I listen to the selfpublishing podcast. I either listen in the car or on the couch at night. Every so often, Mark wants to know, “Why are you laughing?” Because these guys are funny. Be warned: they swear, a lot. If that offends you, don’t listen.
I’ve been listening to their advice about writing, marketing, and publishing. I’m working on it. So, when their book came out, Write. Publish. Repeat. (The No-Luck-Required Guide to Self-Publishing Success)
The book is organized for easy reading. I read it all one afternoon. Okay, I was motivated. And then I read it again the next morning. I loved this book.
This book explains how, if you write great books, keep publishing, and keep repeating, and you make it easy for your fans to find you, you can create a writing career. Why? Because you write great stuff. You publish it. You do it over and over again.
- Find your 1000 true fans. Okay, it might be more. It might be fewer. But you need some number of people to tell other people about you, write reviews for your books, etc.
- Keep going. There are some days, when something in your marketing or the market will shift. What you have been doing won’t work anymore. They talk more about this in the book. You need a way to connect with your fans when everything goes haywire on you.
- Take your fans with you, and get new fans when you genre-hop. If you keep writing, you will genre hop. Not all of your fans will go with you immediately. You will gain new fans. They will tell each other about you.
This book is easy to read. I already said I read it twice in an 8-hour window. It’s what’s in it that’s challenging to do.
It’s hard work. It’s not sexy or easy. There’s no little pill.
In the book, Sean and Johnny differentiate between the artist/hobbyist writer and the business writer. This is a key differentiation.
Do you write for art or do you write as part of your business? If you write as part of your business, you will make your books as good as you can make them, and then, using the 80/20 rule, you will release those babies into the world and start on another.
Making those books as good as you can make them mean you make an eye-catching, professional cover. You might need help. You always get editing help, because you have to make your books as good as you can make them.
But, you can put your books on Amazon, Kobo, Barnes and Noble, Smashwords, and wherever else you desire. By yourself. You don’t need anyone else to put your books up for sale.
Whether you are a fiction or a non-fiction writer, you need this book. If you think you might be, you should buy Write. Publish. Repeat anyway. If you’re still not sure, you should listen to their podcast.
Write. Publish. Repeat. It’s all you have to do.
