Michael Andre McPherson

Beyond the Slushpile

Category archive: Promotion

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Another Anti-Self-Publishing Hit Piece

BullOnly 40 authors “make money” on Amazon! The horror! All the rest don’t make any money says author Claude Forthomme on her blog. This startling claim came to my attention because it’s been making the rounds on Facebook, and my bull-sh*t detectors went off immediately.

It’s all about math. The actual announcement from Amazon was that close to 40 independent authors had sold more than a million copies of their e-books. Let’s assume an average sale price of $3.99, of which the author gets 70 percent, so we’re talking about $2.80/e-book. That means that if an author sold the minimum of one million in five years, they were netting $560,000/year. Awesome! But surely they’re not the only authors making money. What about the ones making $10,000/year or $50,000/year?

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And The Winners Are…

Off to the Post Office

Off to the Post Office

Actually, I can’t tell you. Goodreads is very big on protecting the privacy of people who enter—let alone win—book giveaway contests. In fact, it’s pretty much fire and forget for an author. Goodreads gave me the names and addresses of the winners so that I can mail out their free copies of Sacrifice the Living, but then I pretty much have to forget that I have the contact information of ten fans. I might as well throw these valuable leads into the garbage, because other than sending their winnings, I’m forbidden to contact them. If I do, I’ll be banned from ever doing a Goodreads book giveaway promotion again.

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A Goodreads Giveaway Contest

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Sacrifice the Living by Michael Andre McPherson

Sacrifice the Living

by Michael Andre McPherson

Giveaway ends November 14, 2015.

See the giveaway details
at Goodreads.

Enter Giveaway

Package

A Book in the Mail

I always like to try new ways to market my books, and I especially like free ways to promote the novels. But I’m not always timely. A year ago, when I launched the print version of Sacrifice the Living, the novel became eligible for a Goodreads Giveaway. It was in the back of my mind, but I didn’t get around to reading the Frequently Asked Questions until today, and I discovered that the good people at Goodreads recommend doing a month-long Giveaway contest before a novel is published and a second one several months after it hits the shelves.

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Promotional Bombs to be Avoided

I confess that one of the ways I’m a bad marketer is that I’m a lurker. I read the posts on the Goodreads apocalypse lists or Kindle Boards with fascination, but I rarely comment. I always feel like I’ve arrived too late to the conversation and that everything that can be said has been said. Then the thread goes for another two hundred comments. Apparently there was more to talk about.

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Social Marketing Advice

At the Ad-Astra SFCon, I was surprised to meet a couple of talented authors who didn’t know much about Twitter, let alone about a Facebook fan page. I struggle with social media myself, trying to find the time, put up the right post, and not say something I’ll regret ten years from now. I think of social media as a fertile field sowed with a healthy crop and three or four land mines. I’m always worried about blowing a leg off, but I nurture the field as best I can.

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