Tag Archives: self-publishing

Reviews v. Endorsements v. Critiques. A Proposal for Writers.

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Writers want to support other writers, but when it comes to leaving reviews, we’re torn. What if we don’t like a book? What if we spot flaws? Fortunately there are options — if we change the way we think about “reviews.”

If you’ve ever hit the “publish” button on Amazon or Smashwords or D2D, you know how terrifying it is to put your novel out there for everyone to see — and judge.

You also know how badly you need reviews.

And as you meet other writers on Twitter or Facebook or Instagram, chances are you’ve faced another dilemma: should you review other writers’ books? And if you’ve read a book and don’t like it — or, worse yet, spot what you think are flaws — what should you do? Share your thoughts publicly? Contact the writer privately? Drop the whole thing and enter the witness protection program? All of the above?

As a writer, you know first-hand how much negative reviews hurt.

Negative reviews dampen sales — and that’s not even the worst of it. Getting a negative review is personally painful for writers. It’s discouraging. No matter how thick-skinned we try to be, it feels so, so personal.

On the other hand, you also know the importance of feedback.

I speak from experience! As much as I hate negative reviews, I learn a LOT from them. I get data from negative reviews that helps me become a better writer and better understand my audience.

I’m currently doing a completely re-write of a novel based on input I got via negative reviews. Yes, those reviews tanked my rankings. I was just starting to get traction as an author, and poof. Everything I’d built was gone; years later, I still haven’t fully recovered. But when I’m done with the revision, the novel will be a better book. MUCH better. (If you’re interested in this story, by the way, stay tuned. I’ll be sharing more about it in a future post.)

In other words, there’s nuggets of gold buried in negative reviews, if you can stomach looking at them.

But that doesn’t mean that writers should use reviews to point out flaws. Especially when there are other ways to support each other. Better ways.

  • Once Upon a Flarey Tale by Kirsten Mortensen
We interrupt this post to remind you that I have a new book out. And it’s the best book I’ve ever written. Available on Amazon for print or Kindle, or click here to browse other e-formats.

A New Framework: Review, Endorsement, or Critique?

As writers, we need to get more comfortable — even a little cynical — with what we all know is true. Reviews exist because the platforms where we sell our books use reviews to drive sales.

Reviews may benefit authors, too, but that’s not really why Amazon lets us post them. Amazon lets us post reviews for one reason only: because it’s good for Amazon!

Writing and posting reviews also requires us to invest time and energy. When you publish a review, you’re creating content and giving it away. Sometimes it makes sense to do that. But every minute you spend creating content to enrich the Amazon platform is time you could have spent working on your novel.

Fortunately, there are two other ways to support our fellow authors.

The first way is an endorsement. You publicly praise a book and recommend it to others.

And see what I did there? Because guess what. You can use a review to make an endorsement. But all that really means is that reviews are a vehicle for publishing endorsements. It doesn’t change the fact that reviews and endorsements are two entirely different animals.

In fact, when I stopped mixing up the concept of “review” with the concept of “endorsement,” I saved myself a ton of headaches, because the question “review or not review?” is now extremely easy to answer.

“No. Nope. And no.”

I never just “review” other writers’ books.

Instead — time permitting — I sample read other writers’ books, and sometimes buy and read other writers’ books, and then, if I really like something I’ve read, I’ll endorse it. I’ll post an endorsement (what everyone else calls a “positive review”) on Amazon. I’ll sometimes share my endorsement in other ways, e.g. Twitter.

“But Kirsten,” you say. “What if I read another author’s book and for some reason I don’t feel I can endorse it?”

Glad you asked, because that leads me to the last category: critiques.

Critiques, unlike reviews, are private. They’re feedback — just like negative reviews are feedback — but they don’t embarrass the writer or hurt rankings and/or sales.

I’m a lifelong reader and a lifelong professional writer. I’m also a self-published author who has been working on novels for over twenty years, now.

I’m far from perfect! But when it comes to novels, I’ve learned a little bit about what works and what doesn’t. And I’ll be blunt: I immediately spot serious flaws in the majority of self-pubbed novel I sample.

Am I going to buy a flawed indie-pubbed book, slog through it, and post a public review that details its problems?

Hell, no.

Because who would benefit?

Not me! I’d be taking time away from writing and from reading books I actually enjoy — not to mention the rest of my life.

And certainly not the writer! See above. Negative reviews do real hurt. And what writer wants to hurt other writers?

On the other hand, if you came to me and asked me for an HONEST critique, I’d read a few pages and don my fire suit and tell you what I honestly think could be made better. Even though, mostly likely, you won’t like it. Even though there’s a very good chance you’ll think I am completely wrong and don’t understand your book and don’t understand you as a writer or what you’re trying to do and everyone else who’s looked at your book told you it’s AMAZING.

I know you’re likely to respond that way, because that’s the way I respond to “negative reviews” (which are actually critiques … by people who have chosen to make them public).

But I’d be supporting you in a way that is a lot kinder and more useful than pretending your book is wonderful when it’s not, or telling the world I think your book has issues …

Or staying silent.

So, what do you think?

Maybe, instead of committing to public reviews, we could start offering other writers either:

A. Public Endorsements or

B. Private Critiques …

We’d be helping each other.

We’d be avoiding sticky promises that make us feel deeply uncomfortable.

We’d avoid hurting each other.

What do you think?

Rolling the elephant

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Rolling a baby elephant might not be so hard...

Rolling a baby elephant might not be so hard…

You’ve heard this, I’m sure.

Q. What’s the best way to eat an elephant?

A. One bite at a time.

And that’s great advice — if the analogy happens to fit your problem. Say you want to clean out your attic. Or ride your bike from Key West to Anchorage. Or . . . write a book.

But what if what you’re trying to do is completely different?

What if you’re not trying to eat an elephant — you’re trying to roll him?

Now we’re talking about overcoming inertia.

Marketing your book is an example. You can write a book one word at a time. But marketing it — successfully marketing it — requires something different.

You need a lever.

You need a way to exert an extraordinary amount of force — when the only thing you have to work with is your own weight, your own two hands.

The question is: how do you get it started?

Where’s that lever?

KDP Select. My experience so far.

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I’ll be honest. I initially bristled at the whole idea of KDP select:

  • Don’t like the exclusivity clause. Don’t really see how that benefits Amazon, either. Just seems to me it’s their way of throwing their weight around.
  • The $500,000 pot is a joke. What are the odds that some Amazon Prime member will pick my book as the one book he/she borrows that month? Vanishingly small. I’m an unknown, remember? I’ve read that an estimated 27,000 titles were enrolled in KDP Select within the first 24 hours. Explain to me how my book stands out among tens of thousands of other titles? Answer. It won’t.  The writers who are going to collect a more than a few pennies from that pot are the same writers who are making money self-publishing already.

So why enroll?

Because my sole hope, as an indie author, is that my novels are good enough that over time I’ll start generating word of mouth.

And that comes down to a numbers game. Everyone who has read my novels has told me they think they are really good. (Yes, I realize that’s a sample that self-selects — i.e. people who don’t care for it aren’t too likely to let me know.)

But “everyone” so far consists of a really small group of people. Embarrassingly small.

As a side note, there are two categories of indie author who have an easier battle.

First: genre writers, because you have a ready-made audience and all the benefits of the publishing industry’s genre-centric communications apparatus. Your books fit neatly into the categories and tags for example.

Second: the mid-listers — people who have a backlog of titles they can take over and self-pub.

Notice that in almost every indie “success story” you read, the writer fits into at least one of those two categories (and very often both).

Me? I don’t write genre, and worse yet my books incorporate elements of genre but also elements of lit fic. And I’m starting from absolute scratch — I had a couple of non-fic books published traditionally but other than that, nobody knows who I am.

I love the idea of Smashwords, but if there’s a way to leverage it to generate exposure, I haven’t figured it out. For example, I’ve participated in several of the Smashwords Facebook promos (such as Freebie Friday, where you post a coupon code for a free copy of your book). At most it’s gotten me a handful of downloads.

And here’s the thing: with KDP Select, Amazon lets you give away free books.

So I talked it over with one of my best indie author buddies, Peazy Monellon (here’s her debut horror novel, Meany) and enrolled Can Job.

Yesterday I offered a 24-hour promotion.

285 people downloaded my novel.

I don’t know how else to put a free copy of my ebook in the hands of 285 Amazon customers.

Now, how many of those people will actually read my book? Who knows.

But if even a fraction do, and if out of that fraction one or two write reviews, or decide that they want to buy When Libby or something else I publish — well, then I’ll count this experiment a success.

Stay tuned. I’ll let you know how it works out long term . . .

An Author’s Amazon Wish List

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Via the top-shelf blogger Passive Guy, here’s a top-shelf post by Mike Stackpole about Amazon and the book biz.

One of the points Stackpole makes is that as an online/digitally savvy company, Amazon has real time access to data about what its customers are buying — i.e., “statistics and analysis that tells them which authors are trending or about to trend.”

Amazon can act on those stats to “cherry pick talent and promote their ‘discoveries.'”

Amazon also has the ability to promote digital sales of books and later on produce a print compilation of digital novels, offering a unique print product. This is actually stated as a plan in their press release.

Good on Amazon. And I agree. This gives them a huge advantage over brick & mortar publishers/distributors.

But I do wish one thing: that Amazon would share more of its statistics with its writers.

As Passive Guy writes in his post, indie authors are in many respects Amazon’s partners in the e-publishing trend. He also writes:

Indie publishing has changed authors from helpless little children who cry and wait for their agent or publisher to come and wipe their noses into savvy and intelligent entrepreneurs, people who know how to do things for themselves.

To which I add: entrepreneurs need data.

I’d like to know how many clicks I get on my stuff on Amazon — my book pages, my author page.

I’d like to know how many book samples are being downloaded.

I’d like to know what percent of sample downloads convert to sales.

I’d like to know when/where people abandon my page or for that matter quit reading the sample.

And I’d like to know how all those stats compare to data about other authors’ Amazon activity.

I mean, think about it. For indie authors, Amazon pages and samples are marketing tools.

With the right kind of data, we’d better understand how well those tools are working — or how they can be tweaked.

Of course Amazon has reason to keep its data inside its kimono: competitors. But there’s a workaround, too: just release it in the form of trends and percentages rather than raw numbers.

So how about it Amazon? Please? Pretty please?

She self-pubbed, got a Harper Collins contract . . . and now is self-pubbing again

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That sound you hear is another old taboo exploding.

It used to be that authors with book contracts pretty much had to do what publishers told them to do. Right?

If you got big enough you might be able to throw your weight around. But most authors had little if any power.

So this is definitely another milestone moment in 21st Century publishing trends:

Novelist Polly Courtney has dropped her publisher HarperCollins for giving her books “condescending and fluffy” covers aimed at the chick lit market.

There was a time when Courtney would have had to accept whatever covers/marketing decisions her publisher made.

Not any more — because now she has options.

A tale of beer and books

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Southern Tier Iniquity black ale.

Out there in The Long Tail you’ll find some mighty fine brewskies. P.S. Southern Tier, please bring Iniquity back. Thank you.

Only imagine: MSNBC has a story up about beer sales, and lo and behold, they’re plummeting — for mainstay brands like Bud, Old Milwaukee, and Michelob. [UPDATE: sadly, story no longer there…]

Of the 23 “largest selling beer products” in the U.S., “eight . . .  have lost a staggering 30 percent or more of their sales between 2005 and 2010.”

Yikes.

But here’s what strikes me. For years, we’ve been hearing that “digital” is killing the publishing industry. Digital is killing newspapers. Digital is killing music.

And the focus for the most part has been on the medium. You’ve probably heard “kill the medium!” arguments along these lines:

  • Blogging makes it too easy for know-nothings to pose as journalists. Result: newspapers face too much competition from low-quality websites. Newspaper circulation plunges.
  • Digital music is too easy to steal. Producers can’t control their product any more — people are getting for free what they used to have to buy. Music sales plunge.
  • Self-pubbing books is too easy. Now unvetted self-proclaimed “writers” can put their better-hold-your-nose junk on Amazon or B&N with a click of a mouse. They are squeezing out legitimate publishers. Print book sales plunge.

But here’s the thing. With beer, you take the medium out of the equation. People can’t buy or sell beer in digital form. It’s an analog world experience still, thank doG.

So beer becomes a control case.

Right?

You have your traditional, old school industry — all those gargantuan beer brands that our grandfathers used to drink — and you have this nascent (well, still sort of nascent) decentralized craft brew movement with its funny labels and quirky flavors.

And what happens?

We learn that when people have a choice, lo and behold, they will abandon “safe,” boring, insipid products and seek out interesting, imaginative, vibrant alternatives. In proverbial droves.

This also suggests IMO that “brand” — which you  may have noticed has been elevated in the past couple decades to near-mystical status in the marketing lexicon — is actually not enough to carry a product. On the contrary, “brand” has some mighty heavy clay feet.

Anyway, a prediction. Bud, and Old Milwaukee, and Michelob (which btw is in my WP spellcheck. Really? My spellcheck doesn’t recognize the word “spellcheck” but it generates its red squiggle if I type Michalob or Michelobe? Really????) are already working furiously behind the scenes to launch a stunning new menu of “craft-style” beers.

Second prediction. Book publishers will engage in a parallel activity, if they’re not already. And they’ll figure out which self-pubbed products sell well (possible examples: shorter novels; serials) and start assembly-lining e-books into those niches with a vengeance.

But without offering author advances ;-)

Write, or buy a lottery ticket?

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In a Guardian article on POD (publish on demand) books, we find this charming side dish:

. . . 50% of all published books with an ISBN (International Standard Book Number) tag sell fewer than 250 copies and barely more than 1% of manuscripts submitted ever get published.

Interesting numbers; I don’t doubt they are true. Yeah, the odds are stacked against us.

What I don’t understand is how POD is supposed to help. Sure, by publishing yourself, you are, technically, um, “published.” But does anyone think that by self-publishing, you can improve your chances of selling more than 250 copies? Even if Amazon does list your book?

Sure, you bypass the multiple gateways of agents, editors, publishers, distributors, and booksellers. But not the readers. Ah, the readers . . .