Advice for Indie Authors: Indie authors beware! Do not feed the reviewers!

This indie author and publishing malarkey isn't always plain sailing, as I've learnt the hard way in the last 24 hours! There are more highs and lows than a 90s TV game show hosted by Bruce Forsyth! Good game? Not quite.

It was just yesterday I pranced on to Blogger with a skip and jump in my step, waxing lyrical about all the fantastic new reviews The Drought had received. Fast forward one day and my mood has dropped quicker than Luis Suarez in the penalty box!

You see, like many indie authors, it's up to me to be my publicist and marketer, with just one small problem - I don't have a Scooby Doo what I'm doing! And unfortunately this week I had a 'brainwave' and boy did I run with it!

My great plan was pretty simple: people on book reading social platform Goodreads like reading. Top reviewers on Goodreads love reading. So why not contact all 100 (yes, 100!) of those reviewers to offer them a free copy of The Drought to review? They'll be falling over themselves to read it, right? Nice to see you, to see you, nice!

Well, not quite. I hadn't quite thought through the whole 'spamming' issue. You see, and I'm sure other indie authors can relate, when you have a 'great' idea you don't really sit back and think if the consequences, you just go for it! Previously I had searched for readers who had read books by authors I would consider my book to be similar to (Mike Gayle, etc.) but on this occasion I just thought: "This reviewer loves supernatural thrillers - that must mean she'd love to read a comedy about a guy on a sex drought!"

I know, I know! But I just saw the positives, and never gave a thought to the potential gut-wrenching negatives!

The first reply came through last night from a female reviewer in the US who kindly pointed me towards her reviewing policy. I won't go into all the details, but the gist of it was do your homework before asking for a review and don't just spam! Reviewers are busy people too, but I will freely admit my nativity at thinking I must be the first indie author to have hatched this great plan to contact reviewers on Goodreads! My feeble attempt at a reply probably - and rightfully so - fell on deaf ears.

Next up I did a wee Google search to see if anyone out there in blog land had reviewed my book, and what do you know - I found one!

Now if my stint doing stand-up comedy has taught me anything, it's that you take the rough with the smooth. I've stood in packed rooms with people laughing at me (not literally, but at my jokes of course!). I've had audiences tell me I was the funniest comedian of the night (granted that was a private family gig in front of my parents and I was the only comedian, but that's not the point...!).

But the gigs that stick in the mind are the ones when you stink out the place and die on stage. I guess it's just human nature; praise is easy to take but criticisms stick in the back of your throat like a cracker on a hot summers day, because you take it as a personal attack.

So back to the review I found...

Two out of 10 lousy stars! Two! And the worst part about it was that it was only based on one chapter! One! (Don't worry, I'm not counting backwards towards anything...). But there is nothing I can do now. It's out there, floating around in cyber space for all to see. I then did the one thing I always tell others not to and I left a comment on the review. Nothing malicious, just that I didn't feel a whole review based on one chapter wasn't very fair, but hey-ho...

They say things come in threes, and right on queue this morning, I got a reply on Goodreads from another reviewer I had contacted. This message was perfectly nice, saying that she would be happy to review The Drought, but...

She did warn me that it was considered gauche to be promoting my own book to readers, and that spamming (that bloody word again!) will rub some people up the wrong way. In fact, she went as far as saying that there was an "evil underbelly" of people on Goodreads who like nothing more than bad-mouthing new authors. She even called them 'dangerous'! Gulp - what have I let myself in for?!

Now every time I get a message on Goodreads or an email notifying me of a purchase on Smashwords, I take a deep breath and pray! If anything, this has taught me a valuable lesson - Do not feed the reviewers!

Only kidding! What I have learned is that I've never confessed to being the best writer in the world. I'm not stupid enough to think that my book will set the literary world on fire or be heralded as the new Dickens!

But...

I would like to think that I'm not bad at comedic writing. I have to take heart from the majority of reviews who genuinely seemed to have enjoyed The Drought. But most importantly, I do need to know my audience! It sounds utterly ridiculous to say that, but sometimes you get caught up like a rabbit in the headlights.

So my final plea to reviewers everywhere - I'm sorry I spammed you! Please take pity on me and if you see my little bunny ears in front of you as you are driving around in your busy book-reading lives, try to politely swerve rather mowing me down and leaving me for road kill! I promise never to spam again.

To steal a line from Rocky Balboa - if I can change, you can change, we all can change!

Advice for Indie Authors: Hints and tips for indie authors!

It is exactly one year ago that The Drought was published in paperback!

I'm certainly no expert by any stretch of the imagination when it comes to writing and publishing a novel. I am still learning with each step I take, but here are some tips that helped me along the way and things that I have learned as an indie author that you might find useful.

Think before you write
Have an idea before you start hammering away at the laptop! Sit down and write down on a piece of paper what your story looks like - the start, the middle, and the end. Who are the characters and how do they all link together? Where does the story happen? It doesn't matter if this changes or takes a different shape when you actually start writing, but it will give you some sort of direction.

Be committed
Unless you are lucky enough to write for a living then you are going to have to give up a lot of your free time to write a novel. For three months solid I wrote every day after work and as much as I could at weekends. It was not easy at the start (and my girlfriend must have thought have dumping me several times!) but slowly you create a routine. Constantly working on your novel not only improves your writing skills, but it will help you develop characters and create new stories.

Don't burn yourself out
Okay, this will sound slightly contradictory after my last point, but allow yourself a break from time to time. Take an evening off, or allow yourself a weekend when you don't switch the laptop on. As long as you are ready to get back into the saddle after a day or two then this will help recharge the batteries, especially if you are working a full-time job and trying to write a novel at the same time.

Always carry a notepad
Every time you think of an idea, write it down. I find the best ideas always come to me when I'm not sitting in front of the laptop. Every idea I think of, I write everything down. After I completed my first draft I still had 10,000 words worth of ideas that I hadn't even used. Referring back to your notes is a great help when you hit a wall or have writers block. In The Drought there is a whole chapter about how much the main character hates going clothes shopping with girls. The majority of this chapter was written on the notepad on my iPhone while my girlfriend was dragging me around Top Shop in Oxford Street!

Music
Try to pick a soundtrack to your book. Like a film, choose songs that represent the tone of your book and create a playlist and listen to it. Let your imagination wander. Some of my best ideas came when I was listening to my iPod on the way home, or when I was out jogging. Music can also jog your memory of real-life events that have happened in your past and can help you come up with ideas for your novel.

Write what you know
I can only advise from a personal experience, and writing about something you have not researched or have little knowledge of is clearly going to be bloody difficult! Even if you manage to write a complete manuscript, chances are your reader won't believe in the story because it won't seem real. It is no surprise that John Grisham practiced criminal law for a decade - his writing clearly demonstrates an author who knows his way around a courtroom. Writing skills aside, that is a major reason why he has been so successful. If you are blessed with a fantastic imagination like J.K. Rowling or J.R.R. Tolkien, then all the power to you!

Don't be too critical
If you have decided to write a novel, you are starting out on a process which can easily take over a year before you will be fully satisfied with your work. Mike Gayle, best-selling author of My Legendary Girlfriend, offers some great advice on his website. He says the first draft doesn't have to be perfect, and that the proudest moment of his career was completing that first draft. Your first draft will always be the one that needs the most work, but as Mike Gayle says, by finishing that first draft you have done something that most people only ever talk about. I finished my first draft in September 2009, and I was still making changes right up until it got published as an eBook in August 2011!

Give your novel to friends... and their friends, and their friends...
Choose people who you trust will give you an honest opinion. Take their comments on board and then go back and start the second draft of the novel. Ask your friends to give it to their friends, and to their friends, and so on and so forth. The more feedback you can get the better. You will be surprised how similar the feedback is, and this can be invaluable in terms of telling you what works and what doesn't.

Get your book proof-read and copy-edited
I checked, re-read, and re-wrote my manuscript dozens of times, and I still could believe how many mistakes I had missed when I had my manuscript proofed. It can be a costly exercise but it is well worth it in the long run. You can find proof-reading and copy-editing services in the Writers & Artists Yearbook with NUJ rates starting at £24 per 2,000 words.

Do your research on self-publishing
So you have sent your manuscript out and tried to secure a literary agent without much luck. If you are like me, you have decided to go down the indie author route. Do your research because the hard work has only just begun. All of the responsibilities a literary agent would take on board are now your responsibilities! This means getting costs to self-publish, choosing and designing a front cover, speaking to book shops to try and get them to stock your novel, sending out press releases and dealing with the local media. The list is endless. The more work you put in, the greater chance your book will stand of gaining exposure, and hopefully increasing sales.

Get by with a little help from your friends
You are going to need all the help you can get to help you along the way. I was lucky enough that I happened to work on the sales team for a magazine serving the print industry, and that the online editor agreed to let me write a blog. That opened doors for me. It helped me make contact with Lynn Ashman, the MD at Pen Press. I was also lucky enough through friends to be put in contact with national newspaper journalists, a television producer, and television presenters. Each one has helped me in some way or another, whether it is by agreeing to read my novel and supply me with reviews, to helping me create a promo video. Think about where you work, the people you work with, your friends and family. Don't ever be afraid to ask for help - the worst someone can say is no.

Keep it local to begin with
Naturally every author wants to see their book reviewed in national newspapers and magazines, and stocked on the shelves of all the major bookstores. But as a self-published author you need to take baby steps. Start by sending your press releases out to local media, and approach local bookstores to see if they are willing to stock your book. Local newspapers love to hear about the achievements of local people, and if you are lucky, gaining enough positive local press reviews might, just might, one day see your novel end up reviewed in the Sunday Times.

Posters, flyers, business cards
Invest in marketing material to help promote the book. If you have asked a local library or bookstore to stock your book, it would be great to have a poster hanging on the wall, or flyers sitting at the counter. Carry business cards and anyone who seems interested in your novel, hand them a business card with your details and details of where they can find your book online. I used a company called Authors Essentials, who specialise in marketing and promotional services for authors.

Create a website or a blog
If you have gone to all the trouble of self-publishing your work, marketing your novel, and sending out press releases to promote your book, then it is crucial to have an area where you point people back to. Think about how you buy things as a consumer. In this day and age, most people will refer to the internet now for more information before they buy. Your website should include details about the book (such as a sample chapter), contact information for the media, and most importantly, where people can buy your book.

Social media
Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, to name just a few of the social networking tools you have at your disposal completely free of charge. Set-up a Facebook fan page, Tweet details about your novel, and blog as often as you can to raise your profile online. The more you can get people talking about your novel, the better. Check out my previous blog post The social media opportunity for more information. Another fantastic tool is Hootsuite.com, which allows you to schedule and manage all of your social media posts.

Immerse yourself into the book reading community
Go beyond the social media giants like Facebook and find those niche book communities online. I have found lots of great sites that bring book lovers together, and allow indie authors to promote themselves. Goodreads is a fantastic social media site that allows book readers to share and discuss their favourite books. And make sure you are talking to readers in book forums like Kindle Boards or the Book Club Forum, as nothing beats speaking to readers directly.

Invest into an eBook version of your novel
Ebooks have revolutionised publishing across the world. Amazon now sell more eBooks than physical books for its top 1,000 titles, and there are 115 eBooks sold for every paperback. The figures don't lie, so creating an eBook version of your novel makes sense.

Ask readers to write reviews
People will buy from sites such as Amazon based on positive reviews. So if you have had friends read your book and tell you they like it, then ask them to post a review up on Amazon. It won't cost them anything, but it could be priceless for you. And then when you start to engage with readers on social media or in the forums, ask them to write reviews if they are kind enough to give your book a chance!

Enjoy it!
If you don't enjoy the whole process, then maybe writing and self-publishing a novel is not for you. You have to have a real passion for writing, and you more than anyone must believe in yourself. Writing and self-publishing a novel should fill you with a huge sense of achievement. That is what makes all the hard work worthwhile.

Advice for Indie Authors: How do I get those reviews?!

A couple of weeks before my novel was published I got busy identifying certain publications that I could send my book to for reviews. The nature of my novel - a story about a guy trying to get his leg-over - would appeal to lads. So I opted for lad mags like Shortlist, FHM, Nuts, Zoo, and Loaded.

But I have also had good feedback from women who have read the book, as they were intrigued (and a lot of the times appalled!) at what goes through a mans head. It was often getting called chick-lit for men so I sent the book out to a few of the womens magazines like Glamour.

I also decided that some press coverage would be nice, but perhaps the readers of The Times or The Guardian were not ready for my book- not yet anyway. I went with my own advice to stick with the local papers. After all, I had been given some pretty good coverage in the local press so far. I sent copies to papers such as The Evening Standard and the London edition of the Metro.

That was two months ago and guess how many reviews I got? That's right - a big fat zero!

It is tough. A lot of these publications are inundated with similar requests, and unfortunately there is still a stigma attached when it comes to self-published novels. Maybe because publications get so many self-published novels that they have to draw a line, maybe a lot of the really badly written self-published novels harm the chances of those well-written novels, or perhaps there is an element of snobbery. I would guess one of the main reasons is that it is a much safer option for a publication to review a novel by an established author or to accept work from a big publishing house.

The guys at Glamour magazine did actually reply, but they had already gone to press and therefore missed my publication date so the opportunity had gone. I learned a valuable lesson though, and that is to make sure you send copies of your novel out at least 4-6 weeks prior to publication date.

So now I was back to square one. I had yet to get my book reviewed anywhere other than Amazon - and then I had an idea! When you look at reviews on Amazon you will often see certain reviewers have a ranking such as Top 100 Reviewer. These are the people who have not only reviewed the most products on Amazon, but they have also been ranked the most helpful by other customers. In other words, people trust these reviewers.

If you have a bit of time on your hands, then it is well worth searching through the list of Amazon's Top Customer Reviewers and looking at the type of items they most commonly review. Most of the reviewers will have contact details, so I contacted a dozen reviewers and asked if they would be interested in reviewing The Drought if I sent them a copy.

Two replied and said they would be happy to review it, but offered no promises in terms of giving it a postive review. They would read it and give it a fair and honest review. I was more than happy with this arrangement - after all, this is what a review is all about. You have to be confident in your work.

I sent the copies off and I am pleased to say that this week I had my first review from one of the Top Customer Reviewers. It was given a five-star thumbs up and as an added bonus, in turns out that this particular reviewer has her own book review website and uploaded her review at BestBooksToRead.co.uk.

I could not have hoped for a better review, but it also made me realise that there are dozens of independent online book review websites - all with an audience of keen book readers. This is now starting to get interesting again!

Advice for Indie Authors: Media exposure and reviews

The Drought is now less than two weeks away from official publication date. On September 24 my novel will be available to the masses of book lovers everywhere. I can’t wait! The only thing getting in the way of my excitement is that tumbleweed which seems to be hanging around.

Let’s face facts – as an indie author I don’t have the benefit of a well-oiled marketing machine promoting my book and drumming up a buzz that every book launch needs. What I have is me, myself, and I. So what have I been doing for the last few weeks I hear you say? Allow me to explain.

At the start of August I received the first batch of printed copies of my book. As I explained in one of my previous blogs, it was time to sell, sell, sell! I am pleased to say that sales have been going reasonably well with about 60 copies sold already to friends and family. Not a bad start, and to encourage those sales I offered signed copies through my website.

I have been plugging the signed copies at every opportunity via my social network feeds and emails, and as a result I have made sales to people who I haven’t seen in years. It might not be a huge number, but these people are going to be key in my future promotion sales plan. I now have people who have read the book and if they like it, they can tell their friends about it, or like my Facebook page, or Tweet about it. Never underestimate the power of word of mouth. These are the people who will write those first initial reviews on Amazon, and anyone who shops online knows how a good review can influence your decision to buy.

However, I knew I couldn’t simply rely on sales to friends and family. After all, I’m not that popular! Sales would soon start to dry up. My next step was to start circulating the press release that the marketing team at Pen Press had put together for me as part of my self-publishing package. I decided to keep it local to begin with. Having a background of being a reporter on a local paper, I know what sort of hook to use when approaching local newspapers to cover a story.

Think about your connection to an area and send it to papers where you live, where you work, where you went you school. Send it to as many local newspapers as possible and make sure to mention early on what your connection is with that local area. Local newspapers want stories about local people – it might sound obvious but it’s amazing how many times people miss an opportunity by not flagging that up early.

From this I have already managed to get some good media coverage. As soon as I had a story in my local paper I took it into my local Waterstones and asked if I could do a book signing in their store. I have now been pencilled in for a Christmas book signing!

The one mistake I made in this whole process was not sending the press release out earlier. I identified other titles and media I should target by matching up the audience I was trying to target with the readers of different magazines or newspapers. I sent it to all of the lads mags and a couple of women’s magazines. I actually had a response from a features writer at Glamour magazine, but they had just put their October issue to press, so I had missed the boat. However, they did ask if I would mind being kept on file if they ever needed a funny male writer, so something could potentially come from that in the future.

You must have an entrepreneurial way of thinking. No one is going to sell your book other than you, so think about what else you can do to open up access to a wider audience. There are a large number of forums out there on the world wide web, full of book lovers discussing what they want to read next. Join these communities and instead of just plugging your book, engage with these people. I have already started selling copies of the eBook and yesterday, someone from Australia came on to my website and bought a signed copy of my book. This marked the first sale of my novel to someone I don’t know – an indication that my marketing plan is starting to work!

Facebook, Twitter, and blogging are a great way of engaging with people who might be interested in your book. Last week I decided to start a competition where I offered a signed copy of The Drought and a £25 Amazon voucher as a prize to one winner (chosen at random) who followed me on Twitter or ‘Likes’ my Facebook page. Using the hash-tag #competition and asking people I know to help promote this on their status updates or tweets has resulted in over 150 new followers and Likes from people I don’t know in under a week. This is all free publicity (well, apart from the £25 Amazon voucher!) and now I have an audience to promote to that I didn’t have a week ago.

This is the sort of promotion you will have to keep on doing long after your book has been published. I am already working on a new strategy that I am about to unleash on the unsuspecting world this week, but I’ll save that for another blog!

This blog was originally posted on printweek.com