Enter to be a character in H.P. Mallory's next Lily Harper Novel

H.P. Mallory is having a fantastic contest!  If you win, she will write you into her next book. Just go to http://urbanfantasyauthor.blogspot.com/2014/01/become-character-in-next-lily-harper.html to enter (contest ends January 22nd, so get going!!)

A Paid Promotion That Was Worth the Cost

As a self-published author, I'm always looking for ways to market my work.  There are a lot of options and I've tried many: blog hops, giveaways, ads.  You name it, I've given it a go. The success of such promotions can be measured in a number of ways, but if you want to increase sales most don't give much bang for the buck.

Given my prior experience, I was reluctant to shell out more money on the Lendle Today's Featured Book Promotion.  For $35, they promote your Kindle book on their website, Twitter and Facebook and in emails to subscribers for the entire day you book the deal.  I decided to throw caution to the wind and check it out.  In that 24 period, I sold five times as many books that I had the rest of the month.  Now, I don't sell huge amounts, but five times more was a big deal, and I definitely made back the invested money.  

The scientist in me wanted to try to determine if this was a fluke.  So, a few weeks later, I promoted the same book again.  I figured sales might be less than from the first promotion, reasoning that the people who had previously purchased the book obviously wouldn't be buying again and a similar cohort of folks would be seeing the promo.  Surprisingly, the number of books sold was slightly higher the second time around.

From my experiences, I recommend the service.  I'd be interested to hear from others that have bought the other promotions - which are more expensive but are genre-specific and last a week - for their impressions.

How Bullying Made Me a Writer

“This must be a twenty-first century girl-thing,” my husband observed while reading a story about a twelve-year-old girl who killed herself because of cyber-bullying.  He was appalled that anyone would get together with a group of “friends” and systematically send taunting comments to a classmate via social media.  “Why do they do it?” he wondered.  “Boys would ridicule you to your face but girls do it over the internet.” 

Frankly, I have no clue why people chose to diminish others or if females are more likely to use more circuitous means, but there’s nothing new about harassment-by-proxy.  When I was in the fourth grade, I was bullied by girls I’d known for years, some of which had previously been my friends.  While some of the torment was face-to-face, the worst of the abuse came as anonymous letters through the mail.  I’m sure if Facebook had existed then, whoever was responsible would have used that media to let me know how stupid, unattractive and generally worthless I was.  In a way, I suppose, using the mail is more malicious.  There’s a time-lag between writing and sending that doesn’t exist when you can just type and hit “post”.  You even have to find a stamp and address the envelope, steps that are eliminated over the internet.  Regardless of the means, bulling sucks.  The internet just makes it easier.

The letters showed up periodically for a few months, and then they stopped.  The next school year no one bothered me.  Maybe they found a new person to focus their nastiness on.  Maybe they just grew up.  Whatever happened, the experience changed my perception of myself, mostly in negative ways.  The constant barrage of mean-spirited bashing made me question myself and I became wary of others.  I never found out who was responsible for the hateful letters.  Part of me doesn’t care anymore, but I do sometimes wonder, as my husband did this morning, why it happened at all.  It did, however, fuel something positive:  turning inward gave me the chance to think up tales, something I’ve done ever since.  It took decades before I actually decided to write some of them, but now I can’t seem to stop.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying any part of what happened was a good thing.  While it made me who I am today, I’m pretty sure I would have turned out a whole lot better adjusted without it. 

Now, I don’t let anyone push me around.  I still have some self-esteem issues but I like how I turned out and I love being an author.  When you read my stories, some of the scared little kid probably leaks out into the words, as does the confident adult.  As for the girls that made my life so miserable all those years ago?  Fuck you. 

Hey, I said I was confident, I didn’t say I wasn’t still pissed.

#SexySnippet

This is my first Sexy Snippet!
In case you are also new to this, Sexy Snippets are seven sentences from an author's in-progress or published work. Today's is from the second book in the Coursodon Dimension series, Special Rewards.

Here's the set up: Alex found a rather dangerous package in his hotel room, but the guy at the front desk can't remember much about the woman who brought it.

 ~~~~****~~~~ 

“Let me guess, she had large breasts and was wearing a very tight sweater,” Sebastian said with a smirk.
“Close, she had very large breasts, wore a low-cut, tight sweater and the only other characteristic he remembered was that she had long, auburn hair.”
What is it with men and mammaries? Shove some humongous hooters in front of them and they lose 50 IQ points.
“Let me get this straight,” I began, shaking my head slowly in disbelief. “He can’t recall anything important because he was mesmerized by her cleavage?”
“One should never underestimate the befuddling power of boobs,” Sebastian replied. 

~~~~****~~~~

Thanks for stopping by.  Check out my work and visit again, maybe next Sunday!

Tidbits on Marketing for the Self-Published

Not that I am, by any means, an expert on the subject, but I thought I’d offer some personal marketing experiences for the self-published:

Any promotion where your book(s) are part of a giveaway isn’t worth your time or effort.  I’ve participated in about 10 blog hops, book tours, contests etc. in which people could enter to win a free copy of my book.  As far as I can tell, I’ve never made a sale as a result of one of these.  Sure, people are all gung-ho for a freebie, but if they don’t win, they don’t buy.  It makes sense.  If someone doesn't win, they probably forgot they entered.  Even if they thought the book sounded fabulous, they likely don’t even remember it by the time the giveaway is over.  If you are doing a giveaway because you just want to get your work out there, then these promotions are fine.  If you think your sales might improve, don’t hold your breath.

 Some paid advertisements are better than others.  This one’s a no-brainer, but the trick is to figure out which sites are worth what you pay.  In my experience, there aren’t many paid sites that get you more in sales than you shelled out for the ad itself.  If it’s more than $25, think long and hard about it, unless you know books in your genre do well on that site.  And the only way to find that out is to ask authors in your genre where they advertised with good results.  And make sure the author you ask is someone who will give you the real scoop – it doesn’t help if they exaggerate their sales just to make it seem like they’ve sold more books than they actually did.

 If your book is going to be free on Amazon, make sure you promote it!  Just because your book is free on Amazon doesn’t mean people will know it’s free.  I used the Author Marketing Club’s Free Kindle Book Submission Tool .  It lets you sign up for a bunch of promotions, most of which are free or a nominal fee, on the days your book is free.  Make sure you sign up as soon as you know when your free dates are; many sites require advanced warning so don’t wait until the night before.  I ended up with over 4,000 downloads of Special Offers in the 2 days I offered it for free and was #2 in free sales in my genre for about 10 hours during that time span!

Don’t pay a crap-load of money for a contest.  You know what I’m talking about, pay hundreds of dollars to enter your work in a contest for Independent/Self-Published authors so you can say you’ve won the coveted Obscure Literary Guild’s Gold Medal.  I have no specific evidence, but I’m pretty sure these are scams.  Use a fraction of the money and slap your own “medal” on your book’s cover or webpage if you feel you need validation to make more sales.   There are only a couple of literary awards that, when associated with your work, are going to make people stand up and take notice and I’d bet the Pulitzer people don’t ask for a fee.  Even if they do, if your book wins one of those bad boys, your sales are going to go up so it’s worth the cost.

Bewitching Book Tours Magazine

I've been extremely busy with my day job this last few weeks and I've been a slacker when it comes to the blog.  But I have been promoted all month by Bewitching Book Tours (I've kept everyone up to date on twitter and my Facebook page). Guess who is interviewed in the Bewitching Book Tour Magazine this month?  That's right, it's me!

April-2013-Bewitching-Book-Tours-Magazine

Big Cocks and Shamrocks (It's a Blog Hop)

Somehow, with a blog hop named “Big Cocks and Shamrocks,” shouldn’t the grand prize be a giant green vibrator?

Oh, wait.  It kind of is!

The grand prize is a Basket Full of Naughty. 

It contains the following in a Cabal of Hotness tote:

·         Two-sided Tickler/Flogger

·         Penis-shaped sour candies

·         Flask that reads, “Girls with Class Don’t Need a Glass”

·         G-spot vibe

·         Oral Sex “Essentials” Kit

·         Glow-in-the-dark erotic dice

We'll also include a $30 gift card and a Cabal of Hotness t-shirt. Wow! 

All you have to do is leave a comment and your email in the comment section of this blog.  That will give you an entry for the grand prize as well as one for my individual giveaway.  Here's the Rafflecopter contest form for the Basket of Naughty!
a Rafflecopter giveaway


And what is the giveaway prize on this site?  A pair of handcrafted, St. Patrick's Day inspired lampwork-glass bead and Swarovski crystal earrings made just for this hop by me!  

Note:  If the selected winner is from somewhere other than the US, they will receive a $10 Amazon or Barnes and Noble gift card instead of the earrings unless they would like to pay for the shipping.  If I send out the gift card, I will choose another winner (in the US, natch) to receive the earrings.  You can increase your chances of winning my personal giveaway by using the Rafflecopter form below.

And the winner is...Joy! Joy chose the gift card, so I will pick another winner for the earrings. 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

But here's the best part!  You can enter at all the hop sites and increase your chance to win the Basket Full of Naughty.  Just go to 

Big Cocks and Shamrocks Giveaway Hop 

for all the sites.