Mary Sisson's Blog, page 77

Define "work"

M. Louisa Locke has a good post on marketing via KDP Select. I keep seeing these really black-and-white posts about that strategy. You know what I mean: In the Golden Age KDP Select was a license to print money, but since the algorithm change it doesn't work, not even a little bit.

I have to question both sides of that assertion: There were plenty of authors disappointed by KDP Select back in the day, and obviously my experience shows that it can work, if by "work" you mean "improve sales," not "make me a huge bestseller forevermore." It's all a matter of your expectations, I guess--I was actually happy with how the Facebook ads were working. Yeah, BookBub worked way better, but even if it hadn't, I still would have considered the experiment with KDP Select to be a success, both because it improved sales immediately and because it pointed out an approach that I could use to improve sales in the future.

I think a big part of the problem is that people are still looking for the One Magical Thing that they can do for their book once that will take care of everything forever. And you know, that One Magical Thing just doesn't exist. I think the BookBub ad worked because of all the effort I'd put into the book beforehand, and I expect to have to continue to put effort into marketing in order to keep sales going.

Where the industry is, and is going

So the very special BFF relationship between Barnes & Noble and Simon & Schuster is going the way of all very special BFF business relationships when the market changes: Down the toilet.

Business is business, and the bottom line is the bottom line.

Of course, the authors in the story are interpreting this in the way most likely to get them screwed:

Several writers published by Simon & Schuster expressed dismay that their books have been affected by the dispute but said they understood economic forces were involved and didn't blame their publisher or Barnes & Noble.

Jamie Mason, author of the thriller "Three Graves Full," published by Simon & Schuster imprint Gallery Books, said Barnes & Noble was "incredibly supportive" of her book during preproduction and that the chain was instrumental in changing the cover. "It was really cool," she said. But shortly before publication on Feb. 12, she learned that "Three Graves Full" would no longer receive the promotion at Barnes & Noble stores that had been expected. "It's frustrating," she said. "I'm a debut novelist. I don't have name recognition." She said Simon & Schuster has worked to boost sales elsewhere.

That's right, authors--it's your job to be understanding (not to understand) an industry that is failing you, because all these BUSINESS people who are in this to MAKE MONEY are so Gosh-darned nice and supportive.

Remember what your mother told you: It doesn't cost anything to smile. Yeah, sure, your mother wanted you to take something different away from that than I do.

Anyway, the Wall Street Journal also has an article on how publishers of coffee-table books are coping with the changes in the industry, since their books aren't well-suited to the e-book format and bookstore ain't what they used to be.

It isn't all doom and gloom for Quarto [Group, which publishes specialty books,] though. Many of its sales aren't in traditional bookstores but in specialist retailers that mostly sell nonbook items, such as home improvement and arts & crafts stores.

Marcus Leaver, Quarto chief executive, says selling books in nonbook stores can be extended to less obvious areas, adding that having the right books on display can enhance the atmosphere of a store. He cites the fashion chain Urban Outfitters, where you might go in looking for a distressed T-shirt and end up buying a book about body art....

Mr. Leaver, who became CEO in December, says books have a better chance of capturing a buyer's attention in a specialist store than in a general bookstore. In a traditional bookstore, niche titles are vying for attention with thousands of other titles.

Quarto says traditional bookstores now account for just 15% of its overall sales in the U.S. and Canada, though the figure is higher in other markets, such as the U.K.

Heading home

I go home soon (YAAAAAY!!!), so I went looking at my sales, and yes, they are clearly slowing down even more, despite the fact that the book now has 13 (!) five-star reviews and is now up to a 3.9-star average.

Which, as an aside, I think points to a limitation of those algorithms. I think that, in a perfect world, the fact that there's more data out there now about what kind of person REALLY likes the book should trigger more outreach to likely buyers. But the algorithms seem instead to be very reliant on momentum, so each slowdown in sales begets a further slowdown.

Anyway, I had set all the Facebook ads to run extremely cheaply since I wasn't going to be able to pay attention to them, and sure enough, very few people have seen the ads and almost no one has clicked. Which is far preferable to getting hammered, but since I shall soon be in a position to actually pay attention to the ads, I bumped up the per-click bid a little today.

I also realized that I never did a Kobo ad for Facebook. Gotta get on that (and fix those links) when I get home....

That's exactly what I look like when I write!

The eagle has landed, more or less in one piece, and although I am still out of state, I now have access to the Internet.

Which means I went poking around again looking at Korean entertainment--music, this time, because I found a couple of bands that I like. (It turns out that both Shin Woo and Jeremy from the imaginary boy band in You're Beautiful are musicians in real life--and they're both actually quite good, which I was REALLY not expecting.)

Since I am incapable of not turning everything into a research project, I wound up looking up English translations to some of the song lyrics, which lead me to these extremely realistic depictions of the song-writing process of the band CNBlue. As you can see in that first photo, they all hang around in ONE ENORMOUS BED as the Muses speak to Jung Yong Hwa (aka Shin Woo), who has never heard of the importance of removing your makeup before you hit the sack. WITH YOUR BANDMATES. Not to suggest that I'm not entirely dedicated my craft, but if that were me lying there, I certainly wouldn't be writing.

How much does it amuse me that Yong Hwa's life is even more ridiculous than Shin Woo's? It amuses me a whole lot.

But this kind of author porn always cracks me up. I mean, writing is just not a really glamorous undertaking--the main risks are the health problems caused by being sedentary and not having a ergonomically-sound workspace.

People keep trying, though. When I worked for an educational publisher, we did a biography of Muhammad Ali that featured as its sizeable frontispiece a photo of a young, shirtless Cassius Clay lying on his side, pencil (of course!) in mouth (of course!) as he penned his next insulting poem about, I dunno, Joe Fraiser or someone. Of course, I can't find it now, but turn this picture sideways, put a pencil in his mouth, and have him look up and to the side just like Yong Hwa does in that second photo, and you've got the general idea.

I mean, I realize they're writing songs and short poems, but how productive can you be lying down, with no shirt on and/or several bandmates in bed with you? Why gaze up and to the side when your paper is right down in front of you? And what's with the pencil and paper? Computers exist for a reason. If you really prefer the look of writing over, you know, actual writing, just go all the way with the quill and the blotter like Will Wheaton at the 5:30 mark here,

How a tinny earlobe!

I've never had a problem watching movies with subtitles (yeah, you have to read a movie. For me, that is not a problem). That means I've watched a lot of foreign films, which means I've read a lot of really crappy translations, which is part of why the translators in the Trang book are so damned clunky--I like to share my pain.

Translation is an interesting process: I once worked as an editor on a series of books that had been translated from French, and the really fascinating bit was how the (native-English-speaking) translator had fallen down on the job in actually making the book English. For example, in French, you say, "It is the dog that is big" when you mean "It's the big dog," and "It is that which we want to do" when you mean "That's what we want to do"--you're not trying to be wordy, that's just the way the language works. But this person was leaving in all the "thats" and "that whiches" that you have in French, even when there was simply no reason for the English version to have them.

My fellow editor thought this meant that the person's French was not very good, but my theory was that once you get into the syntax of another language, it's actually pretty hard to get back into normal English syntax, and this guy just didn't complete the process. I felt like if he had the translation aside for a week and then read it again, he would have realized that you basically never need to use "that which" in English, ever.

The translation issue came back to me when I watched You're Beautiful a second time with different subtitles. It's not like the first set of subtitles was perfect by any means, but the second set lose anything even vaguely resembling humor in the dialog--I'm guessing because they used auto-translation technology, and algorithms are not exactly known for their wit, timing, or aesthetic sophistication.

The difference is pretty stark: At one point, two characters, Tae Kyung and Go Mi Nam, are discussing what to do on Tae Kyung's birthday. In the first set of subtitles, the interaction went something like this (this is from memory--the original was probably clunkier, but the repetition was there):

TK: You brought me here against my will, so you decide what we're going to do.

GMN: But you never want me to decide what to do. You always decide what we do.

TK: And I've decided: You're going to decide what we do.

In the second set of subtitles, the scene is:

TK: You brought me here against my will, so you tell me.

GMN: You didn't like me to decide for us, do you? You always decide for us when we are together.

TK: I will just follow you today.

"I will just follow you today"? Honestly, that borders on an out-of-character line for the acerbic Tae Kyung.

There's also a priceless scene where Tae Kyung (who is the dour leader of a popular boy band) explains slash fiction to Go Mi Nam (who is a very naive former nun-in-training). The example I'm going to use first is actually from yet another set of subtitles, but they are quite similar to the first set:

TK: Fans write novels with us as the lead characters. There are lots of love stories without a woman involved.

The second set (oh, look how you have to log in as an adult to watch that video. Because it contains The Gay!!!):

TK: Our fans always write novels about us. Women don't even appear in some of their novels.

It's like, come on. I know nothing about Korean, but which approach is funnier in English? It's a comedy! Work with me here, evil robot!

March sales

I'm not going to be able to do anything book-wise for pretty much the rest of the month, and I won't even have reliable Internet access much of the time, so I figured I'd get a note in now about March sales.

If you recall, after my last giveaway on Feb. 26, I got a big two-day bump, so in the final two days of February, I sold almost 200 copies of Trang. Then things slowed down, and at this point I might sell 150-200 copies in March. Which is certainly less than the 200/day rate, but FAR better than I was doing before.

The question in my mind is, will sales level out or continue to dwindle? I'm off all the bestseller lists at this point, so visibility is reduced. On the other hand, whenever I'm convinced that things have totally run out of steam with the 99-cent price point, I get a burst of sales.

Of course, since Trang is 99 cents and Trust is $4.99, at this point I make 10 times the money on the sale of a single copy of Trust than I do on a single copy of Trang. Trust sales are chugging along nicely at the moment, but if they start to dwindle, then it will be time to reopen the mouth of that funnel.

So it turns out that I'm actually at a good place to just ignore everything for a couple of weeks, because it will force me to wait until I have more sales data before I decide whether to keep Trang at 99 cents or go ahead and make it free.

(And Jim, I saw your review--thank you very much. But feel absolutely free to yank it if Amazon gives you any static whatsoever.)

How NOT to promote on Facebook

You think I'm bad, check this out.

Definitely read this

A great article on Hugh Howey in the Wall Street Journal.

Progress report

Things are getting hectic, but I was able to focus on GIMP for a bit today and make the Norwescon flyers.

Random points

You know, if one of the big selling points of a traditional publisher is prestige, what happens when those prestigious houses start running vanity presses?

Well, then John Scalzi (via Dean Wesley Smith) starts asking Random House if they're fucking kidding him and calling their behavior genuinely shameful, while April Hamilton starts accusing Simon & Schuster of bribery.

That's the problem with prestige: It's hard to earn and oh-so easy to lose.

And a helpful commentator explained the correct way to make a link on Kobo. Thank you, helpful commentator! As much as I truly appreciate that, I feel obligated to point out that when a retailer is relying on the public-spirited to explain how things work, that's actually a bad thing.