Andrew Seiple's Blog: Transmissions From the Teslaverse - Posts Tagged "conventions"

Afternoon, all! After some wrangling, I'm going to be attending the Independent Creators Expo and Film Festival on 20 February, at the Ramada Inn off Miller Lane in Dayton, Ohio. I will be hanging with my friend who makes cute dragon statues over in the dealers' hall, and peddling copies of Dire:Born. I'll happily autograph books, chat, or throw cards at you as you please, if you can make it over that way.

Small conventions like this are a good way for local writers to network and get word-of-mouth PR. The tables are typically inexpensive, so that you only need to move a few books to recoup your cost of attendance, and sometimes you can even get in on panels or other programming events. As long as you aren't too shy, your gain usually outweighs your risk. And you get all the joys of attending a convention, and meeting fun people!

It's also a non-standard marketing technique, that can help ally the boredom of your usual work in this area. Which is important, because if you fall into a rut, your writing can suffer. So don't be afraid to get out there and mix it up a bit, you might enjoy the results...

The Boonshoft Museum of Discovery is a small children's museum in Dayton, Ohio. It's got a beautiful location across from a park, and a heck of a lot of nifty exhibits.

It's also a venue for a lot of non-museum stuff, as I came to find out. Lots of weddings and even a couple of conventions. One such is Geekfest, and oh me oh my what a glorious time it was!

I'm still new to working the OTHER side of conventions. Normally I'm the guy with the backpack full of RPGs going around and perusing the vendors, and listening to the panels. This time around I was a vendor, and speaking on a panel. It's a nifty shift from my usual practices, and I found it fresh and amusing. Only downside was I didn't get much of a chance to play in any games or see all of the sights, but that's okay. I'm quite sure they'll be there next year.

It was a little one-day con that started after the museum closed from its normal hours and went until nearly midnight. I shared a table with a couple of friends of mine who make jewelry and sculpt little polymer dragons. It was a good night for dragons, I'll tell you that! Pretty good night for books too, as I found out.

Geekfest was a celebration of tolerance, oddness, pop culture, and letting your weird hang out. As such, I felt it safe to bring the tarot cards along and offer readings to those who wanted them. Pretty sure that little service sold me a few books too. Whether you believe in the tarot or not, a good reading can get you thinking about your life and your perspective, which is always good. It can maybe give your subconscious the chance to tell you something you've been ignoring or missing.

Oh, and I also ended up on a panel with Rob Boley, a more traditional author who's done scary fairy tales, and has a few more years of experience at this than I do. We got to discuss "Making your Dreams Real" with a couple of dozen folks, give or take. It was encouraging to see so many prospective authors, songwriters, game designers, and what have you giving us a half hour of their time in exchange for war stories from the turbulent fronts of creative endeavors!

(That last part may be a bit exaggerated.)

In any case, it was a joyful experience, and I look forward to being back there next year with more books and more things to talk about.

In other news... Dire:Time (Working title) is about 5% complete. Also working on the second half of Freeway's story, for those who are on my mailing list.

Peace, and I'll catch you later!

I went into Acadecon not knowing what to expect. I had hopes, mind you. What I'd seen so far seemed encouraging.

But when you're dealing with a new convention, you really don't know what you're going to get. So I approached it as I approached everything, hoping for the best but preparing for the worst.

Guys, it was the best.

The con was well-run, efficient, and offered a good amount of value for money. The schedule was packed with gaming events, they had plenty of door prizes, and every vendor I know who set up there made a profit above table costs. I'm no exception to that... the books sold were enough to cover my weekend, and a souveneir or two.

It was encouraging, to see so many local folks who share my niche hobby, and to talk to some of them on panels as a subject matter expert. Got to tell five prospective writers about the realities of self-publishing. Also got to lay out my strategy for creating sandbox campaigns. In between I sold books and chatted with local artists, craftsmen, and authors. There's a lot of us in the Dayton area. And barring mishap, most of us will be back next year.

That's how good conventions should go. A solid, well-planned launch leads to word of mouth spreading leads to growth the next year. Back it up by extending advertising, and you end up with a tradition. Sure, it won't all be cake and sunshine, but at the end of the day if you keep smart and remember to try to keep people happy, you can ride out the bad spots.

So good on Acadecon's organizers, and I very much look forward to seeing them next year. Peace, out!

Evening, all! I'm happy to announce that the next Dire book is undergoing beta reading right now! Expect her to drop in March... possibly February, if the stars align.

In other news, my convention and events winter season is shaping up nicely.

February 18th, I'll be at I.C.E in Dayton ( https://www.facebook.com/events/18166... )

At the end of March I'll probably be holding a small book signing/meet and greet at Urbana University.

And the first weekend in April, I'll be attending the Gem City Comics Convention. ( http://gemcitycomiccon.com/ )

There may be another event or two in there, I'm still sounding out possibilities. But this should make for a pretty full season.

Stay warm, be well, and may politics never touch your life...

For a couple of years now, Amazon Createspace has always been my go-to for making print books.

Oh, it's not perfect; formatting can be a pain until you learn the idiosyncrasies of the template, and it's fussy about the cover images that it accepts. Also, the ISBNs that used to cost me $10 went up to $99 last year, thanks to a deal with Bowker running out or something like that.

But honestly? Once you learn the quirks and compensate for them, it's still one of the best source of POD books for Indie authors. Sure, there's also Ingram Spark/Lightning Source, but from what I've seen, they're more complicated and require more money. Not a lot more, but enough that Createspace is the better bargain.

I might feel differently about them if I wanted more customization for my books. I view IS/LS as the advanced mode. If you know you're going to sell a ton, and are willing to put a few more days of work in on'em, then it might be a factor.

But as it is, Createspace is simple, cost-effective... and makes pretty darn good book.

Print books aren't a huge seller for me. Figure they make up two percent of my profits in online sales. But the ability to get them shipped to me at cost means I can sell them at conventions and turn a small profit. Usually it's enough to pay for the books and the conventions, if I'm lucky.

But it's a marketing vector I wouldn't have covered otherwise, and it also lets me donate books to libraries for another method of attack.

And I got to hand a signed copy of my first to my Dad, and watch his reaction. That's a lot to me.

Now Createspace is being phased out, so they say. Amazon KDP is picking up the slack. But... they don't have full capabilities on their paperback creation yet. They don't offer proof copies, or print author-bought copies at cost.

Someday they might do that. Until they do, it's Createspace all the way.