Self Publishing and the Nuclear Bomb

Wormwood said:

So as you can see by my signature I self-published a short story. I did it mostly to get my name out so when I release my novel I'll have some people who know who I am. The short story is ranked #6 in short/horror/free on Amazon and #27 in free/short stories/single author. I enrolled in the KDP select program and making the story free was what shot it up the rankings. I'm not sure how common this is or if the story is doing well simply because I made it free, it obviously helps. The good thing is that people all over the world are reading my work and I've managed to grab 6 five star reviews in the process.

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Select free promos aren't the near-guarantee they once were. The rankings depend a lot on how niche the particular list is. Getting on them at all is still nothing to sneeze at these days. Raw downloads tends to be a better indicator. For a short story from an unknown author, 500-1000 seems pretty strong these days.

I think a strong cover image helps, and you've got that. (I'd quibble about the text font, size, color you've selected, but that's a discussion for elsewhere.)

The number and quality of reviews you've gotten out the gate is phenomenal for my guess at the number of downloads. The pattern seems a bit unusual, so maybe some friends/acquaintances have pitched in? That's often not within your control and their hearts tend to be in the right place but some authors do experience some backlash (whether appropriate or misguided) based on this kind of appearance.

Also, from skimming both samples, I see a lot of grammatical issues. This isn't the place for detailed craft discussions, but I mention it because I'm assuming you haven't used an editor. That's understandable for shorts--I don't use one either. It's just not financially viable. But I think this level of quality may backfire some in getting your name out there with the association for quality you'd be happy with. I recommend finding some way to barter for proofing help, or investing some time in self-editing help and further passes through the manuscript. The Share Your Work forum here can also be a tremendous help if you don't have a critique option already and I see you have enough posts already to take advantage of it.

Good luck. I'm a fan of horror shorts, and I grabbed your freebie to read through when time permits.

Wormwood said:

J. Tanner thanks and yes on all counts. These are the first two I've put out and the next one I put up is going through a professional editor. I had beta's read both and although they did catch a few errors mostly in grammar and punctuation some did slip through the cracks or there was disagreement about them. I also used grammarly which is fine for a basic once over, but leaves a lot to be desired when taking into account feel and style.

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In a post in a different thread, Wormwood, you say you worked with beta-readers and used two different editors. Just so you know, putting your work through the free grammar-check facility at Grammarly is not at all the same as working with an editor; Grammarly is notorious for spamming people (it has its own thread in our Bewares section); and judging by the results I got when I ran some text through it, it doesn't seem very good, either.

Have you used our Share Your Work section? You might well benefit from a quick run around in there, although you will have to brace yourself before you go in.

Wormwood said:

J. Tanner thanks and yes on all counts. These are the first two I've put out and the next one I put up is going through a professional editor. I had beta's read both and although they did catch a few errors mostly in grammar and punctuation some did slip through the cracks or there was disagreement about them. I also used grammarly which is fine for a basic once over, but leaves a lot to be desired when taking into account feel and style.

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It's good you're making a change. I can safely tell you that your betas are missing more than one obvious error per page if the rate in the samples holds through the remainder. That's just far too high.

Both of the stories have continued to chart even after switching over to paid.

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I'm not seeing them on the paid charts, but sometimes Amazon is slow to update. Anyway, if they continue to sell you're doing really great as short fiction goes for a new author. Most people seem to sell a few here and there and need a catalog of 30+ stories to see any sort of consistent daily sales outside of erotica/romance.

So that has been a positive, in fact the short one liners were both organics.

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Short isn't always a red flag. Some of the heavy reviewers are just trying to meet the minimum length and make one point. Five star reviews that are a paragraph or so with extreme hyperbole from a reviewer with no other book reviews are what sets people to wondering.

I've also grabbed a good number of sign-ups to my email list and I think it has to be stemming from the two shorts.

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Starting a mailing list right out of the gate is a smart move. If I could go back in time and give myself one marketing tip about self-pubbing, that would be it.

(Funny coincidence, I'm also Jason who goes by J (not, Jay, like your story, but darned close. It was odd seeing that at the start with a handful of common suburbia details that could easily have been my childhood.))

I've never used Grammarly, but EditMinion is a fairly decent, completely free and it seems much more trustworthy. It's by the Write or Die! people.

It's still just a spruced-up spell check and should only be treated as such, but it's a nice little tool.

EMaree said:

I've never used Grammarly, but EditMinion is a fairly decent, completely free and it seems much more trustworthy. It's by the Write or Die! people.

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I like EditMinion too. Like all of these automated tools, you cannot trust them wholesale, but they can highlight individual items that you miss not due to a lack of understanding, but just because you see what your brain thinks is on the page rather than what actually is on the page.

These tools benefit those with a decent grasp of grammar, and often punish those without. I see so much writing from newer writers where I'm 99% sure there are errors from following Word suggestions.

Wormwood said:

Oh yeah the podcast is at theMegaPods.com and I now own my domain name at MicahAckerman.com

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Is the podcast you refer to here the same one you mentioned in this post? If so, then you should make it clear it's your own podcast you're promoting, otherwise it looks like you're spamming AW. Which isn't allowed.