Good for you Matt! The end results of my promotion were priceless. My five day free run shoved me into the #8 best seller in historical romance. I had over 6,200 copies downloaded. Since the five-day promotion, it has increased my sales on all levels. I’ve had increased hits on my website, increased positive reviews, [...]

I use a website called Grammarly.com. It’s great for not only grammar, but it highlights text that matches anything on the Internet or elsewhere. It also gives you the reference to add, if you need to give credit where credit is due. It’s somewhat helpful.

Well, I for one was very skeptic over the KDP select. However, out of a moment of madness I pulled one book off Smashwords distribution out of my three fiction novels and opted into the game. Today started my free five-day promotion on my historical romance novel. This morning alone my book has been download [...]

“Most independent authors will sell less than 100 copies of their ebooks.” I hate to say it, but I’m somewhat sick of this figure. It gets carried over from article to article off of someone’s quote over average self-published author sales totaled up and divided by how many use some vanity publishing house. Is that [...]

You can email them through Author Central too. They are pretty responsive about fixing any problem.

The whole argument that traditionally published books are better than self-published is bogus. The gatekeepers in the romance genre let so much trash through their doors to make a buck selling sex, six-pack abs, exposed boobs and thighs, it’s nauseating. Some of the very popular romance writers churn out so many books each year it [...]

I’ll admit to being puzzled at the f-word backlash my book has received. I’ve often wondered if it was because it was marketed as women’s fiction, that perhaps I’d broken some unspoken rule. But after reading about your experiences I’m forced to reconsider.

You are quite right about traditional publishers doing the same thing. I’ve downloaded free historical romance books on Kindle by big name publishers that were free. Everyone is “experimenting” if you will. I honestly don’t find anything inherently wrong with the practice. We all have our personal goals and ways of getting what we want [...]

It’s been interesting to read this string of opinions. In the end, I think it boils down to our individual goals as writers. I will admit right now I have an overwhelming need to be read. Giving my books away free on Smashwords this month has kept me continually in the top 10 best sellers [...]

Right now I’m enjoying the free offering on Smashwords. It’s tossed me into the #5 for best sellers on my first book of three in a series. Right now I’m heavily involved in marketing the series and working on book. I can only hope that it will generate sales for the next two releases from [...]

Thankfully, my books through LS are still in stock. Though frankly 90% of my sales are from eBooks on the same title. Not sure the rationale behind their decision here, unless they’re choking off other options to make more money with CreatSpace. Any thoughts?

I went through Xlibris before I became totally independent. Cover design with these companies is not hard. You can have a professional cover done by any graphic artist. You just send them the file. You’re not stuck with any cover services by these companies. I did so with two of my books. They are just [...]

Hmmm, what I wouldn’t give for an edit button right now: “an” not “a”….”its” not “it’s”…I’ll let you do the rest yourselves.

I have a guy here fixing my roof and my dogs want to eat him, so I’m a bit distracted running back and forth.

But this is the difference between a “artist’s vision” (writer, designer, illustrator)and a project manager. Money is tight, not everyone has the money to experiment, so from a business point of view it pays to play it safe. I can think of no book that blew it’s competition out of the water based only on [...]

The cover sells the book to bookstore owners who do buy based only on cover in the instance Jerry has described, but quite often author name, will also. They will order the next Stephen King without looking at the cover, or liking it. Also, those advance covers often change (many times) before the publishing date. [...]

The self-publisher is also the project manager. It’s a difficult, complex and often thankless job that many authors don’t even know exists.

Thank you for your well-written response, Arthur. It’s nice to know someone read my article. I believe my profile here does disclose that I am a cover designer, and there is no intent to disguise that fact, but having said that, I am not here seeking work, so I won’t promote my own covers or [...]