Marketing For Online Authors

In the last lesson we asked if we wanted fame - and at what cost.

The good news is that Internet fame is probably not the same as real, offline fame. Nobody is going to mob you, chase you down the street, or try to kidnap your children. Online fame is more subtle and less obvious - so we might as well stop worrying and just go for it.

I mean you know me, don’t you? But probably not because anyone in the real world told you about me.

And not because I do anything except run an online writing school.

Weird thing is, people round here think I’m a retired pop star who lives off his royalties with his wife on their country estate.

People are often surprised when they hear I run an online Writing Academy as well.

So there’s no shame in being famous online for something personal to you.

I mean really, what’s the worst that can happen?

People “hate” you and say nasty things to you and about you.

Well, for a start, people rarely do say nasty things online — but when they do you have to realize it’s not about you, it’s about them.

“Haters gotta hate,” as the great philosopher Taylor Swift once said. Besides, most haters are anonymous and hide behind cat avatars.

Which tells you a lot about THEIR courage and self esteem. Anyone can be a dirt bag when they’re wearing a mask.

Most significantly, bad reviews, nasty comments, personal digs, even a generally poor reputation - precisely NONE of these things will hurt your book sales. I promise.

More than likely they will increase your book sales.

It’s just one of those weird quirks of humanity. We’re drawn towards that which is criticized.

It’s why flop movies become huge box offices successes. Everyone wants to see if this or that movie can possible be as bad as people say! Suicide Squad, for example, made over one hundred million dollars, even though the critics seriously hated it.

And if you look at Amazon you’ll see that almost all of the OFFLINE bestselling books have HUNDREDS of bad reviews.

It’s a net thing. The internet brings out the critic in people - but all the mud and badmouthing makes no difference whatsoever to the commercial success of a book.

If anything it enhances it.

And anyway, as I said, people rarely criticize you anyway, especially when you’re starting out.

The way I see it is that when people start bagging you, you’re probably on your way. You’ve finally made it.

You should be more worried if nobody ever says a bad thing about you!

Because clearly you’re not rattling anyone’s cage.

So, once you accept that a certain amount of personal marketing or a little “personality pushing” is necessary, then we’re ready to get started.

Now, here are the three most important things to focus on from this moment.

One, getting readers

Two, getting a following and

Three, getting buyers.

Now, these are in this order for a reason, because this is the right way to think about your progress. You can’t just put out a book then bemoan your lack of sales. People rarely buy books anyway. That’s the simple truth.

But online book buyers need to be attracted, nurtured, wooed, cosseted, even loved, and lovingly pampered.

First of all, to state the obvious, you won’t get book buyers if you haven’t produced writing that people want to read (and that’s usually without paying for it - at first!)

Plus you won’t get buyers unless you have attracted a following.

Think in terms of percentages.

For every 1000 followers, you will have perhaps 50 buyers. 5% who will actually pay for a book you’ve written. A low percentage sure but no different for many other aspects of marketing online and off. In fact 5% is quite high. I used to work for an investment company who sent out mailings to thousands of people and who thought a 0.07% pickup was entirely satisfactory.

So 5% is more than enough to get you going. Because even only 50 buyers can make you look very good for a short while on Amazon. You’ll be on the “Hot New Sellers” list, you’ll probably chart and Amazon robots will begin to promote your book to its readers.

Remember, millions of people buy books from Amazon - EVERY DAY.

And, as I will keep stressing during this course, people online are buying stuff all the time. Books, film, music, games, clothes, electronics, cars, drugs, you name it.

Even stuff that’s badly promoted.

You don’t need everything to be perfect your first time out, your second time out, even your twentieth. Badly marketed stuff sells well all the time. JK Rowling’s marketing staff once received an award for the worst advertising campaign of that year BECAUSE the first Harry Potter book did so well after an appallingly ineffective marketing campaign.

Plus, many good - nay, theoretically perfect and hugely expensive - marketing campaigns can and do FAIL all the time because they don’t press the right buttons in the consumer.

You can just never tell.

All you can do is your best - and simply BE there.

As they say over here, You’ve got to be in it to win it.

And keep writing!

So how do we get started on the road to author success?

One answer: Do what works.

As I say, there are no real “theories” anymore. Everything I’m telling you is now proven fact, at least for writers. All you have to do is what you’re told - and your results will appear. Author Success is a forgone conclusion because this is how the net works these days - many people buy books and WILL BUY YOUR BOOKS - all you have to do is BE GOOD and get in their faces.

Step One: Start a Blog

Before anything else, you need to establish an online presence.

It’s like having your books in a store.

People can’t find you if your product isn’t on the shelf.

Starting a regular blog is like putting up you hand and saying “I'm an author. Look here.”

Even after fifteen years online, I still blog every Friday because:

1. After each blog, I get new subscribers from Google+, LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook.

2. My Amazon book sales spike after every blog

3. My fans and subscribers constantly tell me they love my posts.

From simply writing short public posts and articles you can start the ball rolling, get the conversation started, begin placing yourself inside people’s heads. And, believe it or not, it’s not that difficult to compete because there are not too many intelligent people out there who CARE enough to blog properly, thoughtfully, and with due respect to their potential readers.

I am constantly amazed at the cynical garbage and click bait put out by the new money driven inforporations.

By comparison, your blog will be a welcome diversion to intellect-starved punters who might be looking for something more challenging than Photoshopped pictures of ghosts and freaks and endless lists of crappy celebrities you’d forgotten for good reason.

Here’s an important consideration.

The Internet is now by and large tailored to its users. Your experience of the web, for example, is probably very different from mine. Content, adverts, searches, whatever, are all designed to reflect what the net learns about you. This helps advertisers get a good bang for their buck because they only have to appeal to people already curious about their wares. Plus, using what they learn about you, search engines look clever because they can and do auto fill your more common searches. They look as if they know you because in a sense, they do. This is called the “walled garden approach” to user experience because it’s been established that people are more comfortable roaming a web they think they know - almost like an Internet rose garden that has somehow been set up just for them. This is why, when you attract your readers, subscribers, and buyers, you’re more likely to appeal to them and stay appealing because you’re always going to be within their sphere of attachment. It’s like making friends at a school. You’re going to keep bumping into them because you’re going to the same classes.

Facebook Ads can help your enormously in this regard too.

You can tailor your ads - that is , only pay for, the ones that target your specific customers - right down to their actual names if you want! More on this later.

New advertisers, new artists, musicians, creative people and entrepreneurs always make the same mistake and assume that “everyone” must be their target market. That’s NEVER true. Your target market is usually only a slim sliver of a demographic and it’s up to you to use ads, surveys, and marketing feedback to find your specific target market.

Blogging is a good way to find potential customers because the people who read your blog posts are bound to like the other things you write, especially if they bond with as a person through your writing.

The common myth is that people want information, so you should provide informative blogs that rate highly on Google.

This is not strictly true. People actually want to find OTHER PEOPLE who can help them, either through blogs, YouTube or other web presences. The trick is to engage your readers and make them feel like they’re talking to a real person. That’s much more important than simply listing facts and tips and strategies.

And you want to connect because the more times your fans and subscribers reference your site, the more times the search engines will provide your site as an option for the answers people are looking for.

That’s how to build a loyal following over time.

But the best way forward for an author, in the shorter term, is to turn that following in a mailing list, which is what we’ll deal with next.

Okay? Getting excited by the possibilities yet?

You should be!

This is how you get to be a rich and famous author!

Woohoo.

Do You Need a Website?

Short answer, No.

The thing is that designing and creating new websites is expensive and often they really don’t get much traffic.

And then only fun for people if it’s interactive and the content changes every day.

Most writers will pay big dollars to have a static website that might be visited a few times a week, probably less than that.

You have to ask yourself, Do I really need to invest in something that no one’s ever going to use? Including me?

To give you some idea how things have changed:

Over the last twenty years I have owned and run perhaps fifty or more websites. I used to think I couldn’t function online without at least a dozen.

But social media has changed all this.

I now have only a Google blog and my Academy website - which is actually hosted by someone else.

I have gotten rid of most of my websites, redirected the ones with time still to run, and will cancel the ones that come up for renewal in the next year or so. I don’t believe normal websites are particularly useful anymore, and certainly not as a selling tool.

As an information source, they may be fabulous but who looks for that kind of information any way? Perhaps one in a thousand surfers. Is really worth paying several hundred dollars a year to cater for people who can find out just as much about you from Facebook or from your blog? Even most celebrities don’t bother with websites except Wiki, Imdb, and if they like interacting with their fans, Twitter

And all this annoying garbage spouted about using “SEO” to optimize your website into Google rankings is all just stuff and nonsense.

Next time you hear talk of fairies, unicorns and SEO optimization, remember you’re just being conned out of money better spent elsewhere. 

These days, normal authors - and normal websites - can’t possibly compete with the clickbait farms that currently populate the net.

And why would you want to?

It’s totally pointless.

If you want to sell stuff, use the corporations that have already spent billions making it easy to process payments.

Like Ebay, Amazon, Google, Apple, JVZoo, Clickbank, Udemy, Thinkific, Paypal, and many other payment providers.

My sincere advice is that a Facebook page is going to be a lot more effective than a website and that all you need to communicate with your audience is either a Blogspot page or a Wordpress page.

Personally, I don’t like Wordpress because it’s much too complicated.

I like things simple. Wordpress must appeal to people who don’t like simple.

Or to people who want to get sucked into buying expensive Wordpress templates with more expensive retail hosting options.

Remember, everything you spend is money you're not earning! Or saving.

So - there you have it.

Don’t waste your money on an author website.

Later, maybe, when you need a place for journalists to misquote you from - or somewhere you can advertise your world tour.

Or perhaps somewhere you can tell people where your millions of charitable donations are going!

The money is in the list.

You hear it all time.

It’s what everyone says, right?

Why?

BECAUSE IT’S TRUE.

But not any old mailing list.

Use someone else’s list of perhaps a million subscribers and you won’t make a dime.

BUT…

Use your own list of less than a thousand subscribers - and you can get seriously rich!

Really!

Of course you have to build the right kind of people into your list: YOUR fans, YOUR readers, YOUR potential buyers.

And - I’m sorry to have to break this to you but: the only way to build a decent list is the hard way - one PERSON at a time. But - this is also the BEST way and the most gratifying and fun.

Building a mailing list slowly will also help you know what to do when it comes to promotion, what works and what doesn’t, without jeopardizing your success with rash experiments or ill conceived plans.

You can build your experience at a comfortable, organic rate.

Over the years, I have built many mailing lists from scratch.

It actually used to be a lot easier to build enormous lists of online people - because almost everybody used to sign for free stuff.

Nowadays people are more picky - and probably worried they’re simply signing up for more spam.

These days, it’s often hard to build large lists but the fewer people who do stay are usually much more beneficial to your career.

Especially if you treat them well and don’t abuse them.

But understand this: small lists are good for you, as long as they’re responsive and involved.

I regularly purge people from my lists who do not respond to my emails - for one good reason:

Email host companies don’t like seeing emails going out to thousands of people and going unopened. They label the sender a spammer and will sometimes block all the emails before other subscribers see them. Better that I remove my non-responders and keep my email blasts looking active and wanted by my cherished recipients.

So, building a mailing list is the way to go but there’s a downside.

A good list hosting company will cost you money.

Nowadays, nothing any good on the net is free.

Autoresponders, email broadcasters, and list building software is generally expensive - but you have to remember why…

It’s because, TA DA, Internet marketing now works - especially list building. A good list of responsive subscribers built over the course of a year can turn you into a bestselling author. It’s that powerful - so of course it costs money!

But you need to be careful with whom you spend your money - especially at first.

My advice is to always be sensible online - and don’t overstretch yourself.

Unless you have several thousand to spend before you expect to see any return, try to keep your outgoings to a minimum.

Whatever you do, DON’T go with a sophisticated outfit like InfusionSoft just yet - their stuff is great but extremely complicated and massively expensive, especially if you’re not making any money, which you probably won’t for a while.

Aweber is the best and only autoresponder company I recommend and endorse.

I’ve tried Get Response, Mail Chimp and Constant Contact but I just don’t like them. They’re pretty, and full of natty features but they’re expensive and I get the feeling they’re really only in it for the money. Aweber seem committed to helping their customers - and especially getting your mail to your customers. I’ve been with them for nearly two decades and never had a complaint.

The only other company I liked went out of business in 2008, taking my then 130,000 subscribers with them - so you see, I do know what it’s like to start again from nothing!

Large lists can be fatal for you if you suddenly lose them!

But as I say, these days I focus on smaller but more responsive lists.

There are three main ways to pick up subscribers.

1. At the end of your blog posts offer a freebie as an enticement to sign up for more articles and news about writing. I usually offer PDF copies of my books and courses as an incentive.

2. I have a link on my Amazon author page to my mailing list

3. I use Facebook ads to capture “leads”

Now, it’s fairly easy to create email capture boxes when you use Aweber.com. You create a list name, add a few follow up emails that might contain links to freebies and articles. Then you design an email capture box, which you then post on your website or blog. Both Wordpress and Blogspot let you put your email capture box on your site - so you don’t need to worry about that.

Amazon doesn’t let you do that but does allow you to say what your site name is (not as an active URL though). Plus of course you can add mention of your site and blog in all of the books you publish on Amazon and Kindle.

Facebook ads - I will deal with these in the next lesson - as they can get complex and confusing if you let them.

It took me a while to use Facebook ads.

To be honest I’ve never liked spending money on ads because it seemed like a lot of money for nothing.

In the past I’ve spent over $5000 on Google ads and seen absolutely NO significant increase in my subscriber numbers. I’ve vowed at various stages in my online career to never pay for advertising. That was until recently when Facebook announced they would let you “buy” leads that you could automatically place on your mailing list.

I do this using Aweber, Facebook, and software from a company called AW Tools which allows me to add Facebook subscribers directly onto my Writing Academy mailing list. Indeed, you may even have arrived at this course via that somewhat circuitous route.

You should consider doing the same - getting followers to your Facebook page and then onto your mailing list.

You can do this organically if you like - with blogs - but ads are quicker.

You sign up to Facebook ads by by creating a business you want to promote - usually your book or a series of books or just an author page, then you design posts which Facebook will then encourage you to turn into ads. The process is fairly simple and they help you all the way through it. The most important aspects are these:

1. Type of promotion - getting page likes, getting website clicks, or getting leads

2. Gender - which sex you want to appeal to: male or female

3. Their Interests - people who’ve clicked on certain categories like reading or writing as their interests and hobbies

4. Territory - which countries and languages you’re appealing to

5. Age range - actually much more important than you think!

Don’t get overwhelmed by the huge potential numbers Facebook throws up during your audience refinement process. Ideally what you want is a small focused group who will support you and your work. You can better identify this demographic by running a short campaign, say a week at $10 a day, to discover the cheapest and most enthusiastic of your target audience.  After a few days you can analyze your data and see who is responding best. Then you can either run a new campaign or tweak the one you’re already running.

For instance, after lots of trial and error, at the moment I focus all of my Facebook advertising efforts on attracting female writers over 45.

Why? Because I’ve discovered they’re the most loyal to my Writing Academy.

Also partly because I seem to get enough males coming in from my blog posts already!

But also because, in general, younger people tend to be more fickle and will request refunds for courses they never really wanted in the first place. (I can see how much of the course they take when they request returns and it’s usually less than 5%.) Older people don’t do that. They have the time and patience to commit to writing and don’t expect impossible results.

It’s hard to believe but many young people actually believe that writing “software” can literally write articles and chapters FOR YOU and are disappointed to learn this is not (yet) the case! It’s a sign of the times that we’re expecting more and more of technology - so much so that we have unrealistic expectations of what is possible.

The same feeling sometimes goes along with advertising. Many new marketers assume you can get anything you want with a few plug and play pieces of software. Not true. You have to work to make things effective. You have to test everything and keep tweaking over time. Eventually you need to design and build a unique sales funnel that attracts your potential buyers, keeps them happy and engaged, and then motivates when you need them to rush out and buy your stuff. It’s a delicate balancing act - and one that, alas, needs constant monitoring!

The idea that you make money in your sleep is a fun one but it’s more likely you’ll initially LOSE sleep wondering why your funnel isn’t working like the gurus say it should!

Which is why next we look at how your autoresponder sequence should look.

At this stage you might be thinking, why are we focusing so much on software and marketing when surely I should be selling my books, my novels, articles and short stories?

Simple answer, because you can’t do one thing, or have one thing, without the other.

Soon I’ll be explaining how to use Amazon effectively.

Before you start sending people to your books on Kindle or Amazon, or more specifically, to CreateSpace - you’re going to need your mailing list in place - all primed and ready to do your bidding. And ideally when you have between fifty and one hundred people, which might not take you as long as you’d think to collect.

For instance, if you put out a strong social media blog EVERY DAY you might expect 2 to 10 new subscribers per post.

Facebook ads would also give you 4 or 5 a day if you’re spending just $70 a week.

Doing both you’d have a 100-strong mailing list within just a couple of weeks. A thousand within a couple of months.

And remember it’s a widely held belief in online marketing circles that you can basically give up your day job when you have a 1000-strong mailing list.

So don’t underestimate the power of doing things right - and in the right order!

The freebie you offer in exchange for people’s email addresses should be a no brainier.

Your incentive should be absolutely irresistible to your target demographic.

Offer something extravagant or outrageous and, honestly, you’ll never fail to attract new subscribers.

I usually offer a PDF that was previously for sale at a high price. These days I offer courses at my Academy.

You can offer a free novel or a short story or a collection of focused articles from your blog. And. if you’re not getting all the sign ups you want, experiment with different freebies until you find something that works well.

It has to be a good offer because it has to appeal to potential subscribers TWICE.

ONCE when they first sign up and AGAIN when Aweber sends out a CONFIRMATION email.

This is called a “double opt-in” - and it’s compulsory - it’s designed to prevent people from feeling spammed. Basically the idea is that if you’ve asked people TWICE if they want to receive your emails, they can’t really complain when they get them.

Never hit people with offers to buy stuff as soon as you get their email addresses. This strategy is guaranteed to make people unsubscribe immediately. Remember that your audience are people just like you who deserve respect and even love. You’ll find that if you bear this in mind when you compose your emails to them, you’ll naturally strike the right balance.

As I said in the promo, you have to CARE.

And caring about your readers means always being nice to them, always treating them with kindness and consideration and always taking the blame if something goes wrong or if your customer isn’t happy.

Here’s a good email sequence to consider for your list:

1. The welcome email detailing where the freebie is located - sent immediately on sign up

2. Email again welcoming the customer telling them a little more about yourself and your work. Sent one day later

3. Email containing a link to perhaps an author interview. Sent two days later.

4. Email offering another small freebie for being a loyal subscriber. Sent three days later.

5, A weekly article that will be of interest to your subscribers - perhaps promise to make it a 5 or 10 part series.

You can also send out broadcast emails with links to your new blogs and articles as you write them, either daily, weekly or monthly.

The advantage of this approach is that you’re not trying to sell anything - yet. You can rest easy in the knowledge these people stay subscribed to you because they like you - and they enjoy what you have to say.

Now, if you never needed money or never wanted to become a bestselling author, you’d always have a growing band of followers.

That’s how I thought way back in 2002 when I was building a list for the first time - I just enjoyed the process and didn’t worry too much about what I’d do with the list for the first year or so.

And that’s cool - it’s just nice to have followers - and it’s one of the reasons that, years after I’ve needed to, I still write a weekly newsletter to my subscribers. Simply because I like it - and they seem to like it too.

Okay, one of the great advantages of Aweber is that you can create more than one mailing list and depending on how your subscribers behave, you can move them around and service them differently.

To give you some idea, I have lists for new students, for regular buyers, for Academy members, and even one or two for the many people who never buy a thing but who just like my newsletters. I find having different lists very useful - and having segmented lists seriously helps me focus my marketing efforts when necessary.

More on this aspect later.

As I mentioned earlier I regularly purge subscribers who stop responding to my emails altogether. It helps me look good to the spam robots and gives me a better idea of what’s actually going on with my followers.

All this may sound a little bit anal - and I understand because I too used not to bother with all the analytics - funny how that word has anal in it - but since I’ve been working much more closely with the dynamics of how my subscribers interact with my Academy, I’ve become a lot more successful - plus I enjoy it more.

Not to put too fine a point on it, it’s pretty much a waste of time to use anything but Amazon to sell your books.

That may change in the future but basically Amazon is the only company with a reach that equals - if not exceeds - that of traditional publishers and offline bookstores. Everyone else may try but they are all lost - way behind the front runner.

So forget about Barnes and Noble and all the other piddly book retailers - they’re really not worth the effort of even discussing.

The iStore perhaps?

Think again. Apple is an ass-kissing tool of the establishment. They don’t give a flying toss about the independent author. They get massive kickbacks from the Big Five publishers NOT to feature books from the likes of you and me. Don’t waste your time with Apple. They don’t care about you, so why would you use up energy on them so they can treat you like garbage - which they will.

Not only does Amazon rock, it works, big time.

You sell books.

You get sent royalties.

Monthly.

Amazon is the greatest thing to happen to the author since Caxton invented his printing press in 1476.

It finally takes the middle men out of the equation, stops rewarding administrators, businessmen, and random shop workers and gives the money to the people who earned it: the artists, musicians, filmmakers, and authors of the world.

Now I have all kinds of things on Amazon: movies, music and books and by far the best royalty rate goes to books - around 70%, which is actually huge. Would we like more? Of course, but compared to 5% to 10% you’d normally get from the Big Five, you can immediately see why the independent author is always on the fast track to wealth with Amazon.

All you have to do is get your books up there.

But how is that done?

It’s actually very straightforward and I’m going to walk you through it now. 

First you need to become a member of the Amazon author tribe by getting your own Kindle account. Go HERE for that. https://kdp.amazon.com/en_US/

You fill in the usual details - name, address, phone numbers. At some point you’ll need to give Amazon your tax details so they can pay you without deducting tax but you don’t have to do that immediately. But, it is best to go through the tax interview early on - especially if you’re outside the US - because it can be time consuming to register yourself as a US business entity.

By the way, when you sign up as an author, your NAME becomes your business. This is a good thing because later you’ll be able to claim all kinds of writing-related expenses against your writing income. Meaning you’ll pay less tax if you do everything above board.

Now, if you have anything you want to publish, it’s a good idea to at least start the process as soon as you can. You don’t want to keep putting things off. Best just to get your first book over with. That way you’ll learn quicker.

When you first register a Kindle book, Amazon gives you the option to make a real book at the same time. Great - especially because it’s free - BUT, it can slow down the process so maybe do it later. That’s what I do, actually mainly because you sell a hundred times more Kindle books that real books anyway. It’s just the nature of the beast.

To upload a Kindle book you’ll need the manuscript in Kindle format, a cover design, and the book blurb all ready.

Everything else you can tick and make up on the fly.

When it comes to making a Kindle version of your book, use Scrivener, which can do it for you automatically.

Yes, Amazon say you can upload a PDF or a WORD doc but, by the time the MS has been through the Amazon grinder, it can look terrible, so best to use Scrivener. It’s a Godsend.

Use fiverr.com to find a cover designer. There are literally thousands of them who will do a great job for around fifty bucks. Why pay more? It’s only a book cover…

Don’t stress over your book blurb. Simply try to imagine what someone else would say about your book. It doesn’t have to be long or complicated - or press all the buttons - and you can always change it later anyway.

Ask Amazon what price you should make your book - there’s a useful calculator within the uploading section to help you with that. And then as quickly as possible, press PUBLISH.

That’s it, you’re then a published author.

And your journey into enlightenment and royalty payments will begin…

By the way, people often say that Gutenberg was more important than Caxton when it comes to the printing press. I disagree. Gutenberg wanted all books to be free and printed thousands of bibles, academic books, and music scores. Yawn. Conversely, Caxton owned a shop in Westminster from which he SOLD his books and paid his authors for the privilege. Now that’s my kind of guy!

The great thing about using Amazon is that you never lose your rights. Amazon do not require you to surrender your rights.

When you upload your manuscripts you are basically “licensing” Amazon to sell books on your behalf.

With Amazon you always keep the rights - and the copyright - of your own works.

This is NOT what happens with a traditional publisher. With the Big Five - and any other publisher for that matter - you give up all rights to your work. Your book or books essentially become THEIRS to exploit and they pay you just a TINY proportion of their profit for the “privilege” - actually for the “outrage”, as I prefer to call it.

Owning your own rights is a big deal these days, and not everyone appreciates the magnitude of this advantage.

Especially when they’re just starting out.

Many older artists, writers, film makers and musicians WISH TO GOD they could have kept their own rights!

That’s the Holy Grail of all of us. And it’s only now - in the 21st Century - within reach for creators.

How are you advantaged by having your own rights as an independent author?

Like this.

If you have an Amazon bestseller, publishers will come to you and you’ll be able to negotiate your advance from a position of strength.

If someone wants to make a movie from your manuscript, you can pretty much name your price.

If you ever want to take your work off the market, or repackage your work, or re title it, you can.

You don’t need to ask anyone’s permission to reedit the work, or add characters, extra chapters, back story - or sequels.

Plus, and this is MASSIVE: you don’t EVER have to pay an agent.

The weird thing is: I speak to new authors every day who think that having a literary agent is the best thing that could happen to them.

Wrong! TOTALLY wrong in the extreme.

Literary agents are a blight on the surface of humanity. It’s an appalling profession, worse that being a lawyer - so it’s kinda funny how many agents are lawyers as well - have you noticed that?

Blood sucking leeches all of them. Yecch.

Anyway. Consider this.

A literary agent is allowed to take 15% of your GROSS earnings - advances, royalties, media deals, anything and everything. Doesn’t sound too bad does it? Until you realize that the 85% left over for you is subject to tax, expenses, administration fees and all kinds of other deep cuts that the industry is likely to take from you. Which means that whatever you’re left with is usually going to be a lot less than your agent creamed off the top. So, in reality, your agent is often going to make MORE MONEY THAN YOU - even though you’re the one doing the work: the actual writing!

Now if you don’t believe this is how it works, ask the next literary agent you meet whether they’d rather take 15% of your gross earnings or NEVER MORE than 50% of net earnings. Trust me, I’ve tried this so I know. The agent will give you a tight smile and be heading out of the door so quickly you won’t have time to shout, “And did you know Charles Dickens earned 99% royalties!”

Always remind yourself of this fact when you’re on Amazon: your writing is always yours, whether it’s selling or not.

Plus, if it’s important to you, there is absolutely nothing stopping you from getting a regular publishing deal AS WELL!

People have this weird idea that if you self-publish you somehow become unattractive to publishers.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

By putting your book on Amazon, you’re showing the world you believe in your own work.

Even better, when it sells, you’re proving to the world you are RIGHT to believe in your work.

And the best part?

EVEN IF traditional publishers never come knocking at your door, YOU are the one making money from your book.

So many traditionally published authors these days complain they’re trapped in deals where they can’t release the books they’ve written, or they’re not making enough money to have the freedom they surely deserve.

For some bizarre reason. you may look down on self-published authors… but at least they're making money - and getting to spend it.

The latest statistics tell us 95% of traditionally published authors don’t ever make enough to give up their day jobs.

And yet the new breed of independent authors are leaving the nine to five prison daily!

Anyway, it’s not for me to change your mind.

It’s up to you to try it.

You never know, you might grow to like freedom, independence, and the money - right?

Keep writing!

At this stage you might be thinking, yeah, well, Amazon is all well and good but what else is there? How else can I make money as a writer?

Clearly Amazon should be the obvious FIRST PORT of CALL for an author.

You can sell books, novels, short stories, even pamphlets and essays.

And all for free.

And you get paid.

Why wouldn’t you want to get that done first?

Who would want to leave that easy money on the table?

Because you think it’s too hard?

It’s too embarrassing to put yourself out there perhaps?

Most likely because you think you’re not good enough?

Yep, that happens.

Thing is, if you’re not good enough for Amazon, you’re never going to be good enough to submit to one of the Big Five!

Now that’s something to bear in mind…

But okay, what about other forms of income for writers?

Well,  you can do what I do which is to create courses - either text based or on video.

I write my courses first, even if I’m filming them. Most courses will take me a week or two to write. You can choose any subject you like or email your mailing list with a survey to ask them what they’d most like you to do. I did the same for this course. Of the six options, this one, Marketing for Authors, was the clear leader. I also discovered that people think the ideal length for a course is 12 lessons, which is my benchmark for this course.

It’s best to split your course into modules or lessons so that you’re not just talking solidly for 2 or 3 hours. You want to give people the option of dipping in and out of the topics that interest them.

For a long time I offered my courses as weekly lessons delivered in PDF from my website. That was fun but time-consuming. Now I deliver my courses through Udemy, SkillSuccess, iStudy and Thinkific, mainly because it’s easier to host videos at sites dedicated for that purpose. Plus all of the sites mentioned take payments and send me Paypal transfers every month.

Mainly I sell to my mailing list but I will also post course promotions to social media sites though online ads that link directly to sales pages rarely do well these days.

You can use the same marketing strategies I’ve previously mentioned for almost all the other services you might offer like:

Editing, proofing, mentoring, book doctoring etc.

Let people know you offer these services in card shaped ads in Facebook, Google Plus, Linked In and places like Instagram. It’s good way of finding new people and also letting your subscribers know you’re busy and working.

Talking of that, Facebook has another new thing is does which is actually really clever.

You can load your mailing list to Facebook and they will only advertise to your subscribers. This is a very cheap and effective way of following your subscribers around on social media! The best part as they don’t know you’re just targeting them. To them, you just seem to be everywhere!

Another way you can drum up business is by indulging in joint ventures. Look for other writers who seem to offer writing services or courses or perhaps also write books like yours. Connect with them and agree to cross promote - you to their list and them to yours. It’s a good way of creating a new list of people to interact with and sell to. An extension of this idea is run affiliate marketing options where by you allow others to sell your wares, usually at a sizable profit to them like 75% of the sale price. This may seem like a high price to pay but what you lose in the percentage of revenue you gain in the increased volume of sales.

Finally, another way you might want to add a useful string to your bow is to learn to review books, music, and film, so you can submit your reviews to online magazines and the like. This used to be a profitable enterprise but it’s getting more difficult to get paid for this kind of work - indeed any kind of online freelance article writing is hard to get paid for these days.

As I often say - and I am always universally ignored - the well paying freelance is still offline.

See my other courses for that. Like Secrets of a Freelance Writer.