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Hello all!
I have been a member of the Fast Lane forum for a little over a year. I'm actually an Insider, but I am protecting my anonymity here on the chance I decide to reveal my pen name. Most of my business ventures (they are numerous) have been met with failure or marginal success. I am an eternal optimist and tend to ride things all the way to the bottom when I know they're going down. My dad used to tell me, "I'd rather fail a thousand times than quit once." I took that to heart. Anyway, I was perusing the forum toward the end of last month, after the last crash and burn, looking for some inspiration. I decided to read the self-publishing section, something I had ignored before because I have no interest in creating information products.
That's when I read HfR and Chicken Hawk's thread for the first time. I found the inspiration I was looking for. HfR's road map fit my current situation perfectly. So, I spent a day researching genre's and deciding which one I would do. Here's a great resource for that, btw: http://www.tckpublishing.com/list-o...petitive-amazon-kindle-bestseller-categories/
I decided my genre, read the 'look insides' of a few of the top 100 within that subgenre to determine POV and tense. I purposely stayed away from my favorite genres because I didn't want this to become a work of love (though I will admit that I have come to love my characters, damn it!). Then, I sat down and banged out a 60k word novel in three weeks (part of a series). Like I said, I have met with marginal success, just enough to keep me out of the 9 to 5 world, so spending the days writing a novel is no problem for me. I spent a day editing, then another day formatting, creating a cover and writing a summary. I pushed publish on the 19th and started banging out the next one in the series (I'm about 25k words into it right now). I always planned on creating a progress thread, but don't like talking about the things that I'm going to do until I've already done enough to justify sharing my plans.
I approached this with three expectations based on HfR and Chicken Hawks threads:
1. I'm treating this pen name like practice writing. I don't care if it bombs, so long as I steadily improve.
2. I don't expect to have my first month over a thousand dollars until I have eighteen books out.
3. I will not write a book that sells 100 copies a day, but I can write 50 books that each sell 2 copies a day.
Anyway, that is where I'm at. I usually write 2,000 words a day, but sometimes I get in a zone and bang out more. Even had a 5,000 word day a week ago.
Oh, I almost forgot the progress portion of this post. Because it's part of a series, I ran a two day free promo, figuring that one or two people may read it and be interested in the follow up. I climbed to number 48 in free books in my genre and 1100 over all. Gave away a little over 500 books. Netted 0 reviews and only seven sells since then. I have read enough on these threads to know not to have any expectations, so I'm not bothered by the drop off at all. I'm just hoping one or two of those free readers will read the next one. My current ranking is #365,040 Paid in Kindle Store and I don't have a genre ranking underneath it at all.
Again, seven books is higher than my expectation, so I'm actually ecstatic. I figured it would take me three or four published books to start selling any.
Anyway, need to get back to writing. I'll check in periodically. Thanks again to all of you who have done progress threads and stuck to it. HfR and Chicken Hawk are the first two I read (because they're pinned to the top), but I did read many others. All of you have been a real motivation. Wish me luck!
* I had put twelve books a day on my expectations, but I looked at my expectations worksheet and realized it was eighteen books before I get over a grand each month. This is based on the 2 books per day model, once I get a head of steam. Anything better than that is just gravy.
I have been a member of the Fast Lane forum for a little over a year. I'm actually an Insider, but I am protecting my anonymity here on the chance I decide to reveal my pen name. Most of my business ventures (they are numerous) have been met with failure or marginal success. I am an eternal optimist and tend to ride things all the way to the bottom when I know they're going down. My dad used to tell me, "I'd rather fail a thousand times than quit once." I took that to heart. Anyway, I was perusing the forum toward the end of last month, after the last crash and burn, looking for some inspiration. I decided to read the self-publishing section, something I had ignored before because I have no interest in creating information products.
That's when I read HfR and Chicken Hawk's thread for the first time. I found the inspiration I was looking for. HfR's road map fit my current situation perfectly. So, I spent a day researching genre's and deciding which one I would do. Here's a great resource for that, btw: http://www.tckpublishing.com/list-o...petitive-amazon-kindle-bestseller-categories/
I decided my genre, read the 'look insides' of a few of the top 100 within that subgenre to determine POV and tense. I purposely stayed away from my favorite genres because I didn't want this to become a work of love (though I will admit that I have come to love my characters, damn it!). Then, I sat down and banged out a 60k word novel in three weeks (part of a series). Like I said, I have met with marginal success, just enough to keep me out of the 9 to 5 world, so spending the days writing a novel is no problem for me. I spent a day editing, then another day formatting, creating a cover and writing a summary. I pushed publish on the 19th and started banging out the next one in the series (I'm about 25k words into it right now). I always planned on creating a progress thread, but don't like talking about the things that I'm going to do until I've already done enough to justify sharing my plans.
I approached this with three expectations based on HfR and Chicken Hawks threads:
1. I'm treating this pen name like practice writing. I don't care if it bombs, so long as I steadily improve.
2. I don't expect to have my first month over a thousand dollars until I have eighteen books out.
3. I will not write a book that sells 100 copies a day, but I can write 50 books that each sell 2 copies a day.
Anyway, that is where I'm at. I usually write 2,000 words a day, but sometimes I get in a zone and bang out more. Even had a 5,000 word day a week ago.
Oh, I almost forgot the progress portion of this post. Because it's part of a series, I ran a two day free promo, figuring that one or two people may read it and be interested in the follow up. I climbed to number 48 in free books in my genre and 1100 over all. Gave away a little over 500 books. Netted 0 reviews and only seven sells since then. I have read enough on these threads to know not to have any expectations, so I'm not bothered by the drop off at all. I'm just hoping one or two of those free readers will read the next one. My current ranking is #365,040 Paid in Kindle Store and I don't have a genre ranking underneath it at all.
Again, seven books is higher than my expectation, so I'm actually ecstatic. I figured it would take me three or four published books to start selling any.
Anyway, need to get back to writing. I'll check in periodically. Thanks again to all of you who have done progress threads and stuck to it. HfR and Chicken Hawk are the first two I read (because they're pinned to the top), but I did read many others. All of you have been a real motivation. Wish me luck!
* I had put twelve books a day on my expectations, but I looked at my expectations worksheet and realized it was eighteen books before I get over a grand each month. This is based on the 2 books per day model, once I get a head of steam. Anything better than that is just gravy.
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