by Stephen Campbell | Mar 16, 2015 | Podcasts
Author Chris Fox is the guest on Episode 34 of The Author Biz Podcast.
Chris Fox
Today’s guest, Chris Fox, is an author who also works as a software engineer for a Silicon Valley startup. That’s a world where careful planning, big thinking and being able to adapt are critical to businesses success.
Chris brought that type of thinking to his author business while writing his first book, NO SUCH THING AS WEREWOLVES. He identified his “ideal reader” in great detail, and learned what he needed to do to reach that reader.
When he launched his book he wasn’t satisfied with the results he was getting so he adapted, tracked the new results, kept what was working and dropped what wasn’t. The net result is that five months after the release of his only full-length novel (the next will be released in April) his book still ranks in the top twenty of three different Amazon categories.
As you’ll hear in the interview Chris also produced an audio version of the book and the results of that effort have been nothing short of amazing.
In this 49-minute episode, we take a deep dive into author marketing and audiobooks covering topics like:
- Chris gives us an overview of the first book in his Deathless series, NO SUCH THING AS WEREWOLVES.
- Chris works in the startup technology world of Silicon Valley and thinks of writing and marketing his books as running a startup business.
- Chris identified an author who is achieving great success in his genre and studied his work and business tactics, prior to launching his own author business.
- Chris describes the initial marketing plan for his first book.
- The creation of “Mythical Bob,” the target reader Chris was hoping to attract with his book.
- Chris breaks his marketing plan into two categories - active and passive.
- The one small keyword change that doubled sales of NO SUCH THING AS WEREWOLVES overnight.
- Amazon maintains a list of keywords that will get a book into specific categories.
- Why Chris chose to be brief with his book description at Amazon, instead of using the entire 4,000 characters available to authors.
- The value of choosing an evocative title for your book
- Chris has built a street team to help with user engagement, reader feedback and discoverability.
- Chris’s next book, NO MERE ZOMBIE, the second in his Deathless series, is scheduled for an April release. He explains what he’ll do differently with the launch of his second full-length novel.
- Chris hired an author’s assistant to help with the launch of his second book. He explains why and how he found his assistant.
- Chris has experienced tremendous success with the audio version of his book and suggests Audio Books for Indies, by Simon Whistler to authors interested in producing audio versions of their books.
- How the Audible algorithm helped fuel the sales of Chris’s audiobook.
- Chris chose to pay his narrator in full rather than doing the Audible royalty split. He explains why and how that decision has worked out.
Links
Chris’s author website www.chrisfoxwrites.com
Chris’s Amazon Author Page
Simon Whistler’s Audiobooks for Indies
Kindle Boards website
Click here to listen to The Author Biz no. 34
Creative commons image by startupstockphotos
by Stephen Campbell | Mar 9, 2015 | Podcasts
Helen Sedwick is the guest for Episode 33 of The Author Biz Podcast.
Helen Sedwick
Should you incorporate your author business? How important is record keeping? Do you need a Federal ID number? What should you pay the most attention to when reviewing contracts? What is a copyright and what do I need to do to get one?
For these types of questions, there’s no better person to ask than Helen Sedwick. She’s a business attorney with over 30 years of experience, and the author of what Publisher’s Weekly calls one of the Top Five Resource Books for Indie Authors, THE SELF-PUBLISHER’S LEGAL HANDBOOK.
Helen believes the best time for writers to ask these foundational questions is when they’re getting started, but no matter where you are with your author business this is essential information.
In this 55-minute episode, we take a deep dive into the nuts and bolts of your author business, covering topics like: (more…)
by Stephen Campbell | Mar 2, 2015 | Podcasts
Robin Houghton is the guest for Episode 32 of The Author Biz Podcast.
Robin Houghton
If you’re an author in today’s world, you’re faced with the blogging question. Should I blog or shouldn’t I?
As you may have already guessed, today’s show is all about author blogging. While we may not be able to answer the “should I or shouldn’t I be blogging” question, we will explain why it can help you grow your audience and expand your author platform.
Today’s guest is Robin Houghton, the author of BLOGGING FOR WRITERS. She has over two decades of experience in marketing and communication, and she’s been running her own business, Eggbox Marketing, since 2002. Robin now works primarily with writers and publishing industry professionals to help them make the best use of social media.
In this 62-minute episode, we take a deep dive into author blogging, covering topics like:
- An overview of BLOGGING FOR WRITERS
- The benefits and drawbacks of the three major blogging platforms
- Robin answers the ‘why should authors blog’ question
- Blogging offers an author the opportunity to control the top results readers (and others) will see when searching for you.
- Blogging can improve your writing
- There are numerous objectives authors can reach through blogging
- Determining your blogging persona as part of your planning process
- The value of your author blog increases over time, with the addition of new, timely, relevant, and interesting content.
- The value of your blog is the content, not the look and feel of your site.
- The steps and the costs involved in setting up a self-hosted WordPress blog
- The significance of maintaining an editorial calendar for your blog
- Don’t think of blogging as broadcasting your message to the world. Instead, think of it as building your audience, one person at a time.
- The benefits of being a member of the blogging community
- Robin explains how blogging helps author sites rank better in Google and other search engines.
- The value of analytics to author bloggers
- What analytical metrics should authors focus on?
- The importance of adding a media page to your author website / blog
- Robin shares some advance information on her next book, THE GOLDEN RULES OF BLOGGING (& When to Break Them).
Links:
Click here to listen to The Author Biz no. 32
Creative Commons image by Edar.
by Stephen Campbell | Feb 23, 2015 | Podcasts
Author and financial journalist, Nicole Lapin is the guest for Episode 31 of The Author Biz Podcast.
Nicole Lapin
Think for a minute about your last book launch. Did you have a strategy for the launch or did you rely on your publisher? Was your launch unique, or did you follow a path you’ve seen used by other authors? How much time and effort went into the launch of your last book?
For some authors, book launches are an artifact of the old world of publishing, something difficult to justify, with a limited, or even negative return on investment.
But for others a book launch is a tool for achieving the goals they’ve set for their book.
My guest in this episode, Nicole Lapin, was the youngest anchor ever at both CNN and CNBC. She’s a believer in setting big goals and doing the work it takes to achieve them.
When she wrote RICH BITCH, A Simple 12-Step Plan for Getting Your Financial Life Together, she didn’t sit back and let her publisher decide how to market the book. Instead, she reached out to experts - people who have written hugely successful books for advice on launching her work.
In this 46-minute episode, we’ll discuss Nicole’s educational and highly entertaining book, and then we’ll dig into her unconventional launch plan. Interview highlights include:
- Nicole shares the genesis behind RICH BITCH, a plain English, no holds barred book of financial advice, which is both highly educational and entertaining.
- Nicole spent years as a financial journalist at places like CNN, CNBC, MSNBC, and NBC. Every story she covered came down to money.
- Money becomes more interesting when it’s not compartmentalized.
- The value of goal settings in everything we do.
- The value of being able to articulate the work we do and what we want to accomplish with that work.
- The Unconventional Launch Plan for Nicole’s Book
- Nicole defies conventional wisdom, both in her book and with the way she’s launching her book.
- The lead up to the book launch was one of the hardest things Nicole has ever done.
- Reaching out to others who had launched books directly onto the New York Times bestseller list and using that advice to put together her own marketing, promotion and media strategies.
- Putting together a team to help with the book launch.
- Nicole decided against the traditional book tour after weighing the return on investment (ROI) a tour would bring.
- Nicole identified the reading audience for her book and is doing targeted events with groups who already reach that audience.
- Nicole is using “list and influencer arbitrage” to help launch her book.
- Nicole spent her own money (and time) hiring strategists, a traditional PR firm, and a social media PR firm to help her reach her goals for the book, which are: 1.) Hit the New York Times Bestseller List on week one, 2.) Create a meaningful conversation that goes beyond the book launch, 3.) Create a sustaining platform for herself and her mission.
- Using King Sumo to run a contest to grow social media followers prior to a launch.
- Nicole created a free e-book, THE RICH BITCH GUIDE TO LOVE AND MONEY, to drive interest in RICH BITCH, and as a post-launch marketing tool.
- Nicole’s use of memes on social media to indirectly drive interest in her book.
- The value of offline, targeted events to create value for potential readers.
- Leaving a job to start an author (or any other) business can be scary. Nicole offers some advice for those considering making the leap.
Links
Nicole’s Website www.nicolelapin.com
Click here to listen to The Author Biz no. 31
by Stephen Campbell | Feb 16, 2015 | Podcasts
Bestselling Author Harry Bingham is the guest for Episode 30 of The Author Biz Podcast.
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Imagine you’re the best-selling author of a highly regarded crime fiction series published by one of the world’s largest publishers, and you notice that most of the sales of your novels are as e-books. When it came time to negotiate the next contract with your publisher what would you do?
Harry Bingham
My guest today is Harry Bingham. He’s been an author for 15 years, and in that time he’s had two agents, four publishers, seven editors and 13 books. That’s another way of saying he’s been around the block as a traditionally published author.
As you’ll hear in the interview, Harry saw how his Fiona Griffiths crime fiction series was being marketed and sold in the United States and suggested a change to the ebook royalties from his big 5 publisher. They disagreed, and Harry made the remarkable decision to walk away from a publisher that he enjoyed working with, and one he felt was doing a good job with his books. He chose to self-publish his most recent book, THE STRANGE DEATH OF FIONA GRIFFITHS in the United States.
Harry joins The Author Biz to explain why he walked away from his US publisher and the opportunities he sees available to authors today in what he calls the fourth era of publishing.
In this 45-minute episode Harry and I discuss:
- The writing style that goes into making the Fiona Griffiths series so unique
- The response to Harry’s guest post on Jane Friedman’s blog, Why
Authors Walk Away from Good, Big 5 Publishers
- The hardcover pricing dilemma facing authors who don’t automatically jump to the top of best-seller lists
- Harry’s solution to the hardcover pricing dilemma
- Why Harry publicly shares his sales, advance and royalty numbers
- Harry’s thoughts on the print market for crime fiction in today’s world
- The four eras of publishing
- Transitioning a series from traditional publishing to independent publishing without owning the backlist
- Harry set up his author website, by himself in an afternoon
- His thoughts on the Amazon pre-order feature for authors
- Harry explains why he purchased a Kirkus review
- Is it possible to get big 5 quality editing done outside of big publishing?
- Why Harry launched The Writers Workshop over a decade ago
- The process and the prices for formatting and cover design for The Strange Death of Fiona Griffiths
- Harry’s thoughts on the inherent advantages Indie publishers have when it comes to pricing and audience connection
Links:
Harry’s Author website www.harrybingham.com, his Amazon Author Page, his Big Publishing and Me blog Series and the sites for his two businesses, The Writers Workshop and Agent Hunter .
Click here to listen to The Author Biz no. 30
by Stephen Campbell | Feb 9, 2015 | Podcasts
Literary agent Anne Hawkins is the guest for Episode 29 of The Author Biz Podcast.
Do you have an agent? Do you have the right agent?
If so you already know how valuable your agent can be to your author business. But if you don’t, this episode is for you.
Anne Hawkins
Literary agent Anne Hawkins represents bestselling authors across multiple genres, from mysteries and thrillers to literary fiction and even non-fiction. Her clients include New York Times bestselling authors, Tasha Alexander, Taylor Stevens and Miranda Beverly-Whittemore.
Anne works for the John Hawkins and Associates Literary Agency, a New York firm with a long history in the publishing business. Through the years, the firm has been the agent of record for authors like William James, Jack London, P.G. Wodehouse, James Clavell, Alex Haley and other literary stars.
In this 58-minute episode, we take a deep dive into the literary representation end of the publishing business, covering topics like:
- The History of the John Hawkins and Associates Literary Agency, which dates back to 1893.
- Anne’s clients range from best sellers in mysteries and thrillers to history, politics and even nature and the outdoors.
- Where literary agents fit into the publishing process.
- An in-depth discussion of how to find the right agent for your work.
- The importance of having an agent that both understands your work and knows your genre.
- The many reasons why an agent might not be interested in your book that have nothing to do with the book, itself.
- A step-by-step guide for querying agents that will give authors the best possible chance to find the right agent.
- How much follow up should you do when querying agents?
- What should an author understand about an agent before agreeing to representation?
- Should an agent’s membership in the Association of Author’s Representatives (AAR) be an important factor when an author selects an agent?
- Anne describes the process of submitting manuscripts to different publishers.
- Anne walks us through the different rights the agent negotiates before a publishing contract is signed.
- The importance of carefully negotiating the terms of the option book.
Click here to listen to The Author Biz no. 29
