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What do you look for in a review site?
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I went to your site a while ago and wanted to submit my book Myriad for review, but you state "romance has a very small chance of getting reviewed as they are not genres I have any real interest in."
My book is fantasy with a fair amount of romance in it, so I didn't submit my book to you. That's probably what you want, but are you meaning to exclude any books with romance as a theme, or books that are just classified as romance? Would a book with romance as a secondary theme be okay? I'm just trying to point out where you might be excluding some authors without meaning to.
The color of your site could use some work :) I think the same site, but with shades of blue or green as the block colors in the background, instead of shades of brown. I don't think you'd need to change anything else :)
My book is fantasy with a fair amount of romance in it, so I didn't submit my book to you. That's probably what you want, but are you meaning to exclude any books with romance as a theme, or books that are just classified as romance? Would a book with romance as a secondary theme be okay? I'm just trying to point out where you might be excluding some authors without meaning to.
The color of your site could use some work :) I think the same site, but with shades of blue or green as the block colors in the background, instead of shades of brown. I don't think you'd need to change anything else :)
Mod
There are also plenty of books that have a romance element that I have enjoyed, so there's no guarantee either way honestly.
In terms of the color thing, I have no taste whatsoever. It took me like four hours to find that color because the black text works on it. Using colors that black text didn't really work made my head spin trying to coordinate text and background colors without causing blindness or insanity.
Thanks for the opinion :)
Scott, I did a little research, and found some colors I thought might work a bit better. Please forgive me if I'm overstepping my bounds, but I know what it's like messing with website themes and colors, and thought I could help. I put this together, and wanted to show you:
Click to see larger.
You might hate it, but I thought it looked okay. I put the color codes on the boxes. If you want me to find something different, I'd be happy to help. You might want something paler? Again, sorry if you think I'm being rude :)
Click to see larger.
You might hate it, but I thought it looked okay. I put the color codes on the boxes. If you want me to find something different, I'd be happy to help. You might want something paler? Again, sorry if you think I'm being rude :)
Mod
When I look at review sites, the first thing I do is read a bunch of the reviews. I look at the books reviewed and the scores received to try to figure out whether my stuff would be a good fit. I also try to avoid the sites where the submissions process is overblown, or the text of the submissions process shows that the blogger is sick of the whole affair. It also helps when the review site is focused on (non-romance) fantasy. Which is rare.
Scott wrote: "I know several articles have been written about proper etiquette for an author to approach a reviewer to maximize the chance of a response, but I'm wondering if there is anything that reviewers do that makes an author more eager to approach them. ..."This is a great question, Scott.
For me, the first thing I look for is a clear review policy. I don't want to waste a reviewer's time on a book that's not a good fit for them, and I want to be sure that I give them all the information they are looking for, and give it to them in the format they want, when I submit a review request.
The next thing I look at is their review history. Do their reviews give enough relevant information for readers to be able to make informed decisions about whether they are likely to enjoy the book? A series of vague "OMG, BEST BOOK EVAH!" and "Yuck! HATED THIS!" reviews that don't help other readers know whether they personally will enjoy the book is a huge red flag.
One thing that I have learned, the hard way, is to be wary of reviewers who may have an ulterior motive in soliciting books for review. I once submitted to a reviewer who also offered editing services to authors. She accepted my book for review, then e-mailed me back telling me that I should hire her to edit my book. I declined. She proceeded to trash the book as being so poorly edited that it looked like I hadn't even run spellcheck. So, now I check a little more deeply into any potential conflicts of interest or hidden agendas.
Moving from the general case to the specific, I think your blog is reasonably good on all of these points, although the review request page could possibly use a little more information about what genres you like to review. Improving the color scheme and overall visual organization of the blog might make it more appealing.
If you are looking for more authors to submit review material, let me know. I may be able to send some folks your way.
Mod
I'm surprised it's hard to find reviewers that aren't focused on romance reviews.
J.D. wrote: "Scott wrote: "I know several articles have been written about proper etiquette for an author to approach a reviewer to maximize the chance of a response, but I'm wondering if there is anything that..."
Thanks J.D. I don't really want to get too specific on genres I'll look at because I don't want to miss out on some good stuff. Romance bores me for the most part so I'm not super concerned about it, but I'm open to looking at pretty much anything else. Hopefully tomorrow I'm going to apply Mona's color scheme and see if that makes an improvement to the general feel of the blog.
Also I'm always looking for people to submit stuff, though there is no guarantee on acceptance or turnaround time.
Scott wrote: "I'm surprised it's hard to find reviewers that aren't focused on romance reviews. "One thing self-publishing has taught me is that romance is by far the most popular genre. Review bloggers are readers to, so it only makes sense that most blogs focus on romance. Paranormal romance often gets lumped in with Fantasy nowadays, so whenever I come across a new reviewer, I always stop to check which sub-genre of fantasy they mean.
Disclaimer: I don't spend a whole lot of time looking for new reviewers these days, so my information may be old.
Mod
One thing self-publishing has taught me is that romance is by far the most popular genre. Review ..."
I have noticed that a lot of the book giveaways I look at are for romance books. I wasn't sure if I just was somehow tuned in to a lot of romance stuff or if it was a universal thing.
In other news I took Mona's colors (thanks again!) with a slight darkening of the background and have applied it to the blog. Let me know what you think.
Steve wrote: "When I look at review sites, the first thing I do is read a bunch of the reviews. I look at the books reviewed and the scores received to try to figure out whether my stuff would be a good fit. I..."I do reviews on my blog (not everything I blog, but about 2-3 times a week), as well as on Goodreads, Amazon, and B&N. I tweet the reviews and then RT later on (usually on Fridays as I'm promoting new authors and give a reason my followers might be interested). I review primarily paranormal, scifi, and fantasy. I will review if it has romance elements but most of what I've reviewed does not. I don't really care either way, though.
Scott wrote: "In other news I took Mona's colors (thanks again!) with a slight darkening of the background and have applied it to the blog. Let me know what you think. ..."I like the new look.
Scott wrote: "In other news I took Mona's colors (thanks again!) with a slight darkening of the background and have applied it to the blog. Let me know what you think..."
I think the website looks a lot better, but I do think the dark blue background is a little intense. You chose a better color than the background I had chosen, but I think it needs to be toned down just a little - a little bit paler. But I think the website is much more calming now, a much more relaxing place to visit. I'm glad you tried the colors! Happy I could help :)
I think the website looks a lot better, but I do think the dark blue background is a little intense. You chose a better color than the background I had chosen, but I think it needs to be toned down just a little - a little bit paler. But I think the website is much more calming now, a much more relaxing place to visit. I'm glad you tried the colors! Happy I could help :)
Did you change the background slightly? The blog looks so great now! I just love how it looks :)
Mod
I have a nitpick. On the border, the black text blue border lacks contrast, making it hard to read. A lighter text color would make it more eye-friendly.
Steve wrote: "I have a nitpick. On the border, the black text blue border lacks contrast, making it hard to read. A lighter text color would make it more eye-friendly."
I think it might be a pain to change the font color, and a bit tricky to get everything to match. Maybe make the blue background really quite paler - it looks good, but it is quite vibrant.
Maybe try #488AE7 ?
EDIT to add: On this website you can put in a color code in the top left box, and you can play with settings, and it give you the new color code. It's really useful.
http://drpeterjones.com/colorcalc/
I think it might be a pain to change the font color, and a bit tricky to get everything to match. Maybe make the blue background really quite paler - it looks good, but it is quite vibrant.
Maybe try #488AE7 ?
EDIT to add: On this website you can put in a color code in the top left box, and you can play with settings, and it give you the new color code. It's really useful.
http://drpeterjones.com/colorcalc/
I really appreciate when a reviewer really takes their audience and/or readers into consideration when writing reviews. Some bloggers like to run their blog as if it were a personal journal while others look at it as providing a service. I tend to be more interested in submitting to bloggers who give thorough, insightful reviews for the sake of helping readers make more informed decisions--not to say that either way is best. I just think being thorough, detailed, and honest is the only way to help the right readers find the right book.
Mod
I think it might be a pai..."
I lightened up the background a bit more. Does that make it a bit more pleasant? I just go to the blog layout spot and slide the little circle around in the color box to change it lol. Colors just don't really register with my mind and I tend to be against bright things so it's difficult for me to do stuff like this. I appreciate all the feedback.
Mod
That's good feedback Laekan. I try to be as helpful as possible even if the book isn't for me. Generally it happens when there is too much romance for my taste. I make sure to mention that the book was not flawed, just had an aspect that wasn't to my personal taste. My blog began as a way to try to help get some more eyes on indie authors and it still has that goal, just hopefully a bit more effective at it now.
Scott wrote: "Mona wrote: "Steve wrote: "I have a nitpick. On the border, the black text blue border lacks contrast, making it hard to read. A lighter text color would make it more eye-friendly."
I think it m..."
I still think the background it needs to be much paler. More watered down. I like it, like I said before, but reading from it might be tough if someone is on the site for a long time. I think, even though a pale blue might look unattractive at first, it would work better in the background, because the background shouldn't be that noticeable. But I think the site looks way, way better than it did before :)
I think it m..."
I still think the background it needs to be much paler. More watered down. I like it, like I said before, but reading from it might be tough if someone is on the site for a long time. I think, even though a pale blue might look unattractive at first, it would work better in the background, because the background shouldn't be that noticeable. But I think the site looks way, way better than it did before :)
I agree with Mona. They other piece is that since the center block is where the main content of the blog lies, that's the part you want the eyes drawn to. In addition to the contrast problem, the brightness of the border keeps drawing my attention away from the meat of the blog.
Mod
Nice! It looks great! It's really good :)
Mod
Mod
Scott wrote: "I just noticed my links weren't really popping out and getting any notice so I changed the colors. Thoughts?"I think that it might be even more effective if the links were significantly different from the background in value (lightness/darkness) as well as in hue. The orange is very different in hue from the blue, but they are very close in value. Making the orange significantly paler might make them stand out even more.
I think J.D. is right - the orange needs to be much paler, so it stands out. I find it hard to read against the post background, and a bit hard to read against the blog background. I understand you changing it, though, so if you make the colour lighter it should work. It always takes ages to get these thing right! :)
Mod
Also even though the thread got a little off topic with it becoming massively helpful based on the color scheme of my blog I'm still interested if any author has seen something on a blog that made them really eager to get some exposure from that blogger.
Scott wrote: "I tried to lighten the orange up a bit, but then it disappeared into the lighter blue of the background. I switched everything over to a darker green that seems to be ok in both circumstances. "This is much more readable.
Along with everything I mentioned before, a blog that has a decent number of followers and active comments on the reviews are both things that make me think that I'd like a reveiw from that site.
Mod
Scott wrote: "What is considered a decent amount of followers? ..."Anything over 200 is very respectable. You're there, as far as numbers. Obviously, the more the better. Numbers in the thousands are drool-worthy. Being linked to in the sidebars of a good number (20 or more) of other book blogs or other types of relevant blogs is a plus, too. Essentially, the wider the potential audience for a review, and the greater the chance of a good match between reviewer and book, the more likely an author is to want to submit to a reviewer.
Scott wrote: "I know several articles have been written about proper etiquette for an author to approach a reviewer to maximize the chance of a response, but I'm wondering if there is anything that reviewers do ..."I think that is an interesting question, Scott. I hope more authors will respond, but I expect most bloggers have no shortage of review requests. It is usually the opposite.
J.D. wrote: "Scott wrote: "What is considered a decent amount of followers? ..."Anything over 200 is very respectable. You're there, as far as numbers. Obviously, the more the better. Numbers in the thousand..."
Keep in mind that followers does not necessarily equal visitors. Don't ignore the smaller blogs. They may have a shorter review queue and may actually be able to get to your book sooner. And if they cross-post to Amazon and GR and other places, it doesn't really matter. Not to mention just getting the name out there and backlinks for search engines to find.
Michelle wrote: "Keep in mind that followers does not necessarily equal visitors. Don't ignore the smaller blogs. They may have a shorter review queue and may actually be able to get to your book sooner. And if they cross-post to Amazon and GR and other places, it doesn't really matter. Not to mention just getting the name out there and backlinks for search engines to find. ..."
You're absolutely right, Michelle, that smaller blogs can be a great source of reviews for independent authors, and they are often the place to start to get larger blogs to be willing to do reviews.
Mod
I do get plenty of requests, but I'm still trying to figure out what makes a blog the most appealing. I'm actually thinking of trying to get a network of reviewers together to cross promote each other and hopefully funnel more preferred genre stuff through the pipeline.
I'm just wondering as I would like to know where my blog can get some improvement (I know the color is terrible).