Sale!!!

The holiday prep getting to you? Need a little something to relax that doesn't involve pot or alcohol?

I've some end of the year sales!

First of all, Blood Magick (Bloodlines #1) is free on ALL retail platforms. If it ain't free, you're looking at a pirate site.

Amazon, all countries
Apple
Barnes & Noble
Google Play
Kobo
Smashwords

Second, I'm participating in Smashword's End of the Year Sale! All novels and novellas are half-price. All short stories are free. If there's something you wanted to try, you can do it cheap!

Lastly, I've been updating links. If I get one wrong, PLEASE let me know. I admit despite my usual perfectionism, I'm a little frazzled between holiday prep, yet another funeral, and finish writing a bunch of stories.

I hope everyone is staying warm and safe, and that you have a great whichever- holiday(s)-you-celebrate!

Do I Stay on Smashwords?

D2D (aka Draft to Digital) merged with Smashwords in 2022. At the time, D2D said they'd move all publishers from the Smashwords database to theirs.

Two years later, none of my boos have been moved. Many friends, still using Smashwords, whose books were move were told that D2D could not be distributed for various reasons. But let's face facts, most of those books D2D would not accept were erotica or erotic romance.

*sigh* Sometimes, I feel like the 2013 Pornacolypse has never ended, and its spilled over to touch everything.

I'm currently making some changes to my business plan, and I'm looking at some new avenues to selling my books. There also avenues I've been using for the last thirteen-plus years that I'm analyzing the old avenues.

I know a lot of folks love buying their reads on  Smashwords, and D2D has signaled its going to keep the Smashwords storefront to sell books. But under my current plan, I'm no longer selling as much on Smashwords as I did before the merger was announced. In fact, I haven't broken $13 for the last two years for the Suzan Harden titles. The Alter Ego tomes do better, but they are also going downhill.

So, I'm looking at removing all of my books off Smashwords. And that's taking into account that Alter Ego's revenue that can pay for five pizzas a year.

However, I'm not looking to hurt any readers who rely on Smashwords to obtain their books. If anyone has an objections to this plan of action, add a comment or you can contact me privately, via the Contact Me page.

Social Waves

Over the years, I got a lot of "You'll understand when you're older." It's expected between birth and leaving high school. Maybe some more in your twenties and thirties. But I was told that a lot during my forties and fifties. I'm not sure why. Maybe my Coke-bottle glasses hid my lines and the bags under my eyes.

But one thing about turning the big 6-0 next year is I notice the ebbs and flows of our society. Especially when it comes to my chosen professions. For now, we'll stick to the publishing industry.

There were friends who were so excited about getting a trad publishing deal, only to have shit happen around the time of their release. One gal's came out on the second Tuesday of September in 2001. Yep, 9/11. Tons of books, movies, and records that came out at that time were dead on arrival all over the United States.

Another friend's debut novel was supposed to come out on September 16, 2008. She had personal appearances lined up in books stores all over southeast Texas, especially the Houston metro area. Mother nature has other plans. Hurricane Ike made land fall on Galveston and ripped through Houston. Most of her books never made it to stores between flooding, road closures, no power, etc.

People in the business longer than me will be the first to tell you to expect a dip in sales during presidential election years if you publish/sell fiction in the U.S. Citizens pay more attention to politics major election years. That's been especially true over the last four presidential election years, and the obsession has already started for 2024.

Writers also forget about natural disasters. Hurricane Ike hasn't been the only problem. Then there's the man-made disasters like 9/11.

But the big wave writers have ignore is the COVID-19 pandemic. Sales shot up during lockdowns because readers could download ebooks and audiobooks or order paper books for delivery to their doorstep. But the surge wasn't going to be sustainable or permanent. Eventually, the lockdowns would end, and everyone around the world would return to their real lives.

I made my prediction based on the Spanish Influenza pandemic a century ago. It took our great-great-grandparents roughly three years to gain herd immunity from that devastating disease. I figured it would be roughly the same with COVID-19.

Sure enough, all the writers I know and a lot I didn't bitched about the drop in sales in 2023 when things opened again around the world. Folks could travel, not just to see family, but to hug them. Who on earth is going to read when they haven't been able hug someone they love.

So, the 2023 travel surge led straight into the current obsession over the 2024 presidential election. I don't expect a major uptick in my sales this year, so I'm using 2024 for experimentation with both writing and new sales outlets. If I fail at either, well, no one's really paying attention right now.

Goddess, I miss the days when Johnny Carson joked about President Ford's clumsiness.

With the End of the Pandemic, Entertainment Sales Fall

It's spring, Dr. Anthony Fauci says the pandemic is over*, and Americans are suffering from a major case of cabin fever after two years of limited in-person social contact. So people are out doing the things they've missed--sporting events, graduation parties, barbeques with neighbors, etc.

Toss in the current inflation spike which is a long term effect of the pandemic plus the invasion of Ukraine. People no longer buying a lot of indoor entertainment.

Netflix stock dropped by almost 50%  last week after thousands of subscribers eliminated the service. The other streaming services are starting to see similar results.

Movie theaters haven't recovered. New releases are lucky to break eight-figures on their opening weekend, much less the nine or ten figures some of these movies would have made prior to the pandemic.

Now, both trad and indie publishing are seeing a loss of sales. And writers are panicking. "We aren't making as much as we did in <name the year>."

I'm really confused by everyone's surprise at this. First, the pandemic growth simply wasn't sustainable. People are no longer trapped at home with limited entertainment choices. Heck, even I'm getting outside of the house. DH and I went to dinner at my favorite Mexican restaurant in town last night. It's been two and half years since I sat down INSIDE this place. And damn was it delicious!

Second, it doesn't mean everybody has quit reading (or watching) forever. This is a a short-term lull. Why do I believe that?

If an introvert like me is getting out, my readers are too. And you know something? That's okay. I'll have new books ready for them when winter rolls back around and we're stuck at home because of ice and snow.

*Don't take either me or  Dr. Fauci wrong, COVID-19 is still a dangerous disease, but the U.S. is no longer suffering from millions of infections per day and most of our hospitals have normal capacity again.

Unrealistic Return Expectations of of the Indie Writer - 9 Years Later

Below is an essay I posted on my blog almost nine years to the day. It bears repeating because the same ridiculousness is rising again.

Take a look at the previews of the books from some of the authors bitching about returns. There's more than a couple with some really bad editing and formatting. Fix your damn problems, people, before bitching about returns and bad reviews!

Hell, I got ripped for bad editing before. Did I blame the reviewer? No, I fixed the book he/she/they complained about.

I'd also like to point out my current Kickstarter campaign is running at a less that three percent backer cancellation rate. I'd much rather have a potential backer check out my other books and decide the brand new series isn't their cup of tea rather than give me a crappy review because of their buyer's remorse. I'm sure as hell not going to bitch them out publicly any more than I would bitch out the reader who returned A Question of Balance this year.

In fact, I'd like to say to that reader, "Thank for trying one of my books. I'm sorry it didn't meet your expectations."

**************

There's a petition circulating right now through Change.org asking Amazon to refuse refunds on e-books that have been read.

I understand the sentiment. No one wants to feel they've been taken advantage of. But there's major problems with this stance:

1) I doubt many of the signers of this petition have owned a retail store of any kind. When my husband and I looked into purchasing a brick-and-mortar store ten years ago, the statistics we received from the Small Business Administration said to expect 5% in returns. (When I find the blasted file in my office, I'll give you the source.)

According the the National Retail Federation ("NRF"), retail returns were expected to hit 8.7 percent during the 2008 Christmas shopping season, the height of the housing financial disaster. They actually hit 8.9 per cent and climbed over subsequent years.

According to Businessweek, retail returns hit a yearly average of 6 percent for 2007. A 2012 article by Businessweek said the yearly average was back down to 5 percent.

What does that mean for us indie authors? Alter Ego's first book, Book A, is my bestselling book to date. It also has the highest number of return. So, let's calculate it

Total books sold through Feb. 2013 = 1558
Total returns through Feb. 2013 = 9
Percentage of returns = 0.57 %

Not even the national average of 5%, but a tenth of that. If I add in my other seventeen books, the percentage drops even lower. That's damn good!

If your return percentage is higher than 5%, you need to take an honest, objective look at your book. Is the cover or blurb misleading? Are you calling it a romance when it doesn't have a "happily ever after" or "happy for now" ending? Is the beginning polished to perfection and the middle or ending need a major overhaul? Your readers may be feeling cheated or misled and want their money back. Not all of them leave nasty 1-star reviews.

2) Changing the policy punishes people who are not cheating the system. Haven't you ever accidentally clicked on something you shouldn't have? Have you ever bought a book where the formatting was so screwed up it was unreadable? The NRF survey for Christmas of 2012 estimates that 4.6% OF THE RETURNS are fraudulant. In other words, only 23 fraudulent returns out of every 10,000 sales.

That means out of all my sales, statistically speaking, less than one of them was a fraudulent return.

Were any of them fraudulent? Yes, I suspect two were because Book A was bought on Day 1 and returned on Day 2 when suspiciously Book B was bought...and then returned on Day 2 when Book C was purchased. So, is punishing these two idiots worth pissing off 1,556 other customers?

In my opinion, no, it's not.

3) Are you absolutely sure the book has been read? The reason I say this is? Sure, Amazon can track where you leave off on your Kindle, but both my mom and mother-in-law jump to the end of the file and READ THE END FIRST. If they don't like how the writer ends the story, they don't read the rest.

Yeah, I've had the argument with Mom thirty years ago that reading the end first ruins the book. I don't dare say a word to the MIL. LOL

4) Contrary to popular belief, Amazon does cut off customers who abuse their return policy.

5) Be very, VERY careful about throwing stones. Norwegian author Anne B. Ragde slammed e-book piracy in a 2010 article in Dagens Naeringsliv, only to have her own teenage son out Anne's music piracy.

Are there always going to be people who steal? Unfortunately, yes.

Will these people buy your books if you prevent them from stealing them? Probably not.

Will Amazon change its return policy? I have no fucking clue.

Will having print-only editions save your books from piracy? Seriously, do I have to explain to you what a scanner does?

I recommend that indie writers take a deep breath, grab their favorite beverage and get back to working on that current wip. I will because I know I have a thousand people waiting on Alter Ego's Book D.

Sales Are Down and Why It Isn't a Bad Thing

Sales are down for the month of November, and I see a lot of writers wringing their hands over it.

Frankly, the reasons are many, but everyone's blaming inflation, and some folks are considering raising their prices. However, I believe that's not a good idea at this time.

1) For the last eleven years, November has been notoriously slow for indies and busy for trad publishing. This is the time of year where trad really pushes sales for holiday giving. Bestsellers like the latest Grisham, Patterson, and Sparks novels rule the sales, and then there's the specialty items like Paul McCartney's Lyrics. Shoppers like getting a physical object they can wrap and hand over to a loved one.

2) Are we having an inflation issue? Yes, we are, but it's a factor I've been expecting with the shortages and hangups in the U.S. ports. We are still in the middle of a world-wide crisis, and until shipping gets back to normal, prices are going to rise. But raising book prices is a catch twenty-two. Books are a luxury item. If someone is struggling to feed their kids, they're not going to buy your book. And if they do have a little extra for some cheap entertainment, they're not going to buy your e-book that's the same price as a mass market paperback.

3) I won't be worried unless Kindlemas totally tanks. Kindlemas is the nickname for the roughly forty-five days after Christmas when people use their new devices and redeem their giftcards for books. For indies, it's the cyber equivalent of Black Friday. However, I do expect Kindlemas sales to be lower this year because there's a ton of devices already on backorder thanks to the shortage of compute chips.

For now, I'm staying the course--writing and publishing on a regular schedule. Any revisions in my business plan won't happen until February at the earliest.

I hope y'all have a safe, pleasant Cyber Monday!

Sales Dropping in the World's Chaos

A lot of fellow indies claim they're seeing a drop in sales over the last few months. I was going to address this in today's post, but Kris Rusch did a much more elegant and thorough job yesterday in her business post.

I strongly recommend if you own or run a business, even if you're not a writer, you need to read Kris's post on Disruption.

BOOK SALE!!

There's good news and bad news.

BAD NEWS
As of October 31st, Amazon is discontinuing its Matchbook program. For those who don't know what that this, some publishers have deals set up where if you buy the paperback novel you can get the e-book of that same novel for a deep discount or free.

GOOD NEWS
Angry Sheep Publishing has most of my e-book novels and anthologies set to free in this program.

Even better, Amazon has been marking down a lot of my paperbacks. Some really good discounts too, like 25-66%. With the holidays coming up, you could buy the paperback and keep the e-book for yourself.

For example, the paperback of Hero Ad Hoc is $4.57 in the US store as of this posting, so you could buy it and the e-book version for $4.57 plus tax. Check it out if you're interested!

The August Doldrums

I get perverse amusement out of indie writers who panic during the month of August. Which is to say, most of them. And it happens every fricking year.

Why? Let me give you a hint--the high school teacher's parking lot was nearly full as I drove past this morning on the way to a doctor's appointment.

For my romances, I literally see sales stop the first week of school in the U.S. Fantasy slows way down, too, to barely a blip on my dashboards. Because my readers are dealing with changes in their children's schedules (which the little buggers hate) and changes to their own schedules (which the moms are dealing with in addition to the tots' temper tantrums and the "I can't find my brand new shoes!"). They barely have a breath left to keep from falling asleep face first in their dinner, much less read.

"But not all readers have school-age children!" you cry.

True, but a lot of my baby boomer readers are watching their grandchildren. Those still working themselves have to deal with the extra traffic in the mornings and evenings. And at the end of the day, they don't have the energy to read either. Or they want to enjoy that last little bit of sunshine and warmth before the cold arrives in earnest.

"But, but what if sales never pick up again?!"

Sales will pick up again, just like they always do. After trad publishers stop dumping their holiday offerings into the market, and everyone is finished with their holiday shopping. When the readers finally have time to breathe after the New Hallowthanksmas shenanigans are done.

In the meantime, why aren't you writing so you have a book to put out when everyone starts spending their gift cards in January?

Status Report - October 2013

As the Celtic year winds down (yes, folks, Halloween, or Samhain if you will, was the Celtic equivalent of New Year's Eve except with a lot less glitter and champagne), I'm looking at what I've accomplished.

Sales have been down over September and October, just like they have been for the last three years. Why? Because readers are dealing with school, kids, fall activities like football, and holidays. Oh, and October is when trad publishing unleashes a flurry of paper books, especially hardbacks, in preparation for the Christmas rush.

A lot of folks in indie world are panicking, but they've panicked every fall for the last three years.What they need to be looking at is the long-term implications. The initial gold rush in self-publishing is over. Thank Djehuti!

Why do I say that? Because the people who aren't serious about writing as a career are starting to give up. That doesn't mean the rest of us can relax. If anything, we need to up our game. We not only have to be better than other indies, we have to be better than trad published books in our production values.

Fortunately, that's not hard. *grin*

Here's some of the data you're looking for:

After Amazon's August surge, Apple sales are still beating the house that Bezos built as far as my books go in September. Barnes & Noble sales have dropped thanks their schizophrenic board of directors and total lack of direction. Frankly, I can't blame Nook owners for not wanting to invest any more money in their devices. Kobo and Smashwords sales have been non-existent since April. Sony is the retailer that surprises me because I'm starting to see 2-3 actual sales per month for the second half of 2013.

Total sales in August = 215
Total sales in September = 139
Total sales for October as of the 22nd = 74

I place a lot of the blame for October on Congress' shoulders because of the stupid-ass government shutdown. There was a marked increase in sales after 16th, and not just because Alter Ego published a new novella on the 18th.

The rest of the year will be interesting. Blood Sacrifice will be published by Halloween. Sword and Sorceress 28 with my short story "Justice" will be released November 2nd. Alter Ego will put out her first novel in December as well as the last novella of her current BDSM series. That will bring my total releases up to ten for the year.

And I've officially made more money in 2013 than I did in 2012, and I've still got two more months to go.

All-in-all, I think I've done pretty good this year for an average mid-lister.

A Hell of a Week...Oh, and Apple

Well, the moving truck pulled out of the driveway at 10:30 a.m. this morning. Three and a half hours behind schedule.

Fortunately, one the few aspects of mine GK has developed is the desire for organization and sticking to a schedule. Unfortunately, DH has neither. Add in his heavy dose of sentimentality and both GK and I were ready to kill DH this morning.

I was at least prepared for DH's meltdown, having experienced it seventeen years ago when we moved to Texas. GK is like, "What the fuck is wrong with my dad?"

In addition to the actual moving BS, my laptop died, our shredder died, and there was a fubar regarding our moving truck reservation. Everything was dealt with, but it sucked unnecessary hours out of our already tight schedule. But we still would have left late today anyway because of DH.

*sigh* Anyway...

Three interesting personal things about Apple:

1) Apple finally decided to pass on numbers for free e-books. My giveaways for Zombie Confidential are 494, which brings my total to 3,370 as of June 30, 2013. On a side note, every time I think the book will drop out of the top 100 in the Amazon Women Sleuths category, it jumps right back up.

2) Apple has some very odd standards when it comes to cover art. They are refusing to sell Book #4 of Alter Ego's BDSM series because it has a naked woman in handcuffs on the cover. Apparently, they did not notice the naked woman in chains on the cover of Book #1. In both cases, you cannot see any of the naughty bits. I haven't decided what I'm going to do just yet, but I'm leaning toward replacing the current cover with a Victorian woman.

3) As I mentioned, my Apple sales have been matching or surpassing my Amazon sales this year. Here's the breakdown of percentage of total sales:

January: Apple - 0.9% Amazon - 24.9%
February: Apple - 11.4% Amazon - 12.2%
March: Apple - 14.2% Amazon - 14.8%
April: Apple - 23.3% Amazon - 12.3%
May: Apple - 8.6% Amazon - 22.4%
June: Apple - 21.3% Amazon - 11.8%

It'll be interesting to see if this trend continues through the rest of the year.

Unrealistic Return Expectations of the Indie Writer

There's a petition circulating right now through Change.org asking Amazon to refuse refunds on e-books that have been read.

I understand the sentiment. No one wants to feel they've been taken advantage of. But there's major problems with this stance:

1) I doubt many of the signers of this petition have owned a retail store of any kind. When my husband and I looked into purchasing a brick-and-mortar store ten years ago, the statistics we received from the Small Business Administration said to expect 5% in returns. (When I find the blasted file in my office, I'll give you the source.)

According the the National Retail Federation ("NRF"), retail returns were expected to hit 8.7 percent during the 2008 Christmas shopping season, the height of the housing financial disaster. They actually hit 8.9 per cent and climbed over subsequent years.

According to Businessweek, retail returns hit a yearly average of 6 percent for 2007. A 2012 article by Businessweek said the yearly average was back down to 5 percent.

What does that mean for us indie authors? Alter Ego's first book, Book A, is my bestselling book to date. It also has the highest number of return. So, let's calculate it

Total books sold through Feb. 2013 = 1558
Total returns through Feb. 2013 = 9
Percentage of returns = 0.57 %

Not even the national average of 5%, but a tenth of that. If I add in my other seventeen books, the percentage drops even lower. That's damn good!

If your return percentage is higher than 5%, you need to take an honest, objective look at your book. Is the cover or blurb misleading? Are you calling it a romance when it doesn't have a "happily ever after" or "happy for now" ending? Is the beginning polished to perfection and the middle or ending need a major overhaul? Your readers may be feeling cheated or misled and want their money back. Not all of them leave nasty 1-star reviews.

2) Changing the policy punishes people who are not cheating the system. Haven't you ever accidentally clicked on something you shouldn't have? Have you ever bought a book where the formatting was so screwed up it was unreadable? The NRF survey for Christmas of 2012 estimates that 4.6% OF THE RETURNS are fraudulant. In other words, only 23 fraudulent returns out of every 10,000 sales.

That means out of all my sales, statistically speaking, less than one of them was a fraudulent return.

Were any of them fraudulent? Yes, I suspect two were because Book A was bought on Day 1 and returned on Day 2 when suspiciously Book B was bought...and then returned on Day 2 when Book C was purchased. So, is punishing these two idiots worth pissing off 1,556 other customers?

In my opinion, no, it's not.

3) Are you absolutely sure the book has been read? The reason I say this is? Sure, Amazon can track where you leave off on your Kindle, but both my mom and mother-in-law jump to the end of the file and READ THE END FIRST. If they don't like how the writer ends the story, they don't read the rest.

Yeah, I've had the argument with Mom thirty years ago that reading the end first ruins the book. I don't dare say a word to the MIL. LOL

4) Contrary to popular belief, Amazon does cut off customers who abuse their return policy.

5) Be very, VERY careful about throwing stones. Norwegian author Anne B. Ragde slammed e-book piracy in a 2010 article in Dagens Naeringsliv, only to have her own teenage son out Anne's music piracy.

Are there always going to be people who steal? Unfortunately, yes.

Will these people buy your books if you prevent them from stealing them? Probably not.

Will Amazon change its return policy? I have no fucking clue.

Will having print-only editions save your books from piracy? Seriously, do I have to explain to you what a scanner does?

I recommend that indie writers take a deep breath, grab their favorite beverage and get back to working on that current wip. I will because I know I have a thousand people waiting on Alter Ego's Book D.

Status Report - March 2013

Well, it finally happened. For the last three months, my sales on the iBookstore have been closing the gap on Amazon sales. In February, Apple sales of my books edged past Seattle's darling. It wasn't by much though, just a few dollars, i.e. two books. For the record, Barnes & Noble still outstrips both of them by five to one.

Don't ask me why my sales patterns are radically different than so many other indie writers. I don't get it either.

Ironically, today Joe Konrath talks about why he pulled all his books from other retailers and went exclusive through KDP Select.

I'll be the first to admit I don't come anywhere close to Joe's numbers. After talking with several friends who are indie publishing, the radical difference in sales through the various retailers only means book sales are still in upheaval. There STILL ISN'T a perfect answer to best-seller-dom.

I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm planning some experiments regarding exclusivity for this summer. (To my readers, don't worry. None of the experiments will involve already established series!) I'll definitely report the results.

The Clash of the Expectations

I've joked about new writers having a "thar's gold in them thar hills" mentality when it comes to self-publishing. And yes, some of writer are guilty of spamming message boards, their Facebook pages and their Twitter feeds with "Buy my one and only book!" But most indie writers I know are well aware of the uphill slog they face, and they're willing to put the time and money to create a career.

Now, mid-list traditional-published writers are realizing the gold is in their backlist. On agent Rachelle Gardner's blog, Jennie Nash talks about what she sees as the pluses and minuses of self-publishing now that she self-published her seventh novel.

In some ways, experienced authors like Jennie are suprised by the amount of work that goes into producing your own book. Then they are surprised by what they believe is little return.

On the same day, Dean Wesley Smith had a blog post about numbers. Most of you reading this are going to roll your eyes and think, "Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know all about the long-tail."

A writer should aim for making a typical advance of $10,000 off their self-published title in the ten years a traditional publisher would have the title tied up. He then goes on about pricing to hit this goal. Here's something to chew on though:

If you think selling 20 books average per month of all your titles across all sites is bad and your average price is $5.99, you really need to have an attitude adjustment. Get a friend to tap you gently on the top of the head until wake you up and realize your sales are just fine and you need to keep writing and get more books out.

That paragraph made me check my numbers for 2012. As of October, I had fourteen titles for sale. For January through October, I averaged 20 book per month FOR EVERY SINGLE TITLE EXCEPT ONE!

I know a lot of people have argued with Dean and his wife Kris Rusch about their methodology of controlled, steady growth in a writer's business. So the question you need to answer for yourself is what are your expectations and are they realistic.

Personally, I think Aesop's turtle was right.

Is It Starting?

Okay, I did lie a little bit yesterday. One prediction I did make was that all the folks who received new e-readers and pads for the holidays would start filling them.

What I've seen so far over the last month in sales:

1) A little bump over Thanksgiving weekend

2) Sporadic sales across all platforms over the next three weeks (i.e. one or two a week)

3) A nice bump just before Christmas

My guess is some folks were loading up stuff to read for the trip to Grandma's house. Even better than the sales was the lovely thirteen and a half hours of sleep last night.

So if you're not seeing bumps in sales just yet, be patient. I'm one of those people who got Amazon and Barnes & Noble gift cards, and I haven't had two seconds to shop yet.

Lessons Learned Part 6 - Real Numbers

Currently reading - Vamipre Mine by Kerrelyn Sparks (MMPB)

For those of you thinking about indie-publishing your work, I going to be perfectly honest about my sales numbers so far for Seasons of Magick: Spring.

Live on Amazon April 29th:  19

Live on Barnes & Noble May 9th:  3

Live on Smashwords May 11th:  3


The two reasons I've sold 25 copies so far is (1) it's cheap, only $0.99, and (2) it's erotica.  Remember, I've done virtually no promotion for this novella.  I've posted each time the book went live on a e-tail site, and I've tweeted each time.  That's it.  That's all I did.  My friends took up the slack and have promoted the hell out of the novella (for which I'm eternally grateful, guys!).  So all in all, I'm rather pleased with the sales.  But that also doesn't mean I can continue sitting around and doing nothing.

First of all, I plan to release at least three novels this year (and possible a fourth depending on my time).  I also plan on releasing at least three more short stories (and again, possibly a fourth depending on time).  I'm already well into scheduling releases for 2012.  From my research, your best bet for success as an indie is to have as much quality product available as you can manage.

Second of all, some heavy duty promotion is planned including contests, blog tours and begging for reviews sending out copies for review.

While I'm more than willing to share what works for me in this strange new world, don't take it as gospel.  Your mileage may vary.

Publishing Sales Tidbit

Currently reading - Infinity by Sherrilyn Kenyon

For those of you who don't know, publishing is like any other industry. Initial sales figures can make or break a product. And let's face facts, to the PTBs in the publishing world, our babies are just a product.

If there's an author you love out there, help them by buying his/her books the week they come out. Pre-ordering is always good too. Most online bookstores list the street date (aka lay-down date, the date the book's supposed to go on sale).

Here's the two books on my shopping list this week.