C.E. Murphy's Blog, page 111

Crowdfunding: What's Up Next

(Sorry for the delay in getting this posted, I've been busy breaking my website…)

I've ended up with some FAQs about what I'll be doing next for crowdfunding/Kickstarter, so I thought to close this series out with a poll, which I'll post shortly (ETA: I have posted it! It is here! You should be able to vote by logging in with FB, G+ or OpenID, I think, so if you don't have an LJ account, fret not!), and a tackling of the FAQs. Surprisingly (or, y'know, not), the most common question is:

So will you be doing this again?

Um, yes. Yes I will. :) The next campaign will be the ElectriCity graphic novel, in fact, and you ought to start seeing some serious squee coming down the line about that in about a month. Because OMG. *OMG*, it's going to be cool.

Followed by:

Will I eventually be able to buy "No Dominion" even if I didn't get to participate in the Kickstarter campaign?

Yes. At some point it'll be made available through Some Other Means. I don't currently know what those means are, but will keep you posted.

Does this mean you might Kickstart the next book in The Inheritors' Cycle (THE QUEEN'S BASTARD books)?

…I might. I really don't know. The idea has obviously crossed my mind, but it's also already been a loooong time since I wrote those books, so perhaps they've cooled off. Also, the price point for a novel would be a lot higher, and the number of copies of THE PRETENDER'S CROWN that sold (about 5,000) do not necessarily convince me that I have access to the right readers to make that particular project work. It's a lovely idea, but I don't think it's reality-based.

How about "Take A Chance"? Is there any chance you might go back and do more of that comic?

Yes. Yes there is. A lot of things have to shake out first, and it's not going to be a this-year (or possibly even next year) project, but it's on the really short list of things I'm thinking about doing.

Oooh! What about the Strongbox Chronicles? Could you crowdfund some of those?

I could. I might even love to. There are literally *dozens* of Cate Dermody books I could potentially crowdfund, and the Strongbox Chronicles were huge fun to write. But it makes me utterly crazy that the first books are essentially lying fallow, and I don't want to do anything with the rest of them until I have a definitive idea of the first 3′s eventual fate.

Okay, and what about HEAVEN CAN WAIT, that YA book you're writing the first 3 chapters of as part of the "No Dominion" awards?

Do not tempt me. That way lies madness.

Or maybe your climate change trilogy?

See above.

Or perhaps Something Mysterious that is very close to your heart and has been on a back burner for (dear god) twelve or thirteen years now that we don't actually know about?

*looks shifty*

***

Here's the thing that's really striking me about crowdfunding: it opens up the possibility of simply working on whatever I want to next, rather than necessarily working on something I'm absolutely certain is commercially viable.

I mean, don't get me wrong: I will continue to publish traditionally and will be very happy to launch the projects I've got on proposal as commercial, traditional works. But for the side jobs, the things I just really want to do and don't know if I can sell straight off? The idea of being able to see if I can get support to go ahead and do them is mind-blowing and wonderfully freeing.

Now, whether it's actually *possible* remains to be seen. "No Dominion" was preposterously successful, but it was the Walker Papers universe, and it was Gary, who is possibly the most beloved character in that universe. (Seriously, my mother threatened to never speak to me again if I ever did anything really bad to Gary.) I have no idea if a new project would meet with such enthusiasm. Obviously it would be nice to *think* so, but I can't really know without running it up the flagpole.

Still, the idea is pretty compelling, and it'll be very interesting over the next few years to see how it all plays out. There are things I can't or won't do out of concern for pissing off my traditional publishers, but for projects that seem more of a long shot or which are more collaborative, like graphic novels, this is really a hugely exciting time to be a creator.

And to wrap this all up: thank you, everybody, for your patience with this series of blog posts, for your questions and comments, and for your astonishing support.

On Running Crowdfunding: Commentary From the Crowd

I've got at least one more crowdfunding post to do, I think–one that's more about future projects for me rather than probably being wildly useful in general–but this one is comments from the crowd: things people have said/asked in comments on these posts. I'm not attributing them, but they will perhaps give you (the general "you") an idea of what other things to think about when launching a crowdfund campaign.

I will add more questions and commentary to this if people have more to say. :)

On excitement/saturation levels, if the question is "So people don't get frustrated if you keep mentioning a project that's not available yet? They do this with ebooks, so one learns to not mention them until they can be ordered."

The answer appears to be:

"Having frequent, excited mentions of it helped, because even if I forgot about the open kickstarter tab after first checking it out, it would have reminded me to poke at it again."

and

I think the biggest reason why you got funded in the first 24 hours is the whole you were way excited before kicking it off and were mentioning it for *ages* here and on twitter. Yes, getting excited before it is even launched is very contagious.

And a piece of advice on that topic, from the person who kept encouraging me to talk about it even when I thought I was probably being really, really obnoxious:

If you are unsure if you are oversaturating your audience with the "All Kickstarter, All The Time" channel, ask. Ask them, ask a friend, ask a neutral party, etc.

From someone who's supported others of my crowdfunded projects: I'm wondering how No Dominion stacks up to your other crowd funded projects from outside Kick Starter. This time was more exciting [for us] because of that feedback loop of being able to track how excited other readers were by the comments and pledges…

The words "blown out of the water" barely begin to apply. In my first post I talked about the dollar amounts I'd been paid for novellas in the past. The $4K was for "Banshee Cries", the one 'official' novella I've done for Luna. The $3K and $3500 novellas were both Old Races stories done via crowdfunding. My Old Races Short Story Project took in about $4K over the entire course of 2011. So we're talking orders of magnitude here, in terms of comparative successes.

I actually need to do a poll about that, because I'd *really like* to know what made ND get a response on such a phenomenal level. Was it because:

- it was Walker Papers instead of Old Races

- it was *Gary*

- it was Kickstarter

- you didn't even know I'd ever run any other crowdfunded projects

- of where you heard about it

- because I wouldn't shut up about it

and probably some other things I should add to that but can't think of right now (suggestions welcome).

On Running Crowdfunding: Boosting the Signal

Okay, I lied. I said I thought probably figuring out the reward tiers is the hardest thing about crowdfunding, but then I thought about advertising it and that's much worse.

There are people who are really good at shameless self promotion, and getting themselves out there where everybody in the whole world knows about the projects they're working on. Despite No Dominion's success, I'm not actually one of those.

What I did learn doing it, though, is that either I have the most tolerant fans, readers, followers and friends on the earth, or the saturation point for reminders, endless discussion, and squeeing over a crowdfunded project is much, much higher than I would have imagined.

Although I clearly have amazing readers, I suspect there is a lot of truth to the second part of that statement.

Honestly, I don't know how to really truly spread the word. I don't know how to reach completely new audiences, people who might not have ever heard of you before. Using Kickstarter at all helps that, because there are people there who just check out new projects. But it doesn't help a *lot*: the pie chart I got after the campaign ended shows that 5% of the final dollar amount came from within Kickstarter. The other 95% came from without.

About 3/5ths of pledges came from my sites or people sharing my links on FB/Twitter/G+. Another 1/5th have no direct referral information. The other fifth came from within Kickstarter and from people independently boosting the signal in their journals, so those *do* make a difference. I just don't know how to capitalize on any of those things for future projects.

What I *do* know is that unmitigated enthusiasm is your friend. Now, it is true that it's easy to have unmitigated enthusiasm if the project explodes beyond your wildest dreams, as "No Dominion" did, but here are things that I did which may have helped:

- Start talking the project up before you launch it. Ideally several weeks before you launch it. Let your readers know that you're really excited about this thing. People get excited about what you're excited about. It's a feedback loop. Use it.

- Hold your breath, squee, squeak, peek between your hands, gasp in astonishment, wonder if a magic number can be reached in a magic time in public. It doesn't matter if you're sitting there in your computer chair squirming with embarrassment about it. This is the Internet. Nobody knows you're a dog, as it were. What people *see* is your blog/Twitter/FB/whatever going OMG HOLY CRAP, not you sitting there hiding your face behind one hand while you type OMG HOLY CRAP. They get excited because you are. It's a feedback loop. Use it.

- I didn't actually do this on purpose, but offer a reward idea to encourage people to go charging for a finish line. "No Dominion" cracked its goal in the first 24 hours, which I utterly did not expect. Somewhere around hour 18 I said "Holy shit if we do this in the first 24 hours I will write an extra story for everybody!" Be prepared to have something like that waiting. It doesn't matter if you're aiming for full funding, 25%, 50%, whatever, in X time. Give people a shiny sparkly reason to fling themselves in headfirst RIGHT NOW. They get excited because you are. It's a–you get the idea. :)

- Do not be embarrassed to ask people to boost the signal. Some of them will. Some of them won't. But go ahead and ask.

***

I am *more* than happy to take other suggestions about how to boost the signal, and will post a follow-up to this if there are ideas suggested!

On Running Crowdfunding: Rewards

More on crowdfunding:

What sorts of rewards would be attractive?

Rewards are the hardest thing about crowdfunding, I think. (Except for the general nerve-wracking "I'm throwing a party and wonder if anybody will come!" aspect of it.)

Your basic reward for crowdfunded storytelling is the story. $5 gets you the e-book. There's a real argument to be made for making it a base $10 buy-in because, as someone pointed out to me during the "No Dominion" campaign, if you're pricing your book at what you'd buy an e-copy for on Amazon or B&N.com, you're basically just setting up a pre-order system, not crowdfunding per se. But I like a $5 basic buy-in, because it's a price point almost anybody can afford, and it gives the patron the specific item they presumably most want: the book!

General Reward Thoughts: I said a few days in to the "No Dominion" campaign that I'd already thought I needed to restructure the reward levels, and I still think I shoulda. I should have set it at $5, $10, $25, $50, $100, $250, $500 for the realistic rewards, and I think leaving the $1K, $2500 and $5K for "anybody got silly money?" rewards is fine. It probably should have looked something like this:

$5 : the novella

$10 : the novella & 2 short stories

$25 : novella, 4 short stories, name in acknowledgements (because holy crap, 520 backers, I'm gonna have four pages of thank-yous!)

$50 : the above & a bookmark featuring the NO DOMINION cover art

$100 : the above & a behind-the scenes chapbook of the NO DOMINION cover art photo shoot/9×12″ print of the cover art

$250 : the above & the limited edition print run of NO DOMINION included

$500 : the above & and your name as one of the characters in either NO DOMINION or one of the companion short stories

(Comments & suggestions on this are enormously welcome, btw.)

For other peoples' reward ideas: Laura Anne Gilman's "From Whence You Came" campaign page; Tim Pratt's GRIM TIDES campaign page, and Chrysoula Tzavelas's MATCHBOX GIRLS campaign page (which is still running, & she's less than $100 from reaching 10x her original goal! Go make it happen! :)). There are others that I can't think of right now, but I will happily link to them in the next post if people want to point me at them in comments.

Best Reward Idea: For the "No Dominion" campaign, it's clear that the extra short stories were the best reward idea offered up. That makes sense: I'm a writer, the people supporting this are my readers, so of course they'd like extra stories. I write fast, so a short story is a reasonably time-effective reward to offer.

Worst Reward Idea: My worst reward idea, hands down, was the Unique Kickstarter-Patrons-Only Calendars. For two reasons, as it turned out. First–or the one I discovered first, anyway–is that it didn't appear to be an exciting rollover point for people. Short stories garnered faaaaar more enthusiasm. So that's important to know.

Second, though, and actually far more relevant than the popularity angle is the cost-ineffectiveness. I knew standard 11×17″ calendars would be too expensive, even if I was ordering a couple hundred of them, but it turned out (and I didn't look this up beforehand, bad me) that 7×11″ calendars aren't noticeably cheaper than the big ones. So I have learned to, for pity's sake, do all the due diligence for cost effectiveness ahead of time next time, and, er, if I'm going to do calendars again, make them a high-end buy in bonus, like the handful of them that went to patrons who bought in at $250+, rather than an "everybody who buys in at $30 or more gets one".

While calendars are probably not something everybody's likely to try to put together, the principle stands: if it's something that has a high cost point, only include it at the high end of the buy-ins. Learn from me on this one.

A Mistake I Made: When I went into the "No Dominion" campaign I only intended to write 1 extra short story. This made the higher end rollover points of "if we break $15K I'll write another novella!" seem pretty reasonable. But then during hte course of the campaign I became overwhelmed with excitement and ended up throwing freebies and things out, with a total of I think 5 short stories and 3 chapters of a book I haven't written.

You can see how this starts becoming not-cost-effective. The *smart* thing to do would have been say "And at $15K we will have something REALLY NIFTY! But you have to get us there, or almost there, before I'll tell you what it is!"

As it happens, I've ended up with 3 novellas*, 5 short stories, & 3 chapters of a book I haven't written to serve up. Subtract $2K for Amazon fees, $5K for limited edition print run fees, and $1K for calendars (and hoping to God that shipping will come out of that $8K), well, that leaves me with about $12.5K, which isn't a *bad* rate for 3 novellas, 5 short stories & 3 chapters of a book that doesn't exist, but it's not a *great* rate either. So in case of success beyond wildest dreams, make certain to have your rewards set up at a level that is not, you know. Insane.

*Although I did say if it broke $30K and earned the book that doesn't exist, that there would either be a total of 3 novellas, or one novella and one novel, because I was not proposing to write 3 novellas and a novel. And now "No Dominion" has lurched into novel-length territory and I'm not sure if I've covered my ass there or not, really…

Website Redesign in Progress

All right, for the next few-to-several days the site is likely to be something of either a mess or very plain, depending on how badly I've broken things. I'm doing a redesign and it's clear I need to start from scratch, so that's what I'm pretty much doing. Apologies for the mess, and I swear I won't be leaving it for months on end.

On Running A Kickstarter Campaign

I have SO MUCH to write about what I've learned from running the Kickstarter campaign that I've basically been unable to move forward on it, you know? Too much information and not enough mental capacity to break it down. Fortunately for me, a friend who is looking at running some crowdfunding had a list of questions to put to me, and that's giving me some badly-needed structure. So I'm gonna hit this thing over a series of blog posts, and will do my best to include further questions asked in comments and the like as well as break out my own personal experiences.

…all of this stuff basically assumes you're a writer running crowdfunding, but I imagine that after the fact a lot of it might be helpful to other people. I hope so, anyway.

What would be a reasonable amount to set as initial goal? (I understand the part where if you don't make goal, you get zero.)

For me, this depends on anticipated wordcount, but the "if you don't make goal" bit is the kicker.

For "No Dominion", which I planned as a novella, I set my initial goal at $4000. I chose that number because I've sold 3 novellas in the past, and was paid approximately $3K, $3500 and $4K for them. So I'd been going to split it down the middle for "No Dominion" and ask for $3500, but then I jumped the gun and got Kyle Cassidy to do the cover art photo shoot, so I went ahead and rolled the cost of that into the campaign, thus setting the dollar amount at $4K, and setting the novella price point as a whole for the campaign at $4K.

Tim Pratt set a $6K goal for his novel-length Kickstarter. I suspect I would do around the same, probably topping out around $7500 for an anticipated, say, 80K novel, because the *idea* here is to get the cash in the door, so it's counter-productive to aim super high and not make it. It's a question of what's the minimum bearable to make for your work, but one of the positive sides about crowdfunding is it frees you to do something you really want to do, and that may be worth taking a little less cash in hand.

How long does one run this thing?

Kickstarter itself suggests 30 days, because there's pretty inevitably a trough in the middle. I ran "No Dominion" for 45 days and will do that for any other Kickstarters I run, because 45 days is pretty likely to mean everybody who might want to buy in is going to have a paycheck in that time. 30 days can miss out on people who only get paid monthly, and that can make a difference.

What's with this video one does?

I think the video is God's way of being cruel to writers. Honestly, for mine, I wrote a 45 second speech, practiced it a bunch of times, then set up my phone to record me and recorded it about twenty times until I had one where I hadn't embarrassed myself stumbling over the words. I was very proud of myself for managing to put a fade out at the beginning and maybe the end. Regardless of the approach, keep it short, because people lose interest fast. Under 60 seconds is genuinely fine.

Assuming it makes the goal, when does payment come in, all at once or in chunks?

All at once. Amazon takes approximately 2 weeks to process it, and then it's all yours. This is a totally bizarre concept for writers: the entire advance up front. This is also why you'd better be pretty goddamned sure you're going to do the project.

And how does one disseminate the rewards?

For writers, your major reward is of course your novel/short stories/etc, which you would *think* Kickstarter would allow you to attach to the patron email lists they automatically create for you. For some bizarre reason they don't allow epub/mobi/pdf/doc attachments, though I've suggested it to them (and if, say, everybody reading this would like to go suggest it to them too, Kickstarter's contact link is at the bottom of any given page).

I do not yet know if you can attach such files to the finalized mailing list that they suggest you create, because I haven't gotten that far yet. At the moment, I'm providing links to a password-protected Tumblr page for rewards, and have taken their Excel files to create a mailing list which I'll end up using at the end of it all if I can't attach an e-pub file of some sort.

Other rewards of a physical nature are sent to addresses which you can collect via the above-mentioned finalized mailing list they suggest doing shortly before you're ready to send everything out.

Except for international patrons, shipping appears to be assumed to be included in the patronage reward level, so bear that in mind when setting reward levels.

Are there deadlines for writing/producing these?

Only those you set yourself. Probably adding an extra month to any deadline you think you might actually make is smart. She said, having not done that. :)

Recent Reads: MATCHBOX GIRLS

One of the things about being a writer is people sometimes ask that you blurb their books. Sometimes they're total strangers. Sometimes they're people you've known for fifteen years. Being asked by someone you've known forever is far more alarming than a stranger asking you, because both parties are painfully aware that it's not just a professional relationship riding on the request. It's a presumption on friendship, and the potential outcome of not liking the book is considerably more agonizing than it is with someone you've never met.

Furthermore, if you're me, you're miles behind on your TBR list already, and have so many writing projects going that you've put a moratorium on blurbing books at all until sometime after April.

This was the scenario when Chrysoula Tzavelas emailed to ask if I might consider reading her debut novel, MATCHBOX GIRLS, for a blurb. She knew it, too, and the email she sent asking if I'd read the book had a considerable air of "I'm doing this because I promised my publisher I would at least try, and I feel I should humor her" about it. So she was rather astonished when I said I would try to make time to read it, and honestly, if I hadn't known Soula for fifteen+ years I wouldn't have said I'd even try. I started reading MATCHBOX GIRLS with the general assumption that I would like it (because I don't go into a book assuming I *won't* like it, that would be silly) combined with a certain trepidation because oh god, what if I *didn't* like it?

Fifteen minutes later, I posted a grumpy update on Twitter: I am two chapters into @chrysouladreams's MATCHBOX GIRLS, and I REALLY WANT to keep reading instead of going to stupid work!

I went to work anyway, because I had to, but two nights later I stayed up well past my bedtime reading it, because I couldn't stand not knowing how it ended for a whole 'nother day.

Chrysoula's written a wonderful urban fantasy novel with a sympathetic, depression-suffering protagonist who can barely keep the cat fed, nevermind take on more serious duties, who suddenly finds herself the guardian and protector of twin 4-year-old girls whose usual guardian has disappeared under Mysterious Circumstances. It is a complete delight. The relationships are tremendously well developed, deep and realistic without any of them being romantic. The *descriptions* are incredible. (I weep in despair.) And there are charming, unexpected twists and character developments that make it a good read all the way through to the end. It's well worth it.

Now. MATCHBOX GIRLS is coming out through a small press. In order to help offset the costs of production, they're running a Kickstarter campaign where you can get not only the print edition of the book, but also extra goodies. This is the Internet & crowdfunding at some of its finest: it's essentially a pre-order with bonus material for pre-ordering. How can you not love that?

Also, far be it from me to use a "oh YEAH? well my MOM LOVED IT, so THERE!" pitch to sell a book, but, well, my Dad's halfway through reading MATCHBOX GIRLS–and he doesn't turn his nose up at fantasy, but it's not his first reading choice either–and he's loving it. So there. :)

The Numbers Game

Readers often ask me where they should buy books from, whether I get the same cut from an audio or e-book as a physical copy, and when they should buy a book, because they are concerned with giving me the best deal, and sometimes with what it might take to push me into bestseller numbers. So I asked my editor about some things, such as:

There is a rumor that best-seller lists don't count books that are sold early, only the ones that are sold in the official week of release. This is a question of some relevance, because my books are almost always on the shelves two weeks before release date. So: does it matter to the lists?

And the answer is yes and no. Almost everybody has to deal with the same soft release problem that I get (a hard release is like Harry Potter got: you were not gonna get that book before midnight the day it was supposed to come out). The NYT apparently aggregates the numbers/momentum over the first weeks of release, whereas USA Today evidently only counts books sold from the week of release (though if you buy it on the Sunday when it's supposed to come out on Tuesday, that counts as the release week).

We looked at some of my numbers with some of the Walker Papers and concluded that there are enough early sales that it *could* affect my ability to get onto some lists. So ideally? Really, really ideally? My readers would torture themselves and not buy the book until the actual release day, and then everybody go out at once and buy it immediately. This, however, is asking a lot of readers, and I can't corral everybody and release them all at once. :)

There is also a rumor that Amazon's numbers don't count toward any lists. That one is apparently more true than not, though apparently Amazon falls on and off in usage for the lists depending on how willing they are to release their numbers, which varies.

B&N.com, however, *does* count toward list numbers.

Amazon also *always* ships early unless it's a hard release date. I don't know if B&N does, but I gather B&N aggregates the numbers shipped anyway and lists them on release day/week. So–without biting a hand that feeds me–it's probably of more use (not just me, but to any author you like) for readers to pre-order through B&N.com instead of Amazon*.

Now, all that aside, here's the other vicious truth: I'd really need literally everybody who buys my books to buy them in the first week/month of release in order to have any hope of making seriously big numbers. I have wonderful, loyal readers who have given me an amazing career and have kept my books on the shelves for a long life, which is hugely, hugely important to continuing to do this for a living, but if I want to level up to the best seller lists**, something has to change.

Possibly what has to change is I have to write something different which catches fire, but that's very hard to predict. :) In the meantime, though, the best I can probably do is hope to get something going that leads into a big splash for the final book of the Walker Papers.

Because we're on the downward slope here, guys. There are nine books planned for the series, and the timeline is pretty much hell bent for leather from the start of SPIRIT DANCES all the way through to the end of book 9. It's probably too late to rack up some kind of magic momentum for RAVEN CALLS, since it's out in four weeks, but I (we, if I assume you're in this with me) have two books after that to try to hit it out of the park.

*This is not a statement intended to make people with Kindles feel bad. If you have a Kindle, for heaven's sake, buy a Kindle book. I get the *royalties* the same no matter what; this post is just about whether there's hope for me to reach a bestseller status over the next few years. :)

**And I do. I have always been in this game to–for lack of a better phrase–win it, and my personal definition of "win" is not "beat the other guy" but "get onto the national bestseller lists". There is nothing wrong with being a mid-list writer and I'll take it if that's what I forever land at, but my completely-out-of-my-hands goal is to have that awkward first name "New York Times Bestselling Author" preceding the already-on-the-covers "CE Murphy". :)

Website Registration

All right, I've started getting spam registering as users again, so I'm shutting down the "anyone can register" option again. However, I'll post a page with a big link on it soon about how to register at this site: basically, email me with your username and email address and I'll set you up an account so you can respond here. I'm sorry, and I'll try to come up with a more elegant solution in the long run, but for the moment that's how it'll have to be.

You can email me at cemurphyauthor AT gmail DOT net. :)

RAVEN CALLS contest winners!

The cemurphy.net winners of the RAVEN CALLS giveway are izzybot, uofmdragon, and willowblade!

All of you please email me at cemurphyauthor AT gmail DOT com with your snail mail addresses, your username if that's what you've won under so I know who you are, and whatever name I should sign the books to. :)