A Call to Arms: Send me your Huddled Numbers

Mar 2, 2015 | Marketing

Since Tara Sparling and I published our post on using paid ads to promote your book yesterday, I’ve been reading the comments left on our blogs. At first, I was surprised by how many authors feel lost when it comes to ads. How many point out that there are no...

A First Look at Advertising with Amazon

Feb 24, 2015 | Marketing

I’m sure you remember my step-by-step tutorial on how to advertise with Amazon. Three weeks later, I have some preliminary results, which, as promised, I’m sharing with you, so that you can learn from my mistakes. In a nutshell: I’ve failed. The...

My Book Marketing Secret

Feb 13, 2015 | Marketing

This is a guest post I wrote for Chris, the Story Reading Ape’s blog, and it describes my marketing strategy – which is really very simple. In fact, it can be summed up as follows: Be real, be fun, be helpful. If you do that, people will buy your books...

Tips on starting a Newsletter

Feb 11, 2015 | Marketing

Newsletters can be tricky. As a rule, people avoid subscribing to a mailing list because it eats up their time, and they don’t know how frequently you will email them. A second but equally big concern is that you will share their addresses with spammers....

Advertise with Amazon: a Step-by-step Tutorial

Feb 1, 2015 | Marketing

I was reading Chris McMullen’s excellent (as usual) post on Amazon’s new advertising service, and thought I’d give it a go. My monthly advertising budget is $100, but I hadn’t spent anything in January. So, I had this month’s and the...

Winning an RRBC #PushTuesday slot

Jan 20, 2015 | Marketing

I had a lovely surprise last Tuesday, while checking my Twitter feed: I had been selected for a #Pushtuesday slot by the Rave Reviews Book Club. Each Tuesday, an author is selected, and members are asked to promote one of their books with the hashtag #Pushtuesday....

Show, Don’t Tell, on Twitter

Dec 20, 2014 | Marketing, My friends' Guest Posts

I have often mentioned the “show, don’t tell” rule in my blog. MMJaye, a regular around here and a great supporter of Indies in her own blog, kindly wrote this guest post for me, tackling the rule from a novel perspective: how to use it when tweeting. Enjoy her...

Why Should You Publish in Ebook Format?

Dec 14, 2014 | Marketing, Publishing

Frankly, I’m surprised this is even asked anymore. And yet, I did encounter the question a few days ago. I consulted Author Marketing Ideas,  Vox.com and, of course, Author Earnings for some interesting statistics on ebooks. EBooks are on the rise right now....