S.M. Butler's Blog, page 30

I’m over at Lady Scribes talking about how I’m not a creeper. Come check it out!

I have a confession. I’m totally spying on your conversations. In the coffee shop, in the line at the grocery store, on Twitter, Facebook, and especially at the bar. If you’re talking, I’m listening. I could say it’s just making sure I’m being realistic with my dialogue, but the real fact is I just find people interesting. In fact, I have perfected the art of listening without staring. I can zone in to a conversation at ten paced. I used to stare but when I finally asked a couple to raise their voices while they talked so I could listen and got the weird looks… I decided that listening without letting on would be a better plan. Yes, I know. I have no shame.

Read the rest over at Lady Scribes…

Death makes one think. I’m a fairly healthy individual. I work out, I watch what I eat (sometimes… I do have that weakness for chocolate, after all) and I smuggle my own popcorn into the movies. We do all these things to prolong our life, but what we are is mortal. We can’t stop death. All we can do is delay it a little while*.

What prompts this morbid subject you ask?

My grandfather died last night. He was 93 years old. In his life, he was in the Army, fought in World War II. He was an engineer. He was a father, a grandfather, and a great grandfather.

When I was a kid, I loved him. He was my favorite grandparent. He would play with us, make funny faces and jokes. When I got into adulthood, he was more withdrawn. I suppose twenty years would do that to a person. He spent a lot of time in his room. He didn’t make the jokes as much anymore. He was old and crotchety, the epitome of the Grumpy Old Man.

I could be angry with him. We didn’t get along all that well in my adult life, after all.  I’d like to think it was the fact that we were too alike. We were both stubborn, and headstrong. We were both too stuck in our ways.

But he was still my grandpa. I’ll always remember him as the guy who made the funny faces and told the jokes.

My grandparents, circa 2006 because after that Grandpa refused to have his picture taken anymore.

*Yes, I did just think of the Princess Bride quote there. “Death cannot stop true love. All it can do is delay it for a while.”

I hope everyone has an amazing Fourth of July, for those in the US. For those outside of the US, Happy Thursday.

In honor of the Fourth of July, here’s the cover for No Strings Attached, my August release. No Strings Attached is my new adult military romance. I’ve been wanting to use my military experience for something, so I’m glad I had this opportunity, and I hope everyone loves Ethan and Ash as much as I do. The blurb is up on the website, and you can add the book to your TBR shelf on Goodreads now.

I think this might be one of my favorite covers so far. What do you guys think?

This week starts another ROW80, a quarterly challenge that accounts for having a life. I haven’t been very good at this challenge lately. The busy of my life has sort of taken over. But recently, I took some steps toward alleviating the stress in my life and I’m feeling much better now.

So this round of ROW80, I’ve decided to keep things simple, especially as I have a release in August, and there will be a blog tour and stuff to deal with. My goals this time around:

Release No Strings Attached
Finish Scoring His Heart
Edit and format Christmas novella.

That’s it for me. Of course, the first involves formatting, and uploading and blog touring and such. The second is just writing the draft, and I think that it will be doable this quarter.

And now I will go back to my hidey hole and get things done.

I’m not going to tell you how long I worked on this post and just kept it in draft form. Before now, I haven’t really felt qualified to blog about self-publishing. There are authors out there with 30 or 40 books, and making a living off self publishing checks. Me, I have two books out, and I’m not quite to the living wage part.

BUT… I’m a huge researcher. Before I decided to try to get published, I Googled publishing. I ran across some scams, and found out what literary agents were. I found Writers Beware. I didn’t get taken in by a scam because I did the leg work. I don’t know what aspect of my personality does this, because in all honesty, I’m incredibly impulsive. I don’t usually look before I leap. But I recognized that writing is a business, even if back then I didn’t know. And that’s why I did the same thing when self publishing came about.

I read a lot about self publishing, I’ve listened to many successful author/publishers about what works for them. I’ve found forums and podcasts, and so many useful blogs and information out there. Because, I don’t want to get taken in by a scam. My business is in its fledgling stage, so I’m not an expert by experience. But I’ve read and learned enough that I taught some other people about their business and saved them money in the long run. I do have a strong foundation that I’m building on. And you know what? I do the research so I can write these posts, including the personal branding posts I do here occasionally.

It’s likely that only newer self-publishers, or those that aren’t to the publishing stage and are information collecting will actually find any use from this. That’s okay. Everyone takes a different view on things, and two people will take away completely different things from the same piece of writing.

So, that said, if you’re interested in self-publishing, are a self-publisher, or aren’t interested in doing it, but like to read up on industry things, read on, and see if you can take something away.

What is Self-Publishing?

Chances are, you’ve heard of Amanda Hocking or Hugh Howey. Self-publishing has always been around, but the advances of digital tech has made a very expensive business much less so. The author-publisher is now more likely to make a profit, and has more avenues in with the retailers.

Self-Publishing is publishing a book yourself, which means you’re creating the ebook, the print book, the audio book, and marketing it direct to readers instead of through an established publisher.

What goes into Self-Publishing?

To make this happen, the self-publishing author must take a finished manuscript and add in all the services that publishers normally provide. These items may include:

Editing at various stages in the production process
Cover art
Writing sales copy
Requesting reviews/sending out books for review
Selecting excerpts for cross promotion
Purchasing ISBNs and copyrights
Final layout and production of book files
Distributing the book
Arranging for promotional media for the book

It’s a lot of work. In each case, this does take away from the writing time. Of course, there’s no rule saying you can’t hire out for these tasks. In some cases, you may need to, simply because you don’t have the skill set. Not everyone can be a great cover artist, even if they own Photoshop. And just because we’re writers, it doesn’t mean that we can edit our own work. Well, we can to a point, but it’s always good to get other eyes on it.

Running a business isn’t easy, and it’s even harder for creatives, because a lot of creatives just aren’t business-minded. If you’re not good with numbers, you might consider hiring an accountant. If you’re not good at Photoshop and design, then maybe consider a cover artist. And remember that graphic designers need to eat too, so don’t go off expecting a $5 cover because you found some hack that did some godawful cover for a friend of yours for that.

Sorry, I digress.

So, the first question one needs to ask is… do you want to think and act like a publisher, or do you want to focus on writing books? Because if all you want to do is write, finding a publisher is probably your option.

One of the most important things I take away from my self-publishing experience so far is that it’s not a get rich quick scheme. To be financially successful, regardless of what business, your product needs to be as good, packaged as good as a book published by commercial, top-tier publishers.

Of course, none of this is anything that I’ve not said before, in other posts. But it bears repeating because it’s important to know these things.

So here’s a quick little list of things to think about before self-publishing.

The Plan

Every author needs a business plan, even those that work with publishers. Here are some questions to ask yourself as you think about where you want to go with self publishing.

How do you want to publish? Print, digital, audio?
How many books are planned?
Is writing your primary income? Do you want it to be?
Will you be developing a publishing company name to release your books?
How much experience running your business do you have?
How much will you need to hire out? How much are you willing to budget for those services?

There’s a lot more involved in self publishing, but I’m on a book deadline right now, two in fact, so I’m going to quit procrastinating here and go back and write the books. After all, that’s why I’m here, right? If you have any questions about this post, just throw them down in the comments there and I’ll answer them if I know the answer. If I don’t, well, I’ll just say I don’t know and try to point you toward someone who does.

Are you a self-publisher? Do you want to be? If you’re already self-publishing, what kind of advice would you give a new author?

Last week, I was in Ohio at the Lori Foster Reader/Author Get Together (blog wrapup forthcoming… I have video…) and I have finals due this week so I’ve been a bit lax in getting the wrap up blog post up. It will be sometime this week though… I promise. But today, I’m going to talk about summer.

Summer sucks. There, I said it. I hate summer. It’s not so much the heat that gets me. I’ve lived in Texas for half my life at this point. It’s the fact that my kids are out of school and I still have to work.

So, here’s five reasons why my life sucks in the summer.

1. I still have school.

My kids are out of school, but I’m not. I’m rushing to finish school so I’ve been going during the summer too. So, homework and writing and kids and all kinds of things are still out there.

2. My kids DON’T have school.

Seriously, if you had asked me when I was sixteen, if year round school was a good idea, I’d have told you no. In fact, I wrote a whole persuasive paper on why it was a crappy idea. Now? I would love year-round school for my boys.

3. It’s freaking hot.

I live in Texas, so summers here are blistering. We go from our weird wintery weather straight to 100 degree days. Last year, we had over seventy days of weather over 100 degrees. Normally, heat doesn’t bother me too much, but even by that point, I was wishing for cooler weather.

4. My kids are home.

It’s not enough that my kids are out of school. But now they’re home all day. Now I love them. I truly do. But I really want to love them from a distance, so I can continue to love them. Having them home for nearly three months makes my head spin.

5. OMG THE AIRFARE.

Yeah. Family is stir-crazy. So, it is deemed that a vacation is necessary. Great! But have you SEEN the price of airfare and hotels in the summer? OMG. Trying to find a flight for under $700 to ANYWHERE is crazy-making.

All that said, I do enjoy some things about summer. Going outside to the pool, grilling food. I do love spending time like that with the boys. So, I will bitch all summer long about how much I hate summer and how much my life sucks, but it makes me happy to spend that time with my boys.

Now… if I could just get them off the computer…

Most of you that follow my blog know that when I sit down to do Serious Writing, I have to put my Serious Writing Tiara on. This is no metaphysical tiara. I mean a real, live tiara, with shinies and everything. You can see one of them on my About Page.

Now, I’ve had one for several years. I call it my NaNoWriMo Serious Writing Tiara, because I bought it as a joke, during my very first NaNoWriMo that I officially signed up for. I told people that I was coming to the Night of Writing Dangerously with a freaking tiara on. They didn’t believe me. So I bought one.

It was pink, like my laptop was then. That year, I banged out 185,ooo words (approximately). From that moment, I put that tiara on every time I needed to focus and get words on the page. It’s always been the tiara I go to the most.

But lately, it’s been having some issues. The comb on it is breaking off, piece by piece. Three of the pink stones on it have fallen off. As sad as it is, it’s time to retire my NaNoWriMo Serious Writing Tiara. It’s weird to have an object so silly be so important to you. But this tiara and I have been through a lot together. I’ve literally written millions of words with that tiara.

So it’s time to put this tiara on the shelf. I won’t throw it away. We’ve been through so much together. But it’s time for a new every day Serious Writing Tiara. I went to Sam Moon this weekend, and bought two new tiaras.

One is small, and red, meant for editing power. I’m calling it my Serious Editing Tiara.

 

The other is larger, and has purple stones in it. This is my new Serious Writing Tiara.

Neither of these will ever replace my NaNo tiara. That’s not what I’m attempting to do here. But I do recognize that for the tiara to retain its writing power for me, it needs to rest. It will no longer be held in my hair by its comb, since it’s missing most of it. I think that it’ll be now held by pins. I’m not entirely sure yet.  The thing I do know is that I realize that it’s time to begin a new chapter in my life, and while that tiara did me so much good, I need to move on, to allow myself to love another tiara.

Sure, this sounds crazy, right? That’s okay. I’m a writer. I make shit up for a living.

 

Recently an author wrote a long diatribe on how she sold out and wrote an erotic story. The post has since been deleted, because it was offensive to many erotic authors. But because the Internet is forever, here’s a screenshot of the post in its entirety (click to view the bigger image):

I don’t usually write responses to posts by people who don’t think before they leap. It’s not worth my time. But there were a number of things in this post that I take issue with.

I’ve been self-publishing for a few months now. One of my books took three months to write, the other a year and numerous rewrites. I’m proud of both of them. I stand by my work.

They’re also erotic romance.

This particular author made a business decision and published an erotic story. And then got upset when it sold well.

I’m sorry. I’m not going to feel sorry for someone who made a decision to make money and then got upset when she sold well. The sad truth is that best selling genres change. Erotic content sells. It always has. And with the advent of ebooks, it’s gotten even more lucrative. But getting angry because your urban fantasies didn’t hit bestseller status right off the bat? I can’t agree with that.

Switching genres is a time honored strategy to sell more books. Publishers do it all the time. Sometimes, they do it with the same book. I remember finding Lynn Viehl’s Darkyn series on the shelves at Barnes and Noble in the Fantasy and Science Fiction section. I bought them, glommed them, and went back for more. But by the time I did that, PNR had taken off. The books were moved from SFF to Romance shelves. They changed genres. Is that a sellout? Or is that simply doing what it best for the lives of the book?

If Lynn’s books had stayed in the SFF section, her later books probably wouldn’t have existed, because they would have languished.

The author mentioned this in the post: “Some hard truths came to light through this process. The biggest revelation was that as authors, we have to decide whether we’re in this business to make art or to make money. We can’t have both.”

I think that’s wrong. Lynn Viehl didn’t write her Darkyn series because vampires were popular. No, her books weren’t even categorized as romance at first, even though they really are. She wrote those books because she loved the story.

I wrote my first hockey romance because I couldn’t find any on the shelves. Now there’s a lot, and it could be said that I’m chasing a trend. No. I just wrote what I wanted to read. I found readers that felt the same.

It is possible to have art and money. It’s difficult and it means putting in your dues. But it is possible.

I hope this author realizes how offensive her post is to authors who write erotic content. I like writing sexy books. I like the explicitness of it. I like that these books are unabashedly unapologetic. The authors that wrote them? They love what they do, and they don’t do it because it’s popular.

J.K. Rowling didn’t write about a boy who goes to wizard school because it was the popular thing to do. E.L. James didn’t write 50 Shades because BDSM was popular. Suzanne Collins didn’t write The Hunger Games because kids killing each other were the New Thing. They wrote what they loved, and whether we like their books or not, they struck a chord in the mainstream readership.

So, I’ll keep writing my “trashy smut” because I like it.

Don’t judge me because you don’t like what I write and what I write sells. Don’t get mad at me because urban fantasy (a genre I truly love and have written in the past) had its heyday five years ago and you missed the boat.

I write for me first. I don’t write to the market.

But I’m always aware of what sells. It’s called good business.

I’ve been super busy lately working on not one, but TWO books. I typically always am juggling projects, but usually it’s a drafting project and an editing project. This time, I’m drafting two books at once. I’m happy that they’re different enough that I can keep them straight. I think that if they were both contemporary romances, I’d have a problem with that.

I’m really loving both these books too.

One is my holiday book this year. The other is a brand spanking new project. And both are simply just flowing from my fingertips. I wake up every day wanting to write on them. I actually had to put the second hockey romance down so I could finish these two books, and hopefully, I’ll be done with the drafting process by the beginning of June and I can go back to my Texas Highlanders and get that story done before November. I’m hoping for an early 2014 release for that book so I need to have it written soon.

So… We’ve reached the point of the year (actually a few weeks past) when we start having severe thunderstorms and tornadoes here in Texas. We live smack dab in the middle of what’s known as Tornado Alley, which means we’re prone to get them. I realized last night that many people take tornadoes for granted.

There used to be a weather guy on one of our stations locally that recorded a tornado safety video. He retired, so they stopped playing it, but it was really useful information, and educational too.

Thankfully, someone had it and uploaded it to YouTube, but I tell you what. I had to do some digging to find it. I’m going to embed the three parts below, because I think that everyone in a tornado-prone area should watch this video. I’d skip the dude with the glasses though. He’s just annoying. They didn’t have him in the original broadcast in my area.

Part 1:



Part 2:



Part 3:

And now I will start my day. I’m back to exercising regularly, so I’m off to do that so I can come back and get to writing. June 1 is coming…

This entry is part 10 of 10 in the series The Personal Brand

Here’s another installment of my ongoing series, The Personal Brand. Today’s less of a how-to, and more a look at the overall efforts I see in today’s author marketing climate. Keep in mind that the post contains my opinion, and take it with a grain of salt. Of course, I believe strongly in my opinion, or I wouldn’t write about it.

Image by Suzan Butler

Effective marketing does not equal incest marketing

I have a lot of authors that follow me, both on the blog and on Twitter. There’s a reason for that. I blogged a lot about writing for a while, something that I enjoy doing. I also design, which is another thing I enjoy doing.

And I also participate in a lot of email loops. I am constantly bombarded by spam as a result.  Seriously. There’s no other word for it. It’s all spam. This is pretty representative of the current national climate though. As a nation, the US population is used to being constantly marketed to. That’s why when an author is real on social media, it’s such a novelty. Because when do we ever see that?

I’m always told I never market myself. That’s probably true. I have my little sites that I like to visit. I have forums that I enjoy. I network with writers on those forums and on Twitter. So what’s effective in the land of publishing? What gets readers to buy?

My number one source of books is Twitter.

It’s true. I’ve bought more books because of an author’s presence on Twitter. But I’m an author. I’m there to network with writers, and to talk to readers who are on Twitter, which are largely book bloggers. I’m not necessarily representative of the Twittersphere in terms of readers.

I’m not saying it’s impossible to find a reader there. But it’s not likely to find a lot. Recently, we talked about Twitter in my Package Design class. Less than half of those people in the class had a Twitter account. Twitter is big with designers too, but it’s a class. These people are students. They aren’t immersed in the ecology of the design world yet.

So, less than half the population has a Twitter. It’s probably a small portion of that segment that actually finds authors to follow. So who are authors marketing to on Twitter? I’ll give you that answer: Other authors.

But all the readers are on Facebook!

Yes, someone told me that. I believe that there are more readers on Facebook than other social media. I also think that they’re more open about liking a page than following someone on Twitter. Getting someone to engage is much easier. But I was recently in a social media class and at the end of it, all the students went and liked each other’s pages.

Here’s my problem with this: Who would I be talking to on my page then? Other authors. Again.

I know that authors read too, but honestly, authors buying books is much less of an occurrence. We just don’t always have as much time. So why should I be marketing to people who don’t have time to read my books?

Hey, look! There’s email!

Yeah, this is probably the worst offender of incest marketing. Email loops. There’s an author loop I am on that gets 300-400 emails a day, and 95% of them are promo posts to author blogs, free book announcements and a variety of other things. New release announcements, I like. Because that helps me stay on top of what is going out onto the market. And when Amazon had likes and tags? OMG. The loop was bombarded with said requests for likes and tags.

Another loop I’m on banned promo except for Tuesdays. But here’s the thing. It’s an RWA chapter. Do you really need promo on a business loop? Because again, who are you marketing to on a writer’s loop? Other writers.

Think about strategy and target audiences

Why waste time marketing to people who couldn’t care less about your book? Use that time to go build your newsletter, or write a blog post, or interact with commenters on Facebook. Stop spamming fellow authors for a few lousy hits to your website. Because website hits do not equal book sales.

The last time you bought a book, how did you hear about it?