I'll be talking about my latest frustration with this whole book business in a minute. I warn you, it's going to be a bit of a ramble.
First though I want to thank everyone who has been commenting lately and ask forgiveness for the lack of responses.
I have not been doing at all well and have been fighting a lot of things health-wise and life-wise and that really takes it out of you. I have read every comment though and appreciate them greatly. Thank you.
I do have an 'up' story to tell you as soon as I can- about a rare victory I had the other night over some of the things that hold me down and how it felt- but I have to find the words first.
In the meantime, the question of the day is, how the hell do you compete with free?
When there are so many readers who now ONLY get their reading material from the free offerings available, how do you get your book noticed? And when authors use KDP or other means to make their books available for free then claim thousands of 'sales'...how do you keep your sanity?
The word is downloads, people, downloads. Not sales. Even if Amazon is paying you your portion. You cannot sell something for free.
I think this whole free issue is one of the more unsettling issues facing writers right now, along with marketing practices in general. As in, 'why is it wrong for me to tweet about my book regularly and/or from more than one Twitter account but the same 'marketing experts' telling me not to are doing it all the time to promote their own shi...er...stuff?'
(I think the answer to that last one is it's annoying no matter who does it and sends me for the 'unfollow' button every time. I don't want to annoy people so I don't do it, no matter who says it's okay or not. I am not a squeaky wheel and therefore get less exposure, good or bad. But I'd rather be able to stand myself than sell a few more books by irritating everyone I come in contact with.)
Do YOU have an answer to the 'how do you compete with free' question? (and please don't tell me to write another book-- why that is not my plan is a subject I intend to address in another post on another day.)
Because I think the answer is that you can't compete with free, and since getting the story out there has always been what mattered to me, I should have followed my gut which told me to give my book away from the beginning.
It's never been about sales for me- I am not trying to make a living as a writer.
For me writing is purely about art- I don't want to be part of the business side of it-- that's why I've turned down opportunities I've had to make GODSPEED more of a business than it already is just by existing on Amazon and Barnes and Noble. I am not built to survive that machinery.
I just want people to read my book, and it hurts to know there are many readers who never will if they have to pay for it, even less than a dollar. I'll admit that is a little more than disheartening given the going rate of a pack of chewing gum. But it is what it is.
How would you feel three months after your book came out if you realized that people were only 'buying' what they could get for free? I think you can understand why I'm a little sad about it all right now.
I'm thinking I should just put the thing online like I intended to originally...and have done with the rest.
After all, free is what the people want. Maybe it's just time to give it to them.
I remember, though, how it felt when I suggested long ago I was going to do that-- give my book away for free-- and authors of other books came out of the woodwork and over here and yelled at me, basically telling me if I did so then I devalued their book which they were trying to sell for three dollars or less. That free devalued everyone's work.
I don't know if it's the work it devalues, (is art worthless if no one will put a price on it? I don't think that's necessarily so but I suppose many would) but I do think that it is going to make it a lot harder in the future for anyone who does want to make a living at writing to do so if the only 'price' people are willing to pay for a book is nothing at all.
Will these free 'sales' now cost us a lot more in the future than we realize?
I think if people get too used to getting all their books for free, then the answer is going to be yes.
I think most of the people who only "buy" free books are probably looking for a throwaway read, rather than a piece of artwork that will stay in their hearts forever. I don't give my work away because I think it is worth something. Hopefully, my readers agree. I think the people willing to pay the cost of a magazine, or a cup of coffee are the types of people who will value your work, make time to connect, give feedback. They are worth hanging on for, I think.
ReplyDelete"I think the people willing to pay the cost of a magazine, or a cup of coffee are the types of people who will value your work, make time to connect, give feedback. They are worth hanging on for, I think."
ReplyDeleteVictoria, I think you're right. Thanks for stopping by and weighing in. *hugs*!
i have this debate with myself on a regular basis. i still don't have the answers, but i feel the same way about getting it out there. and i'm going to ramble now, so be warned.
ReplyDeleteit's a crazy e-world we live in now, where people will spend more for a cup of starbucks than for a book, and honestly, though i know the person serving the coffee deserves to be paid, they didn't spend as much blood, sweat, and tears making that coffee as i did writing my book. at the same time, i admit that when an author i love has a freebie on kindle, i snatch it up. but in that case, it's their publisher or Amazon that's putting it up for free, or for a discount.
when i've put my book up for 50 - 75% off on Smashwords, i've had sales and no sales. when i've put it up for free, no one looked at it. i don't know that there's any rhyme or reason to it.
Like Michelle Gregory above, I find it horrible that people are willing to pay more for an overpriced cup of coffee than for a book. No coffee is worth over two dollars, considering the ingredients that go into it and the effort needed to make it.
ReplyDeleteAs for books, you get what you pay for. I have nothing against self-published books and e-books. (I did both myself a few years back, when there was still a greater stigma to it). But you get what you pay for. I have found that ebooks priced under a dollar and especially for free are usually not good quality. And while there may be some highly skilled authors out there giving away a book for free to hook readers to their other books, they are wildly outnumbered by the authors who didn't work at their craft to produce a quality product.
The savvy readers know this and look for qualities other than price. As for the Walmart mentality readers who download free books of low quality and never even read them ... you weren't going to get their business anyway.
Dianne read my mind. The people that only "buy" free books aren't good customers.
ReplyDeleteI just did my own post about free last wednesday, but what I said, I think doesn't pertain here.
ReplyDeleteI do not think you should put your book for free. It's too well-written and it deserves the place where it stands now. Regardless of whether you're doing it for the money or not.
As for figuring out what to do about it, how to market it, when all the marketing people tell you (and me) you annoy people by Tweeting endlessly about it, screw them. What do they know? Let me ask you this -- how many doctors did it take for ONE of them to figure out what exactly was wrong with you? 20? 30? But it only took one to tell you what the correct diagnosis was.
So if you listen to all those marketing/PR people, who can you believe? No one has the "right" answer because the publishing industry changes every day. Especially when Amazon messes with their bloody algorithms.
I think in order to get your book seen, (and this is only my opinion and what I'm doing now to get my books seen) is to Tweet occasionally about it with a line from the book, or a line from a good review, slap on a hashtag and the buy link, and leave it go. Other friends can reTweet it, (which to me is the best advertisment anyone can get).
In my opinion, word of mouth still sells books. Look at 50 Shades of Grey. No one had ever heard of it before and now look at it. All from word of mouth.
You know I support you whole heartedly in this endeavor, and will retweet and Tweet you til the cows come home, because I believe in the integrity of your book.
Sorry for the ramble. <3 you with big ((hugs))