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The One Week Post-Promo Results
If you read my post The 2-Day Amazon Free Promo Aftermath then I would like to give you major kudos for actually reading such a long-ass-winded post. Those of you who read the post will probably recall that Wildflowers Come Back had 19,687 free downloads during its 2-day free promo on Amazon. The results continue to blow my mind. It’s amazing to think that my book is in so many hands within such a short period of time! The only downside is the fact that my book is in so many hands within such a short period of time. Haha. That’s 19,687 opinions on my labor of love. That’s 19,687 people who could make me cry if they decided to join the ranks of the people who leave reviews that go beyond honesty and into the cruel intentions territory. (After all, we’ve already gone over the fact that I’m overly-sensitive).
This past week I’ve cried. I’ve stressed myself out to the point of being so sick that I thought I needed to be rushed to the ER. I’ve questioned myself as an author. Then the most amazing things started happening: Just when I was starting to doubt myself, several readers actually took the time to send me e-mails and leave me comments telling me how much they loved WCB. I can’t even begin to tell you how amazing it feels to find an e-mail in my inbox from an avid reader who never contacts authors but felt the urge to contact me and actually thank me for sharing Lyss’ story. I am so touched. I am so thankful. I am so humbled. This past week has taught me a lot about having faith in yourself, about staying focused, and about not letting the bad stuff overshadow the good. This past week I’ve learned that not everyone is going to like the books I write, but there are people out there who will…and those are the people for whom I am writing. It’s hard to ignore the haters (How the hell do people in the limelight like Kim Kardashian handle it?!), but this week I’ve learned that you’ve gotta try. Find something to focus on as your mind is spinning out of control so you don’t get dizzy. Hold onto your britches. Hold onto your dreams. …And if you need it, put on your earphones to drown out the bastards who try to get you down.
Enough rambling…
In my last post I promised I would post an update on my one week post-promo results. I don’t know what results are typical when it comes to these free promos, and after talking with various authors it seems that results are all over the place. I’m hoping that a little transparency with my numbers will prove useful for other indie authors as they attempt to form their own conclusions about the KDP Select program and the free promo days.
After my 2-day free promo ended I had to strap myself in for a roller-coaster ride. My post-promo week one started on Sunday, January 15th. By Tuesday WCB had catapulted to #227 paid in the kindle store. It hovered somewhere between the 200s and 300s over the next few days until sales started to even out a bit. At the time of posting as I begin week two post-promo WCB is currently ranked #693 paid in the kindle store.
My numbers for the first week post-promo = Just under 1,400 sales and 217 borrows. Those numbers are huge, especially for a book that sold just 9 books total across multiple platforms in the month of December and just 4 books in January before joining KDP Select and doing the 2-day free promo.
What does this all mean? I haven’t a clue. How did it happen? I haven’t a clue. Did I do anything special? Nada.
I think I’m seeing sales for WCB slowly level off. Hopefully they won’t die off completely. Only time will tell. If something crazy happens… I’ll let y’all know. 
The 2-Day Amazon Free Promo Aftermath
Have you ever had your mind blown? I’m not talking about being surprised or shocked. I’m talking about going beyond surprise and shock into mind blown the f—- off territory. If you’ve visited ‘mind blown the f—- off territory’ before you must excuse my jaw hanging open because this is my first visit.
I will preface this by saying that I don’t think I have ever hit the refresh button as many times in a 48-hour period as I did over the course of Friday and Saturday. If there is a world record for such obsessive behavior then I probably broke it.
Now, as many of you already know… I made the decision to join Amazon’s KDP Select program and go Amazon exclusive on January 10th. This decision was basically a “What the hell!” decision brought on by the fact that my debut paranormal mystery novel Wildflowers Come Back needed a serious kick in the ass (as did I). I released WCB on September 27th, 2011 and since then the book has received eight 5-star reviews between Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk. (None of those reviews belong to my mom). Since it’s release WCB has experienced paltry sales. What do I mean by paltry? In the month of December I had 6 sales on Amazon, 2 sales on B&N, and 1 sale on Smashwords for a grand total of 9 sales for the entire month of December. Not a pretty picture.
I should mention that I pretty much neglected my marketing efforts during the month of November, so my sales numbers during November and December are not exactly those of an author who is actually putting forth an effort. Why did I neglect my marketing efforts? I was scared. Plain and simple. The day I released WCB was such a frightening day for me. I can’t even begin to count how many times I thought, “I need to just unpublish the book before anyone buys it!” I was sure I would receive nothing but 1-star reviews that would reduce me to a blubbering pile of tears. (Obviously I’m one of those over-confident types. ) So when the new year rolled around I made a resolution to myself that I would grow a thicker skin, do my best to shake off the voices in my head that tell me I suck in sing-song voices, and freakin’ fight for what I want.
The Decision To Go Free
After joining Amazon’s KDP Select program I started to consider taking advantage of the free pricing promo that they offer for up to 5 days every 90-day period. I talked to other authors who had put their ebook up for free, and I read blogs from authors who had done the same. The results were varied. Some authors had crazy results with thousands of downloads during their free period followed by steady sales after the promo which trumped any of their previous pre-promo sales. Some had more modest but still quite successful results that gave their post-promo sales a nice enough boost. Meanwhile, there were some who had experienced what can only be labeled as crappy results. Of course these results varied due in part to the variance in genres. Some genres just have a bigger audience than others.
I made the decision to go ahead and give it a shot. It’s not like I had much to lose with my ranking of #273,483 paid in the Amazon.com Kindle Store and #178,371 paid in the Amazon.co.uk Kindle Store. So, I set up a 2-day free promo scheduled for Friday, January 13th and Saturday, January 14th.
It’s January 3rd: You Can Eat Your Cake Now
It’s the third day of January in the shiny new year of 2012. This means that you have successfully kept your new year’s resolutions to diet or eat healthier for two full days. Before I go any further: If you are one of those people who leans back with a smug expression as you exclaim, “I’m not making any resolutions this year.” I would first like to throw used confetti at you and then proceed to point out that you are essentially making a resolution to not make resolutions. Now wipe that smug look off your face and join in with the rest of society as we trudge through a sea of promises we made to ourselves that are impossible to keep. Don’t argue with me. It’s tradition!
Pass The Lettuce, S’il Vous Plaît.
Right about now grocery store cashiers everywhere are ringing up thousands upon thousands of Lean Cuisine microwaveable meals which are being purchased by people who are staring longingly at the candy display as they silently bid adieu to Snickers. The intentions are good, but we all know that most of those Lean Cuisine meals will get lost in the freezer only to be dug out sometime in mid-April when you are too lazy and/or broke to make a run to the grocery store.
It Hurts To Sit Down
As you read this, the number of new memberships at gyms around the world are skyrocketing through the roof. People are buying spiffy new workout clothes and practicing their gym nod in the mirror. In fact, yesterday I joined the masses and spent some time in the gym with the company of a personal trainer as I took on the hardest core of all hardcore workouts. Okay, so I’m lying. Yesterday I played an Xbox 360 Kinect game in my living room. However, I assume the results of said game are fairly close to those of the hardest core of all hardcore gym/personal trainer workouts. After all, today it hurts to sit down. That has to be the most productive workout ever. A workout that makes you NOT want to sit down? A workout that makes sitting down like a lazy bum unenjoyable? Genius. Pure genius.
…….I’m never doing that again. AND, most of those new gym membership cards will languish in the back of wallets until people realize it’s nearly November and they still don’t look good in a bathing suit at which time they will hit the gym for approximately a week.
You Did It!
So, it’s January 3rd, 2012. You have kept your new year’s resolutions this long. Kudos. You can eat your cake now. Granted, you probably shouldn’t eat the whole damn cake…but a few bites won’t hurt you. Seize the moment, fluffy.
The Connection Between Nightmares & Author Anxiety
This morning I woke up with my leg hanging off the bed, my head resting precariously halfway off my pillow, and that now-familiar “What the fuck am I doing?” feeling knotted up in my stomach. I looked around my bedroom as I stretched with an exaggerated yawn that sounded more like an animal being slaughtered than an actual yawn. The sun poked its rays through my blinds urging me to ‘rise and shine’. Bite me, sun. The sound of my cat crunching on his dry cat food made its way upstairs–apparently my loyal cat abandoned the opportunity to snuggle with me for his food bowl. Everyone has their priorities.
As I began to emerge from my post-sleep fog the events of last night began to come into focus. Well…the events of last night’s dream. It involved a Super Wal-Mart that was more like a Walgreen’s and was housed inside a massive, empty shopping mall structure. If you walked to the right you found yourself in an Italian courtroom. If you walked straight you found yourself in the small Walgreen’s-esque shopping area. The shelves were short and the single cashier was Paris Hilton. She tried to sell me Avon. When I refused she attempted to sell me one of her homemade jewelry pieces. I didn’t want to be rude so I smiled as she insisted that I buy a gold necklace/black bib combo with hefty chunks of turquoise and bells. When I hesitated she looked like she might cry so I lied and said I had a friend in the market for a necklace/bib combo and would gladly snap pictures of her creation to show to said friend. Somewhere between snapping picture #1 and picture #2 she decided it would be best if she modeled the necklace/bib combo topless to show how the bib can act as a shirt. Okay then. I snapped the picture and went on my merry little way. I stopped off at a cafe to hack into an ex-boyfriend’s non-existent blog and post ridiculous things to humiliate him. Then I jetted off to New York City to visit the friend who I said was in the market for a necklace/bib combo. She looked at the pictures and considered purchasing the piece until she found out that it cost $700. We called Paris and informed her that my friend would not be buying the necklace/bib combo. She sounded upset and hung up on us. Mere minutes after hanging up the FBI bust into the apartment and demanded my phone. The FBI agent stood there scrolling through my pictures deleting the ones of Paris, informing me that I was in possession of unauthorized celebrity pictures and would be put on death row. At that point I peed myself and blacked out.
Now I am beginning to wonder if there is a connection between nightmares and bouts with author anxiety. Yesterday was a stressful day filled with author anxiety, and it seems each time I have a crazy nightmare it is preceded by such a day. Perhaps that explains my crazy dreams.
Or maybe it’s just because I fell asleep with CNN on.
Wishing You A Merry Christmas & Happy Holidays!
It’s that time of year again. The time of year when a chubby man dressed in red velvet with a posse of elves and pet reindeer (who are tripping out on some sort of reindeer catnip that makes them fly) breaks into our homes, eats our cookies and leaves us shit. Of course, if you celebrate Christmas, then this weekend doesn’t only mark the return of the red velvet chubster but also marks the birthday of, you know…God. Since he couldn’t be here to accept his gifts we will gladly accept them on his behalf, making sure to return them to the store to get what we really want after which we will enjoy them thoroughly for approximately two days until we get distracted and start obsessing over our holiday weight gain and our new year’s resolution to lose those pesky pounds. OMG, why is chocolate so good?! Wait. Where was I? Oh, right…
It’s a magical time of year. It’s the only time of year when seeing your living room floor covered in crap is actually a Kodak moment. The time of year when we express our appreciation for the beauty of trees by killing them, taking them away from their tree families and bringing them into our homes where we decorate them as they die a slow, suffocating death beneath twinkling lights. It’s also the only time of year when we tell our children it’s okay to sit on the laps of strange men and tell them where they live and what toys are sure to lure them into white vans as long as said strange men are wearing red velvet and have beards. Oh, and we mustn’t forget the obligatory holiday greetings we send off to people we love, people we hate, and people whose addresses are in our address books for some reason unbeknownst to us, but they might be important and they might send us a card so we better send them one too. It’s the time of year when you are reminded which family members really wish they weren’t related to any of you. Trust me, there’s one in every family… they are the one wishing you a “Merry-ish Christmas” in an Eeyore tone of voice and standing in the corner blowing bubbles in their eggnog at the family get-together mumbling about how stupid your Christmas sweater looks. To be fair…your Christmas sweater does look stupid.
Some of you will be spending Christmas with your entire family from your parents, children and siblings to your fourth cousin Fred. Some of you will be spending Christmas with just your immediate family. Some of you will be spending Christmas with a few close friends or maybe your dog or cat or goldfish. Some of you may spend Christmas at someone else’s gigantic family celebration as the token pity invite where Aunt Edna will take a label off one of the extra gifts for Bubba and write your name on it so you don’t feel left out. I hope you like cheap bubble bath that comes in a giant bottle shaped like Justin Bieber that will give you a really bad rash into the new year. Meanwhile, some of you will be spending Christmas doing other things…non-Christmas things. Those of you doing non-Christmas things may find yourself wondering why the hell your family doesn’t celebrate the fat man with toys holiday. You like fat men too. I know. I know. But perhaps you’ll find solace in the fact that many of us celebrating Christmas will be standing there next to non-spiked punch and a family member who smells of moth balls. We will be wearing the horrid Christmas sweater our grandma knitted while thanking people for gift cards to stores we never shop at like Home Depot. All the while wishing that we could be somewhere else learning how to spin a dreidel.
So, whether you celebrate Christmas or Hanukkah or Kwanzaa or JigglyHoHo Sunday or nothing at all (or even if you’re one of those selfish bastards who celebrates everything because ‘hello…more gifts’) I would like to wish you a very Happy Whatever-You-Celebrate-Holidays! I hope you don’t gain too much weight. I hope you don’t have to spend too much time with the people you don’t like. I hope you have plenty of time with the people you do like. I hope if you receive gifts that they aren’t too crappy. I hope that if you do receive crappy gifts that you will accept them with kindness and be thankful that you’re getting any gifts at all on someone else’s birthday (unless it’s actually your birthday too…in which case feel free to cry). May you enjoy eating not-so-good fruitcake and overcooked sugar cookies with too-sweet icing. May you have fun making fun of the holiday newsletters sent by various family members touting their accomplishments and their genius children. Who cares? Your kids can pick a lock… chew on that one, mathlete mom.
If you get snowed in…I hope you have someone to cuddle with (even if it’s just a cat who merely tolerates you). If you don’t get any snow…I hope you have fun making grass or sand angels.
Stay safe, stay happy, and stay tolerant of all the idiots out in force. Oh…and if you get a kindle for Christmas please buy my book Wildflowers Come Back. Not only will it entertain the shit out of you, but it will help pay for all the Home Depot gift cards I bought for people.
Love,
Santa’s Favorite Ho (Yes, I saw that on a t-shirt. 
)
The Girl Who Failed Library Aide
I know what you’re thinking. How does someone fail library aide?
Well, to answer your question honestly… I don’t know. However, I do know that once upon a time there was a teenager who managed to accomplish such a seemingly impossible feat.
The other day I was going through old files and paperwork trying to get more organized for the upcoming new year since one of my resolutions for 2012 is to remain masterfully organized throughout the entire year. I’m sure my efforts will hit a wall somewhere around week 4, but at least that’s a longer run than most people’s diet or fitness resolutions will have.
As I was sorting through a mix of randomly filed paperwork, which was probably jumbled together in one of my many moves, I came across a variety of interesting things: report cards belonging to my brothers when they were in elementary school, old medical paperwork belonging to my ex-stepdad, notes and figures made by my mother on the backs of random envelopes, and the old report card belonging to a 14-year-old girl from 1999.
That old report card from 1999 caught my attention. I scanned through the list of classes. She was a teacher’s pet in her science class, a slacker in gym, and an advanced student in her math class. I bet that girl grew up to be a doctor or some shit. My eyes continued to scan through the list of classes with a mix of decent and fantastic grades. Then I saw it… This girl failed her library aide elective. Library aide? How does someone fail library aide? I guess that doesn’t really matter if she did indeed grow up to be a doctor.
But she didn’t.
She grew up to be a writer.
She grew up to be me.
Go figure.
Sarah’s Advice: Work Hard and Fake It
A few years ago I spent approximately a year playing dress-up as a music journalist. I wrote articles, music reviews and did a few artist interviews. After about a year I left the position to run my own music news blog, and after a short stint at that I closed up shop completely on the music front. As it turns out, being a music journalist wasn’t the job for me. Don’t get me wrong; I was pretty awesome at what I did (if I do say so myself), but I didn’t quite have the cojones to cover the music industry.
Case in point? Rabid pop music fans. After writing a marginally positive review with a few ‘eh, whatever’ type comments about a Katharine McPhee music video I was blindsided by a rash of emails, tweets and comments from some of her fans who didn’t like that I gave her video essentially one thumbs-up instead of two. I later stumbled upon the forum where my article was being discussed and where a number of fans had gathered to plan out their strategy to systematically annoy the crap out of me until I apologized. Of course, I never apologized. Instead I think I made some comment about Katharine McPhee fans being crazy which led to even more emails and then I somehow ended up sitting in a dark corner eating cake.
However, that’s not the point. The point is…writing about the music industry is hard. At least it was for me. I’m not one who takes easily to the role of critic, nor am I one who handles being the target of a systematic ‘annoy her until she breaks’ project very well. Hate mail makes me cry, and when you write about music you step into some serious hate mail territory. People love their music. I get it. I love music too; it’s the reason I got into the whole thing to begin with. But…I guess I’m better suited to sit down, avoid being anyone’s target and bounce in my seat along with the music. You probably won’t be seeing something I wrote in Rolling Stone anytime soon….or ever.
Dark corner-save me from rabid fans-chocolate cake meltdown aside…I must admit that I did learn a lot during that time. The biggest lesson I learned? Fake it until you make it. Okay, I know “fake it until you make it” sounds so cliche and ridiculous, but trust me…that’s one cliche worth taking to heart.
I had just moved back to my hometown after a crazy rollercoaster ride with the little job offer that was bullshit. (That’s a story for another day). After several email exchanges with the PR firm for an up and coming male singer/songwriter I was offered an interview with their artist. Score! At first they offered to let me interview him backstage at his show that upcoming Saturday in Los Angeles–an opportunity which would have been awesome if A.) I lived in L.A. or B.) I had the money to get my ass to L.A. in a hurry. Unfortunately, neither applied to me. So, after several more email exchanges which included me making it sound like I just wouldn’t be in town that weekend (which wasn’t a lie…), they agreed to have the artist call me for a phone interview.
On the day of said interview I sat in my new makeshift office nervously staring at the wall, waiting for the phone to ring. My makeshift office consisted of a desk made of two cardboard boxes and a floor pillow in an otherwise empty room. I was tapping my pen against the cardboard and reviewing my questions when the phone rang. Please don’t let me fuck this up.
The interview itself went off without a hitch, unless you count the slight delay on my end caused by my recording device. Oy. Other than that though, things went great. He never suspected my cardboard box desk, and at least 50% of the time I managed to ask insightful and journalist-y questions. His answers were colorful and painted with British humor, and the conversation before and after the interview was lighthearted. When I ended the interview I actually managed to sound like a seasoned professional.
After the interview I immediately got to work on the article, pulling my favorite quotes from the recorded interview. The energy was just pulsating through my veins as I tapped away on the keyboard crafting a charming and at times funny portrait of this energetic artist. Within the hour I was done. That was probably the quickest turnaround I’d ever had on a project. I spent the next hour editing the piece before sending it off to his PR people with information on when it would go live. By the end of the day his PR people had responded to my piece with excitement. They loved it. The only problem? The artist had used the word “saucy” about half a dozen times throughout the interview which ultimately found itself into the article at least once. They didn’t think their artist would say the word “saucy” since it didn’t quite fit the image they were trying to project. While I could have easily left the word “saucy” in the article, I figured that would only piss them off and screw up any future interview opportunities with them. So I removed it. They thanked me. The article went live. Feedback from my readers was pretty fantastic. I had officially interviewed a major label artist. …And no one had to know about my cardboard desk or floor pillow. No one had to know that I didn’t live in L.A. No one had to know that I didn’t have the slightest clue what I was doing. No one had to know that I was totally faking it.
More people in the industry began to contact me. More opportunities to interview even bigger artists came up. I was faking it until I made it, and it was working. …And it would have continued working if I had been able to handle rabid pop music fans and their ‘annoy her until she breaks’ campaigns. Alas, I wasn’t. But at least I learned one very important lesson: Even if you have a makeshift office and zero clue about what you’re doing, working hard and faking it will take you further than any mahogany desk and leather office chair could.
About Sarah
She’s the type of person who doesn’t have a favorite color. She’s a gypsy at heart who was raised on country music, green chile, and change.
Buy Sarah’s Books
eBook available at:
Amazon.com
Amazon.co.uk
Paperback available at:
Amazon.com
CreateSpace
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Coming March 27th!
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