The Laws of the (Amazon) Jungle—Eight Rules Authors Need to Know to Stay Safe

Update: This is probably now the longest blogpost in history, so I apologize. But I've had important updates from commenters that I'm incorporating into the post. An intellectual property lawyer has enlightened me on a lot of things I had wrong. (Scroll down to Rule #5). And South African romance writer Niki Savage has an update on Amazon's rules for reviewing authors in your own genre (Rule #2) Thanks for all the helpful comments!

Everybody tells authors we must use social media to have successful careers in the E-age, but nobody talks much about the dangers that lurk here.

Here's the thing: the Internet is still the wild frontier. And it's so huge nobody's quite sure how to police it.  Big, loosely regulated social media sites seem to encourage the worst in human behavior. Facebook allows people to make hate pages for celebrities with happy abandon, and the comments on news sites and You Tube can make you want to wash your eyeballs.

You Tube is making some sweeping changes to try to curb some of the more horrifying comments. You'll soon need a Google+ account to log in. (Google+ is set to become the most important player for business in social media. We'll have a post on that in a few weeks.)

Online nastiness is so pervasive that even some literary sites have become more like a jungle full of feces-throwing monkeys than a place for civilized discourse.

Recently, the review site Goodreads (now owned by Amazon) has tried to cut down on the poop-tossing by deleting some ad hominem attack "reviews" and obscene or threatening "shelf" names. Some people decry this as censorship and are protesting by sabotaging Goodreads with thousands of one-star "reviews" on random authors' books.

You can read an overview of the new developments by Pavarti K. Tyler at Indie Reader and Laura Hazard Owen at Gigaom and more at the Passive Voice.

But I fear it will take more than deleting a few reviews to change the online culture of entitlement and emotional brutality.

After I wrote my post on "Gangs of New Media" a few months ago, people contacted me with heartbreaking tales of online bullying in the publishing industry. Authors, readers, and reviewers alike had horror stories.

Respected reviewers had stopped posting to Amazon because of reviewer-on-reviewer attacks and harassment by angry authors. A seasoned Hollywood screenwriter was hounded so mercilessly she had to unpublish her books and change her name. Even a retired army sergeant has been terrified into silence.

But Amazon is trying to crack down, and you can help by reporting abuse when you see it.

Meanwhile, writers need to learn how to avoid gang-infested neighborhoods and stay off the radar of the poop-tossers, bullies, and vigilantes.

Unfortunately marketers sometimes tell us to go into those neighborhoods and do the very things that will set off attacks. I've seen "marketing handbooks" that are the equivalent of sending children into gangland wearing a rival gang's colors.

Part of the problem is that the rules of the online book world bear little resemblance to the conventions of the staid, gentlemanly publishing industry of the past.

That's because the laws of online activity come from the people who were here first: hackers and gamers.

When you enter the online culture, it can feel like stepping into a game of "Grand Theft Auto." It's an aggressive, testosterone-fueled, competitive universe. On some sites, sociopathic behavior is the norm and innocence is a crime.

Everybody is trying to eliminate the enemy, and the enemy is probably you.

"Gaming the system" is a matter of pride for some, and because people tend to judge others' characters by their own, the system-gamers think every innocent newbie is gaming the system too. (If someone accuses everybody he meets of sneaky, underhanded dealings, he's revealing a lot about himself.)

Probably the most infamous Internet menace was the sociopath called Violentacrez, who slimed up the forums of Reddit with threats and hate speech masked as "categories" with names like "chokeabitch" that were technically within site guidelines, but invited misogynist rants, child pornography and hate.

We can't blame the Internet entirely for the phenomenon. These are the same people who 40 years ago would name their dogs a racial slur and claim to be "just calling the dog." If anybody objected, they'd rally a mob to beat up the "puppy hater."

Violentacrez was finally outed by Gawker last year, but thousands of his trollish kin remain—and plenty of them lurk under literary bridges.

So don't give them an excuse to terrorize you. Follow the rules. Nobody deserves to be bullied, but you're safer if the bullies don't notice you.

Remember: social media should not be used for direct marketing. It should be used for making friends. You wouldn't wear an advertising sandwich board to a Chamber of Commerce mixer, but a lot of authors are doing the digital equivalent. It makes them bully-bait.

If the bullies catch you breaking their rules—even unwritten ones—they will destroy your career and reputation with all the self-righteous sadism of the Taliban slaughtering a schoolgirl.

Unfortunately, ferreting out those rules can be daunting. Even when they're posted, they're usually obfuscated by legal jargon written in a fly-speck font. I've only learned the following by trial and error. Lots of error. When I wrote this post urging older people to learn to write Amazon reviews, I was pretty naive. I still urge readers of my generation to write reviews—this is a culture desperately in need of grown-ups—but if I'd known about the hostility of the review culture, I would have worded it more carefully.

Since then, I've been saying, "I wish somebody would post the rules!"

But hey, nobody has, so here they are—as well as I can figure out. Pass them on to your marketing department.

Rule #1 Never Spam 

Easy to say; harder to follow.

What is spam? It's unwanted promotion: the digital equivalent of those sales pitch phone calls you get just as you're sitting down to a family dinner.

But one person's spam is another person's "savvy marketing." One of our biggest problems is that spam is defined differently depending on where you are.

Here's a detailed post on how NOT to spam on specific sites like Facebook, Twitter, Goodreads, forums, etc.

A few authors have spammed and gamed the system so badly that we're all paying the price.

Some readers have reacted so negatively they've invented a bizarre dichotomy of readers vs. writers. They consider anybody who writes to be the mortal enemy of "readers." Don't ask me where they think reading material comes from. A Magical Book Stork in the Sky may be involved.

Of course, in real life, authors are voracious readers, but remember this is a videogame world, so they need an enemy.

Mention you've written a book—even an unpublished one—and that enemy is you.

Rule #2: Never Trade Reviews

It's against Amazon's terms of service. A violation can get you kicked off Amazon. It will certainly get your reviews pulled if you're caught.

One of the tricks of the early Amazon-gaming authors was to give a book a 5-star review, then contact the reviewed author and demand a 5-star in return. If the targeted author refused, the 5-star would be reduced to a one-star.

Not all trading of reviews is the result of blackmail. Lots of authors drop hints they expect a quid pro quo when they've written a good review. Do not fall into this trap. Even if you love the reviewer's book, you could be violating Amazon's TOS.

One of Amazon's rules is that you can't review a product if you will benefit from the proceeds. That's why your Mom can't give you a review. Or your editor. You also can't review if you have a "rival" product. This has been interpreted recently to mean "any author who writes in the same genre"—even if that review is positive.  I think that's silly, but it's best to be safe.

In the great Amazon review purge following the purchased-review scandal of 2012, thousands of reviews were removed, some of which were solid, honest reviews, so you need to avoid any hint of impropriety. If you love the book of an author in your genre who has given you a nice review, and you want to avoid any worries, give her a spotlight or interview on your blog or offer a blurb to be included in the "editorial reviews" instead of appearing to trade.

Update: South African author Niki Savage reports that an Amazon spokesperson told her the Zon has revoked the rule that authors can't review other authors in their genre! I don't know if this applies to the Zon worldwide, but if you've been dying to review a book in your favorite genre, go for it!

Rule #3: Don't Pay for Customer Reviews 

As I mentioned above, buying reviews is a major no-no. Not only will they be removed, but your career can take a big hit. When John Locke got caught doing it a year ago, he got hit with hundreds of one-stars and his sales slowed considerably. 

It's OK to pay for a professional review from Kirkus, Publisher's Weekly, or other respected publication like the Midwest Book Review. But those reviews can't be posted on Amazon as "customer reviews." You can paste a quote into the "editorial reviews" section. But a customer review is not supposed to be for sale. 

Even a free book is considered "payment" by some, so book review bloggers are now required to post disclaimers when they review a book they have received from the author or publisher, although free review copies have always been a standard practice in the industry.

(Recently a blogpost was circulating that accused pretty much every major indie author of purchasing 500+ book reviews from Fivrr. This was a nasty hoax. Some of the authors accused don't even have 500 reviews on all their books combined.)

Rule #4 Never Respond to Your Reviews

If a review violates the rules, you can ask for it to be removed, but responding—even to a good review—makes some reviewers nervous. They want to feel we're off in another realm somewhere, not right here looking over their shoulders.

On places like Goodreads, people will call you a "badly behaving author" simply for thanking a thoughtful reviewer for a good review.

What you can do when you get a fantastic review is follow the reviewer on other social media and hope they'll initiate contact. Several of my reviewers have become good friends because I friended them on Facebook. But resist the urge to say "thank you" in the comments of the review itself. I did this myself before I knew the rules, with no bad consequences, but you never know when a vigilante might be lurking. (I'm only talking about review sites here: not blogs. Most bloggers welcome a thank-you for a nice review.)

But especially don't comment on nasty reviews. You're inviting more abuse.

Here are a few facts about reviews that may help to keep your fingers off the keyboard when the nasties hit:

1) Online review sites do not require reviewers to read a book and often allow people to rate a product even before it's available to anyone. This is a convention of the gaming world. It's something videogame companies did in the early days to gauge interest in a new game. Now, unfortunately, it's become a convention in online bookselling.

There's nothing we can do but spread the word that those star ratings don't mean a thing. I wish they'd drop them.

Why do people write nasty, hateful reviews of books they haven't read? Because being nasty and hateful is what they do. A new study says haters really gotta hate. Be glad they're on your book page and not in your living room.

2) One of the most common nasties is the "I hate this genre" review. I've seen plenty of review pages by people who apparently do nothing but troll Amazon for books in genres they hate so they can write one star reviews. Unfortunately, they have that right. 

3) Bestsellers pretty much always get snarky reviews. So accept it as a mark of success. Sometimes they're from sour-grape wannabes and sometimes from sock puppets. (Those are other authors with fake id's trying to get you "out of the way.") But sock puppetry is hard to prove. If the person has no other reviews and mentions a "rival" book, report abuse and hope the Zon elves will give you a hearing.

4) Free books are magnets for cruel reviews. It's one of the reasons free books aren't working as well as they used to.

Give-aways of free paper review copies on Goodreads and other book sites are being gamed. Every day I see authors complain that their expensive review copies are immediately sold on Amazon as "new" and they get no review, or worse, a one-sentence one-star.

So I advise that authors only send paper review copies to established bloggers and reviewers they have a prior relationship with.

NOTE: Always query a book review blogger before sending a review copy and for goodness' sake, READ THE BLOG—why is that so hard? Publicists: I'm talking to you.

5) Luckily, your readers can usually spot a troll review and nice people may even buy the book because of it.

And guess what? There really are a lot more nice people than nasty ones. One way to fight all this is to be one of the good guys. Writing honest reviews of books you like is the best way to fight this behavior. 

Rule # 5: Always Report Abuse (and take a screenshot)

These crimes are new—and span continents—but when a few sociopaths interfere with the bottom line of multinational corporations, you can be sure somebody's going to figure out how to control them.

That may result in restricted freedom for us all, so cutting down on it now is in everybody's interest. That's why you need to report abuse whenever you see it.

Okay, what's a screenshot? If you're a Boomer like Ruth and me, you may not know much about them.

But it turns out there's a way to take a photo of what's on your screen.  I could really have used it when I witnessed some abuse recently. But since then, I've found this great thing called Awesome Screenshot that puts a button right on your toolbar. You just click on that button and, voila! You can capture the whole page, the visible part or a partial. You can even make red circles around the pertinent spots.

Note: a negative, snarky review is not abuse. A review that's obscene, threatening, or attacks the author personally is. So is an ad for another author's book or services.

So you have to live with a review that says: 

"This wud be the wurst buk i ever red, if i wudda red it." 

But you can report one that says:

"This author is a cyberslut-boy who gay-sexted with Anthony Weiner."

or

"Somebody should #%&*@#!@$&*%!!! you sidewayswith a %*&@#!!!"

or 

"This book is soooo boring. My erotic romance FIFTY SHADES OF DRYING PAINT is much more exciting. Here's the link."

A barrage of One-star personal attacks, called "swarming" can usually be removed. Character assassination by "review" is one of the more heinous misuses of Amazon and Goodreads.

To report abuse:

1) On FaceBook there's a little downward-arrow to the right of the post that will bring up a menu. One of the possible selections is "report abuse." Unfortunately the trolls have found it too, and they love to report people for abuse when they haven't done anything. But if that happens, you can write to appeals@facebook.com.

2) On Twitter Click on "***more" in the lower right corner of the tweet. This brings up a menu for "share", "embed" or "report". "Report" brings up a new menu where you can simply block, mark as spam, "compromised" (for when your Tweep has been hacked) or "abusive". "Abusive" brings up a form to fill out. It's more hoop jumping than they used to require, but that's to prevent trolls from reporting random innocents for abuse, as has been happening on FB.

3) On Amazon there's a prominent button for reporting abuse. Use it especially if you see abuse on another author's page. Amazon will pay more attention if it's from somebody other than the victim.

4) On Goodreads the button for "flagging" abuse is harder to find, but this post by friend of the blog Lexa Cain will tell you how. Also report abuse to the administrators via support@goodreads.com. Goodreads has tolerated rampant abuse of their review and "shelving" system for a long time. But now they're trying to clean up their act, so they will pay attention to your reports.

Even if you don't see an immediate result, things are probably happening behind the scenes. Site admin. usually pays attention to abuse reports only after they get a lot. So report.

This just in. Some of the info I have here is wrong. We DON'T have to live with misleading reviews. Here's an enlightening addition from attorney Janet Normalvanbruecher,a practicing attorney with a sub-speciality in intellectual property law.

"Just because a multi-national corporation willfully breaks the law does not mean it is legal!

SELLERS HAVE AN AFFIRMATIVE DUTY TO ENSURE ANY CUSTOMER TESTIMONIAL THEY USE TO SELL PRODUCTS IS TRUE

I will list links to the relevant legal statutes, government agencies, and news sources so your readers know they DO have recourse.

1. Online customer reviews are a form of 'endorsement' or 'customer testimonial.'

REF: Federal Trade Commission overview video - http://www.business.ftc.gov/multimedia/videos/ftc-endorsement-guides

(Note: due to the government shutdown you can't access this video until the trolls in congress stop bickering ... but it's excellent).

2. This doesn't just apply to online bloggers, but ANY distributor (seller) or other website that makes their money selling third-party review data to create sales. The operative word is 'commerce.' It has to somehow involve money.

REF: Federal Trade Commission Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising (this link is not effected by the gov't shutdown):

http://ftc.gov/os/2009/10/091005revisedendorsementguides.pdf

3. Attorney generals nationwide are beginning to crack down on fraudulent third-party review sites such as YELP who rates hotels and restaurants much the way Goodreads reviews books:

REF: http://www.nbcnews.com/business/ny-attorney-general-cracks-down-fake-online-reviews-4B11235875

4. If you believe a review is false, you can file a complaint with these Federal Agencies (note: due to the shutdown you may need to wait until congress finishes bickering):

a. The Federal Trade Commission: www.ftccomplaintassistant.gov

b. The Better Business Bureau: https://www.bbb.org/consumer-complaints/file-a-complaint/get-started

c. Your local state attorney general's office:
Google: YOUR STATE + ATTORNEY GENERAL CONSUMER AFFAIRS DIVISION + FILE COMPLAINT

There are also ways to track the IP address of people who post a comment on a blog and then drag them into court to personally sue them, but right now the government is beginning to get interested in how big multinational internet sellers such as Amazon and big multinational internet rating sites such as Goodreads are gaming the system, so I recommend you file a complaint with THEM. It takes HUNDREDS of complaints to get the government to stick their nose into something, but as you can see from the New York AG/YELP scandal, eventually they usually do.

To tie it up ... do as Anne recommends ... avoid troll havens ... never comment on a review ... quietly report the troll-dung and walk away ... but PLEASE take the next step and also file complaints with the appropriate government agencies, not just the media. The media is not always sympathetic to authors. 

The government, on the other hand, is very interested in how powerful Amazon and its sub-rating sites have become. Tie it to MONEY (lost sales), not fairness, and eventually the government will get off it's backside and bite back the trolls FOR you." ...Janet Normalvanbruecher 

Rule #6: Never Argue with a Drunk or a Fool

Internet bullies are both. They are literally drunk on their own rage. Rage can trigger endorphins that create a high similar to cocaine or meth.

How far do you think you'd get using reason and logic with a crazed tweaker on the street? Right. Then don't try it on the Internet. Even if they are wrong. Because guess what? They almost always are.

This famous 2008 cartoon from xkcd says it all.

The most important thing to remember when you encounter unpleasantness is: take a breath, verify facts, and don't over-react. As Bob Mayer said on his blog last week: "The internet is a very dangerous place. I’ve seen internet lynch mobs go crazy over the slightest thing (done it myself a time or two) but a day or two of waiting and watching isn’t going to change anything."

When cybermonkeys start tossing verbal feces around a forum or blog, treat it like any other pile of poop.

• Carefully walk around it.
• Realize you don't have to tell anybody what it is. Its stink will give it away.
• Call maintenance.
• Go someplace cleaner.

You might want to send private messages of support to victims, but don't stand up for victims in cyberpublic no matter how much your inner Atticus Finch is hurting to speak.

I didn’t follow that advice recently and I'm still scraping stuff off my shoe.

Rule #7 Stay Out of Rough Neighborhoods

Absolute Write is no longer recommended. I used to suggest looking there for info on bogus agents and scam publishers. These days, it's so dominated by bitter, bad-tempered snark, you'd probably be safer with the scammers.

Amazon Forums: The Deadwood of the publishing frontier. Brutally anti-author and out of control with vigilantism.

LinkedIn Writers Groups. Some may be safe, but I've unsubscribed from all the ones I belonged to. Way too many rageaholics. LinkedIn is the most invasive of all social media and if you're not on it because of work, I'd recommend you stay away. They'll try to trick you into giving them access to all your email accounts so they can spam every one of your contacts mercilessly in your name, including every agent you've ever queried.

Goodreads: Mean Girls meets Lord of the Flies. This site has been desperately in need of adult supervision for a long time. Recently, they have made big steps in cleaning up the site, but I'd still suggest you stay in safe, author-oriented groups. (I'm fond of my BoomerLit group.) And don't read your reviews!

Or, to be really safe, follow the advice one agent tells her clients: "Go to Goodreads to put up an author profile. Link to your blog. Log out. Never go back."

Rule #8: Change your definition of "review" and don't take online reviews so seriously

1) An online product review is nothing like a traditional book review. When most of us think of a book review, we think of something in the New York Times, or a thoughtful assessment of a work written by a sincere blogger who has read the book and done some careful thinking and writing about it.

But online product reviews—as established in the early days of the Internet—are essentially comments, like the comments you see at the end of online news stories or a You Tube entry.

That means some online "reviewers" bear the same resemblance to traditional book reviewers that homicidal baseball fans do to sports commentators: not much.

2) Cruel, angry reviews say more about the reviewer than they do about your book. And they put you in excellent company.  I know yours hurt like a physical wound, but it helps to read some of the idiotic one-stars of the classics.

3)  It's an urban myth that Amazon requires a certain number of reviews or stars or "likes" on your author page to "move you up the ranks." Only one thing does that: sales.

Some advertising newsletters like Kindle Nation Daily, E-Reader News Today and BookBub do require tons of 5-star reviews, but I think that encourages gaming the system so I use advertisers that don't, like E-Book Bargains UK.

For actual readers, it's much more important to have a few good reviews and some good editorial reviews from well known authors. So don't obsess.

4) A lot of people view retail site reviews as a place for comic relief. Some can be hilarious. Actor George Takei recently made "top reviewer" status on Amazon for his reviews of odd products. I dare you not to laugh.

Others can be morbid and weird, like the Yelp reviews of the hotel where a body was found in the water cistern, or reviews of a wife-killer's "self-help" books.

5) Bad reviews don't always mean bad sales. One young writer engaged in an ill-advised snark battle with an ex that ended up in getting her book over 100 one-star nasty, racist reviews. But her book seems to be selling briskly.

6) Amazon also has an ultra-competitive "top 500/100/50 reviewer" program and you can get caught in their games. According to many reports, Grand Theft Auto mentality is rampant there. Reviewer-on-reviewer bullying and competition can be toxic. I've seen them use review comments and "useful" voting buttons to harass each other. Or they give one-stars to books their rivals love. With the author or vendor getting caught in the middle.

This is obvious breach of Amazon rules, so clicking the "report abuse" button usually solves the problem, but it can be traumatizing for the baffled author.

There is a rigid Amazon review culture and fall afoul of it at your peril. I've just heard of a new book about it called How to Get Good Reviews on Amazon by Theo Rogers, which may explain some more of the arcane rules.

7) Most people who write product reviews and comments are sincere, helpful customers, and some Amazon book reviewers are old school literary experts who could be published in any upscale magazine.

The best way to clean up the review system is add your honest reviews to the mix. Join the ranks of the sincere and helpful! 

I know sometimes it seems as if nastiness on the Interwebz is getting worse, but according to some, it's actually turning around. In the May 2013 issue of Esquire, Stephen Marche said: "The Internet has reached peak hate. It had to. At every other moment in history when there has been an explosion of text — whether through social change, like the birth of a religious movement, or technological change, like the advent of print — a period of nasty struggle ensued before the forces of civility reined it in."

Let's hope for those forces of civility to step in soon.

***

Please don't discuss any specific recent incidents of bullying in the comments, or we'll attract monkey-poo (and if you see it, don't respond. Let it stink for itself.)

But don't keep bullying stories to yourself. Lawyers, law enforcement, and journalists are collecting information and will be grateful for your input. You can leave an incident report for NBC news here. There's more info at the International Bullying Prevention Website.

What about you, scriveners? Do you think Internet can be civilized? What other rules should writers follow to stay safe? Can you recommend other safe places for writers? Know of any other bad neighborhoods we should avoid? Do you think retailers should drop the "star" system on online reviews?

Book Bargain of the Week

Food of Love: a comic thriller about dieting, chocolate, and a small nuclear bomb.

Part thriller and part screwball romantic comedy, Food of Love is a rollercoaster comedy that also addresses complex issues about body image, religion and a woman's right to choose.

Usually $2.99, now only 99c on Amazon , Amazon UK and NOOK

"This hilarious page-turner packs a profound satirical bite. It's a Hollywood romp that provides romance, mystery, and an honest confrontation with the human condition. Food of Love is a funny and powerfully healing book." ...Lucia Capacchione, PhD, bestselling self-help author, Recovery of Your Inner Child

Opportunity Alerts

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Become a Certified Ghostwriter! with the only university level course in ghostwriting. Designed to expand or launch lucrative, professional careers, this course meets online Mondays from 5:30 - 8:30 PM Pacific beginning Oct 14, 2013. Certification at the end of the two semesters is conferred by California State University, Long Beach.

Boomers!! The Huffington Post's Huffpo50 is now publishing short fiction! The rules: You must be 50 or older to enter. Writers can submit only one story per year, and all pieces must be 5,000 words or less. Send your original submissions, as well as your contact details, to 50fiction@huffingtonpost.com.

Get your book international visibility for a reasonable price. EBUK is now advertising bargain books to a dozen countries, including the US and Canada. You can get more info here. Make sure your book is under $3.99 and provide links to all stores, not not only Amazon (unless you're in Select.) Ads are a little over 10 bucks until the end of August. And you can sign up for the newsletter for your country right here. I've signed up for the new US version. If you like bargain ebooks, this is a great free service.

Military Sci Fi Anthology. VFW: Veterans of Future Wars from Martinus Publishing. Write Military stories? Could one of them be set in the future? This is the anthology for you! 2000-6000 words. Make sure to follow submission guidelines. No docx files. Deadline Dec. 31, 2013.

***

This month Anne has an article about the pressures social media puts on authors at Talking Writing, the magazine for creative writers and readers.

Read More

How a 91-year-old Author's Debut Mystery Hit the Bestseller List

NEVER GIVE UP ON YOUR DREAMS!

Recently, my publisher, MWiDP, relaunched Shirley S. Allen’s cozy mystery, ACADEMIC BODY as an ebook. Sales had slowed for the print version published by Mainly Murder Press in 2010, but Mark Williams saw my ad for the book on this blog, read it and loved it. He saw a strong future for it as an ebook--especially in the international market, where classic mysteries still sell.

Shirley S. Allen happens to be my mom, who turned 91 years old in May. 

So this is an emphatic lesson for every aspiring writer out there: IT'S NEVER TOO LATE! Keep at it and your publishing dreams will come true. 

The ebook of ACADEMIC BODY launched in June and had steady sales, but we were kind of disappointed in the numbers until last weekend, when Mark decided to give it some of the free days allowed to ebooks in Amazon’s KDP Select program.

I should note there’s a certain amount of controversy surrounding the concept of giving free ebooks. On the plus side, it’s great advertising that costs nothing.  But the whole concept of free books rubs some authors the wrong way, since it seems to contribute to the devaluing of our product.

But with the advent of Amazon's KDP Select program last year, the freebie became the technique of choice for launching ebooks—both for self-publishers and small presses.

It worked brilliantly when Amazon algorithms gave free books the same boost in “popularity” as their regular inventory. Catherine Ryan Hyde had a huge success with KDP Select free days when launching her self-published novel WHEN I FOUND YOU. I wrote about Catherine’s phenomenal success last month in my post Social Media vs. A New York Times Book Review Cover: Which Sells More Books. After dismal initial sales, Catherine made her book free for three days and the subsequent bounce made her enough money to buy a Lexus. Not a brand new one, but a very, very nice car.

A change in the Amazon algorithms on May 3rd made cheap and free books much less bouncy, but still Catherine was able to launch her book DON’T LET ME GO with a two-day give-away that gave a nice boost to sales.

Author Shirley S. Allen

Catherine and I did the same thing with our nonfiction book HOW TO BE A WRITER IN THE E-AGE. The freebie got us to #1 in free writing books for three days, ahead of the new Eisler-Konrath book, and two of agent Noah Lukeman’s offerings. But then sales went down to well below where they’d been before we went free. We not only got no bounce, but the freebie seems to have worked against us.

Except that it got us some very nice reviews. Thanks to the lovely readers who took the time to write them. Free books that get thoughtful reviews are never wasted. (And it’s still only $2.99, everybody: great deal! And it tells you important stuff about launching your writing career that you won’t get anywhere else, whether you’re self-pubbing or going the traditional route. OK, end of commercial break.)  

It was a learning experience. Nonfiction books with a limited audience do not seem to benefit from free give-aways.

In spite of this, we decided to go ahead and offer my mom’s book as a freebie last weekend. Quite frankly, our hopes weren’t that high. This book is a classic cozy set in a small New England town. It’s beautifully written and plotted, but the criminal activity is all offstage. There’s none of the mayhem, high body count or torture fashionable in today’s crime fiction. But it’s also not one of the crafty cozies that are currently popular with older readers: nobody knitted or tatted or made throw pillows out of dryer lint. The sleuths are a couple of sophisticated middle-aged married people who love each other--much more Nick and Nora Charles than Alex Cross or Stephanie Plum.

But what happened next was epic!

ACADEMIC BODY shot up to the top ten in the thrillers and suspense category. And it started to climb up the top 100 in the entire Kindle free store. By the second day, it was at #2 in thrillers—probably the most competitive fiction genre—and #30 of all free Kindle books. And it stayed there.

And, curse you Bob Mayer, it might even have gone to #1 if Bob’s new Black Ops thriller hadn’t been free the same weekend.

By the time ACADEMIC BODY went off its three free days, it had over 10,500 downloads. Remember how I said last month that the bump a book gets from a New York Times Book Review cover can be as little as 82 actual books sold? Compare that with moving 10,500 books!

Obviously the big difference is that the NYT author’s book cost money and my mom’s didn’t. But still, over 10K people decided to download her book to their Kindles. Considering how many 1000s of Kindle books are free at any given moment, and how many of us have Kindles already loaded than more books than we can read in the next 10 years, it’s pretty durn amazing.

So why did this particular free book climb to such heights?

Here are some things I suspect may have helped:

1) The Perfect Cover. The cover of ACADEMIC BODY, designed by Patricia L. Foltz of Mainly Murder Press, shows an inviting room bathed in amber light—lined with books—and just the legs of a deceased person in the shadowy foreground. It’s the classic “body in the library.” It immediately brings to mind Agatha Christie.

And those books in the library are so inviting and warm. Perhaps as we lose paper books to technology, we’re already getting a little nostalgic for them? To a reader, there’s hardly anything more inviting than a cozy room full of books.

The cover is a seductive invitation to read.

2) A Great Bio. I rewrote my mother’s bio for this book launch, adding material about her academic achievements. In the past, publishers haven’t wanted to advertise that she has a PhD in English Literature and wrote the definitive book on the life of London’s great 19^th century Shakespearean actor-manager, Samuel Phelps. Her publishers were afraid she’d sound stuffy and boring.

But in today’s world of so much not-ready-for-prime-time self-publishing, I thought readers would like to know the author has a superb command of the English language. Plus the protagonist of ACADEMIC BODY is a theater director. I figure it’s a plus to know the author has in-depth knowledge of the subject matter.

3) An Established Social Network. No, my Mom isn’t spending her days on Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr. The network is mine. It was easy to use my own connections to promote her book. Plus I went to some senior sites and FB and LinkedIn pages for alums of Bryn Mawr—our alma mater. That allowed me to reach out to people who aren’t in the current writing scene and didn’t know about free Kindle ebooks, but were very interested in books about academia. And of course they wanted to support a fellow alum.

4) Serendipity. We didn’t think about the Olympics when we chose last weekend, but I think the games worked in our favor. Most of the people interested in action and sports were glued to the tube, watching the spectacular competitions in London—so the readers who might be more likely to buy an action-adventure type of thriller were otherwise occupied. The non-sports fans were at loose ends, looking for some less sweaty entertainment.

5) Writing in a Genre that’s Under-Represented by Mainstream Publishing. It seems readers still want classic mysteries. In fact, they may be starved for them. Contemporary mysteries usually fall into the James Patterson/Steig Larsson category (graphically violent serial killer thrillers) or Janet Evanovich types (rom-com mysteries like mine) or the crafty cozies I mentioned earlier. 

But classic mysteries are puzzles that engage the mind and leave the reader satisfied that justice has prevailed. At the end of a classic mystery, all is right with the world. Evolved intelligence has prevailed over primitive brute force. Reading a classic mystery gives order to the universe--like listening to Mozart.

After the spectacular success of the freebie days, ACADEMIC BODY did get a nice bounce. Not enough for my mom to trade in her old Acura, but the book is selling much, much better than it did before the freebie days. And the paper version from Mainly Murder seems to be moving, too.

Does that mean giving away free books will work for everybody? No. As I say, it didn't work for our nonfic. book. And I’m not sure how much longer cheap and free books are going to be of benefit as marketing tools.

Mark Coker of Smashwords said in an interview with Forbes this week that he thinks many self-publishers are undervaluing their work. Like Amazon, Smashwords has changed its algorithm so it no longer counts free and 99-cent books as “sales” with the same weight as sales of books priced at $2.99 and up. Mr. Coker says he “found that the $2.99 to $5.99 price band appears to be the sweet spot for indie authors, those prices over-performed the average in terms of income for the author. But 99¢ and $1.99 under-performed.”

And free? It still seems to be working for some fiction right now--it sure did for my mom. Her next book—a historical—is due out next month and we'll see how that works out. But whatever happens, I know nothing's going to stand in the way of her dreams!

What about you, scriveners? Have give-aways worked to promote your work? Do you read a lot of free Kindle books? How do you feel about free ebooks? Do you have a dream you'll never give up on?

Don’t forget the Central Coast Writers Conference in beautiful San Luis Obispo CA. It will be held on September 21^st and 22^nd on the campus of Cuesta College. Last year I got to meet Mark Coker in person there.  This year will have an equally exciting roster of speakers and presenters (including yours truly.)

On Wednesday, August 15th, I'll be visiting the awesome blog of M. Christine Weber, to talk about being a writer--and a reader--in the e-age, and why it's such a great time for us all. 

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How to Blog VI: 15 Tips for Guest Bloggers

Guest posting on blogs is a great marketing tool. The frenzy for blog tours seems to have quieted down a bit  recently, but whether you’re launching a new title, promoting an editorial service, or simply building platform, providing content for other people's blogs is still an effective way to reach potential new readers or customers in a personal, interactive way--and hey, it's free!

For writers who aren't comfortable with keeping a blog of your own, it's also a fantastic way to get yourself known in the blogosphere.  

If you’re currently marketing a book, you've probably been urged to line up some guest blogging gigs. If you’re with a big publisher, you may have a publicist who will book a blog tour for you.

Guest blogging can be a lot of fun. You can meet fascinating new people and reach out to readers. I’m so grateful to the wonderful bloggers who have hosted me. I didn’t know all the ropes at first myself, so have to admit I’ve learned some of this stuff the embarrassing way.

Unfortunately, a lot of the information on the Interwebz about guest posting isn’t specific to publishing/ writing blogs. You may hear that you should search for blogs that contain certain keywords and mass query them—or only approach bloggers with a high traffic ranking. This advice can end up wasting your time.

And, um, make you look like a doofus.

You wouldn’t believe how many emails I get like this: “Hello Blogger: I see your blog, ANNE R. ALLEN’S BLOG has an Alexa rating under 300,000, and you once wrote a post on topic X on ANNE R. ALLEN’S BLOG so I (or “my client”) would like to guest blog on ANNE R. ALLEN’S BLOG next week. We’re offering this content free of charge, Blogger.”

Do I really have to explain why that gets our hackles up? The assumption is that we don’t have enough good content of our own, we don't plan ahead, and we’ll take any old content out of the blue, sight unseen. And—try a little Golden Rule stuff here, publicists—who do you know who likes to be addressed as a generic nobody by some robot?

We want posts from people who are familiar with our blog and have something valuable to offer you, our readers—not something to throw on Blogger so Ruth and I don’t have to write a post this week.  And because we only post four times a month, every piece has to be fresh, hooky, and content-rich enough to keep our audience coming back. We also book our guests way in advance so we can drum up interest in the visit.

Here are some tips on how to avoid annoying the bloggers and get the most out of blog touring and guest-posting:

1)     Don’t judge a blog by Alexa rating alone.You’ll only get a small piece of the picture.

Alexa is a Web analytics company that rates websites globally according to traffic. (You can download your own rating icon by going to Alexa.com.) Google rates a 1. Amazon has an 11. Top publishing sites like Nathan Bransford’s or Jane Friedman’s get around 140K. Ours hovers around 300K. Most author sites are in the millions.

But if you’re an author with a southern vampire saga, a blog with a small readership of Sookie Stackhouse fans can reach more actual readers than a major blog that focuses on something like Action-SciFi or Christian romance. I learned that on my own blog tour: the guest post that generated the most sales was for the blog with the “worst” stats. But the readers were in exactly the right demographic for my romantic comedy/thriller  Food of Love.

On the other hand, if your own blog has an Alexa rating of 12 million, it’s not a good idea to approach somebody with much better rating—especially a stranger—and expect them to welcome you with open arms. If you don’t have a blog following of your own to bring to the table, you’ve got to have some spectacular content to offer. 

2)     Don’t expect a blogger to be impressed with “free.” That isn’t going to impress a blogger any more than it would impress the staff of the New Yorker. Most successful blogs have a very specific style and audience and not everybody is going to be a good fit. Most author blogs are not monetized, so we’re ALL working for free.

3)     Don’t offer “content” that’s just an advertisement for your business or books. Offer something of real value to the reader. This is the #1 thing we run across in guest blog offers. If we monetized, a small ad on a site like this would easily cost $25 or more per day. Professional publicists know that, so when they breezily ask for what is basically a free, week-long, full-page advertisement, it’s insulting.

4)     Make a strong pitch and show that your content is up to the expectations of this audience. Each post here averages about 3000 hits, but one mediocre post can permanently lose some of that audience for us. You’re asking us to take a risk. Convince us you’re worth it.

5)     Address the blogger by name. And, um, if the blog is called “Anne R. Allen’s Blog…with Ruth Harris” this shouldn’t strain anybody’s brain cells. 

6)     Make requests by email, not Tweet or FB DM.Those get lost and people can’t find you again. A quick pitch in the blog comments is OK with me—as long as it’s on-topic—but be careful because not all bloggers feel the same way. To me it shows you read the blog and engage with other readers, so a dynamite (short) comment pitch might get a request for more info.

7)     Um, VISIT THE BLOG! Read a few posts and comment. This should be no-brainer, but most of the people who query us don’t seem to have a clue what the blog is about.

It helps a lot if you’ve commented a few times, too.

NOTE: Commenting on blogs may actually be an even more effective tool than guest posting—and it sure is easier. Social Media guru Bob Mayer  said on his blog last week:

 “One of the best networking tools is to go to people’s blogs and leave cogent comments.  People tend to read the comments on their own blogs.  If you make sense, you will get noticed.”

8)     Conform to the blog’s tone. This blog is lighthearted and fun. Doom and gloom and a “boot camp” mentality will totally annoy our readership. So will posts that tell them to spend a lot of money on services they don’t need.

9)     Don’t offer off-topic content. Just because I once made a joke about airport security doesn’t mean we want to run a blogpost on the evils of the TSA. The blog header says “Writing about writing. Mostly.”  If you don’t have content for writers, you’re wasting your time.

10) Always follow the blogger’s guidelines. Some bloggers are very kind and post them. Alex J. Cavanaugh has a great set of guidelines here. We don’t post ours, because with four posts a month, we take very few guests and we don’t want to be swamped with offers we have to turn down. Make sure you find out how soon they need the material (I like a long lead time, so I can pimp the post.) Also find out what the word count needs to be. (This varies widely, so always ask.)

11) Include pictures, bio and links and send your copy as an attachment. Don't make the blogger look up your buy pages, or go to your website for your publicity package. Your copy should contain live links, and you should attach a .jpg of your book cover and your author photo. You can also include a short blurb for your book, if you’re promoting one, but make it short and sweet. The blogger may not use your blurb, but it’s worth sending one along. NOTE: It's best to send your copy in a Word.doc (Word 2003) not a .docx, since some people still use programs that can't read a .docx. 

12)  Offer a free copy of your book as part of the promotion. Not every blog does give-aways (we don't do them often) but it's common practice, so be prepared to offer one.

13) Plan to be available to respond to commentson the day of the post and check in for several days after.

14) Promote the guest post on social media. Tweet, FB, and link from your own blog. You want people to read it, right?

15) Remember to thank the blogger, either in the comment thread or a follow-up email. They are giving you free advertising, so a little gratitude is in order.

The rules for queries are actually pretty much the same whether you’re querying an agent, a reviewer, a blogger or a potential boss: find out who the person is before you take up their time— then take up as little of it as possible.

Personally, who am I most likely to invite to guest post? Somebody who comments regularly and has interesting ideas, not just a product to sell.

Ruth and I do love our guest bloggers and we’ve had some of the best: Lawrence Block , Catherine Ryan Hyde , Samuel Park , Janice Hardy, Jeff Carlson , Elizabeth S. Craig , Roni Loren , Kim Wright , Michael Brandman , Michelle Davidson Argyle , Rick Daley , Danielle Smith, Mark Williams—and of course Ruth Harris (who was such a popular guest I wouldn’t let her leave) –thank you all!

We’d love to hear from you, scriveners. Do you like to read posts from guests? Do you like to have guests on your own blog? Do you think visiting other blogs helps sell your books? Do you have any tips to add?

This week I’ll be doing some guest blogging of my own—Laura Pauling is hosting me at her Spies, Murder and Mystery Marathon. My piece on the real-life Hollywood mystery that inspired THE GATSBY GAME will appear on Tuesday May 8^h.

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Why One Author Chose Traditional Publishing--And How to Decide if it's Right for You

Roni Loren's blog Fiction Groupie has been one of my favorites since I first began reading blogs. I was so happy for her when she signed with her agent, Sara Megibow (who is with one of the classiest, most pro-author agencies around, the Kristin Nelson Agency.) Then I was even happier when she got her book deal. 


As most of you know, I turned down an offer of representation last fall and decided to go the small publisher route so I could keep more control. It's working very well for me and I'm about to launch book #5, THE BEST REVENGE--the prequel to my comic Camilla Randall mysteries.


Ruth Harris has happily gone from the Big 6 (as an editor as well as author) to self-publishing, and we've talked a lot about the indie Kindle revolution. We had a popular post from Rick Daley in October, "When Landing an Agent Lands You Nowhere" telling what it's like to be represented by an agent who can't sell your work.


But lest Ruth and I seem to give too much weight to the "Self-Aggrandizing Self-publishing Monarch-persons," I decided it was time to hear from an author who is comfortable with the traditional publishing process. There's a lot of snarky "us vs. them" talk that goes on in the blogosphere, so I wanted to offer a positive view of traditional "legacy" publishing for those of you who are still holding onto that dream. If you read Publisher's Lunch, you'll see that deals are still being made for debut authors every week, and New York publishing is still alive and well. Not everybody is cut out to be a "wrublisher" or deal with the seat-of-your-pants world of small presses. So here's Roni with a great "can't we all get along" message for the Holidays. She is so right: don't let anybody criticize your dream!

Why I Went Traditional and 

7 Reasons Why You Should (or Shouldn't)
by Roni Loren

First, I want to thank Anne for having me over here at her fantabulous blog. I always learn something new when I stop by, and I love her philosophy of slow-blogging (even though I have yet to take it up myself, lol.) And Anne and I are both traveling on similar journeys with our books coming out, yet we've gone about it different ways. So Anne asked me to talk a little about the journey to debut authorhood from the perspective of someone who chose the traditional route.

There is some polarizing going on in the writing world lately. People in general like to take sides on issues and writers are no exception. Plotter or Pantser? Fast Drafting or Edit-As-You-Go? Literary or Genre Fiction? Man, we love to debate.

And most recently the topic on the docket is Indie vs. Traditional publishing. Both "sides" are guilty of hocking loogies at the other. Traditional pub people complain about the lack of quality in self-pubbed stuff, they fuss about Amazon, they lament about ebooks and missing the smell of paper. (Dude, WHY is everyone smelling their books?)

Then indie pubbed people talk about how traditional authors are letting themselves get totally screwed, they refer to Big Publishing like they're evil overlords, and they talk about how so many horrible books get published traditionally every day. "Look a typo! In a Big 6 book! Gah, the crap that makes it out! Editors aren't editing anymore!"

I'm not going to go into the whole debate because that's already been done well by Bob Mayer--read his post Writers For Traditional Publishers=Slave? Indie authors=f**kwad. Come on!.

But here's the thing I want everyone to hear: WE ARE ON THE SAME TEAM

Writers are writers. Day to day we do the same things. And unless you're one of the BIG TIME multi-million dollar deal writers, we're ALL underdogs. We all have an uphill battle trying to sell books in a crap economy to a public who is reading less and less every year and who would rather a new app than a new book.

And you know what? How we do that is just a detail. Yes, if you go indie, you're going to have different challenges than if you go traditional. But the reverse is also true. Each path has it's own pros and cons. And the beauty of this whole thing is...

Your dream doesn't have to be the same as my dream.

So stop wasting time with these debates on who's right, who's better. Worry about what is best for YOU and your career. What path is going to fit your needs best?

Not sure what path is better for you? 

~Some key things to consider~

1. Validation - How deep is your need for validation from professionals?

This was a component for me. Part of my dream was to hear from an agent and a respected editor that my writing was good enough and that they believed it was worth paying money for. I found it enormously validating to know that Nelson Lit got 36,000 queries in 2010 and only signed 9 clients and I was one of them. Maybe that says something negative about my self-esteem, but that was part of my dream. Indie publishing would not have given me that. 

However, if you don't need that kind of validation. If you only need to hear from readers who love your work, than that part of traditional publishing doesn't offer you any additional benefit, so maybe indie is the way to go.

2. Deadlines - Do you find them motivating or restrictive?

Working on a deadline can be stressful. And working on someone else's time table is WAY different than your own self-imposed deadlines (like Nano or something). Self-imposed deadlines don't have true consequences beyond a little disappointment or guilt. But deadlines with traditional publishers are part of a legal contract. They are a big deal. 

I do get stressed knowing I have a deadline, but I also find it very motivating. It's taught me to reaarange priorities and not to slack. But if your creativity shuts down under a deadline, then this is a con of traditional publishing. If you indie pub, you set your own schedule.

3. Marketing - Can you balance this with writing?

Let's face it, even in traditional publishing, a lot of your marketing is up to you. I am fully responsible for building my online platform, for blogging, tweeting, getting the word out, blog tours, etc. But there's no denying that I get in some doors that would be much tougher if I were indie pubbed. My book automatically gets reviewed in RT Book Reviews magazine because they review all Berkley Heat books. I was in the Breaking In feature in Writer's Digest magazine this month because I have an agent who helped me with that. I get into the bookstores. I have a publicist through Penguin. My book was selected for Rhapsody's Book Club. I have someone working to sell my foreign rights. All of those things are possible for indie authors but there would have to be a lot more hustle and work for an indie author to get those things.

So I see this as a big pro for traditional publishing. I want to have time to write. I'm not an overly aggressive person, so trying to get my foot in the door for promotion doesn't jive with my personality.

4. Genre - Do you know where you would be shelved in the bookstore? 

I write erotic romance. It's a clearly defined subgenre that sells well. I know exactly where I would be shelved. And that's what a publisher wants. They want to know when they read your book exactly how they would market it and to which kind of readers they would sell it to. When I queried Sara, I said in my query "This story would appeal to readers of Shayla Black, Lauren Dane, and Maya Banks." (Note: I didn't say mine was just like theirs or better than or any such nonsense. I just told her who my market would be. Incidentally, I sold to Berkley Heat who publishes all three of those ladies and I now share an editor with Shayla.) 

So if your book crosses a few genres or doesn't seem to fit in a specific spot in the bookstore (or is in a genre that has been declared "dead"), then indie might be the better option because you have a lot more leeway. You can be more experimental. I think this is one of the most exciting things about indie publishing. My own genre started in the small digital publishers before it went mainstream. I love the idea of having new genre options to read like romantic horror or m/m romance (which is now becoming mainstream because of experimental digital publishers.) 

5. Flexibility - Do you want to write in one genre or many?

In traditional publishing, at least when you're getting started, it behooves you to stick to one genre. You're trying to build a readership and your publisher wants to do the same. So, they don't want to sign you for a three book deal where one is horror, one a western, and one sci-fi. They want you to do one thing really well. Then, once you build up a fan base, you can get the flexibility to branch out. (Just ask those authors I mentioned above. They all do much more than erotic romance now.)  

But writers often have ideas that genre hop. I know I do. I don't only get erotic romance ideas--I'm not a hussy ALL the time. ;)  But I'm happy putting my energy into this right now because I love my series and want to build momentum. However, if that feels overly restrictive to you--indie affords you options. You can publish what you want. You can see which genres sell best for you.

6. Speed - How prolific are you?

Indie publishing favors the fast writer. The more backlist you have, the better chance you have for making a good living. If you can bust out a quality novella in a month, then the thought of waiting 12-18 months (the normal publishing turnaround time for publication) may seem interminable.  

I am a slow-ish writer--though I'm steadily improving. My deadlines are set up to have me finish a 90-100k book in 4-6 months. And that's a fast schedule because my books are going to be released every six months instead of once a year. If I was indie publishing, I wouldn't be getting anymore than two books out a year anyway, so the traditional publishing schedule doesn't hinder me any.

7. Control - Are you a control freak?

In traditional publishing, you still have a lot of control--at least in my experience. They haven't made me change anything I didn't want to. I had input on the covers before their development and after. (In fact, they scrapped my second book's cover when I pointed out an issue and gave me a completely different one.) I had full permission to rewrite the back cover blurbs. I wrote my tag lines on the front. They didn't like my original title but I'm the one who came up with the new one. However, they didn't HAVE to give me all that control. And I'm sure with some publishers, they're a lot more restrictive. And there are definitely things I have absolutely no say in like pricing, print runs, etc. 

So if you know you will have trouble not being in control of some of those things, indie may be the better route. However, remember with all that control comes LOTS of responsibility. My work on my cover involves sending an idea of what I want and photos of my character inspirations. That's it. Then the professionals take over and I don't see it again until they send it to me for final approval. So I've spent maybe 20 minutes working on my cover. If you indie pub, that is going to be a much more extensive process.

So based on all those things, I chose to pursue traditional publishing. And I'm happy with that decision. But you may come out with a different conclusion when you ask yourself those questions.

Figure out what path suits you best and strive for your dream. Don't criticize anyone else's. And remember that dreams can shift. You may find yourself on the other side of the coin one day. In fact, I think the hybrid author who publishes both traditionally and indie is going to be the one best poised for success. So don't go poo-pooing the other side. You may be one of them one day. ;)

So what do you think? What does your dream look like? Are you as tired as I am of people making this a "taking sides" thing? What made you decide on your own path? Which of the issues above are big sticking points for you?

Roni wrote her first romance novel at age fifteen when she discovered writing about boys was way easier than actually talking to them. Since then, her flirting skills haven’t improved, but she likes to think her storytelling ability has. Her debut erotic romance CRASH INTO YOU will be released January 3, 2012 by Berkley Heat/Penguin. If you want to read more posts like this one or follow her journey to debut authorhood, you can visit her writing blog Fiction Groupie or her author blog. She also tweets way too much for her own good.

For this week's Indie Chicks' story--from Katherine Owen--click here. 


Next week, in preparation for your New Year's resolutions, Ruth Harris will blog about PROCRASTINATION. Yeah. That thing you're going to worry about tomorrow.

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