Features | Self-Publishing Review

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 […]

Joe Lynam2020-02-21T03:54:59+02:00December 7th, 2012|Categories: Features, Member Blog|Tags: Book Marketing|

Adventures in Innovation, Or: How To Make An Ebook You Can Feel (A Story of Snot and Letting Go)

Present

Returning to my last article on SPR, one year later, I’m struck by a comment left by a reader named Ron Fritsch. The article was about my self publishing experiment, the Bookdrive, and Ron seemed to really like my idea. He liked the potential of a multimedia reading experience provided by a USB Book. But naturally he had some questions.

There is one question in particular that, one year ago, I glossed over quickly in favour of the lower hanging fruit. After a tough year, and of a lot of hard work making my idea into reality, all […]

Mark Kowgier2012-11-29T14:28:39+02:00November 29th, 2012|Categories: Features, Lead Story|

Amazon Remains Mum on Authors Fears of Book Sales Skimming

A canned reply is all that Amazon brass is handing the literary community on why thousands of high-performing authors book-sales dashboards have frozen. In the past month over 22,000 Amazon.com eBook authors have scrambled to the giant online retailer’s kdp Amazon Community Board to complain to the global Goliath about the appearance of lost book sales.

Visit Are Your Sales Figures Updating Normally Now? for details. https://kdp.amazon.com/community/forum.jspa?forumID=7 for more.

“My sales figures screen has frozen,” has become a common complaint among thousands of independent authors who have flocked to Amazon’s book distribution platform in search of an explanation of sudden, […]

Emily Hill2020-02-21T05:52:35+02:00October 19th, 2012|Categories: Features|Tags: Amazon|

eBook Marketing: How Do You Target Your Reading Audience?

One of the first questions a new indie author must ask is what audience will buy my book? The second question is how will I market to this audience? Both questions should be asked way before you get to the publishing stage of your book.

In the old days, there was a very standard set of rules and procedures. If you were fortunate enough to get picked up by a publisher, you got the finished product to the editors and off your book went into the market place.

On the other side, if you had to do the publishing yourself […]

James Moushon2019-02-18T12:13:45+02:00September 28th, 2012|Categories: Features|Tags: Book Marketing, Book Promotion|

eBook Marketing: Is Buying a Great Book Review Your Cup of Tea?

With the huge controversy brewing in the Book Publishing Industry over book reviews and how they’re obtained and used, I thought I would jump in on this.

We have exposed a problem in the trust of one of the decision points buyers have. Is the ebook as good as the review says it is? How much do readers/buyers rely on reviews? Could this start the end of a time-old tradition? Are there professional reviewers still out there that have strong ethics and do the job honestly?

Reviews are Part of the Game

Indie authors are easy to point the finger […]

James Moushon2020-02-21T06:34:47+02:00September 18th, 2012|Categories: Features|Tags: Book Marketing|

I Like Self-Publishing Again

It’s odd that the recent firestorm about paid reviews and unscrupulous self-publishers has actually rekindled my love of self-publishing. Ever since Amanda Hocking, the vibe around self-publishing has been money, money, money. On the one hand, I was grateful for this because it put self-publishing on the map: money talks. On the other hand: this is the worst determination of value and pretty much what’s wrong with the world, and publishing in general. The reason that I fled traditional publishing (after having a series of agents and traditional contracts) was because of the overemphasis on marketing and past sales. Publishing […]

Henry Baum2012-09-13T13:46:18+02:00September 13th, 2012|Categories: Features|

Epitaph: Paying for Reviews

Full disclosure: SPR charges for reviews. People hate this, and don’t necessarily differentiate between paid good reviews and paid reviews in general, especially with the current controversy of paying for 5-star reviews. Since SPR started charging, we’ve been able to review many more books than before, and pay reviewers for their time. So I do think there’s a difference between what Kirkus, or SPR, does, and guaranteeing a block of 5-star reviews without even reading the book. Even so, people are now decrying the entire paid review model. This may seem like self-protection, but I don’t think the paid […]

Henry Baum2012-08-27T13:29:00+02:00August 27th, 2012|Categories: Features|

Lendink: The Age of Knee-Jerk Vigilance

“With great power comes great responsibility.”

If you are new to the Lendink story, here’s the lowdown. A website that lends out ebooks was shut down by a gaggle of indie writers who thought this was an example of piracy no different than Napster. Really, it’s totally legitimate, as lending ebooks is part of publishing on the Kindle. Books aren’t downloaded, they’re lent for a set period and the writer gets paid. In short, it has nothing in common with Napster.

It’s understandable if writers are a little twitchy about piracy. It also makes sense that people like being […]

Henry Baum2012-08-10T19:22:13+02:00August 10th, 2012|Categories: Features|