Some Ramblings on Quality vs. Quantity

Good conversation!

One of the things I keep hearing is that one of the best ways to sell books is to put out more books.

Of course, it goes without saying that they need to be good books, otherwise people won't touch your next book with a 10 foot pole. For instance, I read the first two and a half Shannara books before deciding I never wanted to read Terry Brooks again. It could be that he's come a long way since then, but I don't want to invest the effort or money to find out.

Sadly, the fear of this happening to me is something that holds me back a bit.

Anyway...back on topic. Here's how a lot of the SP authors who make good money do it (from what I'm seeing):

1. Write a good book.
   
2. Put a good cover on it.
   
3. Write an enticing blurb.
   
4. At the end of the book invite the reader to review the book and join the author's mailing list.
   
5. Go back to step 1.

Often times they mix in "do free runs with Select" or "make the first in the series perma-free" with those others.

 

Brian...at this point, instead of self publishing right away, what do h=you have to loose by sending your masterpiece off to the conventional publishers? At worst, they hold onto it for a while and say "no", though some might also explain WHY they're saying 'no' - which should tell you what reficions are in order. If they all say 'no', then go ahead and self publish. At the absoluite worst there, you'd have released something which is

A) well written, and

B) should let you go to a movie or buy dinner somewhere.

Me...I came here with the intent of seeing about properly finishing some tales I'd written long ago. A couple of these have eaten great chunks of my time since then, shrinking to novella length in the process. So I started looking at publishers which accept novellas. Turns out with this internet thing, novella's might be making a bit of a comeback: most aspiring authors seem to jump straight to full length novel, but there are a fair number of publishers accepting novella's...and apparently fewer authors submitting such (going from the commentary in the 'submissions' section.

Since getting into the challenge stories on this site, I also started taking a peek at the magazines, online and otherwise, which accept short stories - generally under 5000 words. Turns out at least some of these outfits, for whatever reason, are buying quite a few short stories.

At this point, I'm seriously contemplating cutting the so called novel length works I'd intended to write down into short story and novellete sized tales, linked together but standing alone.

Then again, I don't see this as a way to make a living...more of a sideline.

 

I don't buy it either. Selling 450 million books is down to 2 factors, I think: 1) tapping in to some popular idea/style/premise ahead of the crowd; and 2) pitching it to appeal to lots of people, otherwise known as the lowest common denominator. Factor 1 is perhaps partly skill, but it's mainly luck, I would say. Factor 2 is something that producers of Hollywood blockbusters and reality TV shows have almost perfected, and (I think) can be at least partially defined for books too - nothing too edgy, or literary, or complicated, or difficult to read. That's why IMO YA books are so big just now, and not just for their target demographic. I recently had a look at some of the best-selling self-published fantasy ebooks, and the common factors seemed to be - lighthearted, straightforward, linear storytelling, often of standard tropes (people love the familiar).

To address the original question: the successful self-publishers (as in, those able to make a reasonable living out of it) seem to be those who have multiple books for sale (4-7 seems to be the trigger point), all in the same genre and often featuring the same characters, with the first either permanently free or discounted. They market intelligently, but without aggression, and they present a likeable public face, while always remaining professional. They keep fans on board by publishing 1-2 new books a year, plus shorts and novellas, and involve fans in the process - helping to choose covers (and even titles, in one case!), encouraging fan art, posting snippets of the next book, posting extra background - maps, backstory, etc.

But good writing is not the deciding factor. To sell books, you only need to be able to write well enough.

 

Keep the faith, Brian.

 

LOL... Well, you must write as the muse takes you, Brian

It does make it easier to sell your work if it's all in one genre, or even sub-genre. One of the first books I read after I got my Kindle was 'Dragon Stones' by James Viscosi, which wasn't perfect but it was a very entertaining piece of fantasy. He had three other books out, and if they'd been in the same line, even if not a series, I'd have bought the lot. But one was horror, one was vampires and one was an urban/paranormal thing, and none of them appealed. They're all broadly in the fantasy/speculative fiction genre, but they really weren't my thing. After that, I never bothered to look him up again (until today, for this post, and I see he's now written another straight fantasy, so I might try that - but you see the problem - once you lose a fan, you may lose him/her for ever).

On the other hand, it's not impossible to genre-hop. Lexi Revellian is one of my must-buy authors, and her 4 books to date are a modern mystery, a sci-fi thriller, a post-apocalypse and a YA fantasy complete with dragons, but the connecting factor with the 3 adult books is a strong romance element. She's sold over 50,000 ebooks so far, so it seems to be working.

 

That 50 copies (or 100 copies or 500 copies - all of which I hear quoted so often) is misleading. It is because it takes into consideration anyone who self-publishes even those who are doing so for something very niche, just for friends and family, and those that are just aren't up to quality standards.

If you have "what it takes" and can produce a well written book then you can sell thousands (or even tens of thousands and hundreds of thousands) of books even through self-publishing.

Most writers are this way. Part of shifting from "hobby" to "professional" is to realize that changes are necessary and at what point you are just rearranging words on a page that won't effect either sales or how people think of your work.

My rule of thumb is that you really can't make a living wage until you have at least 3 books released and that doesn't matter whether you are self-published or traditional. In fact the number of books required is usually higher in traditional - I know authors who did't quit their day jobs until they had published 10 - 15 books traditionally.

Don't confuse "spending a lot of time" and "perfection" - each author is different and there are those that can write very quickly and still produce quality work. While in some cases more time = better product - it is not always the case.

Impossible to tell. It really depends on how quality the work is. Some may require years of editing to get something worthy of publication, whereas others may spend a few months doing so.

Having something you are proud of is of course a minimum requirement.

Again - it's going to vary from author to author. Keep in mind those authors that sell well (whether self or traditional) ARE producing quality or they wouldn't get the repeat buys. Quantity without quality is useless because the trick is in repeat buyers and word-of-mouth recommendations. You have to have quality first.

 

There is no such thing as "perfection." I don't think there is a single author who can re-read their published work and not find things that they would changed if they had the means to. But at some point you do have to say "good enough" because there is a point of diminishing returns where changes make something "different" but necessarily increase sales or word-of-mouth recommendations.

 

If you are looking purely to earn and make money from writing then the formula is quite easy.

1. Pick a genre that has a substantial fanbase which is easy to find/market to.
2. Write a really good book (and by good I mean one that someone enjoys so much that they recommend it to others, or would buy copies for friends and family as gifts) that is in a series and in a genre (from #1) above
3. Until you get 3 books out spend 90% of your time writing and 10% of your time marketing. Once you get 3 books you can shift that to more 50% / 50%
4. Once you have three books concentrate on promotion to get a core number of people to know about the book
5. Keep marketing until the books start to gain a following independent of you.
6. Once you have an audience, shift your writing/promo time back to 90% / 10% because at this stage it's about how much content you have to keep feeding the hungry fans

The problem of course is that doing #2 is not easy - not everyone can write a good book but for those that can't there is nothing that can be done to get any substantial success.