What the best Indie bookstores do…

As an author, I support indie bookstores. Or should I say, I support indie bookstores that support me as an author. I have traveled across the country to do book signings at various bookstores and I have learned quite a bit. I learned not only which bookstores are worth investing in as an author and a reader and which ones will surely go out of business.

Lesson #1 - It doesn’t matter how long your bookstore has been in business. It matters that you make money.

I have personally witnessed bookstore owners with attitudes about their business. They only want a ‘certain’ genre of books. They refuse to keep new books in stock. The result is a bookstore filled with hundreds of books they can’t sell. This is the same philosophy that larger bookstores use. Therefore, why start an Indie bookstore to reproduce the social status quo in the book publishing industry.

Lesson #2 – It doesn’t matter where your bookstore is located. It matters whether you spend your time building a solid customer base.

I know five bookstore owners that exclusively sell their books online and at a local flea market. They have been in business for fifteen years without fail. It is the only thing they do and they make a great living. They understand that a nerd that buys books will get them from anywhere.

Lesson #3 – It doesn’t matter how you do book signings. It matters that you do them often.

The three most successful Indie bookstores schedule 3-6 book signings every week. They have authors come out and sell books on-site. The authors invite their friends, talk to customers, and bring in a new customer base to the store. This is a smart tactic that builds their business with very little effort on behalf of the owner.

Lesson #4 – It doesn’t matter whether you like social media. You need a Facebook page for your business, an Instagram handle, and a Twitter page to keep your customers updated on new books and book signings.

The best indie bookstores are constantly giving out bookmarks with discounts for returning customers. Also, they have their information at the counter. This allows people to follow them on social media on their smartphones.

Lesson #5 - Keeping your store organized is key to attracting readers.

The best indie bookstores have labels for their books. This helps readers to quickly scan and see what kind of books they want to read. Variety is a key component to attracting new customers. My personal favorite advertising are the bookstores that have a special shelf above the register. They put the books and the book signing dates of all the authors that will travel to their store to sign books. This helps the bookstore advertise in advance.   

Lesson #6 – Doing a large event at your bookstore with twenty or more authors present once per year, brings in new readers and builds your customer base.

Large book events are a great way to raise awareness for your bookstore. It also brings in new customers.

Lesson #7 – Using social media to promote your book store signings with authors helps build the reputation of your store.

The best Indie bookstores take lots of pictures. They put them on flickr, Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and the bookstore blog.

Lesson #8 – The best indie bookstores sell books online and never turn down international sales.

There are books in the U.S. that are just not available or that people may not be aware of in the U.K., Canada, and Europe. What better way to make those books available than to sell them online through a blog?

Lesson #9 – The best indie bookstore owners team up with the alternative press outlets in locally.

Many of these local papers are looking to sell papers and will trade advertising space with a bookstore for selling their papers each month in their store.

Lesson #10 – The best indie bookstores have a system for paying the authors regularly.

Most have written agreements, receipt books, and keep 3-5 titles of every book in stock. They even have two shelves that house the ‘new releases’.

The last tidbit of advice is not a lesson. It is a rule of common sense. Please get a mailing list to let your customers know about what is happening in your store.

I love indie bookstores. Many owners have supported my career for the past seven years and I love the free advertising my titles get each day. However, I understand that in order to keep those bookstores open that sharing best practices is key.

Happy Reading!

Show Up to Play Book Review

Every once in a while I like to read books that are completely different from the norm of what I read. The funny thing is so do the fans of my blog. I was gifted this book by an upcoming author at the SC Literacy Celebration during June 2014. Initially, I thought…a book about golf and life lessons? Really? Is this another self-help book?

However, after I read this book from cover to cover I realized that this is a book that high school students, college students, adults, and senior citizens could read and enjoy. It is a clean, quick, and helpful read. The advice and life lessons in this work could help anyone at a down or indecisive moment in their life. Great advice contained between the pages of this book.

Showing up to Play: Business & Life Lessons Learned on the Gold Course by Robert A. Fiacco is a great work for those that want to read and reflect on issues related to courage, overcoming obstacles, limitations, and being realistic.

Please visit this author’s website at www.bobfiacco.com.

To join or not join a writing group online….

I am a member of a good number of writing groups online. Some are great and others…not so much….

My intention behind joining the groups was to find authors to tour with for large book events and to trade cross promotion online. My goal is to get my work in the hands of people that want to read, review, and assist with promoting my work. In about five groups I am a member of that actually happens. However, in most writing groups you will find the same things:

1)      The group moderator that acts like a Nazi about posts. Usually, this is an author that is just plain frustrated with the industry. I mean with 15 million books being publishing just in 2013, who wouldn’t be? They spend the majority of their time moderating the group instead of writing and promoting themselves. You would think this would be obvious to the new authors that join these groups. However, they are so hungry for the bad advice given that they will do exactly what they are told in order to remain in the group.

2)      The group focuses exclusively on promotion. Every day an author spams the room with posts about their ebook that no one is buying. I undoubtedly will wake up to the same fifteen authors spamming social networks about their books.

3)      The group of meanies that think they have seen it all…This is a group of disgruntled authors usually writing in a single genre that have limited themselves to a very competitive genre and they are not selling any books. They spend their days trying to figure out how to market to an already saturated market without spending any money.

4)      The group that is so small that it literally does nothing. This is self- explanatory.

5)      The group with too many rules. The group that has thousands of members and 22 or more rules about advertising, deletion of group membership, and types of posts. These are usually the worse groups to join. The activity in this group is more about rules than about helping authors. You will see at least nine posts a day about group behavior and threats about deletion.

There are more. However, I will stop there. As a writer, try avoiding groups that focus on the negative and select writing groups that you can get something out of each week. Additionally, feel free to add your two cents about what you learn in the industry each week as well.

Tips for joining an online writing community:

In my opinion, authors should only join writing groups that focus on helping you build a social media following, focus on cross promotion, author book review swaps, and information on how to set up book tours. All other information can be found online or in how-to publishing books and guides. Authors should spend their time writing, promoting, and selling their work. Scouring rooms on social media just won’t do it…

Don’t forget to market, market, market….

Happy reading! 

Whatever happened to just being a writer?

I come from a family of artists. My mother is a second generation author. I remember her writing circle that produced publications at a time when it was considered to be outstanding for an author of color to get published. The fact of the matter was that those avenues just didn’t exist for writers of color. Self-publishing has changed much of this along with the establishment of new indie companies and new vanity press companies. Therefore, celebrated a new book release through parties, press releases, etc. is beginning to become a thing of the past. There are at least 2-3 books published every day. Therefore, it is imperative for writers to begin to set their own standard for success. Some writers base their success on book sales. The new buzz in the book industry is the .99 cent authors. Also, the authors that do promotions that are not free where their work is fifty percent or more off. I base my success of my work solely on my ability to put together well thought out work that children can both enjoy and learn from. As an author, I want to get my work in the hands of readers. This can be done in a variety of ways that may not always include an ebook download or purchases from the two main distribution outlets. Writers must define success for themselves in the midst of this industry and there is nothing wrong with being a writer.

Happy reading!    

Author James Gordon Interview

Self Published Authors are taking the publishing industry by storm. One of the amazing things about these authors is their fearless attempt at writing across genres. They feel no constraints or pressure to obey a set of industry rules that classifies them as a one genre type of author. More often than not, you will find that self-published authors write/publish under at least three genres. Our latest blog interview feature features one such author. Chicago Author James Gordon publishes children’s books, poetry, anthologies, and erotica. In short, he writes a conglomeration of fiction for all audiences. His author biography and interview can be found below:

Author Biography:  

James Gordon has written one book of children's Poetry, Hi, My Name is Bobo. As G.P.A. (Greatest Poet Alive), he is the author of four books of Poetry (The Confessional Heart of a Man, The Book of 24 Orgasms, The Mind of a Poetic Unsub, Revenge of the Orgasm, and Revenge of the Orgasm (Soaking Wet Edition)), contributed to several anthologies, and has released one audio CD (The G.P.A. Experience). He is the winner of the Moth Storytelling Slam, Poetry Pentathlon, and Black Essence Award, as well as having been nominate Poet of the Year for three years and Book of the Year twice. G.P.A. has performed at Seven Deadly Sins, Voccalo, Tuesday Funk, and Raunch Stories. Currently, G.P.A. has added acting to his resume with two movies (Persian Version and Animals) and television shows (Chicago PD, Chicago Fire, and Mind Games). G.P.A. proudly claims Chicago as his home and is found at his website iblowyourmind.net, Facebook at G.P.A. (Greatest Poet Alive), and Twitter(gr8estpoetalive)

Where do you typically write?

I write on my couch in front of the television. It is a very comfortable space. Plus, Scooter the new Underdog is usually next to me.

Please tell us about your writing process.

The other night I was out with my brother. I heard a song and in my head, I proceeded to write a poem to the beat of that song. It all begins with something that inspires me. The, very quickly, I have to get it down on paper or recorded. Not a lot of science to it. See or hear, think, and then write.

Could you tell us a bit about your publishing experience?

I blundered at first by signing with Iuniverse. But now I self-publish, and it is a much, much better experience.

What online sites/resources do you use?

I use Google plus, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, Tumblr, and Digg. Do you work with a writing partner? I work with a rhyming partner, Kottyn the Soft Spoken Poet.

In what ways do you promote your work?

I am legendary for my self-promotion. Anytime, anyplace, and anyhow, I promote everything I do. And this is on and offline.

What Indie really means…

Indie does not mean ‘low quality’. It essentially means that as an author or publisher that you have decided to pay for the publishing process yourself. You are willing to pay for editing, copyediting, illustration/cover design, copyright, marketing, book formatting/typesetting, ebook charges, and print costs. People that decide to go indie do so with the full knowledge that this is an expensive endeavor that requires careful money management, realistic goals, discipline, and time. The idea that someone will spend years producing poorly conceptualized books is a false notion. Most of the independent publishers and authors have worked in this industry for a number of years as booksellers, reviewers, editors, and more recently authors. Yes, there are authors that have decided after fifteen years to begin to develop their work independently of large publishing houses. The stress, politics, and small payments written about on blogs all over the web have contributed to this development. Those looking to get published should know that most independent companies have calls for authors year round and have great success with getting their authors awards, speaking engagements, and making amazon best seller lists. I highly recommend that budding authors and publishers continue to do their research. Please learn about the industry from informed insiders that have years of experience with publishing. If you are deciding to go indie, this advice could save you thousands of dollars in the long run.

 

Good luck on your journey and Happy Reading.

There is no such thing as an 'honest review'

I just finished finalizing a new book release. It took me six months to ensure that it was quality work. I know that it is review time. Currently, I am looking for reviewers. Don’t get me wrong. I know plenty of reviewers that can read my work and give reviews. However, I am that rare form of author that is brave enough to ask different people for reviews. Therefore, I search for new reviewers with each book release. This past week I stumbled across three review groups on Facebook. They were hilarious to say the least. In the description it stated that no one should ask to trade reviews or pay for positive reviews. Additionally, there was more comedy as the description stated that this was a place where ‘honest reviews’ take place (Insert laughter here).

Since everyone seems to have opinions on how authors get reviews…I think I will take a stab at it as well…

I don’t believe for one minute that most authors get ‘honest reviews” and this is why…

First, the only people that should be reviewing people’s books in my opinion are readers. This means people that actually purchase your work. If you are sending free .pdf files of your work to random people, how can you look someone in the face and state that you want honest reviews? You are gifting your work to someone and then begging for a review. There is nothing honest about this practice since in fact you are paying them with a free book.

Second, there are thousands of authors on amazon.com that make their work free for thirty days in order to garner reviews and even get best-seller status. Not only is this indeed unethical. It is once again a scam to garner reviews from people that did not pay for your work by ‘gifting’ them a free book. Further, this practice makes it look as if an author has a higher ranking on amazon.com than they actually do. Sorry authors but the scam is up.

Third, never tell someone not to pay to get a book review. That is ridiculous. There are many large review companies under the publishing industry umbrella that in fact do get paid to produce high quality and reputable reviews. What about book critics? What about literary columnists? There are also independent reviewers and those that run literary blog tours that in fact get paid to review authors work.

Finally, most authors send their work to the same review houses over and over again to ensure they are getting reviewed. Positive reviews are often based on the relationship between the author and the review house. I have seen it time and time again in this industry. Do you really think that publishing companies don’t have relationships with review companies? No one can really believe that this true.

Please stop with the ‘honest review’ nonsense. Focus on getting a more thorough review of your work that includes a review of the syntax, storyline, story elements, content, and overall writing style. This is more telling to the reader in terms of the type of experience they will have when they engage with your work. Steer clear of the ‘honest review’ mantra since this clearly hinges on something personal rather than professional. Reviews are hard enough to come by and since most readers report that this does not influence their decision to purchase there is no need to convolute this practice with foolishness.

As always happy reading!