What I'm Learning as I self-publish Loving Emily

I don't know anything about website stuff, but just wanted to say good luck and let us know what works and what doesn't for you.

Google Analytics works with a day of delay. I have never seen stats updated in real time

As for your site, it's actually pretty decent considering it's been created with an online tool, I don't care much for the way the scrolling is done in the Chapter 1 & 2 sections but, that's a matter of preferences.

The thing I would change if I were you, and if you can but I doubt it, would be to remove the "Wix.com" thing in the title of your site. I don't know what the option names are exactly, but it's probably under Title, Site Name or Site Description.

I just took a glance, but it says your book will be published in the fall of last year. I think you mean 2011.

Good luck with it all!

annetpfeffer said:

For the most amazingly thorough inside info about self-publishing, go to http://jakonrath.blogspot.com/

Joe Konrath is one of the best selling self-published writers in the US. In his blog, he and other self-pubbers share their experiences. It's a wealth of information!

www.annepfefferauthor.com

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He's a good source of information, but has an extreme bias so it's best to keep that in mind when reading him. From some of the comments I've seen him make there and in the past (around here and in interviews), it tends to be a bit exaggerated.

I forgot to add yesterday, in the YA Picks section, you should make the link to your blog clickable and open in a new window. Same as any other outgoing link on your page

As for Google Analytics, I don't know. Maybe they changed it or maybe Wix has some kind of partnership with 'em. I've been using it for years but I'm just one guy who doesn't have an internet empire so, I probably don't have the good stuff ;p

It's quite possible that it's a new feature, indeed.

As for eBook conversion, Amazon offers tools to convert your document (I don't remember what were the formats supported but, probably .pdf, .doc and .epub) to a Kindle friendly format. Free of charge. So, once your book has been edited and stuff, your probably can do the converting yourself

annetpfeffer said:

For the most amazingly thorough inside info about self-publishing, go to http://jakonrath.blogspot.com/

Click to expand...

Before you take all of his advice as gospel you might want to read this.

Joe Konrath is one of the best selling self-published writers in the US. In his blog, he and other self-pubbers share their experiences. It's a wealth of information!

www.annepfefferauthor.com

Click to expand...

My bold.

How do you know this? Where have you seen this verified?

Please be careful when you make claims like this. It might be right: but it might well be wrong too. Just because a couple of people say it's true doesn't mean that it is, and if it's not true then by repeating it you're becoming part of The Great Misinformation Machine.

Anne, I'm glad to have helped you in some way. Thank you for letting me know.

Writers don't need to confirm their sources "as an investigative reporter would" (although it does no harm); but if they're going to follow the advice given by various blogs it helps if they understand the various agendas held by the blogs concerned--mine included--and thoroughly check out all sides of the arguments provided.

Annet,

First I want to wish you much success on this venture.

Second, I just want to point out that hits on web sites do not equal sales. When your book is finally for sale, you will see lots of hits but very little sales. Do not get discouraged by these stats as you have a lot of competition out there with tens of thousands of self published authors and they all go through the same thing.

As far as getting the word out beyond your web page, spamming all over the Internet really does not work. You have to find your targeted audience to know where to place your tags and such. Maybe a little questionnaire on you site, something fun for the visitors, but informative for you will help you determine where best to spend your energy...

Good luck

Google Analytics does not take a day to display new information. I use it on my open source code projects and on my blogs and see hourly reports.

As for the current top self-publishers and independent publishers, try consulting the new Amazon Kindle Indie Bookstore, which will show you the "independents" that go through the KDP system themselves. In the right most column, it shows a sorted ranking of the top "independents" in the Kindle paid bookstore. If you click on the title, it will expand to show the correlation in the full list of paid rankings.

From my experience watching lists and the monthly sales postings at the Kindleboards, JA Konrath has had some excellent sales months (in excess of 1,000 sales a day in early March for The List alone when his book held in the top 50 Kindle paid list for a month and 60,000 dollars in March from self-publishing). However, currently, as far as I know, he has nothing in the top 2,000 paid (but many of his books are within the top 3,000 paid) kindle titles (you can verify this by looking at his titles), which generally averages 8-10 a day, from what I understand from others posting on KB. With 41 titles, last I heard, he is certainly doing okay.

I'm sure he's working on another book or maybe even several of them for the Thomas and Mercer contract he recently signed. I wouldn't be surprised if you see his sales jump considerably with the release of his next books. He certainly has a strong brand and is a popular author. And you can check his titles as JA Konrath and Jack Kilborn yourself for his stable positions on the Amazon paid lists. As others have noted in this forum, an author might fake a good ranking for a short period of time, but to fake it for a long time against an automated system based on statistical models? Seems highly unlikely.