Malasz

Over on the Tenka International blog, Michael Norton wrote a post entitled " Book Reviewers Don’t Charge Enough, And Why You Under-Appreciate Them ". In it, he explains the importance of book reviews in promoting one's work. While on the surface that seems like a no-brainer, he emphasizes the importance of book review blogs and how they help to spread the message about your book. Book reviewers are the people who take the time to set up a website and cultivate a dedicated audience. They are under-appreciated by most independent authors, because most writers have no idea how to effectively market their work, and thus fail to see book reviewers as what they are: hubs, trusted by pre-established audiences, that directly influence awareness and conventional opinion of a writer’s work. Norton then attacks the idea that book reviewers should be giving it away for free. Many reviewers read and write for free, under the insecure belief that admitting that they’re professional cri...

In this age of social media saturation, too many authors seem content with just a Facebook page and Twitter handle. Authors need websites. Think of them as a base of operations where readers can go to find out everything they need to know about you as an author. Jane Friedman has an excellent list of components that an author needs for her website. Check it out !

I may be opening up a can of worms here, but I want to try something new. If you're an author whose work has been reviewed by us, we'd like to do a little more for you. Typically, our relationship with authors ends after we review their work. Some authors like our reviews and stay in touch with us, even if there is little reason beyond hoping we'll review their next book. We want to do something more. Promoting indie authors is tough. Very few get the recognition they deserve. Some get more than they deserve, but that's another topic entirely. So let's work on that author promotion stuff. If you have something newsworthy to share, let us know . What do I mean by newsworthy? Yeah, I'd better clarify that. What might seem important to you might not be important to us. So I'm going to list what we do consider newsworthy. Here's what you can share with us: Awards and nominations for awards . Real ones. Not those awards that you can buy: "Send us $20 t...

Last week I received an email from a reputable indie publishing blogger inviting me to a webinar where I could learn how to double my sales from a successful indie author. It sounded too good to be true, but since this was a reputable indie publishing blogger, I decided to give it a shot. The webinar was packed full of writers, and many went around introducing themselves and where they were from. Judging from the introductions, many were either new writers working on their first book or veterans struggling with limited sales of their first book or two. You can put me in the latter category. The successful indie author hosted the webinar and (surprise) primarily spent his time plugging his new book, which featured ways that indie authors everywhere could double their sales. He started off relating what he did and gave case studies demonstrating how so-and-so applied the techniques from the book and saw their sales blossom. But every example he gave involved a non-fiction author. And our...

Normally I'm a sci-fi and horror guy. While I do venture outside of these genres from time to time, a story has to have something that grabs my attention. We didn't receive any sample chapters for Poole's Paradise and the blurb didn't have a firm grip on me, so I was on the verge of passing on it. But before I did, I checked out its author, John Vorhaus. I was impressed by what I saw on Amazon and his website . It was there that I got hooked. He had so much going on with novels, poker guides, Twitter, and videos that I was sold on reading Poole's Paradise. And I'm glad I did . In the publishing world, an indie author has to find a good editor for their manuscript and make sure it has a professional looking cover. But even with those two things set, there's still the matter of marketing. There are some rudimentary things an indie author can do to self-promote, but sometimes that's not enough. Recognizing that John sold himself more than the book, I a...