Lindsay - April 2, 2020This week, Jo, Andrea, and Lindsay shared some of their news and updates before launching into answering listener questions. The questions covered such topics as forms of passive advertising for books, rapid release pricing and launching tactics, and how to market fiction that doesn’t fit tidily into one genre.
They also talked a bit about their writing and publishing plans for what is turning into a crazy and scary start to 2020 with the corona virus and a probable economic downtown.
Here are some of the specific listener questions they answered:
- Val: I’ve asked all my beta readers to classify my first book and everyone gives a different answer (dark fantasy, urban fantasy, historical fantasy). I can see this drastically changing the blurb/cover. Two questions: How do you find out what sub-genre your book falls under, and if it’s not a great fit anywhere, how do you market it? Just throw a dart at the sub-genre that’s close enough?
- Mind of Montgomery Harris: I would love to see a discussion dedicated to passive advertising. What passive advertising has helped you guys and guests out?
- Meg: I would love to hear all your thoughts on the best way to launch in 2020. From what I see, 99c boxsets and 99c rapid release launches are not what they used to be and for sure not a guaranteed success (at least for the same ad spend they were a year ago!). So… how would you launch a series? (Price points, timing in the year, timing between books) How would you launch a boxset? (Price points, timing) Wide vs Kindle Unlimited strategies?
- Jason: If you could write one type of nonfiction what would it be? And also what are some successful “multiple streams of income” that you’ve seen in your business? (We recommended the Joanna Penn show we recorded in January: Publishing Nonfiction Along with Fiction, Audiobooks, and Preparing for an Audio-First Eco-System)
- Cecelia: How do I launch a pen name, not bringing any readers from another genre with me at all?
- William: I am a new author and will be launching this year. I have two separate series that I expect to be ongoing. I am on the final review of the first book, and half way through the first book of the second series. My question is, do I launch them one at a time as they are finished, or do I wait and try and publish all three together at the end of the year? If I can get them all finished that is. I would like to release the first one since I have a stack of people waiting for it but I don’t know if it is the wrong move. Thoughts?
- Tikiri: What’s a profitable rapid release strategy (KDP Select) that’s worked for any of you? Monthly versus every 3 months? What marketing tactics did you add to boost your rapid release?
- A.B.: I’m a middle grade author with three books out. Most of my sales are driven by Amazon ads. On a recent podcast I heard both Andrea and Lindsay say they have middle grade books in their backlist. I’d be interested to know how you both deal with the email list and newsletter for middle grade. I have a small list that I’m fairly sure is mostly adults who read MG but I don’t send out a NL all that often. I’m not keen to target under 12s with a newsletter, and I’m not even sure that it’s legal. Also, if a 10 or 11 year old was to join my list, they’d only be reading the genre for another year or so before moving on to YA. I know that the list is a powerful tool for indie authors but I’m not quite sure how to deal with it for MG. Any suggestions would be appreciated.
- Diana: I’m writing contemporary young adult fiction and have six books published (two traditional, four indie). This past year family matters prevented me from working on marketing those books. I’m planning to publish two more books this year (and hoping for a contract for a third). Marketing contemporary YA is hard! I recently lost my agent because of the “difficult market” (his words). What advice do you have for this genre of young adult fiction? I know YA fantasy and dystopian is hot, but what about contemporary? Drama, not romance?
Thank you for listening, and thank you to Joshua Pearson for producing the show.
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