— Mark Paxson
Months ago, I decided to try traditional publishing with my just-completed novel. That didn’t turn out so well, so I moved on to publishing it myself. I also decided to put some money into the publishing effort for the first time. I’ve paid for a Kirkus review, which I should get in the next week or so. I paid for somebody more talented than me to do the cover. I also joined the Independent Publishers Association, which has all sorts of “benefits” for its members — reduced prices for various editing, marketing, cover design, review, and all sorts of other services the indie publisher desperately needs.
Meanwhile, over on Twitter, I’ve started following a few Twitter accounts that promote books to their followers. Most of them boast follower counts of tens of thousands. One of them has over 114,000 followers. Each of these accounts will tweet out your short blurb about your book with a link to purchase it.
Now, I’m feeling overwhelmed by the choices and the options. I’m the type of guy who would prefer returning to the days when there were only plain and peanut M&Ms, only one kind of Snickers, only three channels on the television. I have Spotify and I absolutely love that pretty much every piece of music ever recorded is available there, but sometimes, I just don’t want all of that choice and I find myself wanting to curl into a ball instead of being confronted with the world of endless options we now have.
Which is where I’m at with my current publishing journey. As the title states, I feel like I’ve opened Pandora’s Box. I have unleashed the kraken. Everywhere I look, there are more sites that will promote your book, more services that will review your book. All of these things, of course, come with a fee attached. Everything from $25 to have your book pushed through one of those Twitter accounts to $500 for a discounted review through my IBPA membership. $500!! For a review!! And that’s a discount!!!!!! (Side note: yes, I paid almost that much for a Kirkus review, but I’m not doing it again.)
Meanwhile, those Twitter accounts that promote your book with tweets to their thousands of followers? There is almost no engagement on those tweets, and I know I pay almost no attention to them. Twitter isn’t where I go for book recommendations, you know what I mean.
There are a few places that will provide a review for free, and when the time is right, I’ll pursue those.
Beyond that … see above about wanting to curl into a ball. There are just so many options out there and I can’t help but feel like it’s an adjunct to the whole vanity publishing concept we discussed a week or so ago. Sure, we’ll be happy to promote your book, pay us, and … bwahahahahaha, good luck!
We’ve talked about this here before, but if you’re an indie author who has used any of these services — particularly the review and promo services — I would love to hear from you, and I’m willing to bet other writers would too. What worked? What didn’t? How did you decide which ones to use and which ones to stay away from? How did you decide how much pocket change to throw at these things? In other words … what’s the secret recipe to success?
Writers Supporting Writers 