My self publishing journey so far
The things I’ve learned and the (many) things I still have to learn
A while back, I wrote a story about what it was like to switch from being a traditionally-published author to being self-published. Back then I was at the very beginning of my journey, so now I’m further down the line I thought it would be good to write an update. So here it is!
As a brief recap, I had two books published by one of the UK big five publishers back in 2017 and 2018. Despite all the excitement surrounding that, things didn’t go quite as I’d hoped. Far from being the beginning of a sparkling new career, I found that, afterwards, things stalled again, and I felt as though not only was I back to square one on my publishing journey, but actually, I felt worse about it — after all, I’d had a glimpse of what it’s like to be a successful published author, only to have the dream snatched away again. It was a tough lesson to learn, not even made much easier by the discovery that I wasn’t alone.
Fast forward to the beginning of this year, and I was on the brink of giving up. My agent had said she didn’t think my next book I’d written was quite right, and I didn’t feel as though I had it in me to keep writing, only to keep being told no.
Stubborn — or determined?
But I also have a stubborn streak, which means that sometimes, when I’m being told I can’t do something, I become more determined than ever to prove people wrong and to do it despite them. And so in January this year, I decided I had nothing to lose by self-publishing the book I’d just finished, and that, most importantly, I loved and believed in. And so it began.
I paid for a thorough edit, and a professional cover design. I paid for proof copies to be sent to book bloggers and magazine reviewers, and I paid for a Bookbub brand new releases advert. I was good to go.
And then, on 12 August, Dear Grace was released and — well, things fell a bit flat. I quickly realised that, despite my connections in the media, and the book bloggers who loved my book, and the dozens of five star reviews I was beginning to get on the mighty Amazon, that all that could only take me so far. The stark truth was, if I wanted a wanted a chance of being discovered by potential readers, I needed to learn about marketing, and I needed to learn it fast.
Marketing for dummies
Now, for some people this might not sound too daunting. But I don’t have a very methodical or logical mind. At best, my mind is in a constant state of (dis)organised chaos — a bit like a filing system that mainly consists of scraps of paper and post-it notes dotted around rather than an ordered, labelled folder. In other words, it’s all there, but it’s hard to find it when needed.
I’d spent some time listening to David Gaughran talk about marketing your book, and I’d googled how to set up Facebook adverts. These two things combined kept me ticking along, with a few sales a day. But when the adverts ran out, the sales dropped off a cliff. The trouble was, I was only just breaking even with the adverts, which meant I still had a long way to go until I’d even be making back the money I’d spent on getting the book out there.
I’ve just started to teach myself about Amazon ads. I know it’s a huge behemoth, and there is loads I can learn. For now I’m concentrating on just getting some adverts out there and trying to bring in more money than I’m spending.
My main problem is that I don’t know how to analyse results, and so I just go for a scatter-gun, hope-for-the-best approach. And there’s no point in me reading more and more about how to analyse my advert/sales data. The information doesn’t go in, and it won’t happen.
A brand new deal
So, what next? Well, very luckily for me, just after I decided to self-publish this book, I got offered a four-book deal with a digital-first publisher, which means that, for the next four books at least, I get to concentrate on the writing and let the publishing company deal with the marketing. And even though I’ve enjoyed the process of self-publishing — for a start I’d ever sold a single book in the US as I didn’t previously have a US deal, and now I have — and would love to make it work, I can’t help being relieved. I know some people relish the idea of playing around with keywords and algorithms, and testing different ways of marketing and analysing data. But me? I just like to write, and have realised, increasingly, that marketing, and anything vaguely logical, is just not something I’m very good at. I need the support of a publisher to make the most of my books. Simple as that.
And so all I can do now is hope that I eventually make back the money I spent on publishing Dear Grace, and enjoy having the support of a publisher behind me again going forward. But I’ll always be glad I tried the self-publishing route, because it’s taught me a lot, and, hopefully, gained me some more followers and readers than I would otherwise have had. I would also never say never again — but next time I’d have to keep a tighter rein on how much I’m spending getting the book ready for market, and keep my expectations low.
So, see you in January, when my new book, Before We Grow Old, will be published — and I won’t have had to market it myself!
