Bone Frog Challenge New England 2015

May 16, 2015

This was my second OCR.  I had originally planned on doing the Killington Spartan Sprint in 2014, but real life got in the way, and I could not manage to train so I did not feel up to it. I vowed that 2015 would be different, and so I signed up for the Bonefrog Challenge. I planned on starting 2015 with some hardcore training, but again, real life got in the way and I wasn’t able to train much until March, and then I knew what I was doing was not enough. The closer I got to the event, the more I felt that I had bitten off more than I could chew. 10+ miles, 50 obstacles, 6000’ of elevation change...this felt like it would be too much for me. I kept training as much as I could, however, and even managed two long “runs” of 10.5 and 11.5 miles on the treadmill in the month leading up to the race. I was very slow, but I could do it, and that gave me a little bit of confidence.

Behind the Scenes of a Free Book Promotion: Part 4

In posts one, two, and three of this series I talked about my previous promotions and how I prepared for the next one. Now for the results. Did it have an impact on my sales?  Did I get a return of investment?

Behind the Scenes of a Free Book Promotion, Part 3

In the third post of my Behind the Scenes of a Free Book Promotion series, I will talk about Promotion Day itself.

The day before the promotion, I got an email from Booktweeters saying that my book wasn’t free today (that is, the day before the promo), and so they couldn’t feature it. I quickly responded saying it wasn’t supposed to be free the day before, and enclosed a copy of my invoice as proof. They responded, apologizing for the mistake. Good, but this wasn’t exactly increasing my confidence in them…

Behind the Scenes of a Free Book Promotion, Part 2

In my first post in this series I talked about my previous experience with Free promotions. Lackluster at best, with no return of investment (ROI) with my first attempt at an ad. Here I'll talk about my next attempt at an advertised free promotion.

Behind the Scenes of a Free Book Promotion, Part 1

Discoverability is the primary obstacle for new writers.  Lost in the ocean of literature, it is difficult to attract readers.  There are various strategies a writer can attempt to remedy this, including using social media, taking out advertisements, and write more books!

Word of mouth is one of the most effective means of getting new readers, but you already have to have readers to spread the word in the first place. It takes readers to get readers.

Indie publishing champion David Gaughran states the issues far more eloquently than I can in his post Starting from Zero.

I have two novels out now, The Pirates of Alnari, and The Grand Masquerade. Sales are almost non-existent. What reviews I do have are good, so I know that my writing isn't utter dreck. The problem is not that my writing stinks; rather it's that no one knows about my writing at all. I don’t have readers, so I can’t get readers. What to do?