Category: Indie Publishing

Business, Indie Publishing, Marketing, Networking, Publishing, Writing Business

How To Survive The Recession: Author Edition

Rachel Rueben
Image by Peggy_Marco via Pixabay

Just a few weeks ago, there was an article that published a survey of the world’s top economists and 80% of them said that they believed this current recession is going to last for 1 ½ to 2 years.  They also predicted a double dip recession where things would look like they were recovering only to “dip” again.  Sadly, this isn’t your typical recession where things look bleak and then slowly improve.  This thing is going to take a while which will be catastrophic for companies that were already struggling before this recession hit.

If you are an author who is contracted with a publisher that isn’t doing well, now may be the time to start securing your future before you find yourself without an income.  Below are six tips that will put you in the driver’s seat during this recession.    

Tip 1: Update Your Online Presence

This includes your website, social media accounts or blog, if your information is outdated, or if there are any broken links, then you need to correct that.  If you’re looking for an agent or freelancing you should let people know.  Your professional online presence needs to speak to the type of people you are looking to attract.  If you don’t know who that is, then you need to sit down and figure that out.      

Tip 2: Start Leveraging Your Network

Hopefully, you’ve been socializing online and have made a few author friends.  I’m also hoping you’ve joined groups and maybe even started one yourself?  If so, congratulations, you have friends in the industry who can help you out.  Hopefully, these people are professionals who can help you find publishers, agents or just good editing software. 

Your network should also be able to help you avoid scams which is important since there’s been a recent rash of con-artists impersonating well known literary agents and major publishing companies. 

Another thing a good network can even give you is the latest gossip on who’s paying authors and who’s not.  An excellent example of this was the Ellora’s Cave controversy where authors shared stories about late or missing payments all over social media.  A short while later, after a lot of drama, the company folded.  Keep in mind, there is strength in numbers, and this is especially true during a crisis.

Tip 3: Diversify

Most successful authors write in multiple genres, usually out of boredom but some do it to create multiple streams of income.  For example, if romance is no longer selling then they can count on their sci-fi or thriller novels to pick up the slack.  

Also, authors who are signed with a traditional publisher may want to look to self-publishing or work-for-hire opportunities in order to supplement their income.  It’s basic financial sense to not depend on one source for your livelihood.   

Tip 4: Raise Your Expectations From Your Partners

If your publisher isn’t selling books successfully, then it may be time to look for another publisher.  I know authors who’ve published with companies and even during good times the company struggled to sell books across the board.  To make matters worse, there’s always an excuse which usually includes, Amazon, the internet, or problems with the printers but you can’t afford to keep accepting excuses.  You’re running a business and your publisher is supposed to be a business partner and partners are supposed to carry their own weight.  This might mean buying back the rights to your work. If that’s not possible, then you may have to start over with a new company or even self-publish.     

Tip 5: Gold Digging

In a recession it makes sense to research the company you want to do business with.  Be sure they’re making real money and have more than just a handful of employees.  Big companies generally do well in a recession in fact, most of them see economic meltdowns as an opportunity to buy more IP (intellectual property) or entire companies.  It’s the large companies that are still buying and not cutting back, and that’s where the opportunities lie for authors.

Tip 6: Increase Your Marketing Effort

It should go without saying that during a recession you’ll need to increase your marketing efforts.  That can mean increasing the amount of queries you send out, to expanding your social media outreach, or running more ads for your business.  Even if hard times haven’t hit you yet, that doesn’t mean that they won’t hit the people you do business with.  As a business owner, you need to keep your options open.

A Final Word

Recessions don’t have to be scary, remember there are people who make their fortunes during tough times and there’s no reason why you can’t be one of them.  Instead of seeing a recession as an apocalyptic disaster, see it for what it is; a time where sectors of the economy get shaken up.  We have to keep in mind that as things shift we can actually find ourselves in a better position than before.  The publishing industry will figure this out, and before you know it, we’ll all be complaining again about how boring the industry is and wishing again for a little excitement.       

Business, Indie Publishing, Inspiration, Life, Marketing, Personal, Publishing, Writing Business

Publishing In 2020: Figuring Out The Next Step

Rachel Rueben
Image via Juanfer_erazo

The past few months have been a whirlwind for me, I don’t know about you. From COVID-19, toilet paper shortages to lost income, this crisis has me anxious and waiting for the other shoe to drop. Granted, this isn’t my first economic meltdown years ago, when I started writing professionally, the Great Recession hit and wiped out a ton of magazines and newspapers. I, along with many writers had to learn a new way of doing business in the digital age. But we managed and I believe we will succeed again.  However, economic disasters have a tendency to bring along change and I believe this new crisis is definitely going to bring about big changes for indie authors and here are just some of the things that I predict:         

More Publishers Will Fold 

Some traditional publishers still rely heavily on paper books and in November of 2019, Amazon, was already reducing the amount of books it was accepting into its warehouses.  Those publishers who relied on Amazon for the majority of their distribution were thrown into a tizzy.  Now ALL major retailers in the U.S. are reducing their focus on luxury items (yes books are considered luxury items) because of their struggle to maintain essential items in their stores. That means hardback and paperback book sales are going down for everyone.  Those publishers who never focused on digital products will be doomed.  Already, several employees got their pink slips at Harper Macmillan, while the CEO of John Wiley & Son’s, estimates they will lose 50 million dollars in revenue due to the COVID-19 crisis. Though the fourth quarter results aren’t in yet, it doesn’t take a genius to know times are going to be brutal in publishing.   

Authors Will Quit

Just as in the Great Recession, many authors will struggle and won’t be able to pivot. Even those who were successful may find it difficult to navigate the changes in this current environment. And those who were hoping and praying for a traditional contract may find themselves out of luck.  In fact, if you do get a contract, you may want to hire a good lawyer to look it over because chances are it won’t be the kind of contract that makes the author money.  In fact, I highly recommend authors be wary of traditional contracts after several authors have reported signing six figure contracts and only seeing a pittance of that. Like it or not, it’s the new math of the publishing industry.              

Authors Will Have To Learn New Skills

Over the past few years, the tech prophets have been preaching about the rise of A.I. and voice technology.  Soon we won’t be using our tablets and phones for entertainment and when that happens everything from blogging to publishing will change.  In fact, we are being warned by marketing experts to start uploading audio and video to our websites in order to make it searchable by the new smart speakers like Amazon’s Alexa and Google’s Home devices.  This is similar to what happened during mobile revolution 6 years ago, when website owners had to scramble after the Google algorithms began deranking sites that weren’t mobile friendly.  Dubbed Mobilegeddon, many popular websites had to completely redesign their sites just to maintain their ranking in the search engine.  I predict authors will have to learn how to use voice technology for advertising, and general book marketing if they want to remain relevant in the upcoming years.            

Indies Will Have To Become Pennywise

Experts are warning us that we are not in a recession but a depression which is worse.  That means businesses will have to become lean (frugal) in order to survive.  Sure, you could pay $5,000 for a book cover but is it necessary?  Only you can answer that question. Right now, I would hold off on buying anything unnecessary unless, you had a guarantee of an ROI.   

Authors Must Exploit Their Intellectual Property

It’s no secret that billionaire author J.K. Rowling made her money not through publishing books, but through the licensing of her I.P., Rowling, had her Harry Potter books made into movies, toys and an endless amount of merchandise.  She turned her books into multiple streams of income which built her billion-dollar empire.  We indie authors need to get business savvy like our colleagues and start maximizing our work. If we don’t, this new economy may crush us.    

The Competition Will Be Fierce

In his financial forecast, John Wiley & Son’s CEO announced they were focusing on their digital products like courseware and online education to offset loses.  This means if other publishers focus on their digital products indie authors are going to have to be competitive in price, quality, as well as customer service. Hopefully, you have been working on your brand and already have a relationship with your readers.  If not, now would be the right time to work on that.  The one thing that indie authors have done right over the years is develop their brand. Most indie authors have mailing lists, social media accounts and even beta readers.  Meanwhile, most publishers don’t have any connection to their readers and rarely promote their books.  This might change soon and that’s when the paradigm will shift.  Indie authors may find themselves competing for ad space, social media and even influencer attention. This could drive prices up so high that authors may find themselves shut out of certain opportunities.  Remember work on your brand, if you want to thrive at a time like this.  

There Will Be More Disruptions

Even if they find a vaccine or therapy for COVID-19, the damage to the economy worldwide has already been done.  People are already losing their jobs after returning from quarantine and it’s being predicted that if a vaccine isn’t found there will be more waves of infections. So just as we are emerging from quarantine, we may have to return if another wave hits.  For those with children, health problems and family members who rely on them, this will be a challenging time financially, as well as emotionally.  I recommend if you have a line of credit or can secure government loans or financial assistance, you may want to start looking into that now BEFORE things get dire.      

There Is Hope

Before you quit and crawl into a hole, remember if you’ve been slowly building your business, you can ride this out.  Some authors are reporting strong sales because people are stuck at home bored and reading more books. It wouldn’t be a bad idea to go hard on the marketing right now if you have the time and financial resources.  Another approach would be to keep your head down and write more books.   

However, if you are having a difficult time during this uncertain period, you should step back and take care of your own emotional and physical needs first. If your family or community needs you then your responsibility is to them. Your work will always be there when you come back.    

No matter what you decide on, remember you can survive this.  Your career isn’t over, the publishing industry will find a way out of this mess like it always does and life will go on.  Granted, it won’t be anytime soon but we will see better days, and this prediction you can take to the bank.     

Indie Publishing, Publishing, Writing Business

Audiobooks: The Next Indie Frontier

Rachel Rueben
Image via Pixabay

Five years ago, I wrote a post about audio books and I’ve been wanting to write another since there have been so many changes in the past year alone.  When I wrote: Audio Books: What Indie Authors Should Know, producing an audiobook was expensive and time consuming.  Also, there was the fact that there wasn’t any real place to promote them.  In the article I actually said, “there is no BookBub for audiobooks,” but guess what?  That all changed in March of 2019, when BookBub announced their latest newsletter called, Chirp, which promotes limited audiobook sales to readers.  Neat, huh?  However, the feature is still in beta and you’ll have to join a partner  waiting list.     

As if that weren’t enough, Kobo announced their own audiobook subscription service for readers which costs $9.99 per month.  This is lower than Amazon’s Audible’s subscription fee of $14.95 per month.  So for the first time in a long time, Amazon has some competition when it comes to audiobook retail.  This is great for indie authors because the barriers to enter this market are slowly disappearing bringing opportunity to distribute audiobooks farther and wider.  Audiobooks have always been difficult for indies and here are just a few hurdles we’ve faced:    

Problem #1:  Production 

Just a few years ago, you had two choices when producing an audiobook and those were: DIY (Do It Yourself) or go through Amazon’s ACX.  This was because most professional narrators have a fee of around $200 – $400 per hour.  At ACX, they had narrators who were either paid based on a flat fee, or shared a piece of the royalties.  Many authors pressed for cash took the later and hoped for the best.  Today however, indie authors can find reasonably priced narrators (notice how I didn’t say cheap) or find a narrator who will agree to a royalty share at the following places without any exclusivity:      

Problem #2:  Distribution    

If you went through ACX, the terms were exclusive or you paid for expanded distribution with smaller royalties.  Since at the time, ACX was the biggest game in town, most indie authors went in that direction, naturally.  Making money with ACX was hard because you could only sell your books on Audible, Amazon.com or iTunes.  Many indies, myself included, didn’t see the point in even producing an audiobook when distribution was a joke. 

Luckily in 2017, Draft2Digital partnered with Findaway Voices to make audio production and distribution seamless.  So now that ACX has real competition in this arena and indies should be seriously considering getting into the market.  If authors start going elsewhere to produce and distribute their audiobooks, maybe Amazon will be forced to rethink their contracts at ACX.    

Problem #3: Marketing

As I stated in the beginning of the post, just a few years ago, there weren’t any major sales routes for indie authors wanting to advertise their audiobooks.  However, things have improved and now, there are more serious avenues that indies can pursue when promoting their audiobooks.  

For those who don’t have a big advertising budget, there are sites that will review your audiobook and even hold giveaways if you’re interested:

The Reality Of Audiobooks:  Doing The Math

What a lot of indie authors don’t understand is that it takes time to get an ROI on an audiobook.  Despite all of the hype that has been going around the publishing community in the last year, this is a lot of work.  One professional narrator said that authors have to sell about 100 ebooks to make just one audiobook sale.  So this is not a get rich quick scheme, in fact, despite the new opportunities, I would still caution indie authors to set realistic expectations when going into the audio market. 

Another point authors don’t consider is the complexity of a project, for example, some authors commission several narrators to read the female and male characters of their book.  If this is your idea, you’re going to have to pony up more money of course.

So as you can see, audiobooks are not the cash cow that some people are claiming.  I still think audiobooks are worth the investment but only after you’re making consistent sales on your print and ebooks.  I see audiobooks as a more advanced part of an indie author’s career.  This particular game isn’t for rookies because you can easily lose money in this type of project.  Nonetheless, the audio market is evolving after years of stagnation and those indies who are ready could find another potential stream of income and this is always a good thing in our industry.                 

Book Promotion, Indie Publishing, Marketing, Publishing, Social Media, Writing Business

How To Handle Online Trolling & Harassment: Author Edition Part 2

Rachel Rueben
Image by StockSnaps via Pixabay

Yesterday, I discussed reputation monitoring but today, I’m moving on to reputation management.  In this post, I’ll give you the tools to go on the offense if you find you’re being target by an individual or group looking to harm your business.  This post goes a little beyond social media and deals with general online harassment but I still believe it’s something authors need to know.  I hope these posts will empower you to take control of your online image and grow your publishing business with confidence.  

P.S. I am in no way affiliated with the products and services mentioned in this post.

Reputation Management

Did you know that there is an entire industry built around managing online reputations?  There are quite a few services that work with individuals to help them either deal with a crisis or monitor the internet for any negative press.

Unlike reputation monitoring, a reputation management service influences and controls a person’s or business’ public identity.  They scan the internet using special software or just use Google, then start a campaign against anything that can be considered damaging to their clients.  For example, actor Charlie Sheen, allegedly paid a fixer (A PR manager who specializes in crisis management), to scour the internet for anything that pertained to him having HIV years before his public confession in 2015.  Later on I’ll discuss some services that can help you with an online crisis but right now let’s explore the dark side of the internet.             

Worst Case Scenario: You’re Being Attacked

Okay, let’s pretend that someone is actively campaigning to make your life hell, what can you do about it?  Well let’s figure out how bad things on the internet can get first:   

#1: Doxxing (Info Dumping)

This includes publically announcing anything such as bank account, social security (e.g. national identity numbers), and credit card numbers.  If you find that your personal information is being shared online there are ways to get it taken down by contacting the owner of a given site and request they remove the info.  If your info is dumped on social media you can report the post or contact the site directly and request it be removed. Most will comply since they don’t want to face any lawsuits nor do they want their website’s rank to be demoted in the search engines.  If this is a website and there is no contact information you may have to resort to contacting the hosting company of the website.  You do that by Googling the words: WHOIS and the website’s URL.  If you can’t find the name of the owner, you will most likely find the host company.  Feel free to shoot off an email to them requesting the removal of the content.

Now let’s say you’ve completed these steps and the information is still appearing in search results, even days after the content was taken down.  Did you know you can request that companies such as Google and Bing take it down from their search engine?  Below is a list on where to find that information:  

*More Useful Tips*

Information like your address, phone number, and names of your family members are freely available online on sites such as; FamilyTreeNow.com as well as Spokeo and the search engines like Google and Bing can do very little about that.  Data is a big business and many times it’s being scraped by various corporations you’re doing business with such as credit card companies, social media sites, and retailers so it’s nearly impossible to remove those things completely from the internet.  If you really want to find out how much of your data is floating around in cyberspace just Google your name as well as your city then see what pops up.  Fortunately, most sites allow you to request the removal of information but you do have to contact them directly or fill out forms. 

If you don’t want to spend time doing all that, there are services like DeleteMe, and OneRep that will go to these sites and fill out all the paperwork for you, however, they do charge a fee.  Also, keep in mind, they can’t rid the internet 100% of your data.  

Now that’s just the tip of the iceberg once your information is out there, you are at risk of identity theft.  There are companies that will monitor your social security number and monitor your credit line for a fee such as LifeLock or IdentityForce and they will even provide you with legal consultation if your personal information is ever compromised. 

 

#2:  Harassment

Harassment can include such things as ordering 100 pizzas in your name and sending it to your house or someone making insulting or inappropriate comments.  However, that’s small stuff, because cyberstalking is considered the most serious form of online harassment and it includes someone who is always making contact with you even despite your protest.  That means making comments on your social media posts even after you’ve blocked them.  (Lots of stalkers just create another account and proceed with their harassment.)  Stalking is considered serious because the harassment can wind up offline.  Case in point, several years ago, there was an author that admitted to stalking a book reviewer who gave an unfavorable review on Goodreads.

Important Tip: If you find online harassment going offline, you must document it and take that evidence and contact your local law enforcement in order to file a report.         

#3:  Reputation Damage

There have been many cases of people being defamed online and if someone is campaigning online to damage your reputation you may need to go on the offense and start countering the damage.  You can use the internet the same way a troll does by drowning out their content with your own by doing interviews on blogs, podcasts and even do guest posts for major websites.  Sounds an awful lot like marketing, doesn’t it?  Anyway, this won’t cost you any money but it does cost time.  However, if you are too busy and don’t have time, you can hire a service to do this for you.  Like celebrities, you can hire a firm to wage war against the reputation damage.  It’s costly, which is why many people don’t bother with it but if you’re determined to fight, there are services like ReputationDefender and BrandYourself that will help by posting positive articles and even build websites that will help you reclaim your reputation online.    

#4:  Hacking Websites, Social Media & Email Accounts

It’s not rare to hear of a celebrity’s phone or social media accounts being hacked.  Most of the time these types of hackings include posting gibberish or pornographic material to the victim’s account, it’s rarely personal.  In fact, the terrorist organization ISIS (ISOL) was targeted in 2016, by the hacker group Anonymous, who posted gay pride images on the terrorists’ Twitter accounts.  They (Anonymous) are also engaging in information doxxing by collecting financial records of terror groups and giving them to various governments around the world.  This is a clear example that no one is safe from hacking not even terrorists.        

So how do you protect yourself from a hacker?  Well having a strong password is a start, which means a password that includes numbers, symbols as well as upper and lowercase letters.  For example, it’s a bad idea to use your initials and address because that’s too obvious, that information can be found online as I said before.  However, something like your nickname, plus your kid’s school bus number, and a random symbol make for a pretty strong password.  Even short phrases like: ItIsWhatItIs2019$ is stronger than your pet’s name and address.    

Also, don’t forget to change your passwords often because when you’re under attack, security should be your first priority.

A Balanced View

I hope this post empowered you to pursue social media without fear, after all, there are over 3 billion people using social media worldwide. This is expected to grow as the internet becomes globally accessible.  And as more people use social media, the drama will become more common but we authors don’t have to be sucked into the dysfunction. We can handle ourselves with confidence even when the waters of social media are churning all around us.  I hope you never have to use any of this advice or experience any of the scenarios I discussed but if you do, you now have the tools to fight back and take control of your online reputation.      

 

Book Promotion, Business, Indie Publishing, Marketing, Publishing, writing, Writing Business

The Struggles Of Promoting And Publishing Erotica

Rachel Rueben
Image via uwerken

Ask any author who writes erotica and they will tell you that publishing and promoting can be tricky these days.  Case in point, on December 3rd, Tumblr, announced they would no longer allow pornographic content after several reports of child pornography on their site. This scandal caused Apple to ban Tumblr from their Apple app store. In response, Tumblr banned pornography and during their announcement, they said they would only allow certain forms of adult content such as erotica stories. However, as Tumblr deployed their new anti-porn bots, several innocent people got caught up in the net when their content was incorrectly labeled pornography.  If that weren’t enough, Youtube, has also long been accused of restricting LGBT vlogs and even demonetizing them.  So it’s reasonable to assume that anything with sexual content can be banned on social media.  If you write and publish erotica, or even steamy romance, this can be troubling not to mention, annoying as hell.

Unfortunately this isn’t anything new, most authors in these genres will tell you stories of petty people who report their content and even try to get them banned from sites.  I’ve seen it with my own eyes in our Facebook group when a religious author, let’s call her Petty LaBelle, for anonymity purposes (I don’t want her reporting me after all!).  Anyway, Petty LaBelle kept reporting this erotic author’s posts whenever she saw them in our group.  P.S. I was the admin, so every week for about a month, I would see this lady’s report in my inbox.  In the ten years of this page’s existence we never had an issue like this before.  To make a long story short, we reached out to the author of the erotic novel and apologized then, later featured him on our podcast.  It was also explained to Petty LaBelle, that erotica was allowed on the page and she needed to chill out with all the snitching.

Why Is Social Media Clamping Down On Adult Content?

For those of you who have been living under a rock, this past year has been pretty tough for social media.  From data breaches, hackings and scandals, none of the major social media sites have gone unscathed from the criticism of consumer groups and even world governments.  In fact, sites like Twitter and Instagram, are scrambling to clean up their platforms due to a law that passed in the U.S. called FOSTA/SESTA, which is a law that is intended to curb online sex trafficking by punishing websites who foster or are found complicit in sex trafficking.  This law has sent social media and most of the internet in a tizzy.  It also explains why some social media sites have gone to extremes and are now banning accounts as well as any posts that have adult content and not necessarily, those that are violating any sex trafficking laws.

How Do You Stay On The Right Side Of Social Media?

The most obvious way of staying in the good graces of any social media site is to not violate their community guidelines or terms of service.  If you are actively promoting erotica novels or adult products you might was to reacquaint yourself with the rules because they have most likely changed in the past few months.  Here are the community guidelines for the top social media sites:

Tip: It would be extremely helpful if all authors would learn about marketing on their chosen social media site.  Many of the major sites offer free courses that help guide you through the process from advertising to promoting, I blogged about it last year in a post called: Why Authors Need To Learn Social Media: The New Reality there, I list a lot of free resources.

Remember The Time Amazon Was Caught Deranking Erotica?

Last spring, several authors woke up to find that their books had been delisted or recategorized courtesy of Amazon.  Many of these authors were romance and erotica authors who were stunned by the sudden and quiet reshuffling of their books.  Authors claimed that their books were relegated to a separate list away from the rest of the population regardless of how well the book was selling.  Amazon however, claims mistakes were made and rectified it but it goes to show you how erotica is being treated these days.

Is There A Safe Place For Erotica Writers To Promote Their Work?

There are safe areas online for authors to promote their erotic literature and steamy romances without being harassed.  There are newsletters and blogs that still welcome erotica authors with open arms.  The best tip to finding these communities is to find an erotica author that you like and stalk them online.  Research where they’re being interviewed or where their books are being reviewed and hit those places up.  Below, I’ve compiled a small list of places where erotica authors and their books are welcomed:

Passionate Ink

Passionate Ink is a chapter of the Romance Writers of America, and they have a newsletter as well as a website you can check out that’s free but if you want to take workshops and go to conferences, you’ll have to pay membership dues of $35/yr.

Harelquin Junkie

A romance site that welcomes erotica and reviews books, holds live chats, and even offers guest posts as well as author features.  They have a thriving community of book worms that love to speak their minds, so it’s worth giving them a look.

The Erotic Book Review

This site offers reviews, features as well as articles on relationships and sex.

Under The Covers Book Blog

Under The Covers Book Blog offers traditional book reviews as well as author features, release calendars (where they announce publication of a given book), and Youtube book hauls for their readers.

All of the sites I mentioned also offer advertising which leads me to my next point…

Where To Advertise Erotica?

Fortunately for erotica authors there are still plenty of places that will accept their money below, I list just a few of the major discount book newsletters:

Have A Seat, I’m About To Preach

I’ve said this several times on this blog, but I’ll say it again: You have to find book bloggers, influencers as well as book communities and support them.  If someone takes the time to review your book or send you a kind word, you need to remember those people and help them out when you can.  Offer to reciprocate any favors and most importantly, keep these people in your network.  You don’t need social media or Amazon for that!  As time goes on, promotion won’t feel like such a chore and you won’t have to keep starting over with each book launch.  Anyway, I hope I this post helps a few of you out there that are overwhelmed by all the drama that the internet is giving you.  If you know of any tips that could help authors who publish and promote erotica, let us know in the comments section.