6 Things we now know from J K Rowling and The Cuckoo's Calling

There aren't many times in your life that you can sit there with raised eyebrows and think: what the hell? But that is exactly what I thought when I found out that J K Rowling had released a book under a different pen name and had taken every step possible to hide it. Well she almost too every step possible - she did tell the snitch after all it was her book.

But there are important publishing lessons that we can learn from this and here are six of them.

1. Publishers choose marketable rather than well written

As soon as it was announced that J K Rowling was the author, some of the big publishers admitted that they had turned down the book from who they thought was an unknown author. Interestingly their reason was not based on writing style, storyline or any technical aspect of writing. It was because they didn't think they could market it. This angers me slightly. How are we supposed to teach our children what is good writing or what is a good storyline if quality books aren't being produced because mummy porn is more attractive to market? If we removed the poor quality books from the shelve that are produced because people buy them (and sometimes they only do so because they want to see how horrible they are really) then perhaps people would buy quality writing.

2. The biggest marketing asset is your brand

The book in question had only sold about 1500 copies and was by no means a best seller despite good reviews. However as soon as the real author had been revealed but the book sold out and was number one on Amazon. Why? Because J K Rowling had written it. The name is associated with quality story lines and therefore people will buy her books. Therefore you should utilize your name and not your books.

3. Publishers aren't very good at marketing

Honestly, if the book sold only 1500 books with the publishers doing all they were willing to do to market it, it shows that while they will get books to the reader's shops, they won't get the books to the reader's home.

4. Readers care about you not your genre

The Cuckoo's Calling is hardly Harry Potter related in terms of story or genre and yet J K Rowling's fans wanted to buy it. There has long been an argument that you might consider pen names for different genres, yet this is evidence that isn't the case. Readers will buy your books because of you, not because of your genre.

5. You should keep trade secrets to your trusted circles

I'm sorry to say but J K Rowling made one mistake at keeping this a secret. She trusted someone that she couldn't possibly really trust 100%. Book publishing is a business and like with any business you need trade secrets to a need to know basis. It is unlikely that J K Rowling stuck to this principal.

6. Twitter is great for reporters

You're laughing I bet. But considering that the partner at Russells shared the news with his wife who then shared the news with a journalist on Twitter. So what can we learn from this? Be careful what you say on Twitter - you never know what paper is listening.

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Six Social Media Blunders and what we can learn from them

Social media is incredibly powerful – it can keep us all in contact with friends and family, market our books and lose us great opportunities. Yes that is right you read the last part correctly. Social media can be as much a pain as a gain. Here are six social media blunders that have cost people dearly and what we can learn from them.

1.                   Connor Riley tweeting about her job offer

Connor Riley had a job offer from Cisco when she tweeted – “Cisco just offered me a job! Now I have to weigh the utility of a fatty paycheck against the daily commute to San Jose and hating the work.”

Shortly afterwards Cisco employee gave a tweet back - “Who is the hiring manager? I’m sure they would love to know that you will hate the work. We here at Cisco are versed in the Web.”

But if that wasn’t enough, she was soon the target of several internet trolls that called her names that would upset even the thickest skinned of us. It is likely it will be a long time before the “fatty Cisco” incident is forgotten forever.

Lesson learned: If want to say anything that could be construed as negative, use privacy functions that limit who see it – or better keep it to yourself and don’t say it at all.

2.                   #McDStories hashtag got hijacked

You can’t control hastags and if we have learnt anything with social media is that people who really want to promote negative aspects of your brand - will. With McDonalds they wanted people to share their positive experiences in their restaurants – however consumers quickly did the exact opposite.

Lesson learned: Use hashtags that can’t be turned into negative aspects about you.

3.                   Ashley Johnson blasting customers over tip onFacebook

Waitress Ashley Johnson decided to take her frustration out on Facebook after she didn’t receive the tip she expected from two customers. She took the extraordinary step of mentioning the restaurant by name. Unfortunately her bosses discovered the update and she was sacked for “speaking disparagingly about customers and casting the restaurant in a bad light on a social network.”

Lesson learned: Be careful what you say about customers online. You never know who is reading.

4.                   Ashley Payne and her photos

Teacher Ashley Payne was forced to resign after she posted a photo online of her out drinking. Someone obviously took offense to the message as the head of her school was e-mailed with a copy of the photo.

Lesson learned: If you are in a public facing position (even if you don’t realize / advertise it) keep your social media profiles professional. If something is deemed unsuitable for your main audience someone will let you know one way or another.

5.                   Employee’s rant on Facebook

Read the exchange and you’ll see why it was a blunder.

Lesson learned: Where to start? I think the important points to take away are remember who you add onto Facebook, don’t write negative comments and be honest.

6.                   2009 Habitat using trending hashtags

Back in 2009 Habitat sent out a number of tweets that contained popular and trending hashtags that had limited if anything to do with the message. The crisis exploded later on when they took advantage of events happening in Iran at the time. Habitat later apologized and stated the hashtags were not authorised.

Lesson learned: Use meaningful related hashtags not just any that are trending.

I hope you have found this article useful. If you have any more examples please let us know in the comments below.

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The Six Reasons Why You Should Not Spam in the Self Publishing World

There is a lot of spamming in self publishing. A day doesn’t go by that I don’t receive an e-mail, a direct message, a tweet, a message on a group or in private message about someone wanting to sell me something. It can be anything from editing services and cover art to their own book. But it is best not to sell in such methods. Here are six reasons why it is a bad idea to spam people about any product in the self publishing world.

1.       It creates negative emotions in most people

Marketing strategies that include spamming are normally only 1% effective. At most spamming is only about 3-4% effective. The rest are either neutral or negative. In a world where negative word of mouth can spread like wildfire it is often best to avoid methods which will garner any kind of negative emotion.

2.       It loses you connections

This is the major one. If you DM me or PM me I am likely to block you. Doing so will lose you any chance of letting me know about your book or services in the future. Losing one customer may not seem bad but remember it is future long term relationships that you want to build. You may lose one sale immediately, but you could have lost dozens of sales from one customer by being pushing.

3.       Publishing isn’t about being pushy

The publishing industry has never been about pushy salesmen. Think about it. Do you walk into a shop and suddenly a group of customer assistants jump on you to buy a book? No normally you left alone to wonder the shelves and choose the book yourself. That is because reading a book is personal it should be totally up to you.

4.       You destroys your creditability

The funniest thing I think I’ve ever had was an e-mail from a person trying to sell me a book on how to make money from selling without spamming. Now if you are spamming me about a book on how not to spam how serious am I going to take it? But if you have to spam to get sales anyway what does it say about your book? Is that it is so bad you have to rely on throwing people at your book and hoping some of them will stick? Creditability is important in publishing – make sure you have it.

5.       You should concentrate more on fans than on sales

A simple line I like to say – a sale is for a day, a fan is for life. Sales are only worth 30-70% of the list price for that one book. A fan is worth a lot more. They will market your book for you, they will buy all your books, they will make you feel successful. Concentrate on getting fans not sales.

6.       There are more cost effective, time efficient methods

Spamming is time consuming. Posting hundreds of e-mails, tweets, direct messages and such is time consuming. You have to identify the targets, write the messages and send. Whereas you could spend the same amount of time writing a good content rich blog post that will encourage people to look at your services.

So here I wish to ask about what you think. What are the best methods of promotion? What do you think of spamming?

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Six things not to do on Twitter

Twitter is one of the biggest social media platforms out there. Everyday articles are posted, shared and talked about. With everything that is put out there and all there is little wonder that people make mistakes. But few people understand that Twitter is also an advertising platform. Everything you push on Twitter says something about you and your brand. So if you do make a mistake it can make a dent in your publishing career. So here are six things not to do on Twitter...

1.                   Don’t comment on an article without reading it

There are those that comment solely based on the title or first line of a tweet. People can tell if you haven’t read the article you are commenting on. Sometimes titles can be misleading or the article has a secret message. Read the articles not just the tweets. It looks unprofessional and it will cost your reputation.

It is also advisable to make sure that you aren't making the same point if you want to debate a topic. It will look silly if aren't adding to the conversation but debating for the sake of it.

2.                   Don’t DM people for articles / products

I don’t really want to go over this again – but it seems people do not understand. In fact I now get more DMs than I did before. So I will just link here to my original article for you to read.

3.                   Don’t acknowledge those who share your news

People just forget their please and thank you when people share their tweets. If you can remember to do that it shows that you are caring person who is mindful of the people who help them.

4.                   Spam

Spamming is ineffective. It is as simple as that. I’ve written about it before for Facebook groups but the message is very useful for Twitter as well.

5.                   Directly insult other authors

It is unprofessional to say something nasty to people on social media. Don’t show your nasty side and stay polite with all conversation.

6.                   Don’t expect everything for nothing

Work hard with your following and reap the rewards. Too many people expect to sit back after they have posted and watch the results fly in. Work with your following to get better results and remember that social media is a two way conversation.

I hope you have enjoyed this blog post. Please feel free to leave a comment.

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Why online retailers needs to change their review policy

It is no secret that I am someone who loves reviews and reviewing. I‘ve already written a couple of review centric posts on my blog:

Six Reasons Why Reviewing Is Good

Six Differences between a Bad Review and a Troll Attack

6 Tips to Writing A Good Review

On each one I have made clear that I feel that reviews should solve one purpose. To give honest, critical feedback on the experiences of the product as it was intended to be used.

Last year Amazon decided to delete hundreds (if not thousands) of reviews written by other known authors. Very little explanation was given though some sources claimed they had financial connections to the books they reviewed.

Interestingly a few of mine had disappeared and I will admit that I do have a financial connection to the books I reviewed – I am part of the Amazon affiliate program.

In contrast to a lot of people who review, I take it very seriously and am proud of what I publish. My reviews give an overview of my experiences with the product from their intended use. For example a recent one, that is not part of the affiliate system and amazingly has stayed thus far.

But there are many reviews out there that aren’t giving constructive feedback. Take some of the reviews on Fifty Shades of Grey. It didn’t take me long to find these five star reviews on Amazon.

And even one star reviews have some poor reviews among them.

I don’t agree with either set of reviews and I think Amazon and other retailers need to consider what they publish on their sites. It took me just two pages to find three usable examples of poor five star reviews. I could have used others if they weren’t so long that they wouldn’t fit on the web browser in one shot. Yet it took ten pages to find those two one star reviews. That suggests that these fake reviews are artificially inflating the overall score of the book. How many other products out there have fake reviews? Read this blog post as a clue on the subject.

Amazon would have you believe that they deleted the fake reviews last year, but they were rather inconsistent. I have just shown you five reviews that seem to go against the principles of reviewing and could post many more. Why are these posts that are not honestly talking about the book be included?

If it is this attitude to reviews; is there any value to them?

I seems online retailers have very little control which reviews are posted online. Which is why troll attacks can and do happen.

Online retailers should stop and consider whether in the long term reviews need to be better regulated so that their value is not demolished by rogue commentators.

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