Indie authors

I have been watching self-publishing Indie authors who are getting the writing success they deserve.  Like a little fly on the wall, I have silently been following their careers and have been learning a lot.  I may not ever see their success but the only way I will never know unless I try here.

Most of these people gave up on the traditional route of finding an agent. The agents might send your manuscript to a publisher if you are lucky. The agents have tons of manuscripts on their desks, and it your book does not catch his or her eye into the slush pile it goes.  Sorry but my baby deserves better than a slush pile either the physical kind or the virtual kind.  I do not have the money to piss away coping and mailing my manuscript to numerous agents.

Therefore, I choose to go the self-publishing route and I am seeing positive returns. It is nothing to live off yet, but I am not giving up on my dream of being a successful author. I have only been self publishing since October of 2011, but it only took me two months to get my e-books and print copies to where they were more profitable than the meager page views I received from half a dozen content sites where I have been pouring my time in for the past four years.

My drive and determination are fueling me to push harder for that self-publishing success I seek. I may never see millions of sales like Amanda Hocking, but I never will if I do not try my hardest.  

A Contest, Win an Autographed Book

I belong to a writer’s group called the Circle 8 Writers and we have been publishing Anthologies since September 2010. I love writing fiction and have been doing it since I was a teenager.  The best way to relax for most people is curling up with a good book. The best way for me to relax is sitting down and writing fiction.

 I have a favorite character I often write short stories about and her name is Paisley. I am in the process with the Circle 8 editor Robert Arend to make Paisley a short story anthology I am honored that they think so highly of my character that they think she deserves her own book! So far four of my Paisley stories have appeared in the Circle 8 Writers group books.

I am blessed to be in a group with such awesome writers I consider friends. There is currently a contest where the visitors can win an autographed book by the founder of the group, Angel Sharum.  Check out her blog for more information. 

Angel's Blog http://www.angelsharums-storyboard.blogspot.com/

Hey also check out the group's Facebok Page. 

KDP Program Restored my Faith

My KDP select experiment began in February 2012. It is important to note that I had been selling on the Kindle platform since October 2011, so I am still a newbie. I have the stats to prove it, yes, it is sad.

I was ready to give up and began searching the net on how to spur sales. I found the KDP blogs, articles etc. it seems as if everyone as singing its praises. I prayed this would be my answer.

I wanted my piece of the pie. So I enrolled a brand new (never published) eBook entitled ‘3x Heart Attack Survivor’. This one is based on my heart attacks and the changes I made since I had them in 2009. I had 103 downloads for the two days that it was free and there were also 3 sales of this title in February.

I had seen that in the days immediately following the ‘freebie’ day that my sales were hitting. I knew I was on to something so I went ahead and edited the book one day. I put the titles of all of my books at the end of the ‘3x Heart Attack Survivor’ and found that it did spur additional sales.

I went ahead and added two more of my books into the KDP select program after I had edited them to include each of my other titles. I went ahead and scheduled the freebie days on all three eBooks to include Fridays for the near future.

I choose Fridays for various reasons, but the most important reason is that as a freelance writer I know my page views on blogs and web content seem to spike on Fridays and Saturdays. This means simply more people are surfing the web on Fridays.

Before I show results here I need to show my stats from previous months to show why I feel strongly that each indie writer needs to have at least one book in this program.

In October 2011, I sold two eBooks.

In November 2011, I sold two more eBooks.

In December 2011, I sold three eBooks.

In January 2012, the amount of copies sold three

Now you see why I felt the need to do something here. Sales were sagging and the first four months I sold 10 copies of various books.

February, which was my first month in the KDP program I got 23 sales and had 293 downloads! All of those free books, which were down loaded, had the other titles so I was essentially advertising all of my other books multiple times without effort.

February I had more sales than in the first four months combined. My profits were more than I doubled for this month when compared to the first 4 months. Some could argue that my eBooks had finally been noticed, but I do not think that is the answer. I do believe that if that were the case the sales and profits would have risen a little and not made a huge jump there.

I do honestly believe that that jump in sales is because I have the three books in the KDP program. March is already almost half of what I did in February and it is only the ninth. I cannot wait to see if sales keep on the current trend.