8 Regrets to Avoid When Self-Publishing Your First Novel

Guest post by James A. Rose

We all have regrets. They are inevitable in some form throughout life. The goal though is to restrict regret as much as possible either through learning from our own mistakes or from the mistakes of others. The process of self-publishing a novel is no exception.

This task is a complicated one with a rather high learning curve. Unfortunately many authors become overwhelmed by the sheer volume of work that goes into the management and promotion that follows the launch of their first self-published book. This can happen to the best of us. The skill set required to sell a lot of copies is different from the skill set needed to write a great novel.

Let’s go over some of the common regrets we in the publishing industry have heard from authors, so you can circumvent the mistakes and get it right the first time.

1. Don’t underestimate the importance of a great book cover. Perhaps no aspect of a book screams amateur more than a low quality book cover. Don’t even try to make your own cover. Research the vital components, hire a professional designer and provide your input. A good designer should work with you until you are satisfied with the outcome.

2. Learn the art of writing a superb jacket copy. Those two paragraphs are so important to get right and because the jacket copy will also be used as a description in marketplaces, mastering this task can be a driving force to at least decent, if not great sales numbers.

3. Don’t fall for marketing scams. Once your email starts getting spread around amongst the business community you will undoubtedly begin receiving spam from marketers claiming to get your book on some bestseller list for only $3,000. Don’t buy it.

4. Proofread your book with a failsafe, compound eye, OCD precision. After you proofread it, give it to someone you know, then an editor, then a professional proofreader, then a beta reader, then you check it two more times, etc. Simple mistakes have more impact on perceived quality than you might think and a couple mediocre reviews from people calling you out on this can certainly be a detriment to sales.

5. Diligently check references for any contractors you hire to work on an aspect of your book. I don’t know if there is an Angie’s List for author services but if not, there should be. Too many authors have been burned by shoddy services rendered.

6. Put a delay on launch advertising. It might be best to wait a few weeks after your book release before you splurge on advertising. This will give advance readers a chance to post their reviews and point out any mistakes your already ‘manic proofreading’ overlooked.

7. Properly formatting an eBook is not as easy as it sounds. Let a pro handle it and be sure to preview the book on a variety of e-readers before posting the book for sale. Another great tip is to include a link at the end of the eBook where a reader can go to leave a review.

8. To print or not to print, that is the question. Well, the answer is sort of both. Print, but don’t print too much up front. Print 25-100 copies to send out as advance reader copies or promotional giveaways. This is important because some reviewers will only read a print copy and fans will get more excited over receiving a print copy in the mail rather than a free eBook download. It also couldn’t hurt to have some copies to put in a few local bookstores. Just make sure the store has agreed to accept them before you have them printed. On the flip side you don’t want 1,000 copies getting moth eaten in a spare bedroom.

Hopefully, these tips will help you avoid some costly setbacks and put your new book on the fast track to success, if there is such a thing. Marketing a book is a skill that must be mastered just like any other. Don’t obsess too much over it or let the job distract you from writing your next masterpiece. Most authors don’t find success until their second or third book anyway. Be content to let this first book be your jumping board.

James A. Rose is a writer for InstantPublisher.com, a full-service self-publishing company with 100% of all work performed in-house. We have been helping authors realize their dreams for the past 14 years. Whether you're printing a novel, how-to book, manual, brochure or any type of book you can imagine, our step-by-step instructions make publishing your own book simple and easy.
You can also find James at Facebook.com/InstantPublisher

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Self-Promoters Take a Page from Taylor Swift's Book

Riddle: So Why Is Taylor Swift a Terrific Marketer?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

ANSWER: Because she knows the real meaning of the word “assertive.”

I fear the word “assertive” has gotten a bad rap in the last couple decades.

People often associate it with being brash or downright overbearing, but it’s a skill we all need in business (in our case the world of publishing) when we must negotiate a contact or make ourselves heard in the din of a hundreds of thousands of books being published each year.

But Taylor got it right. She thinks creative people should get paid for their work. She stood up for that idea. She wasn’t afraid to use her financial clout to do it. And—here’s the biggie. She doesn’t hesitate to do it!

Recently, Taylor pitted her case against Apple--financially the world’s most influential company—who planned to launch a free promotion for their new music streaming business, Apple Music. She did it with an open letter on her blog (ahh, the power of the written word!) and a tweet or two. And she did it without mussing her hair or raising her voice or resorting to a lewd gesture. 

She assured Apple that she loved them, threw in a few more compliments like “I say this with love, reverence, and admiration for everything else Apple does,”  but she still socked it to them. In something like sixteen hours they were smart enough to buckle--which, by the way, can also be a smart marketing and/or public relations move. Swift and all their other musicians will get paid.

And now we can all add the word “assertive” to the lexicon of skills we need to survive, to influence. She used a gentle voice that convinced others that her protest was not about making more money for herself but a matter of principle and passion. Now the rest of us can be assertive and know that can mean engaging and focused as well as strident.

------

Nonfiction Bio

Carolyn Howard-Johnson brings her experience as a publicist, journalist, marketer, and retailer to the advice she gives in her HowToDoItFrugally series of books for writers and the many classes she taught for nearly a decade as instructor for UCLA Extension’s world-renown Writers’ Program. All her books for writers are multi award winners including the first edition of The Frugal Book Promoter published in 2003. Her The Frugal Editor, now in its second edition, won awards from USA Book News, Readers’ Views Literary Award, the marketing award from Next Generation Indie Books and others including the coveted Irwin award.

Howard-Johnson is the recipient of the California Legislature’s Woman of the Year in Arts and Entertainment Award, and her community’s Character and Ethics award for her work promoting tolerance with her writing. She was also named to Pasadena Weekly’s list of “Fourteen San Gabriel Valley women who make life happen” and was given her community’s Diamond Award for Achievement in the Arts. 

The author loves to travel. She has visited eighty-nine countries and has studied writing at Cambridge University in the United Kingdom; Herzen University in St. Petersburg, Russia; and Charles University, Prague. She admits to carrying a pen and journal wherever she goes. Her Web site is www.howtodoitfrugally.com. 

Your Character's Smirking...or Is He? Synonym Pitfalls.

This is a smirk.
And from what I know of this character,
he probably just kissed his brother's girlfriend
or killed someone's best friend.
Not a nice smile.

I've been running into a problem lately:  characters I otherwise like are constantly smirking.  I'm reading the third book now where this word appears in conjunction with friendly amusement, tenderness, or affection, and if I were sitting down with the authors, I might not be able to resist quoting The Princess Bride:  "You keep using that word.  I do not think it means what you think it means."

To Smirk or Not To Smirk

To me, a smirk is cocky, smug, or cruel.  At the very least, it's a teasing sort of smile, or a "hah!  I got you!"  Smirking is what the bad guy does as he pulls one over on your hero, not what your hero does when he tells the heroine that he loves her.

But after so many counterexamples, I thought maybe I had my definition wrong.  So I looked it up.

Oxford:  "to smile in an irritatingly smug, conceited, or silly way."

Merriam-Webster:  "to smile in an unpleasant way because you are pleased with yourself, glad about someone else's trouble, etc."

Apparently back in the day it used to mean simply "to smile," but we're not back in the day, and even if you're writing historical fiction, it's a dangerous game to use an old definition of a word that now has quite a different meaning.

Other Smiling Words

I've come across the same thing with grin.  To me, a grin is a big, face-scrunching smile, usually silly, mischievous, humorous, or teasing.  It's not the kind of thing you usually do in, for example, a sentimental or bittersweet moment.

Laughing Words

Synonyms for 'laugh' can cause problems too.  If your tough manly man giggles, that's interesting characterization.  Maybe he's really a little girl at heart.  Maybe he gets nervous easily in unfamiliar situations.  But you'd better mean it if you use it.  If a character guffaws at something that's not so funny to the reader, you might lose credibility.  Unless, of course, over-laughter is part of his personality.  Again, great characterization--but only if you mean it that way.

Walking Words

I read a book where no one walked anywhere.  Instead, everyone paced.  They paced to the door, paced across the street, paced to each other.  And I don't think they ever actually walked back and forth, which is what I think of as pacing.  It was almost as if the author had been told not to use "boring" words like 'walk.'  This author also rarely wrote 'small' or 'little,' replacing them instead with 'minute.'  By the end, I was almost throwing things at my Kindle and yelling, "Stop pacing, you minute boy!"  

There are many, many sort-of synonyms for walk:  stroll, stride, saunter, amble, trudge, plod, hike, tramp, march, stride, wander, ramble, tread, promenade, roam, traipse, take the air; advance, proceed, mosey, perambulate, etc, etc..

They all mean different things, and most can be good--in the right place.  But if you start using one over and over--especially if it conveys the wrong meaning, you risk annoying your reader.  And don't ever use "perambulate" unless you mean it to be funny.  

Looking Words

Gaze, glance, gape, stare, peer, peek, watch, examine, inspect, scan, scrutinize, consider, observe, ogle, espy, etc., etc.

Again, most can be good in moderation, but the current book I'm reading had a line like this:  "He glimpsed up quickly."  No...to glimpse is to catch a quick look at something, usually before it disappears or you move past it.  You can't glimpse up.  Then there was this:  "He glanced one eye over his shoulder."  'Glance' is intransitive (has no direct object).  You can't glance something.  You have to simply glance.

'Said' Words

Don't even get me started.  Maybe I'll explore this subject next time.  I'll just say now that if you use a dialogue tag like "admonished" or "theorized" more than once or twice in a book, reconsider.  And if you insist on using lots of unusual synonyms for 'said,' make sure the meaning really fits the dialogue.  Don't just use a word you randomly pointed at on your "synonyms for said" cheat sheet.

Using Synonyms (plying, wielding, manipulating...)

Just because there is a synonym doesn't mean you should automatically use it, just to cut repetition or avoid "boring" words.  Be sure that the synonym means what you think it means and that it won't make your reader think you're joking.  (Ascertain that the synonym signifies what you postulate that it betokens and that it will not induce the peruser to opine that you're jesting.)  And generally only use words that are in your active vocabulary.  Else the danger is too high that you'll misuse them.

Obviously, styles differ, and if yours is more flowery, more of these types of words might fit.  Sometimes you can play with definitions and stretch words for creativity's sake.  But you have to do it intentionally...and carefully.

How to Avoid the Issue

Perhaps the real problem is that we often write too many of these types of words to begin with.  A critiquer friend of mine calls them "stage directions":  all the looking, laughing, nodding, smiling words.  Maybe it's best to simply cut down on them altogether.  Then we won't have to rely on innacurate or laughable synonyms.

Melinda Brasher currently teaches English as a second language in the beautiful Czech Republic.  She loves the sound of glaciers calving and the smell of old books.  Her travel articles and short fiction appear in Go Nomad, International Living, Electric Spec, Intergalactic Medicine Show, and others.  For an e-book collection of some of her favorite published pieces, check out Leaving Home.  For something a little more medieval, read her YA fantasy novel, Far-Knowing. Visit her online at http://www.melindabrasher.com.

Blogging and Google Rankings – Do You Really Want to Use that Content in Your Blog Post?

Everyone is working to keep their blogs regularly updated with content. Content is a must. It’s all about content, content, content.

In fact, content marketing is the reigning king.

Because of this, everyone does whatever they can to keep their websites with updated content on a regular basis:

• People write their own posts
• People buy content from freelancers or content mills
• People buy PLRs (Private Label Rights)
• People accept guest posts
• People reprint the content of others from article directories
• People use content curation
• People use newsjacking
• So on and so on

But, is all content the same? Is all content acceptable?

In other words, whether it’s your own content or you’re accepting a guest post, if the article is NOT useful and quality content, if it’s poorly written, if it’s linking back to a spam site, should you use it?

For example: Maybe you agreed to be a hosting site for a service that provides virtual book tours. The content their authors provide for the posts is very poorly written and is primarily promotional. Is it okay to use?

The simple answer is to these questions is NO.

In case you’re wondering what constitutes fluff or ‘poor quality’ content, you need to determine if your content is valuable.

To determine if your content is valuable, you need to answer a few questions:

• Does the content offer the reader useful information?
• Is it engaging or thought provoking?
• Is it controversial (the good kind)?
• Is it entertaining?
• Is it shareable?
• Do you think the content is ‘quality’ enough to appear in the results of a Google search query?

If your content doesn’t hit one of those targets, then it’s most likely fluff.

Okay, what if the content is fluff, but it has ‘good’ keywords in it? Is it okay to publish it then?

Well, it depends on four things:

• Are you blogging to sell something?
• Are you blogging to increase your mailing list?
• Are you blogging to increase your authority in your niche/industry?
• Are you looking to ‘please’ Google and improve your ranking?

With Google’s latest algorithms, keywords don’t pack the same punch they used to. Search engines spiders can get the gist of the entire content. They base ranking and ‘whether they’ll use that post’s link in the results of a search query’ on the overall content, not just the keywords.

In other words, Google can pretty much detect fluff and garbage, even if you have great keywords.

So, back to the title question: Do you really want to publish that content on your website?

If you’re blogging to sell something, increase your mailing list, gain authority, and boost your ranking, then you should definitely AVOID posting fluff or poor quality content to your site.

Poor quality content can easily lower your Google ranking, which will reduce your authority, which will make people think twice about signing up for your mailing list, which in turn will put a damper on your sales.

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~~~~~
MORE ON ONLINE MARKETING

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Harper Lee's Rich Legacy for Writers



Masterpieces are masterpieces not because they are flawless

but because they've tapped into something essential to us all--

at the heart of who we are and how we live. Mark Childress

Photo by Linda Wilson, Copyright 2015.

Few authors have captured the imagination of so many as Harper Lee. Especially an author who has touched so many hearts--some 40 million--with one work: Lee's Pulitzer Prize and just-about-every-other-award-winning novel, To Kill a Mockingbird. Just last year 400,000 copies were purchased, according to an article in the Los Angeles Times.

My personal foray into the fascinating story not only of the novel itself, but of Lee's life and circumstances surrounding the writing of the novel, began with a spellbinding account on the PBS show, American Masters, "Harper Lee," transcribed here in order to paraphrase or quote the views of some of the most noteworthy authors and celebrities of our times. And media coverage of the much anticipated publication this month by Harper, a division of HarperCollins, of Lee's first novel, Go Set a Watchman; a must-read, according to Michele Miller, Correspondent on CBS, This Morning; which was written about a year before the first draft of Mockingbird and reportedly discovered recently among Harper Lee's archives.

What are some of the reasons for the enduring success of Lee's masterpiece, To Kill a Mockingbird, and what can writers glean for their own work?

Great Freedom from One Major Work
Born in 1926 in the small town of Monroeville, Alabama, Nelle Harper Lee met with rejection after rejection in 1957 when, at the age of 31, she searched for a home for her novel, then titled Atticus. Though at first blush the manuscript was said to have many things wrong with it, that it needed a lot of work and was really a series of short stories with dangling threads of a plot; acceptance came when editors at Lippincott Company recognized not only the work's promise, but this author's great potential. Up until then Lee's publishing credits consisted of several short stories that she wrote while supporting herself for eight years as an airline reservation agent.

Lee settled down to write revisions of Mockingbird with the help of her editor and financial support from good friends who were impressed by how perceptive the character sketches were of the people in her hometown of Monroeville. This revision process, which seemed long and hopeless at the time, went on with few distractions for two years.

Accolades
How can our work be informed by this great author and her masterpiece? The PBS American Masters show turned to renowned celebrities and authors for what Mockingbird meant to them.

• Oprah Winfrey (Producer: The Oprah Winfrey Show, 23 actress credits, magazine publisher): I wanted to be Scout. I was Scout. Mockingbird is one of the first books I wanted to encourage people to read.
• Wally Lamb (I Know this Much is True): Mockingbird is the first book that captured me. It was exciting. I didn't realize literature could do that. I taught the book almost every year for 25 years while teaching high school: the students read the book because they wanted to, not because they had to. It cast the same spell for them as it did for me.
• Adriana Trigiani (Big Stone Gap: A Novel): When I was 12 years old I found the book on the library's book mobile. As different as any Italian can be growing up in the small town of Big Stone Gap, Virginia, feeling like my family came from Pluto, it was the perfect time to read Mockingbird.
• James McBride (Crazy in Alabama): I read a tattered copy in my home in Queens. Mockingbird is the first time a white writer discussed issues of racism that were complicated and sophisticated.

A Rich Legacy for Writers

• Allan Gurganus (Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All): The narrator is a grown-up Scout, simultaneously adult looking back and child living in a small town. A difficult feat. Ask any writer: very tough.
• James McBride: Part of why Lee is a great American writer: this child sees the world as an adult, through a child's eyes with an adult understanding.
• Gregory Peck (played the defining role of his career and earned an Oscar as Atticus Finch in the film): Good and evil would never seem as fresh and terrifying as it does when seen through the eyes of a child. It is remarkable for a writer to capture the feelings of a child. Perhaps that's why one book in the last few years has been so warmly embraced by tens of millions of people.
• Mark Childress (Crazy in Alabama): I lived two doors down from Lee's house. That is the reason I'm a writer.
• Rosanne Cash (Singer-songwriter and author): What I got out of the book: The way you behave, whether people see you or not is central to becoming yourself. I remember that [intense] feeling of integrity and sense of conscience.
• Lee Smith (The Lost Girls): Mockingbird still has a galvanizing effect on a young reader. It never ages; is as important today as it was then and remains as relevant today as it did the very day it was written. The characters are indelible for generations of readers.
• Anna Quindlen (author, journalist and opinion columnist): I collected books about insurrectionary, outspoken, non-girly girls: Anne of Green Gables, Joan March in Little Women, and Scout. Scout is a scamp, irresistible, hysterically funny, smart, always has a comeback; always poking at boundaries of good taste and what's proper; doesn't have a mother, childhood in many ways is lonely; struggles how to be in the world.
• Wally Lamb: The language and especially the voice and story take students on a smooth ride.
• Student comments: Helps people see what it was really like. People talk and act differently but they are the same. Inspired me because it showed how one person can change the whole world.
• Alice Lee (Harper Lee's sister): Nell was a gifted storyteller even as a child, with a vivid imagination. She would compose stories and type them up on a beat-up old Underwood typewriter.
• Lee's Own Words: Lee said in her last interview in March, 1964, that she liked writing maybe too much. "I'm a slow worker, a steady worker. So many writers don't like to write. If they must do it, it's under the compulsion that makes any artist what he is. But, they don't really enjoy trying to turn a thought into a reasonable sentence. But I do. I like to write. Sometimes I'm afraid I like it too much because when I get into the work I don't want to leave it."

A final word
A terrific quote by Wally Lamb: [To write a novel] you start with who and what you know. You take a survey of the lay of the land that shaped you. You tell one lie that turns into a different lie and after a while those models become their own people rather than people you originally thought of. By telling lies you're trying to arrive at a deeper meaning.
Reinforced for me: Write what you know; make characters true to life; choose compelling subject matter; craft a great story; keep current societal trends in mind; love the process; be patient, writing as many revisions as it takes.

Now on to the joy of listening to the audio version of Go Set a Watchman, ready and waiting on my desk. Like Lee's story in Mockingbird, my interest is everlasting.

Sources: Most of the information in this post was transcribed and paraphrased from The American Masters profile, "Harper Lee." Other sources include: "http://www.latimes.com/books/jacketcopy/la-et-jc-harper-lee-go-set-a-watchman-mockingbird-20150204-story.html;  http://www.newrepublic.com/article/122290/suspicious-story-behind-publication-go-set-watchman.

Linda Wilson, a former elementary teacher and ICL graduate, has published over 40 articles for adults and children and six short stories for children. Recently she completed Joyce Sweeney's online fiction and picture book courses. She is currently working on several projects for children. Follow Linda on  Facebook.

Encouragement for Writers

We are mothers, sisters, and daughters.

We are wives, friends, and co-workers.

And we are writers. Writers with personal lives. All the roles we have in life can keep us busy, distracted, disappointed, or discouraged. It can even pull us away from writing if we are overwhelmed.

Here are some inspirational quotes I hope will encourage you!

Keep your eyes on the stars and your feet on the ground. - Theodore Roosevelt

Problems are not stop signs. They are guidelines. - Robert Schuller

If you have other things in your life-family, friends, good productive day work-these can interact with your writing and the sum will be all the richer. - David Brin

A wounded deer leaps the highest. - Emily Dickinson

One may walk over the highest mountain one step at a time. - John Wanamaker

Photo credit: s-a-m / Foter / CC BY

Feel a bit better? I hope so.

Next month: ways to balance your personal life with the business of writing. 

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After raising and homeschooling her 8 children and teaching art classes for 10 years, Kathy has found time to pursue freelance writing. She enjoys writing magazine articles and more recently had her story, "One of a Kind", published in The Kids' Ark. You can find her passion to bring encouragement and hope to people of all ages at When It Hurts - http://kathleenmoulton.com

Writing Bonuses

image by jesadaphorn.at www.freedigitalphotos.net

We all have months when our energy is at a low ebb. Mine is traditionally July--the end of the school year and that means paperwork and more paperwork rather than holiday.

But this year, getting away from students and from the computer for the full week of my publishing house summer shut down helped me realize how many networking bonuses we benefit from as writers.

All round us we have experts generous in sharing their expertise and always willing to lend a helping hand.

Writing for Wealth

Freelance writing is an exhausting way to make a living. Yes, we set our own deadlines, choose our own work--how hard can it be? Very.

Juggling submissions, thinking up new ideas, finding oneself "interviewing" rather than talking to friends--it all becomes stressful.

Consider taking advantage of PLR material. Search engines are full of sites offering pre-written content free or at low prices. Never use it as is but it can give you a skeleton framework on which to build your own writing and it is another way of researching the niche markets that are popular in which to make sales.

If nothing else, it may inspire you to say, "I can do better than that. " :-)

Study what is on the market. See what works. One plr report costed at $2.50 sold 100 times means $250. Think about it. 

It is all too easy to stick to the tried and true formula of what works: querying a favorite editor, writing for the same magazine, sticking to lower paid markets rather than trying something new.

 Writing for Health

Health is one of the most popular and profitable markets for writers though ironically most writers suffer from some health problem through their sedentary lifestyle.

My week off gave me the chance to research the reason for an almost crippling sciatic pain that baffled my doctors. If you ever find yourself too sore to sit and almost as sore to stand, look into piriformis syndrome.

I have been doing the exercises for almost three weeks now and they work for me. And of course, when I get round to producing my own mini report, then that will also work for me--either as an opt-in bonus for my newsletter or as a PLR pack.

Writing for Happiness

Australian writer Ruth Barringham has discontinued sales of her Online Complete Course and is offering it free. It is a huge course which covers everything from getting the initial idea through learning html code to web design and putting your site online.

Best of all, she is relinquishing her copyright so it seems you could update it where necessary and do whatever you want with it. A tempting offer.

The Complete Online Course is only one of the marvellous resources Ruth has on her site. Try the free stuff link on her blog and look at her free resources page too. 

As a beta reader for Beth Barany's new  mini course on novel writing, I can happily recommend it. Written for first time authors, it still holds lots of useful tips for those of us on the second time around. And it's another irresistible no cost offer for those of us whose income is limited.

Her older site has several interesting creativity articles available for download and I shall post the link to her new novel writing course as soon as it goes live.

Until then, take a look at her resources page at BethBarany.com

Let me know what you find useful in any of these ideas and please add your own thoughts on writing bonuses in the comments below

Anne Duguid Knol

A local and national journalist in the U.K., Anne is now a fiction editor for award-winning American and Canadian publishers. As a new author, she shares writing tips and insights at her very new Author Support blog: http://www.authorsupport.net

Her novella, ShriekWeek is published by The Wild Rose Press.