Promotion, promotion, promotion! by Mary Smith

Long gone are the days when an author wrote a book, it was published and the publisher took care of marketing and promotion while the author could concentrate on writing the next book. Perhaps the author would be expected to read at the launch, maybe even take part in a book tour organised by the publisher’s PR team.

Now, authors, whether traditionally or self-published, are expected to be experts in marketing, be social media savvy with Facebook pages (though this might be about to change when FB starts charging to promote anything other than cute kittens) Twitter, Google+, Pinterest, Instagram and goodness knows how many other such sites. Book launches and tours are done online, organised by the author. Some publishers insist their authors have their own blog – and of course everyone has a website. Actually, a website is beginning to have a rather old-fashioned ring to it.

All of the above is by way of creating an author platform. The point is not to tweet about your own book or show your new publication on Facebook – well, it is and it isn’t. Creating your author platform is about building relationships, making friends with thousands of people, entertaining them with your witty tweets and hoping they might, one day, buy a book.

Oh, and then there are promos to consider – when to discount your book (or give it away for free) for a limited sales period, and which sites should you use to spread the word to readers? I have lists of promo sites but it becomes complicated when you have to book slots weeks in advance – and some sites only let you know a few days before the promotion starts that they have rejected your book – for reasons known only to them.

It’s exhausting. It’s like being on a treadmill. From time to time I question just why I do it. Then, I look at some of the publishing statistics. For instance UK publishers released more than 20 new titles every hour over the course of 2014.

The International Publishers Association (IPA) reported recently that UK publishers released 184,000 new and revised titles in 2013. Literary agent Jonny Geller at Curtis Brown said of the figure: “Of course, it is utter madness to publish so many books when the average person reads between one and five books a year.”

Around 235,000 titles were self-published in print and digital in the US in 2012. Amazon UK boasts having over 2.5 million e-books on sale.

That’s why I do it and will continue to do it. It has to be done to ensure my books don’t disappear into those millions of others but manage to scramble up to towards the ranking levels at which they will be noticed by potential readers.

I hope to become better at it as I learn from other writers who know more about it than I do: such as the wonderful bunch of writers on eNovelAuthorsatWork  who help each other on this perilous promotions pathway.

I know it works.  I do wonder, though, when I’ll ever have the time to focus on writing my next books? It seems to be easier the more books you have out there so I really must get down to it.

Why do we do it? by Jenny Harper

So Girl Online wasn't written by Zoella. What a surprise!

Zoella, from Wikimedia Commons,
photograph by Gage Skidmore.

When a young girl who has created her own brand of fame in the relatively new world of vlogging is commissioned to write a novel – in eight weeks – and it becomes a runaway bestseller, why are fans 'outraged' when they discover (shock, horror), it's not actually written by her? Or at least, not all of it. Or, at least, the characters and stories are hers. According to her publisher, Penguin, she 'worked with an expert editorial team to help her bring to life her characters and experiences in a heartwarming yet compelling story.'

Those of us who have slogged over the years to learn the craft of storytelling might a) chortle at the notion that anyone could actually believe that a young twenty-something can master the art with her first book, in a mere eight weeks or b) go green with envy at the ringing of the tills as Girl Online becomes the highest selling first week sales of a debut novelist of all time.

But think about it. Pretty girl, popular girl = marketing opportunity. A smart editor at Penguin had the idea and followed it through. Celebrity sells. What's not to like? (Ahem – honestly? Only the knowledge I'll never be twenty-something again, and that the seemingly boundless opportunities afforded by social media weren't available when I was?)

But that's just sour grapes. As writers, what we need to do is acknowledge that this is a smart, savvy marketing initiative, tip our hats to the ghostwriter who pulled off the stunt of actually penning a credible and readable 80,000 word YA novel in eight weeks, then sit down and get on with our own writing.

No, we won't sell nearly 80,000 copies in the first week (or might we...? We can still dream!) But we will have crafted something readable, and thoughtful, and polished, that is all our own work and that – hopefully – will connect with our own readership and give pleasure.

I can't get worked up about it. The row about whether Penguin were misleading readers by 'pretending' the book was written by Zoella might rumble on, but if it has made at least some people realise that writing is a skill and a craft that needs to be honed and polished over the years, then I'll be happy.

What do I know about Zoella anyway? Only that she temporarily withdrew from the internet after her legion of Twitter fans turned their wrath on her, claiming that it was 'clouding her brain.' You and me both, Zoe, you and me both.

SO ....IT'S ALMOST CHRISTMAS AND .... by Linda Mitchelmore

....... my cards have been written and posted. Presents have been bought, although they are as yet, unwrapped. The shops are awash with Christmas trees and lights and gift ideas, and Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells. I have already eaten one 'Christmas dinner' and am booked in for two more before the 25th. There are also a couple of drinks 'dos' on the calendar. But inside my head it is summer. It is what writers do - think ahead of the game. Sun, sea, sangria - and possibly sex depending on which publication I am writing for - have been in my head for weeks. I have to say it's rather nice to have warm sun on my back, and a garden full of roses and to be building sandcastles with a small child or two inside my head when it's grey and grim and grotty out there. Visualization (spell check tells me it is a z in there, although instinct wants me to put an s!)is a gift to the writer - escapism from the reality of sometimes not very happy lives at worst, and like meditation at best. I sold a short story last week set on St Valentine's Day.and there is one set on the longest day half-completed and waiting for me to get on with it. So, all those people who have had Christmas novels and novellas and anthologies and stories printed this year were well ahead of the game, weren't they? I, too, have a little collection of Christmas stories out there in the ether, done in connection with Janey Fraser who asked me if it might be fun to do. It was. And we are already thinking ahead of the game for what next to put our heads together on.

That very excellent publication, Writing Magazine publishes, from time to time, an Editorial Calendar. The current issue tells us that 25th April 2015 is the 100th Anniver4sary of ANZAC landings at Gallipoli. Possibly a bit late for an historical novel set at that time, but there's still time for a novella, I should think. Or an article. Easter, should you be thinking of writing an Easter story, is in April in 2015, so best get your skates on with that one. Or how about something to mark the 90th Anniversary of the publication of F Scott Fitzgerald's, The Great Gatsby? 10th April is the date for that. Now then, don't say you didn't hear it here first and that you haven't had good warning. April 2016 (yes, 2016!!!) is the 200th Anniversary of Charlotte Bronte's birth. And yes, I do know there is the double-dot thing over the e but I can't get it up on this programme, so very sorry about that everyone. And Charlotte. So....get your thinking caps on everyone. How about a modern take on one of her novels?

Not-So Secret Research

So it could have been embarrassing. I was having a little technical trouble (nothing new there) and hand consigned my fate — and control of my computer — into the hands of some stranger in a call centre on the other side the world.

Nothing new there either; but it just so happened that this time I hadn’t closed all the programs on my computer, let alone the windows on these various programs. It was bad enough, then, that as the cursor whizzed across the screen minimising windows here and there (my blog on whether science is sexy… oh dear) it hesitated and I could almost feel the snigger.

Here’s a thing. You can tell what someone’s thinking when they’re on the other side of the world, when you aren’t talking to them and when you can’t see their face. You’d hardly call it body language but there was an eloquence to the way the cursor twitched when it hovered over the open window in Google Chrome. You know the one. The one that’s open at the article on How to Tell if You’re a Psychopath.

If friendly technician had an ounce of sense he would, of course, immediately have put two and two together and made a writer. But I’m mightily relieved that he didn’t get a look at some of the other things in my browsing history. Apart from betraying my time-wasting devices (What Norse God Are You?) and my hopeless fantasies (PhD Projects in Geology & Geophysics and Atmospheric & Environmental Science) he would, if he hadn’t calculated that simple sum of two plus two correctly, been straight on the phone to the police.

I’m writing romantic suspense, remember. And I don’t (yet) have an encyclopaedic knowledge of crime so I have to look things up. Which is why my browsing history contains searches relating to chloroform and how long you will remain unconscious... other drugs which leave no trace... how you can stab someone so that they bleed a lot yet recover fairly quickly. And so on.

It could have been a lot worse. I’ve always been a little bit wary of the search terms I enter into the internet, which is why my story about the Suffragette and her home-made bomb skimped on the detail and is possibly also why it never got published. I’ve also thought twice  before typing certain things into Google Earth , and I certainly will be if I ever have a plot that includes a raid on Fort Knox.

I know I’m not alone. We writers are a vile, twisted lot. Want to tell me your secrets, list some of the sites you’ve visited in the name of research? Go on — I’d love to hear.

Jennifer Young

How To Keep On Writing? by Gill Stewart

Beautiful Iona where we went for the first of our short breaks

My life has been a bit unpredictable recently. Good things have got in the way of routine - like my Other Half atypically booking not one but two short breaks. And bad things, like family illness.

I have always found it difficult to be the sort of writer who writes a little every day, and yet I know that I write better if I do that. And I'm happier, too! So a couple of months ago I told myself to forget being a perfectionist, forget having to reread every word written to date before going forwards - and just write!

With all the recent interruptions I would have expected this to be particularly hard to follow my own advice, but somehow I have pushed through, making notes as I go, e-mailing various versions of the ms to myself so I can access it wherever I happen to be. And making more notes because the main ones are in the wrong place...

But I have kept on writing. And with the advent on NaNoWriMo this month (see Mary Smith's earlier post) it seemed the ideal opportunity to push myself a bit harder and not just write, but to write a decent amount each day. So far, to my great surprise, it has worked.

What have I discovered?

  - once I start writing, even if I say to myself 'A hundred words will do' I find myself enjoying and writing far more

  - the plot is developing itself for me (but then I have always been a bit of a pantser, so have tended to write this way)

  - I am getting to know my characters by writing them. I know I will have to go back and edit things in the early stages, but that's okay, I AM getting to know them

  - I've got back my love of writing and lost all the guilt about not writing/not writing enough/not writing well enough.

This reminds me of something I read that Jennifer Crusie had written some time a go - go write that good book. Don't worry about what others are thinking, what the market is doing, go and write the best book you can. And to do that, you have TO WRITE. Write what you can, where you can. And have fun.

 
If I can do it, anyone can, but I’d certainly appreciate any further advice as to how to keep this drive going.

CONFESSION TIME!

Hello, my name's Linda and I'm an editsaholic. Crumbs, I never thought I'd say that....think it even. I well remember the first set of professional edits I was sent. It spoke in all sorts of strange words the most confusing of which was TRACK-CHANGES. All sorts of settings seemed to be attached to said track-changes and it was all too easy to click on the wrong one. There were whole tracts of this manuscript which now had red writing in amongst the original black. I was told when I wanted to make my own changes in this 'new' document then my new words would come out in blue. Blimey! They did! I was told if I wanted to comment in the editor's boxes down the right-hand side of the manuscript I was to do it in another colour. I chose green. The whole thing was turning into a rainbow....and also a bit of a nightmare. I thought - in total ignorance I now know - that I'd written a book, it would be checked for spelling and punctuation and that there had been no huge copyright errors, and then it would toddle off to the printers. But no. My editor didn't like this, questioned that, suggested that the other would be much better. And I didn't like it one little bit! Oh no...who was she telling me my baby wasn't quite as beautiful as I thought it was? But I knuckled down and got on with. I even learned a thing or two. So when book two came along there wasn't quite so much to do as there had been with book one. Track-changes? We were old mates, weren't we? I was beginning to see how a good editor can make a good book even better - well, that's what someone told me (not necessarily about my book, you understand - not bragging) and I chose to believe it. And now I have another edit on the go. And I'm still learning! I have the same editor I've had before and I think she's a little bit like Kevin on Strictly who's pushing Frankie every which way to get the best performance out of her, because she knows me and knows what I'm capable of. I'm being pushed. And my book is becoming the stronger for it. In the middle of all this, a friend who has a fancy to write short stories sent me something for me to give the once- over and an opinion on. I could see how it could be improved. So....ho hum, here we go ...professionalism came to the fore and I put track-changes on it and played 'editor'. So.....book three of my EMMA trilogy will be out in the very near future....edits notwithstanding. There's a January publication date being mentioned so....better get on with. It will join TO TURN FULL CIRCLE and EMMA: There's No Turning Back. And here for a bit of fun is me with Graham Norton doing my level best to persuade him to buy my books. He was, as you can see from his body language, not in the least bit interested. The strong silent type - or maybe just silent!

Getting the word out by Jenny Harper

Becoming a Mo Sista means that I'm the one with the moustache!

Anyone who calls themselves an author these days knows how hard it is to get your books noticed in the brave new world that is modern publishing. This is true whether you are traditionally published or self published – I've been both, so I talk from experience!

The frustrating thing is just how long promotional work takes. Social media activity sucks up your time and saps your creative energy. I haven't done much in the way of personal appearances so far (just my recent launch in Waterstones), but obviously they take up time too - though I do think there must be something rewarding about actually interacting with real readers instead of hiding behind a computer screen. If real readers turn up to your event, of course!

Last summer, I was contacted by the lovely Janice Horton to ask if I would be interested in joining a pilot group of authors on a new promotional venture. Hit Lit Pro wanted ten authors to sign up for a year, paying a modest (but realistic) fee in return for a significant amount of social media activity on behalf of both individuals and the group and two blog tours (a five-stop tour and a ten-stop tour). Four months in and I'd say it's proving worth every penny. The Hit Lit Pro team have been tireless in their efforts. My first blog tour (five stops) yielded four reviews for my new title within days of it appearing and significant exposure (I have to stress that it is made absolutely clear that reviewers accepting the book for review must be free to be completely honest in their assessment). They ran a Rafflecopter competition for me, which also gained a lot of interest.

But the team at Hit Lit Pro have gone further. They are constantly looking for new ideas to help the group – and their latest is pure genius. We were asked some months ago if we would be prepared to contribute a short story to a Hit Lit Pro anthology in aid of Movember, the men's charity. Most of us agreed, a publisher (Thornberry Press) was found, and a campaign launched.

Today, Let's Hear It For The Boys! is launched. Thanks to the efforts of the promo team, it's already in the charts. It sells at 99p and every penny goes to charity. Please click now and support Movember! As a bonus, if you go to the HLP Facebook page, you can win some fab prizes.

It's a brilliant idea in itself – for a small effort, we get a lot of publicity, but we also raise what I hope will be a significant amount of money for the charity. Win win.

Building an author profile can take years – very few people have instant hits. I am delighted to be a part both of Hit Lit Pro and of the Movember campaign.

Can you think of a better way of getting the word out? If you can, I'd love to hear about it!