Announcement: Expanded distribution and my leg woes

As some of you may have noticed, I haven't been doing much blogging lately. This is due to my having torn a leg muscle in a very stupid way while exercising. Today will be my first session of physical therapy to help me recover from the injury, and I'll need physical therapy twice a week for four weeks.

The good news is that, while the injury will take a while to heal, I should eventually get back to normal, and it's not stopping me from working. The bad news is sitting in my desk chair results in a lot of pain when I have to get up and move around. Because of this, I've been limiting my desk time to concentrating on my writing, so I've been neglecting everything but that.

However, because I've been intensely focused on my books, I've been working hard to start extending my distribution now that my exclusivity clause is expiring, and I'm very happy to announce that Contributor is now available on Kobo and Barnes & Noble, in addition to Amazon. My exclusivity clauses on every book expire at various times throughout the month, so Phoning It In and The Eye of the Beholder will also be available at multiple vendors by the end of this month; I'll keep you posted as the books go live at the other stores.

Along with expanding the distribution for Contributor, I've also got a new cover design in the works. I absolutely love the original cover, but I think it may not make it clear that the book is a young adult book, so I'm going to try different cover art to see if that helps better convey its genre.

One last tip: last week I kicked off something fun that I'm calling Free Book Fridays. It means exactly what it sounds like it means: I give some of my readers free books. Tomorrow will be another Free Book Friday, so keep your eyes peeled. How do I decide who to give books to, you may wonder? Well, rumor has it that being on my mailing list could have something to do with it. Sign up here if you haven't yet joined--I've also got some member-exclusive promotions coming up down the line. I've also been known to drop in on Goodreads and take a look at those who have my books shelved. (And a note about Goodreads: as I expand my books into other markets, I'm also updating Goodreads to reflect this, so that the following editions are listed: Kindle, Nook, and Kobo.)

Woo hoo Wednesday: Sales milestone met!

I am frankly beside myself with excitement today, because I've reached the milestone of having sold 500 copies of The Eye of the Beholder.  As I've said on my blog before, I had hoped I might be able to sell 100 copies within one calendar year of publication, so to have met that goal five times over in the space of five months obviously exceeds every hope and expectation I may have had.  I am so very, very grateful to my readers for investing both their time and their money in me.  Every time I look at those sales figures, I'm encouraged to push myself harder, to make the next book even better, and to get it out as quickly as humanly possible.  I am loving every minute of my self-publishing journey, and every day makes me more hopeful that I can make a career of writing.

Another big woo hoo goes out to the people who have given me good feedback about my books.  Don't mistake me--I also appreciate the negative reviews because they give me an idea of my weak areas.  But I have been absolutely overwhelmed by the number of people who have praised my books and complimented me on my writing.  It took so long for me to get to a point where I'd even let someone take a peek at something I wrote that it lifts me straight off my feet when people like something I wrote.  I'm not sure if this is a common affliction of writers, but I am so close to my work that I end up dealing with a lot of self-doubt.  I'll write something that I think is awesome one day, but the next I look at it and want to tear my hair out because it suddenly seems so awful.  To have others tell me that they like something I wrote, well, that's a kind of validation that's very hard to describe.  I've always wanted to be good at my jobs, but since a piece of my soul goes into everything I write, it's exponentially more meaningful to be complimented on my writing.

Lastly, a big woo hoo for the progress I'm making on Phoning It In.  The words have been pouring out of me and, though I know I'll have extensive edits to do of the first 1/3 or so of the book, I feel confident that I can get it out by the end of the year.  I'm also excited because the cover is ready, and I think it's fabulous.  I can hardly wait to reveal it, but that'll come when I've made further progress on the novel. 

I hope you're all having a wonderful Wednesday as well.  Be sure to check back on Friday for another sneak peek into Phoning It In!

(I also want to remind everyone that The Eye of the Beholder is no longer available on Barnes & Noble or Kobo.  It is still, however, available DRM-free on Amazon, and I will be making it available through the Kindle Owners' Lending Library once again.)

Business Decision: The Eye of the Beholder

Being a self-published author is really a learning experience.  Even though I did a lot of research before going into this, spending hours pouring over posts by other indie authors and gathering the advice they so generously offered, I still often feel like I'm blundering around in the dark.

For instance, I still don't know which day of the week is the best for a free promo.  I've done two for Creators so far this month (one is still active until midnight!), and I had pretty good results with the first one, which I ran on a Friday.  Today's promotion, however, is proving to be far more anemic.  The next time I run a free promo, I'll probably do it on a Saturday and see what my results are like.  Maybe after that I'll be able to figure out which day of the week is best for releasing new books!  (Hint: It's probably not Tuesday as that's the day the traditional publishers list their new releases.)

The other aspect of this whole business that I've been trying to pin down is whether it's best to remain exclusive to Amazon or to offer my books at as many outlets as possible.  In principle, the idea of being exclusive doesn't sit all that well with me.  I want my books to be available to as broad an audience as possible.  Though I do not (and never, ever will) use DRM on my books, I think it's just more convenient for my readers if I can offer my book in multiple storefronts in various formats.  So, when my Select period for The Eye of the Beholder expired, I decided to try selling via Barnes & Noble and Kobo.

Now that I have a few months under my belt, I feel I can make a more informed decision.  The truth is, my sales at B&N and Kobo are ridiculously low.  At Kobo, I have sold a grand total of one, count it, one copy of The Eye of the Beholder.  On my best month at B&N, I sold less than ten.  This is in comparison to the more than 160 copies I sold on Amazon last month.  When The Eye was available in the Kindle Owners' Lending Library, I didn't have too many borrows, but the fact of the matter is that my number of borrows there was higher than my sales on B&N and Kobo.

Given this, I've come to the conclusion that it's not really worth it to continue to sell via B&N and Kobo.  I don't come to this decision lightly and, as I've said, exclusivity doesn't really sit well with me.  However, from the data I've collected, I find I have more of a demand from readers who want to borrow my book from the KOLL than I do from readers who want to purchase via B&N and Kobo.  I'm not ruling out the possibility of selling my books on other venues in the future but, at this point, I've decided to stop selling via B&N and Kobo, return to exclusivity with Amazon, and offer The Eye on the KOLL.  I will unpublish on B&N and Kobo at the end of the month, and I'll post another announcement here once I've done this.

As a writer, nothing is more important to me than my readers.  Without readers, I wouldn't even be able to entertain the idea of writing as a career.  I truly welcome feedback from my readers, and I try to make myself available on as many platforms as possible.  You can hit me up on Facebook, Twitter, Goodreads, or here at my blog, and I will definitely listen to your feedback and suggestions.  One of the things I like best about self-publishing is that it removes the barriers between me and my readers, so I can not only take your feedback to heart, I can act on it promptly.