Author: Shawn Inmon

Shawn Inmon is a full-time author who lives in the bucolic town of Seaview, Washington. He is married to his high school sweetheart, and they are privileged to share their home with two Chocolate Labs and a schizophrenic cat named Georgie. Shawn is the author of the twelve book Middle Falls Time Travel series, which has been produced in audio by Podium Publishing. He has eight other books, including travel books, romances, memoirs, and a collection of short stories. He promises to settle down and write in one genre. Someday. Learn more about Shawn on Facebook or his Author Central page

Writing on Our Walls – Our Facebook Walls, That Is

writing on the wall facebook graffiti-482367_640I’ve written about using your author’s Facebook page to build you platform several times before, here and here. Still, in almost every authors’ group I belong to, I hear the familiar refrains: “Facebook sucks.” “I’m not paying Facebook to show my posts to my own fans.” “Facebook stopped working when they changed their algorithms.” Those things may be true for many writers, but they are not true for me. After my mailing list, my Facebook page is my second most effective free platform builder.

In my previous articles, I shared a few of my strategies for building up your traffic and fans on your Facebook page before — post consistently, don’t post about your books constantly, put links that lead off Facebook in the comments of your posts instead of the body of your message. Here’s a new idea for you, though — write. You’re a writer, so write. Continue reading “Writing on Our Walls – Our Facebook Walls, That Is”

Dear Indie Author: Please Write as Fast (or Slow) as You Want

write fast or slow pixabay clock-92130_640Earlier this week, Huffington Post published an article by Lorraine Devon Wilke addressed to “Self-Published Authors,” asking them NOT to write four books per year. It was a long article, but the gist was: no one can write four good books per year. Not you, not I, no one.

Horse puckey. I thought the indie community had hashed this all out years ago, but here it is again: the old “If you’re fast, you can’t be good” chestnut, raising its hoary head once again in the form of a clickbait article on HuffPo. Just because I don’t write four books per year doesn’t mean I think it’s impossible. I can’t run 100 meters in under ten seconds, but Usain Bolt does it all the time. Continue reading “Dear Indie Author: Please Write as Fast (or Slow) as You Want”

What does it take to be a successful Indie writer?

successful indie author pixabay suit-869380_640That’s a loaded question, isn’t it? Because first, we need to determine what makes a successful author, and that is an entirely personal question. More importantly, the answer is likely to evolve over time. It certainly did for me — it took me five-and-a-half years to write my first book, so on many levels, I felt successful just being able to type “The End” after 80,000 words. A few months later, that seminal author moment when I held a copy of my own book in my hands definitely felt like a success.

Comparative analysis is not a great way to judge success. As an indie, there’s always someone who is doing worse and someone who is doing better. I have writer friends who had sales I used to dwarf who have zoomed past me now. Feeling smug when I was ahead of them or depressed now that I trail them isn’t the path to creative equilibrium. Continue reading “What does it take to be a successful Indie writer?”

If I Was Starting Over as an Indie Publisher

indie author starting overI’ve been publishing for just under three years now, so although not a grizzled veteran of the publishing wars, I’m not a noob, either. Like most of us, I hang out in a lot of the places writers gather: internet message boards, Facebook groups, LinkedIn groups, Google+ groups, etc. It seems inevitable, when I meet someone who is new to self-publishing, that I get some version of this speech: “You were lucky. You got in while “free” was still a goldmine/when reviews were easier to get/when the competition wasn’t so tough.”

I don’t feel defensive when I hear that, because, maybe they’re right. Maybe, if I was launching my first book into today’s climate, I would struggle mightily to get any traction at all. The more I thought about it, the more I wondered — what would I do if I was starting completely over? Continue reading “If I Was Starting Over as an Indie Publisher”