.

Want to win your choice of Katie & Annalise SWAG: a mug or tote bag? Email the permalinks to your HONEST reviews—if you hate it, state it (but I hope you love it)—of Going for Kona (Michele #1) AND Heaven to Betsy (Emily #1) to [email protected]. I’ll pick winners until we run out of loot. Include your mailing address and choice of item.
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3. Heaven to Betsy Discounted Through First Week After Release

Heaven to Betsy (Emily #1) is my new release, out April 2nd, but already available EVERYWHERE for e-book pre-order. Until April 8th, the e-book is only 99 cents, discounted from its regular price of $4.99.

Like the Michele series, the Emily series features crossover characters from Katie & Annalise. Katie’s big-haired bestie Emily takes the lead role, and you’ll see lots of Katie & friends throughout the series.

Here’s the blurb: When a dead body swan-dives from a balcony into the pool at a wedding, gossip comes to a halt about disgraced paralegal and former rodeo queen Emily—whose husband left her for a woman who turns out to be a man. Enter Jack, a secretive attorney and sexy mix of cowboy and Indian. She refuses to work for him, until she learns about the disappearance of the six-year old daughter of his notorious client Sofia, the wedding shooter, who is also an illegal immigrant. Emily feels a strange affinity with the girl and launches a desperate search for her. Bodies pile up in her wake across Texas and New Mexico as the walls around her own secrets begin to crumble, and the authorities question whether the child is anything but a figment of her imagination.

The paperback will be available no later than April 2nd and audio by the end of the summer.

Earth to Emily (Emily #2) is slated for August 2015, and Hell to Pay (Emily #3) for December 2015. After the Emily series comes the three-book Ava series (hello!), then we’ll circle back for the 2nd and 3rd books in the Michele series. Phew! It’s going to stay busy for a few years, for me.
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January 2015 Update to Content of What Kind of Loser Indie Publishes, and How Can I Be One, Too?

Do you own the e-book version of What Kind of Loser Indie Publishes, and How Can I Be One, Too? If so, the content was updated January 2015 and you can re-download your e-book from the sales site you got it from. If you want a paperback with the freshest copy, Amazon carries it.

Featured in the update is the how-to for the sales strategy that resulted in my full-time author status, as it pushed my income up nearly 1,000% (and more topics, too). Yes, that’s one-thousand percent. Maybe you’ll want to check it out ;-).
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Pamela

Pamela Fagan Hutchins writes award-winning and bestselling romantic mysteries 10006025_10152294921092604_1598429323_oand hilarious nonfiction, chairs the board of the Houston Writers Guild, and dabbles in employment law and human resources investigations from time to time. She is passionate about great writing, smart authorpreneurship, and her two household hunks, husband Eric and one-eyed Boston terrier Petey. She blogs on writing, publishing and promotion at Skip the Jack and on her beleaguered family, and much-too-personal life at Road to Joy. She also leaps medium-tall buildings in a single bound (if she gets a good running start). Check out her USA Best Book Award winning new novel, Going for Kona, her permafree mystery (and series lead), Saving Grace, her writing/publishing/promotion Bible, What Kind of Loser Indie Publishes, and How Can I Be One, Too?, and her newest mystery, Heaven to Betsy.

Do Facebook Book Promotion Groups Make Sense?

Yesterday someone innocently posted a question on Facebook about book promotion groups. It triggered an epic rant by me, so I thought I would share it here, and see if it warranted anymore discussion.

Screen Shot 2015-03-26 at 9.45.17 AM Screen Shot 2015-03-26 at 9.45.45 AM Screen Shot 2015-03-26 at 9.46.22 AM Screen Shot 2015-03-26 at 9.46.36 AM Screen Shot 2015-03-26 at 9.46.45 AM Screen Shot 2015-03-26 at 9.46.54 AM Screen Shot 2015-03-27 at 8.41.09 AM Screen Shot 2015-03-27 at 8.41.20 AM

There, I feel better with that off my chest. What questions, issues, concerns, or rants of your own does this trigger? Note: you can view the original Facebook discussion, HERE.

For other articles on review issues, check out:

1. The Good in Bad Reviews

2. The Uncomfortable Silence

3. Book Reviews for Indie Authors

Pamela

Pamela Fagan Hutchins writes award-winning and bestselling romantic mysteries 10006025_10152294921092604_1598429323_oand hilarious nonfiction, chairs the board of the Houston Writers Guild, and dabbles in employment law and human resources investigations from time to time. She is passionate about great writing, smart authorpreneurship, and her two household hunks, husband Eric and one-eyed Boston terrier Petey. She blogs on writing, publishing and promotion at Skip the Jack and on her beleaguered family, and much-too-personal life at Road to Joy. She also leaps medium-tall buildings in a single bound (if she gets a good running start). Check out her USA Best Book Award winning new novel, Going for Kona, her permafree mystery (and series lead), Saving Grace, her writing/publishing/promotion Bible, What Kind of Loser Indie Publishes, and How Can I Be One, Too?, and her newest mystery, Heaven to Betsy.

If you don’t enter, you can’t win.

We’ve preached the value of entering contests many times here on the Skip the Jack blog. Brush up on all that HERE.

Meanwhile, we are super excited to announce that our own Ken Oder received word that his debut novel, The Closing, is an INDIEFAB mystery/thriller finalist. If he hadn’t entered, he couldn’t have won, and the value of adding this recognition to his book pages and author bio will be incalculable and last for years. Even if he hadn’t won, he would still have received a critique, in and of itself valuable unbiased feedback. And we all know how hard it is to get that.

***

The Closing Cover

 

3/12/2015
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: SkipJack Publishing
[email protected]

THE CLOSING named Foreword Reviews’ 2014 INDIEFAB Book of the Year Awards Finalist

Houston, Texas—Today, SkipJack Publishing is pleased to announce THE CLOSING has been recognized as a finalist in the 17th annual Foreword Reviews’ INDIEFAB Book of the Year Awards. Here is the complete list: https://indiefab.forewordreviews.com/finalists/2014/

Each year, Foreword Reviews shines a light on a select group of indie publishers, university presses, and self-published authors whose work stands out from the crowd.

In the next three months, a panel of more than 100 volunteer librarians and booksellers will determine the winners in 63 categories based on their experience with readers and patrons.

“After 17 years, our awards program has become synonymous with quality because our editors set such a high bar on the finalist round, which makes it especially tough for the judges who select the winners,” said Victoria Sutherland, publisher of Foreword Reviews. “In every genre, our judges will find an interesting, high-quality selection of books culled from this year’s entries.”

“We’re elated that The Closing is getting this recognition. It’s a wonderful book, and the first of many from Ken Oder,” said Eric Hutchins of SkipJack Publishing.

Foreword Reviews will celebrate the winners during a program at the American Library Association Annual Conference in San Francisco on Friday, June 26 at 6 p.m. at the Pop Top Stage in the exhibit hall. Everyone is welcome. The Editor’s Choice Prize for Fiction, Nonfiction, and Foreword Reviews’ 2014 INDIEFAB Publisher of the Year Award will also be announced during the presentation.

About Foreword: Foreword Magazine, Inc is media company featuring a FOLIO: award winning quarterly print magazine Foreword Reviews and a website devoted to independently published books. In the magazine, they feature reviews of the best 160 new titles from independent publishers, university presses, and noteworthy self-published authors. Their website features daily updates: reviews along with in-depth coverage and analysis of independent publishing from a team of more than 100 reviewers, journalists, and bloggers. The print magazine is available at most Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million newsstands or by subscription.

You can also connect with them on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and Pinterest. They are headquartered in Traverse City, Michigan, USA.

***

Congratulations, Ken. We couldn’t be prouder to publish your work.

Eric

Kindle-Power Your Direct Email Promotion to Readers

Direct email contact is the most sure way to get in front of potential readers. But how do you achieve it? One way is to build your own list of interested opt-in subscribers that you administer through an online application like Mailchimp or Constant Contact, through your friends and contacts, through your website and blog, through building social media contacts, and through encouraging visitors at your events to sign-up for your list. I’ve been working on mine since 2008. It’s a great list, but it has only 5500 subscribers. The most important thing you can do with this list once you’ve built it is NOT EMAIL IT. The fastest way to get unsubscribes is to bombard your list every week (God forbid every day) with stuff from you about your books. I have kept my list intact by emailing only 2-3 times per year, when I am announcing a new release. Any other news that I hope they’ll care about I include in one of those releases. This has been critical for me: it’s a way to reach thousands of people who care about my books and/or me when I want them to consider one of my new books.

Another way to achieve email contact is to buy a list. This idea doesn’t generally work, though. These people don’t have any connection to you, and often resent their contact information being sold.

Yet another is to run a promotion through a site with a large email following. BookBub is a great example of how effective this can be. It’s pricey, though—currently $750 to promote a 99 cent discount to their 2,350,000 subscribers— and they accept only about 20% of the applications they receive. They’ve picked my books They’ve picked my books six times in the last 15 months, and it’s wonderful, but they’ve turned me down more times than they’ve picked me. Bookbub is just one of many promo sites, but they’re currently the best. http://bookbub.com. Others I currently use frequently because of their great emailing lists: BookSends, Kindle Nation Daily, FreeBooksy, OHFB, and Books Butterfly. I was actually shocked at how effective my most recent Books Butterfly promotion was, and they’re a new addition to my “best of the web” promo sites list.

The last way is “free,” but it requires hard work and savvy, and that’s to get the sales sites to do your promotion for you, to their email lists. If you’re on the short list for advertising expenditures with a giant publishing company, this is a shoo-in. If you’re not at the top of their heap, you don’t get it because you ask for it or pay for it. You have to position yourself for their selection. One such way is the Kindle Daily Deal. Supposedly this is also something big pub can and does ask for. The rest of us haven’t figured out how to talk to humans at Amazon. But it’s a one-day 99 cent (usually) promotion of an ebook handpicked by Amazon. I think it goes without saying that this book is normally a well-reviewed book with a super cover that they expect to sell like gangbusters.

But there’s another way to show up on their lists, and it’s a list TAILORED to you, and that’s to put your next novel up two to three months before it’s due to be released, as a pre-order on Amazon. Check out this amazing email that Amazon sent to its customers last week, about the pre-order for my next novel, especially the text boxed in red.

H2B email from Amazon

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Holy Mother Goose and Grimm, right? They actually send these out. Ever heard the expression from popular advertisements of lotteries, “You can’t win if you don’t play?” Well, yeah. That’s how it works with Amazon emails about pre-orders, too. Now, if only five souls have downloaded your books on Kindle, this won’t mean much, but t’s still better than nothing. If you’ve sold books to someone on Kindle in the past, Amazon knows who they are and has their email address, and they’re willing to send them an email about you and you alone to encourage them to buy your books again. YOU don’t have access to those emails. YOU don’t know who those people are. The only entity in the world capable of reaching them is Amazon. And that is why I am recommending that you absolutely, positively do not fail to put your novels up for pre-order on all sites. Not all of them do this, but there’s cross-over interest on other sites when these emails get forwarded, or when they go to someone who’d prefer to buy on Nook next time, etc.

Some of the people on Amazon’s “Pamela Fagan Hutchins” list are on mine, too, and/or they’re on BookBub or Books Butterfly or some other promo site as well.  And guess what? That means they may hear about your book two or three times during your promotional push for your new release. And it takes most people multiple exposures to your book before they act, if they ever will. This early shot across the bow by Amazon sets your new release email to your opt in subscriber list and your first big promo with someone like Books Butterfly up for even greater success.

I’m putting Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos on my holiday gift basket list for next year. That email about went out last week to, oh, about 500,000 people. Squee! (You can reserve a pre-order copy of the e-book version of Heaven to Betsy (Emily #1), a Katie & Annalise spin-off mystery series, anywhere online, if you want. Like Amazon Kindle, Barnes & Noble Nook, Apple iBooks, Google Play, Kobo, or Smashwords.)

And you can get tips like this and more in the JUST UPDATED (January 2015) What Kind of Loser Indie Publishes, and How Can I Be One, Too? ebook. If you purchased it previously, just update your books on your device to get the latest version.

Pamela

Pamela Fagan Hutchins writes award-winning and bestselling romantic mysteries 10006025_10152294921092604_1598429323_oand hilarious nonfiction, chairs the board of the Houston Writers Guild, and dabbles in employment law and human resources investigations from time to time. She is passionate about great writing, smart authorpreneurship, and her two household hunks, husband Eric and one-eyed Boston terrier Petey. She blogs on writing, publishing and promotion at Skip the Jack and on her beleaguered family, and much-too-personal life at Road to Joy. She also leaps medium-tall buildings in a single bound (if she gets a good running start). Check out her USA Best Book Award winning new novel, Going for Kona, available now, everywhere.

 

 

Defining Success: How 3 Authors Made Their Publishing Dreams Come True

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Check out this cool and informative interview on publicist Paula Margulies’ blog:

Defining Success: How Three Authors Made Their Publishing Dreams Come True.

 

In the meantime, want to snag a free copy of the fantastic audio production of Going for Kona? I’m giving them out like hotcakes, first come, first serve. All you have to do is share this post on Twitter and/or Facebook and leave me a message in the comments when you’re done, with your sworn commitment to review the book on Amazon and Goodreads, and leave a review for the audio production on Audible, when you’re done listening. That’s it! A $13.96 freebie in exchange for your honest review.

Pamela

Pamela Fagan Hutchins writes award-winning and bestselling romantic mysteries 10006025_10152294921092604_1598429323_oand hilarious nonfiction, chairs the board of the Houston Writers Guild, and dabbles in employment law and human resources investigations from time to time. She is passionate about great writing, smart authorpreneurship, and her two household hunks, husband Eric and one-eyed Boston terrier Petey. She blogs on writing, publishing and promotion at Skip the Jack and on her beleaguered family, and much-too-personal life at Road to Joy. She also leaps medium-tall buildings in a single bound (if she gets a good running start). Check out her USA Best Book Award winning new novel, Going for Kona, available now, everywhere.

 

NaNoWriMo: Goals + Motivation = Dreams Come True?

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I did NaNo in 2010. And 2009. And 2011. And I used the NaNo methodology in 2012 and 2014.

It’s National Novel Writing Month in November! I’m revising a novel called Heaven to Betsy this month, so I’m not participating, but I’ve “won” three times and written two other novels using the NaNoWriMo methodology, so I’m a believer.

In celebration of the month, Webucator is asking authors to answer a few questions about their writing careers. Here are my responses:

What were your goals when you started writing?

When I first tried to write a novel, I just wanted to start at “once upon a time” and write all the way through to “the end” on an honest-to-goodness complete novel. Truly. That’s all I wanted. I’d been a writer since third grade, reluctantly so at first, compulsively and secretly so for years, and obsessively and enthusiastically in the last decade.

To read the rest of this post (new goals, what pays the bills, motivation, and advice for new writers), click HERE.

Pamela

Pamela Fagan Hutchins writes award-winning and bestselling romantic mysteries10006025_10152294921092604_1598429323_oand hilarious nonfiction, chairs the board of the Houston Writers Guild, and dabbles in employment law and human resources investigations from time to time. She is passionate about great writing, smart authorpreneurship, and her two household hunks, husband Eric and one-eyed Boston terrier Petey. She blogs on writing, publishing and promotion at Skip the Jack and on her beleaguered family She also leaps medium-tall buildings in a single bound (if she gets a good running start), and much-too-personal life at Road to Joy. Check out her latest romantic mystery,Going for Kona, available now, everywhere.