Lindsay - November 11, 2021For this week’s show, Lindsay and Jo talked about the successes and failures they’ve had over the last ten-plus years of indie publishing. After that, they discussed some of the challenges they’re facing in the present. They ended the show by talking about where things are heading and what they’re going to start doing or continue doing to ensure they’re able to adapt and succeed for the next ten years.
Before jumping into the main topic, Jo discussed his experience beta testing Dave Chesson’s Atticus writing and formatting software.
Lindsay added up her numbers for the year and talked about what accounted for a boost in income for 2021.
Here are the questions they answered in the meat of show:
- What has been your most financially successful series?
- Looking back, do you have any takeaways from that series? Thoughts on why it outperformed others?
- What has been artistically your favorite book or series? Is it different from the one that was your best seller? Any thoughts on that?
- We’ve both been publishing more than ten years, and we’ve seen ebooks and self-publishing, in particular, blow up and become more competitive. How are things going in the present, and what are your current challenges?
- What are some of your concerns about the next ten years?
- Is there anything you’re doing or planning to do going forward to adapt to the changes in the world of publishing?
- Jo, I know you’ve done lots of stuffed critters and extra artwork and such related to your worlds. Do you think about trying to make that more of an income stream? Is it even viable for authors to do so? (Jo mentioned TeeSpring.com as a site that does plushies as well as T-shirts and other memorabilia.)
- Lindsay, you’ve seen some pretty consistent growth, and some pretty impressive amounts of success. How much of that do you feel was a direct result of various tactics you’ve tried? Do you feel like experiments with other genres/release strategies/ad campaigns have been key to your success? Or is consistent high quality output the main thing?
Thank you for listening, and thank you to Joshua Pearson for producing the show.
