Member Blog

It’s free to join SPR and blog about your writing experiences. Read the latest blog entries from our community

Why One-Star Reviews Matter

The most trusted form of criticism for consumers on the internet is now the consumer review. Hailed as SEO gold by Google, these reviews are popping up all over the joint due to rich snippets, which I will explain in my next post in more detail.

In fact, 63% of consumers now buy products not based on the review, but on the rating. Which is scary news for us self-publishers.

consumer ratings

However, I am thinking Amazon, Google, Goodreads, Kindleboards and all the rest of them need to be reviewing their reviewers. With one-star reviews being added to books due to […]

2019-02-03T09:28:57+02:00February 13th, 2013|Categories: Member Blog|Tags: , , , |

Why Amazon Just Doesn’t Play Fair With Formatting

Self-published author Catherine Tosko on why Amazon should write a story of their own before publishing other people’s.

Someone I know has just published their second book on Amazon and due to formatting issues has completely given up on selling any more books due to bad reviews, not about the book but about the formatting.

Then the same day, a friend, a well known self-publisher had the exact same problem with Kindle Fire formatting that I had six months ago when I published my book and is probably tearing his hair out as I write.

Why? Because you can’t even […]

2013-02-10T10:01:59+02:00February 9th, 2013|Categories: Features, Member Blog|Tags: |

But Don’t Obsess . . . .

Recently in this space, I came down pretty hard with the advice that you should make sure your writing is as smooth and error free as possible before you publish it. Now that I’ve made that point, I want to add the corollary: Don’t obsess. Well, maybe obsess a little, but not too much. The fear of a misplaced comma, or a subject and a verb that are having relationship problems, can be almost as much an obstacle to creativity as the fear of what your mother will think when she reads your book. (And if your mother happens […]

2013-02-08T14:45:05+02:00February 8th, 2013|Categories: Features, Member Blog|Tags: |

The end of traditional publishing occurred in 2008……apparently

When I was thirteen I bought a lot of CD’s. I would spend hours flicking through the alphabetically lined racks on the hunt for Madonna, Guns and Roses, or the soundtrack for “Days of Thunder.” I would turn it over and take in the pictures. I would pull out the little booklet and pray that the lyrics had been printed inside so I could learn them and prove that I was a real fan by singing along when it came on the radio. I loved the whole process of CD buying. I still love music, but yet I haven’t bought […]

2013-02-08T14:14:02+02:00February 8th, 2013|Categories: Member Blog|

Getting to a Self-Published Cozy Mystery Series

It was natural for me to want to write mysteries.  My parents loved to read them and I became one of those kids who hid with an apple and a book to get out of something more responsible I was supposed to be doing.

For a number of years I wrote and occasionally submitted, trying to stay abreast of what was selling and which publisher was buying what.  No success with fiction, some with nonfiction.  Then I published a mystery/romance with what is now Author House, and I did about 50 percent of everything wrong.  Typos aside, it wasn’t my […]

2013-01-09T14:42:51+02:00January 9th, 2013|Categories: Member Blog|

What Stages May Come: Free Book Reviews

I never suspected as I researched and wrote my book what further stages of the process were yet to come. I’m probably preaching to the choir a bit here, addressing a lot of people who won’t be surprised by what came next.

Self-publishing with CreateSpace without going for any of their paid services was one challenge. Reformatting for SmashWords was another.

But the real grind came with promotion: establishing a web presence and seeking reviews.

I’ve kept at it doggedly and learned a lot and even found a few kind folks willing to do reviews for my book, which is […]

2013-01-04T13:41:26+02:00January 4th, 2013|Categories: Member Blog, Resources|

How do you become as successful and well-known as Harry Potter or 50 Shades of Grey?

It seems to me that self-published writers are looked down on – that they’re just using up space in the market; that if their work was good enough to get a proper publishing deal it would have done; that they’re putting out any kind of rubbish just because technology allows them to. All of this went through my mind when I was considering whether to go ahead with it myself. Will I be a part of that stigma? Will people look down on me? Should I bother? Is my book good enough?

But what’s the alternative? I thought about not […]

2020-02-21T03:54:59+02:00December 7th, 2012|Categories: Features, Member Blog|Tags: |
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