The publishing industry has been shifting since 2009. Indie publishing has become a force since 2011 or so. At first, we writers made our work available, but the things that worked six years ago don’t work now. The problem is that the marketing gurus for writers are just other writers with an okay idea. As […]
Continue ReadingI love this blog. I love it because you readers make it so much better with your questions and comments. Last week, I wrote about the early stages of building a brand. In that post is something that seems pretty straightforward to me—define your target audience. Some of you remarked in the email and […]
Continue ReadingWhen I do marketing posts, they tend to freak my loyal readers out. Sometimes, the posts freak me out too. What writers want from marketing blogs are simple suggestions that boil down to this: Do x, y, and z, and you’ll get these fantastic results! Only it doesn’t work that way. Or rather, it doesn’t […]
Continue ReadingI’ve been talking to myself lately. Actually, I’ve been talking back to podcasts, vlogs, and emails. Ever since I said I would be doing a series on branding, I’ve gotten links to great branding tips. (Please, keep them coming.) Every single link I received that dealt with branding from a writer’s perspective talked about cover […]
Continue ReadingI feel like I’ve been on a particularly grueling business trip, and am slowly recalibrating back into my office. I worked very hard in the front part of April as I prepared for the science fiction writing workshop I ran here on the Oregon Coast. Then the workshop happened. Lots of great discussions, great questions, […]
Continue ReadingOver the weekend, I headed to traditional publishers’ websites and look at their paranormal romance covers only to discover…that the damn books are branded like urban fantasy or like an E.L. James knockoff or like a cookbook or travelogue. All of this points out a huge problem in the paranormal romance genre. There’s nothing that screams modern paranormal romance. Believe me when I tell you that readers look for such things.
Continue ReadingThis week, Hugh Howey put a funny post on his website. Titled “One-Man Operation,” Hugh’s post profiles—if you want to call it that—the man who runs Nautilis Publishing in Taiwan. Nautilis publishes Hugh, and according to the post, has existed since 2010, and has done two books per year. They’re always bestsellers. Hugh says his […]
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