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Labor Day Holiday Week

September 6, 2016 by in category Pets, Romance & Lots of Suspense by Linda O. Johnston tagged as
by Linda O. Johnston
 
I mentioned this on another blog this week, but Happy Labor Day Week, everyone.  I used to pay a lot of attention to this and other holidays when I was a working attorney.  Now that I’m a full time writer, though, I’m generally aware of holidays but don’t give them much thought except in interest of what they celebrate.  But days off?  Hah!
 
I work every day, and I’m sure every one of you who’s also a writer does the same even if you have another job.  Of course those of you in retail and other professions might not get the holiday off anyway, which may be a shame depending on your situation.  At least writers choose to work constantly.  Sort of.  Our minds tell us what to do, every waking moment of the day and often during sleeping moments, too.
 
Me?  I’m either writing (including coming up with ideas and plotting), editing or promoting, and often it’s a combo of two or three–all the time.  Before I became a full time writer I could say the same, but I often cherished those days off to work on writing-related stuff, so those holidays weren’t days off for me then either.
 
One of the fun things about OCC is being in touch with people at many stages of their writing.  Many do have full time jobs and work their writing in the way I used to.  Others are like me, and writing is their life.  Professional life, that is.  Families always come first–including pets.
 
Unsurprisingly, I’m looking forward to Saturday’s meeting at the end of this holiday week.  In fact, I was asked to participate on a panel then but fortunately there was some flexibility as to when that panel was to occur, so I raised my hand to choose the other date.
 
Enjoy the rest of your week–and hope to see you at the meeting!
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12 TITLES IN 12 MONTHS CHALLENGE UPDATE

September 5, 2016 by in category Pink Pad by Tracy Reed tagged as , ,

I’m very grateful to John Bucholtz for filling in for me last month. I hope you enjoyed reading his post.

It’s been a little while since I last updated you on my project. I’m a little tired, so I’ll try and make this a short post. 
In July, I attended my first RWA National Conference and had an amazingly, insightful learning experience. Not only did I learn quite a bit, that I’ve started to implement. I also met some really nice people, like the two Tracys. At one of the breakfasts, I walked in and sat at the first table I saw and was greeted by a table of fun ladies. Two of which were named “Tracy.” That was a great ice breaker. We spent the rest of breakfast with some rather racy conversation.
No one really prepared me for the conference. It reminded me of one of my trade shows. For the record, when I attend trade shows for my business, I’m going non-stop for approximately eight to nine hours at the venue. Then I go back to my hotel to review another couple of hours over dinner and then sleep. That’s the routine when there isn’t an evening event. When I attend shows, I pack snacks and water and wear comfortable shoes. 
I’ve been to writers conferences before, but not like RWA National. My feet got tired. I got hungry…thank God for protein bars, fruit, and veggies drinks. 
I learned so much that I’m still processing. Of the endless list of things I learned, I really enjoyed the workshops on marketing and the business of writing. Here’s a short list of the things I learned at conference and have put into practice: 

  • Soliciting readers for my street team
  • A formal newsletter
  • My first newsletter giveaway
  • Increasing my mailing list. [I’m extremely proud of this one. At the writing of this post, my mailing list is now at 2300 plus.]
  • Added the KOBO Promotion button to my dashboard and participating in my first KOBO promo event
  • Started a writers support and encouragement group with a couple of friends
  • I’m doing Facebook Ads for new releases instead of blog tours
  • Going wide…as of this post, I have only one book in KDP Select. The others are available everywhere. 

So far, the changes have made a difference. I’m starting to see sales in all the outlets, and I’m having fun trying new marketing tactics.

_____________________________

It’s hard to believe it’s September and I just released my eighth title in this challenge last week, MISS MATCH.


First, let me back up to July. I had a different book scheduled for July, however, prepping for the RWA conference and decompressing afterward, made me rethink my July release. I was feeling a little rushed and felt a repeat of my January release rush and pressure on the horizon. 
While I was at the conference, I made a decision. I had seen Beth Yarnall’s Romance Sampler and thought it was a great idea. I emailed her and asked if she was fine with me copying her. She said yes, and I went to work on my “Sampler” for release in July. 
TEASE, my perma-free romance sampler. It was easy to put together. When I returned from the conference, I went to work creating my little sampler. This marketing tool and title seven took a few days to assemble. The majority of that time was spent researching covers. Originally, I selected a woman but learned at conference that covers with shirtless, muscular men were a big attention grabber. I found a new image and went to work creating a little perma-free book. 
TEASE, is filled with excerpts from most of my books, plus sneak peeks into future releases. It’s doing well and has been in the top 100 of one of my categories for a few weeks. 

To some people, this may seem like I got lazy or cheated in my challenge, but remember, it’s 12 TITLES. 

So my September Release is a novella. It started out as a stand alone, but when I got to the end, I realized the story wasn’t done, so I wrote a cliffhanger. So far, it’s been received well. I’m excited about the follow up which will be out next year.

MISS MATCH
Summary:
Charlotte “Charlie” Griggs is a skilled matchmaker. Her client list reads like the pages of the most prestigious business publications. However, when it comes to her own love life, she needs help. 

Her new client Noah Lancaster has presented her with a unique situation, finding a wife for his younger brother Joshua. Joshua’s been nursing a broken heart since the sudden death of his wife a few years ago and has become a work-a-holic. Now he’s finally ready to give love another try and agrees to Noah’s idea of using a professional matchmaker. However, Joshua may not be the only one to get matched.
What happens when the matchmaker inadvertently gets matched while matching someone else?

Now I’m work prepping September’s Release. Unless something happens, that title is book two in The Alex Chronicles series, WHAT MY FRIENDS NEED TO KNOW.

This continues the story of Alex Miller and her best girlfriends. I think readers will be surprised at some of the things that happen in this story.
I signed up for Book In a Year and forgot, I had completely re-written this book. When I finished the re-write, I eliminated thirty thousand words. That’s not an exaggeration. This book is completely different from what the first beta readers read. This re-write made me eligible for BIAY.

That brings us to the fourth quarter which is a little up in the air. All three books are near completion. October’s release is about three thousand words away from the end. November’s release is a toss up between two titles. Both are approximately fifty percent completed. And December’s release is missing about forty thousand words from an HEA.
That’s my brief post. Enjoy Labor day and happy writing.

Tracy Reed
www.readtracyreed.com

Fiction for Women Who Love God, Couture and Cute Guys

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It’s easy to criticize

August 24, 2016 by in category Columns tagged as
…but I wish there were rules—at least with any public criticism—that required the critic to present a viable alternative (and “viable” is a key word here!). A sort of Thumper-like commitment that if you are going to say something negative, you have to provide a reasonable positive alternative.  That would certainly shut a lot of people up (yours truly among others!).
Is there a better way of doing it?  Is there a better choice? Think about it. Actually think.
If you do, you may determine that the results you are complaining about (sub-optimal as they may indeed be) are the really the best alternative.
Every day we all experience the complex algorithms we work with in daily life to get something accomplished.  It could be the choices we make in getting our kids up, dressed, fed and out the door to school or it could be a business merger.  We balance encouragement, threats, incentives (bribery), etc. to get the job done as well, as quickly, as effortlessly, as humanely (or not), as possible to motivate behavior and get the results we want or need.
That can make for a lot of complex juggling of timing, personalities, personal values, choices, priorities, mood, costs, external pressures etc. The end result often may not be ideal or what we had hoped for. But that’s part of being an imperfect person in an imperfect world.  Life doesn’t usually give us “do-overs.”
The situations we and others face are rarely black and white.  But especially with technology, we can make a judgment without any knowledge or context and we actually expect to be taken seriously.
Complaints—especially now about politicians and the political process—display a startling naïveté, absence of thought and a shocking lack of awareness of history.
I have to admit to being Kinseyan in my assessment of human behavior—if most people have been doing something for centuries, it is unlikely that any person, belief-system or rhetoric will be able to airbrush that behavior out.
It’s not that change can’t happen, it can.  But it’s a slow and hard fought battle and all the incremental gains can be easily lost. There needs to be a realignment of incentives (and there’s usually no incentive to realign them) so it takes real thought and effective politics to get something done.  If you can’t read actual history, watch Lincoln or All the Way for an understanding of what it actually takes to get something done.
As a female, the history of women’s suffrage is depressing—it’s been less than century (19th Amendment was August 18, 1920) in the USA, something to remember as Americans finger-point other countries’ lack of gender equality. That’s about 150 years into our nationhood, and there are still a fair number of Americans who are feeling a bit sad about it & would like to turn back the clock. Change takes time.


Yes, it’s easy to criticize. But it’s far less appealing to be criticized, so before dishing it out, consider if there is a viable alternative (and “viable” is a key word here!) before excoriating the stupidity of others.  

Judge something on its own merits/demerits: don’t blame the peacock for its tail or wish it were a chicken and provided eggs.

Isabel Swift 

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Making Ads and Amazon Rankings Work for You

August 17, 2016 by in category Writing: It's a Business tagged as , , , , ,

by Louella Nelson

I’m hoping this article on promoting free and 99’¢  books helps your sales, and I hope you’ll take advantage of the 99’¢  sale on my first historical romance.
Yesterday my book Rye’s Reprieve hit #7 on the Kindle Historical Romance Best Sellers list. Perhaps you are jaded by all the wonderful best-selling authors in our chapter who regularly hit #1 on all the major lists and don’t think #7 is all that much.
But consider: Rye’s Reprieve is my first historical and my first novel-length fiction to release in more than two decades*. Reestablishing a writing career equates to pushing a two-ton boulder up Mt. Baldy. So seeing your new book hit #7 is about as good as eating homemade blueberry ice cream made with blueberries you picked on the hill behind your house just that morning.
*In May 2014, my period short story Cora Lee achieved #6 in Literary Short Fiction, following behind stories by Stephen King and Lee Child. For that launch, the only promotion I did was to mention the book on Twitter & Facebook and in a newsletter to my email list of about 1200. I reissued my Harlequin titles and put out several short stories. My Amazon author page shows all fiction.
I didn’t achieve this recent modest success on Rye’s Reprieve without friends’ advice and a bit of luck. Here’s how I did it.    
Decoding the rankings
On March 9 after my initial email promotion, Rye’s Reprieve went to #6 in Kindle World Romance. In contrast, this go-round, August 7-11, with the 99¢ sale and some specific promotions recommended by friends, the book has been #1 in Kindle Worlds Romance and Westerns for days. It achieved #3 in Kindle Western Romance and held there; today it went to #4. And the book has been #1 in Kindle Westerns for a few days too.
The message? Make a study of Amazon’s ranking structure. It’s complex – more complex than what you see beneath your title’s descriptive data on the book’s Amazon page. Here is the link to see all the lists available under Best Sellers Kindle Store eBooks: Link. From there, click on your genre and drill down until you find the various lists where your book exists.
Under ebook subcategories, Romance is the umbrella topic. I then checked Historical Romance as well as Western Romance. Clicking Westerns takes you to Western Romance.
Another ranking, Westerns, can be found by clicking on Literature & Fiction/Genre Fiction. Strangely, under Genre Fiction, Romance is not listed!
I found Kindle Worlds rankings in the Ranking area on my book’s page.
But also think seriously about placing relatively inexpensive ads on websites whose sole mission is to promote free and 99¢ ebooks.
 
What worked in promotion
First, because Rye’s Reprieve is published by Amazon as one of several novels released in February 2016 in Debra Holland’s Montana Sky Kindle World, Amazon put the book on sale without warning at the beginning of August. I’m assuming they did multiple email blasts that included my book, but even those didn’t keep the book up in the rankings for long.
In addition to my own Facebook and Twitter announcements of the 99¢ sale, a  member of OCC RWA and Novelists, Inc. (NINC), Lauren Royal, opened her Friday Freebies & 99-Cent Bargain Books and her weekly newsletter featuring historical novels to NINC members, so I submitted my book. She also mentioned my title on Facebook and Twitter. The promotion at www.LaurenRoyal.com hit on August 5 and was free.
Debra Holland recommended I try for an ad in eReader News Today (ENT) and I was lucky to be chosen to participate. The fee for an ad on a specific day for historical romance is only $60. You can pay by PayPal or credit card (as most of the sites I mention allow). The morning the ad appeared at www.ereadernewstoday.com, August 7, the book shot to #1 in the Kindle Worlds mentioned above and the top 5 in Western Historical and Western. Unfortunately, I did not think to check the Historical Romance category, but when I did a couple days later, the novel was ranked #22, rising to #7 in the past few days.
I credit Amazon emails, the ENT ad, and Lauren’s newsletter for Rye’s Reprieve initial rise in rank.
Meanwhile, I contacted Linda Carroll-Bradd and asked her advice about advertising. She recommended I look into www.JustKindleBooks.com and www.Ebookshabit.com.  The ad at Just Kindle Books costs $20 plus Add Ons (keep the book on their homepage for extra 3 days $20; Facebook post to 26,000 followers, $10) for a total of $60. The fee includes cover image/link on Pinterest, Tumblr, and other main social media.
That promo hit August 11. The book rose to #7 in Historical Romance, # 3 in Western Romance, as well as #1 in Westerns, and #1 in KW both Romance and Western. This is a pretty good indication that Just Kindle Books is worth the money. I did not get the bump I was hoping for from a $10 ad with eBooksHabit.
After reading a Morning Juice email and attending the PAW group at OCC/RWA on Saturday, I gathered the following advertising ops for ebooks that are free or 99¢ from Kitty Bucholtz, Vicki Crum, Shelley Bleackley, and others. I had spent $120 so far. With a remaining budget of about $250, I placed ads here:
Robin Reads (August was closed when I checked but I wrote to them about the success of the initial advertising efforts, they encouraged me to submit my book, and voila! A spot in their calendar opened up: Aug. 25. If they select me, the cost will be $45.)
Choosy Bookworm accepted me and will advertise Rye’s Reprieve on Aug. 18. Yay! The Rush Premium Feature costs $70, and the cover will remain on their Featured eBooks Page for a week.
Book Sends is pricey at $90 for the spot on Aug. 18 and just about ate up my budget – I have only $25 left to spend.
However, when you’re making 35¢ per book, money can’t be your main motive for promotion. It has to be gaining new readers, racking up a few more reviews and even cross-over sales to your other books and stories, and seeing your efforts pay off in a rise in rankings that you can share with followers. Some authors also experience a bump in sales when the book returns to its normal price, which in the case of Rye’s Reprieve is $3.99.
Did I mention BookBub? If they agreed to let me advertise with them – a slim possibility – the cost would be $500, and they anticipate I’d have roughly 2500 sales. If that happened, I’d clear $375 after costs, and the ranking would no doubt shoot Rye’s Reprieve to single digits on most coveted lists, plus bring a whole bunch of new readers to my author page.
I did not yet advertise with eBookWorth, Bargain Booksy, or Fiverr’s BKnight with its $5 price tag and 50,000 readers because I needed to meet Marianne Donley’s deadline for A Slice of Orange. However, I will at least check out their sites.
I probably don’t need to mention, most of the authors and professional newsletter editors want the authors they feature to put the newsletter link in their social media announcements.
I would appreciate having an email from anyone who wants to share their promotion/ranking journey, and if things really jump by the end of August, I may give a follow-up report in a future Slice.
Contact me at lounelson@cox.net or www.LouellaNelson.com. Follow on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/louella.nelson.1 and Twitter: @LouellaNelson
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Structuring a Story by Connie Vines

August 14, 2016 by in category Archives tagged as , ,
Please excuse my late post–blame it on first week school overload!
As many of the readers know, I write in multiple genres of fiction as well as nonfiction.  Therefore, it only goes to reason I have attended workshops, conferences, enrolled in extensions classes, and networked with other authors to discuss the topic of story structure.
So many ideas, so many strong opinions, but no fail-proof map to success.  What I have discovered is that many authors (Note: my personal findings only), agree that there are thirteen basic plots.
The following are common plot motivations that have appeared in written literature for centuries.  Of course, more than one of these plot motivators may exist side-by-side, affecting the story.  Take your story idea, add one or more of these motivators to it, and, so I’ve been assured, you’ll have a plot and a storyline.
Catastrophe                     Vengeance
Love and Hate                 Persecution              
The Chase                      The Quest
Grief and Loss                Rivalry
 Rebellion                       Betrayal
 Survival                         Ambition
   
So, is this true in my own novels and fiction stories?  I have three books published at Books We Love, Ltd., as well as an anthology featuring five stories to be released this fall.  Let’s see if this is programmed into a writer’s psyche, or if it is a learned skill.
With my Rodeo Romance, Book 1, “Lynx”.  I have added Grief and Loss into my basic storyline for my heroine.  While my hero deals with Ambition, and one other (I don’t wish to give away too much of the story).
In Rodeo Romance, Book 2, “Brede”, Survival, Vengeance, are added to my romantic suspense novel.
“Here Today, Zombie Tomorrow”, obviously, deals with Catastrophe and Survival (with a light-touch).
Not the result I was expecting. Why?  Because, if you’ve been following my blog posts, you are aware that I follow Joseph Campbell’s “A Hero’s Journey” when plotting my stories.   Joseph Campbell based his teachings/writing on the power of the ancient myth.
Of course, there is more to a story than just a great plot!  So, using the accepted rule of thirteen, let us progress to adding another layer or two to our storyline.
 These added layers to the story do not appear to be genre specific, though some are more commonly used in romance than, say, mainstream fiction. 
                                                                                               
 Authority                                      Conspiracy
Criminal Action/Murder                Deception
                                                                                            
 Honor/Dishonor Making Amends
                                                                                               
 Poverty/Wealth                               Rescue
                                                                                               
 Mistaken Identity                          Searching
                                                                                                
Suspicion                                        Suicide
                                                                                               
 Misplaced Affection (or unnatural if it is a human and supernatural being)
I believe, for a story to be an excellent story, which of course, is every author’s goal. These plot motivators with the added layers to drive the characters in the story, result in the depth (landscape) and richness (emotion) we all crave in a good story.
Readers, do you agree that all the stories you’ve read and loved these plot lines and motivators?
I admit was able to spot many of these plotlines and layers in the works of Homer, Shakespeare, and may of the Classic Greek Myths.
What do you think?  Are there certain plotlines that appeal to you more than others?
Thank you for stopping by today.
I hope to see you here next month.
Connie Vines




Purchase Links:     Amazon.com

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