AgathaChristieFan's self-publishing journey

Tonight (Dec. 21) has been a triumph night for me! I participated in the Plaid Trees End of Year Event for 3 days: Dec. 19-Dec.21. For this event, I committed to having One By One and Something's Amiss free for all 3 days. I ran a Fussy Librarian ad for One By One under the horror category on Dec. 19. Tonight, I hosted an online book signing, using Authorgraph, on my Facebook author page. I used Facebook Live. I was so nervous in my hour video! It didn't help that I had planned on recording with my laptop. For whatever reason, that didn't work so at the last second, I had to switch to my iPhone. Thankfully, it was easy to set up on my phone...

So I wouldn't nervously ramble for the full hour (I didn't really think any readers would ask for my autograph for an ebook), I read my interview turned into a horror story on the blog Wicked Shorts, 2 chapters of Six Plus One, and 1 chapter of One By One. I actually had a viewer watch my video. I was excited. And by the end of the video, I had someone ask me to sign One By One. Yea lol!

I'm proud of myself for getting out of my comfort zone. I'm way too shy for my own good. The best news for the night, which it's only 11pm EST, my book One By One hit the #3 Crime Thriller and #4 Horror spot on Amazon for kindle's top 100 free bestsellers. I'm thinking my Fussy Librarian ad really worked and the Plaid Trees promotion helped too. So far, my book has been downloaded 1,808 times. Hopefully, if the momentum stays up, One By One will get KENP pages read so I can breakeven or make a profit from what I paid for my Fussy Librarian ad. The ad was $9 or $10 bucks.

I'll be excited in the morning to see what my grand total of downloads comes down to. I may not get any sleep tonight if I keep obsessively refreshing my Amazon page. I want to see if I can get the #2 or #1 spot.

Thank you, Old Hack

The last time I used Fussy Librarian for One By One, I made $15 with over 1,500 kenp pages read with no sales.

This time, it was completely different. With One By One, I made close to $40 using Fussy Librarian again. So far, I have kenp pages read of 358 (way down from before). However, I managed to get 15 sales of a full-priced One By One. I managed to make a profit since I only paid $9 or $10 for the Fussy Librarian ad. Overall, my free downloads came to 1,975. And, someone already posted a review on Amazon a couple days ago. Hopefully more will start coming in.

I'll definitely be using them again but probably for a different book.

My Goodreads giveaway started today for Six Plus One. It ends Jan. 2nd. It'll probably be my last one because I can't ever see myself paying $119 for a giveaway when it used to be free. So far, 60 people have signed up.

I'm looking forward to 2018!

I'm pretty bummed that the podcast I did an interview for still hasn't posted. However, I'm excited about trying new things in 2018. I auditioned One By One to become an audiobook on ACX, and it found a narrator. Yippie lol. Iain Rob Wright's free online self-publishing course is really helping me find different avenues I would have never even thought about. If only I could sit my butt in a chair and get through the videos in a timely fashion. I have a very short attention span.

I'll post my overall sales, then starting the end of January, I'll post individual months. I keep going back and forth if I want to take my books off KDP select and try my hand at going wide. There's got to be a better system than always giving my book away for free or only charging .99c for a special...

TOTAL SALES:

--ONE BY ONE 145 sales
3,952 kenp pages read
5,180 freebies

--SOMETHING'S AMISS 56 sales
0 kenp pages read
434 freebies

--PLENTY OF FISH 28 sales
47 kenp pages read
183 freebies

--TWISTED OBSESSION 62 sales
4,723 kenp pages read
246 freebies

--SIX PLUS ONE 9 sales
664 kenp pages read
0 freebies

I tried another Fussy Librarian ad; this time with a .99c promotion on Twisted Obsession for Jan. 27th. I also had my book featured in 2 Book Boasts newsletters on Jan. 28th. I barely sold any, so I had a money loss with Fussy Librarian. My ad had cost $16 because it was the suspense category. I'm thinking companies like these may possibly only be good for free downloads. This is the second time I've tried them with a paid book, and both times had dismal results. I think from now on I'll just use this site when I'm promoting a free novella.

Here's January numbers:
--ONE BY ONE
Amazon 2 1,011 kenp
By hand 1
--TWISTED OBSESSION
Amazon 6
--SOMETHING'S AMISS
Amazon 0 1 kenp (this makes me wonder if there's a glitch with Page Flip again)
--PLENTY OF FISH 0
--SIX PLUS ONE
Amazon 0 166 kenp
By hand 1

Hey, Norman, you may want to give them a try still just to see how your genre would do. Fussy Librarian has 2 newsletters. One w/ discounted books and one for only free books. I think the free only newsletter is cheaper. If it makes you feel any better, my new release, Six Plus One, hasn't really sold anything.

Thanks, Barbara R. I pursued self-publishing because I wanted to be in control of my publishing schedule since I know I'm slow with the process. I was scared if I found a publisher or in-house editor, then they would drop me for faster writers. I liked the idea of being an entrepreneur, knowing it's a marathon finding readers. Plus, I have so many dreams (a curse with having a creative mind lol) so I was tired of always saying I was going to do something without backing it up. Once I got feedback from a crit partner, beta readers, and an editor I found confidence with pursuing my dreams.

Hi, CathleenT, it’s definitely fun and very addicting.

Are you working on anything new?

Keep smiling,
Yawatta

Cathleen, your story sounds great. I've heard of Grimm Tales. Good luck with writing and editing it. I remember enjoying your Dragon Hoard book, so I know you got this I hear ya on the vulnerable mental space. I feel like that too. Sometimes the creation process becomes overwhelming for me to the point where I get writer's block. The story is in my head but I can't get it down on paper...

Right now, I'm working on two novellas. One's suspense--a young ballerina terrorizes her little sister out of displaced revenge. And, the other one's horror--a serial killer stalks a college campus, murdering people with urban legends. They are both written; I'm in the revising stages now. I'm a fast writer but a SLOW editor lol.

February numbers:
NO SALES
--One By One 556 kenp pages read
--Six Plus One 39 free downloads
--Something's Amiss 200 kenp pages read
--Twisted Obsession 64 kenp pages read

I'm disappointed in myself for Feb. I should've promoted myself better, especially with Feb. being Women's Horror Month. Sometimes I just feel like giving up publishing books. Like what's the point? I felt like that today, but kind words from a man (I don't know him) who follows my author page on Facebook brought a smile to my face. He said he enjoyed my books and couldn't wait to read more. I need to get out of this funk...

My Writers Not Writing podcast interview posted. http://www.buzzsprout.com/141279/643346

@RWM4768, I don't know about Feb, but I bet the romance genre is huge due to Valentine's Day. I hope your sales have picked up

@Norman, yeah pages read is the only reason I'm still in KDP select, but I may take a few titles and go wide to see how that goes.

March sales:
ONE BY ONE 21 kenp pages read
PLENTY OF FISH 1 sale

My One By One audiobook finally got approved, so I'm excited about that. I already have one sale. If things go well, I'll consider turning my other titles into audiobooks. Thinking outside of the box, I'm trying to come up with creative ways to market myself and books. I'm pretty shy but YouTube and live videos seem like a good way to go, possibly. I don't want to let my narrator down since he was kind enough to do a royalty split share with me. First thing first, figuring out how to pass out these 25 promotional codes...

I've been selling paperbacks in April, which is giving me confidence

April sales:

AMAZON
One By One 1 (368 pages read)

CREATESPACE
Six Plus One 1

ACX (audiobook)
One By One 2

BY HAND
One By One 1
Something’s Amiss 1
Twisted Obsession 2

May sales:

AMAZON
One By One 273 pages read

ACX
One By One 1

TOTAL SALES:

--ONE BY ONE 158 sales
6,181 pages read
5,233 freebies

--SOMETHING'S AMISS 58 sales
401 pages read
444 freebies

--PLENTY OF FISH 29 sales
68 pages read
183 freebies

--TWISTED OBSESSION 71 sales
5,070 pages read
260 freebies

--SIX PLUS ONE 14 sales
830 pages read
39 freebies

For 2019, I took my books out of the KDP program in order to go wide. I was tired of always having to give my books away for free.

Jan:

--Amazon:
Twisted Obsession 1
--ACX (no sales)
--D2D:
One By One 1
Something's Amiss 1
Twisted Obsession 1
--By hand (no sales)

Feb:

--Amazon:
Plenty of Fish 1
--ACX (no sales)
--D2D:
Six Plus One 1
--By hand (no sales)

March:

--Amazon:
Six Plus One 1
--ACX (no sales)
--D2D (no sales)
--By hand:
One By One 2
Something's Amiss 3
Twisted Obsession 1
Six Plus One 2

On March 30th (Saturday), I attended LitFest in Hagerstown, MD. There were about 40 authors there. I'm surprised I sold any, having to compete with so many different genres. Most represented were fantasy, historical, romance, and children's books. I ordered the Square before the big event. Good thing I did because I only had one cash sale; the rest were credit cards.For April, I signed on with Prolific Works (used to be called Instafreebies) to try and gain subscribers through my newsletter. I've joined a few group giveaways that start May, so I'm looking forward to that. I've also started an account on Bookbub because I love to read. Hopefully, my book reviews will attract readers.

I got feedback from my editor on Perfect Little Murder, so I've been working on that. Plus, in June, I'll have two short stories included in the Don't Open the Door horror anthology. I'm working slow and steady. There's a Twitter hashtag called #turtlewriters

CathleenT, I love your advice of "You do you." Burnout is definitely not a good thing.

So far, Prolific Works seems to be getting me subscribers to the site and my author newsletter. 16 new subscribers as of now. I wrote a Perfect Little Murder teaser to see if these readers from Prolific Works will actually open emails or if they just accidentally signed on. I had a decent open percentage rate. The day isn't over, so I'll keep checking. I sent the email 8am (EST). I'm hoping to publish my new release by May 10th

Hey CathleenT, you should give it a try. I can send you a link if you’d like. I’ve gotten over 34 new subscribers to my newsletter, not just readers wanting to hear from me on the website, 3 have been unsubscribes right after getting my welcome email. But 5 new people have interacted with me. My welcome email offers a free PDF of any of my books.

APRIL:
Amazon:
One By One 1
ACX
no sales
D2D
no sales
By hand:
Something’s Amiss 1

Today I published my new book, Perfect Little Murder, on Amazon and D2D. I just tweeted and posted on Facebook as of now. I signed up on BookBub to see if they’ll feature me for a new release promotion. They’ll let me know in 7 days if I get approved. I’m waiting til the rest of the ebook retailers upload my book before I make an announcement on my newsletter and blog. I don’t want to miss the potential of sales if people don’t have a kindle.

Next week, I’m running a promotion on One By One (.99c) on Fussy Librarian (this will be the last chance with them if dismal results), Robin Reads, and Bargain Booksy. This will be the year I play with advertising my books. You have to spend money to make money, I keep hearing

I’ve discovered a mystery tonight that I don’t think my wannabe detective self will ever figure out. I’m excited anyway! I was on my Amazon sales report checking on my new release Perfect Little Murder when I found something that caught my eye. Randomly, One By One has 23 (or 36) sales. The reports have different figures depending on what section I’m looking at. I have no idea what’s going on! I don’t know if someone popular gave me a shout out; if my new subscribers are trying my stuff; if a promo site sent my book early; or if I’m finally in Amazon’s algorithms. Either way, I’ll take it. Looking forward to see how my promos go. I’m running three in the next two days.