Tag: Marketing

Fake-Out

Don’t you hate that sinking feeling you get when you find out you’re wearing Goochi loafers and a Rolodex watch? Your Mona Lisa is signed by Leonard DaVinci. All that money in your wallet has Art Linkletter’s picture on it. You have a gold American Espresso Card. Worst of all, you are driving a Limburgergini.

In Hise We Trust

People don’t hate fake things. Oh, they’d rather have real things—real teeth, real hair, real tomato ketchup. But as long as it’s a conscious and informed choice, people are fine with it. What they hate is being duped into thinking something fake is real. Then they get angry.

Hence, the uproar over the recent discovery of the posting of fake book reviews. Like most controversies suddenly “discovered” by the media, this has actually been going on for a while. In fact, I’ve touched on this in some previous articles. I won’t bother with a link because I’m not trying to set myself up as some sort of fake Nostradamus. Continue reading “Fake-Out”

Taking Your Pulse – A BookPulse Tutorial

Quick heads up: Since I only uploaded my one book, I didn’t anticipate a problem with this. Apparently, you can’t upload more than one book unless you have a separate Facebook page for each one. This is important information BookPulse might want to place front and centre, just sayin’.

There are some things I am extremely lazy about. Unfortunately, one of those things tends to be self-promotion. I am not good at it and have no great love for it. Actually, it’s worse than that: I actively dislike it. But we’re constantly told (let’s be honest, “harangued” might be a better word) that it’s an essential part of the writer’s toolkit… and not only independent writers but those poor captives of the publishing industry, the traditional writers, too. I kid, of course: we are all brothers and sisters of The Mighty Word, and “Kumbaya” sounds exactly the same when sung by my gruel-spattered co-minions as it does in the lofty yet slightly sterile halls of Simon & Schuster… although the soft moans of existential despair accompanying the former can be a little disconcerting.

But I digress. As I tend to do. Probably because I can already feel the ennui descending as my main topic looms like a grey, haunted, driverless engine on a fog-blanketed night.

So. Once in a while, I break out of my truculent, indolent recalcitrance and stumble on something potentially useful to our collective writerly aspirations. (Apparently, I also break out the Thesaurus.) Continue reading “Taking Your Pulse – A BookPulse Tutorial”

You Asked for It: Matt Valenti

Indies Unlimited reader Matt Valenti asks, “My book is a political satire ideal for promoting during the election. Unfortunately, my marketing is entirely from scratch and I’m brand new at this. I want to strike while the iron’s hot but I’m not sure what marketing activities to focus my energies on the most considering my limited time. Thanks for any advice!”

Well, Matt, great question. We’ve had several posts about marketing over the past few months. However, what you ask about is a very different animal compared to the “traditional” (I laugh as I type that, what is traditional in Indie publishing?) long-term marketing plan discussed previously. Continue reading “You Asked for It: Matt Valenti”

Straight Up: Q&A with Mark Coker

Mark Coker

I recently had the opportunity to interview Mark Coker, one of the visionaries of the indie author movement. In 2008, Mark founded Smashwords to accelerate the death spiral of the bloated, inefficient, out-dated publishing industry—or as he put it:  to change the way books are published, marketed and sold.

Mark and his wife co-authored Boob Tube, a novel that explores the wild and wacky world of Hollywood celebrity. He also wrote the Smashwords Book Marketing Guide, The Smashwords Style Guide and The 10-Minute PR Checklist.

Mark says when he’s not writing or working on Smashwords, he enjoys gardening, traveling and hiking tall mountains, the tallest of which has been Mt. Kilimanjaro.

Here, I ask him nine questions, and he gives expansive and fascinating answers.

So buckle up and get ready for the word straight up, from Mark Coker. Continue reading “Straight Up: Q&A with Mark Coker”