Ebook Publishing Best Practices16 Secrets of the Bestselling Indie Ebook Authors

November 8, 2014

Mark Coker Founder, Smashwords

Twitter: @markcoker

Welcome

• What you’ll learn• The Secrets to Ebook Publishing Success

• 16 Best Practices of the Bestselling Indie Ebook Authors

• Who this presentation is for• Indie authors, aspiring authors, published

authors and the people who love and support them

• No technical experience required!

Let’s talk best practices

Platforms like Smashwords make ePublishing and eDistribution Easy…

Reaching Readers is Difficult *

* most books don’t sell well

The Long Tail of Authordom

Author sales rank

Authorearnings

The Secret to Reaching Readers:

Best Practices!

Let’s review the best practices of the best-selling indie authors

Secret One

#1 Your best marketing is a great book

• With the power to publish comes the responsibility to be a great publisher

• Honor your reader with a great book• Move reader to a satisfying emotional extreme

• Turns readers into evangelists

• Be fanatical about quality• Edit, revise, edit, revise, repeat, proof

• Leverage beta readers

• Readers prefer L O N G E R books

Longer Books Sell Better!

As word count drops, sales and sales rank drops. Visualize the power curve overlaid on this chart. Books ranked in the top 10, 50 or 100 will sell exponentially more units than books ranked 1,000 or worse

Secret Two

#2 Create a Great Cover image

• Invest in a quality cover image• Your first impression on path to discovery

• Look professional

• Resonate with target audience

• Should arrest reader with thumb nail

• Makes a promise to the reader

What’s this book about?

Don’t be sloppy

Don’t do this either

Great covers make a promise

Great covers make a promise

Great covers make a promise

Great covers make a promise

Great covers make a promise

Great covers make a promise

And now a case study…The evolution of one cover

to this cover

… to this cover…

The cover sparked a breakout at Apple

And landed her on the NY Times Bestseller List

Secret Three

#3 Publish Another Great Book

• The best-selling authors on Smashwords offer deep backlists

• Each new ebook offers opportunity to • cross-promote other titles

• build trust with your reader

• build your brand

Bestselling Authors Publish More Books

Secret Four

#4 Give (some of) Your Books away for Free

• If you have a deep backlist, offer at least one full-length book for free• Makes it easier for readers to take a chance

on an unknown, untrusted author

• ~39X more downloads

• Turbocharges a series

• Free works for standalone promos too

• The highest grossing authors at Smashwords offer at least one free book

FREE Series Starters Turbocharge a Series

Secret Five

#5 Patience is a Virtue

• Ebooks develop differently• Traditional print books – big sell-in, then yanked

from shelves, then sales go to zero

• Ebooks – can start small and grow slowly before breakout

• Ebooks are immortal• Never go out of print

• When your book lands at retailer, it’s a seedling, nourish it

• Never remove

• Let’s look at some examples…

Slow boil, breakout, slow boil, bigger breakout

Slow boil, breakout, slow boil, smaller breakouts

Slow boil to breakout

Ruth Ann Nordin’s An Inconvenient Marriage

Secret Six

#6 Maximize Availability, Avoid Exclusivity

• Ebook retailing is not like sports or politics

• If your book is not available at every retailer, it’s not discoverable or purchasable

• Exclusivity • angers fans

• limits audience

• limits merchandising opportunities

• increases your dependence upon a single sales outlet

Smashwords Distribution Network

Upload/Update Once, Distribute Globally

Secret Seven

#7 Build a Platform You Control

• Platform is your ability to reach and cultivate fans

• Platform gives you control, leverage

• Let fans decide how to connect

• Facebook

• Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn

• Blog and/or website

• Mailing list subscription

• Include “Connect with the author” links at the end of every book (more on this later!)

Secret Eight

Secret #8 Use Viral Catalysts to Drive Word of Mouth

• Books have always been a word of mouth business• Your readers determine your success

• Leverage viral catalysts

What’s a Viral Catalyst?

• A viral catalyst is anything that makes your book more available, accessible, desirable and enjoyable to readers

• Read the Secrets to Ebook Publishing Success (it’s FREE!) to learn how viral catalysts spur word-of-mouth

Viral Catalysts

• Every thing you do right increases virality

Great coverGreat bookBroad distributionFair priceGood categorizationProfessionally editedGreat formatting

Great titleGreat book descriptionGreat marketingSampling enabledMultiple formatsPatienceLUCK!

• Fall short anywhere, and you undermine true potential

Secret Nine

Secret #9 Pricing Strategy is Lever for Success

• Pricing strategy impacts unit sales

• Unit volume (sales and downloads) builds author platform, drives readers to your backlist

• Unit sales X royalty per unit = profit

• Pricing strategy essential to maximize both

Which Price Points for Fiction Get Most Downloads (% over/under

average)

Which Price Points Yield Highest Earnings

Secret Ten

Secret 10: Don’t Let Fear of Piracy Paralyze Your

Publishing

Everything you need to know about piracy

• Obscurity is bigger risk• Black hat pirates who steal your book

wouldn’t have purchased it anyway• Most piracy is accidental – it’s an

enthusiastic fan marketing your book for you

• Combat piracy by making your book easier to purchase than steal• Broad availability at all stores

• Low, fair price

Secret Eleven

Secret #11 Leverage Preorders!

• What’s a preorder? Advance book listing at major retailers Allows readers to reserve a copy in advance of

release date Customer credit card not charged until release

date Fast track to bestseller lists We’ll do a deep dive on preorders and preorder

strategy in the final segment today!

Secret Twelve

Secret #12 Practice Partnership and Positivity

• Your fellow authors and service providers are your partners• Develop relationships

• Their success is your success

• Share your secrets

• Positivity trumps negativity• Relationships give you upper hand

• Internet rants are permanent

• Google alerts keep no secrets

Secret Thirteen

Secret #13 Collaborate with Fellow Authors

• Identify authors you love and your fans will love

• Publish collaborations• Box sets of full-length

• Short story collections

• Joint promos• They have fans you don’t reach, you have

fans they don’t reach

• Everyone wins

Secret Fourteen

Secret #14 Add three sections to backmatter

1. About Yourname Lastname

• Short bio

1. Other books by Yourname Lastname

• Title 1

• Title 2

1. Connect with Yourname Lastname

• Facebook:

• Twitter:

• Web site:

• Blog:

• Smashwords author page:

Secret Fifteen

Secret #15 Think Globally

Apple, B&N, Kobo, Amazon and others are going global

You Have the Tools to Reach a Worldwide Market Today

The tools are FREE

The market for your English-language books outside the US will soon exceed the US

market

Apple operates iBooks in 51 countries. We distribute to Apple. In 2013, 45% of

Smashwords Apple iBooks sales were outside the US

Secret Sixteen

Secret #16 Pinch Your Pennies

• You’re running a business• Profit = Sales minus Expenses

• Most books don’t sell well (!!!!)

• NEVER borrow money to publish a book

• NEVER spend or invest money you need for food and shelter

• DIY then reinvest

That’s it!

Q&A

Connect with Mark Coker and Smashwords:

Web: www.smashwords.com

Blog: blog.smashwords.com

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/markcoker

Facebook: facebook.com/markcoker

HuffPo: huffingtonpost.com/mark-coker

Twitter: @markcoker