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« on: March 10, 2017, 06:39:54 pm »
Hi! The back-story:
I've been lurking around here for a few months now, learning a LOT (Thank you!) and scrambling to restore my previously small-press-published reverted titles to circulation as an Indie publisher. Maybe I should have done this more slowly, making more of each release, but I hated to see my Author Page reduced by so many titles.
In January I released my Kindle-Scout-rejected YA book, 'The Winter Knife' and have had trouble getting any reviews for it, despite a month on Netgalley. Someone listed a nice review there, but never posted it to Amazon. I've been working on building up a mailing list and seeking reviews.
I may also have made a mistake in going wide from the start with most of my titles, but I published at least one book in each of two series through Kindle, so I have been able to use AMS for some marketing (though not to much effect so far). The other titles I published through Pronoun, to take advantage of their superior royalty rate for lower-priced ebooks on Amazon. AMS presently shows two sales in one of the series: Fairy Godmothers' Union (sweet romantic urban fantasy). The other series is Team Guardian (a bit spicier urban fantasy featuring a team of super-powered crime fighters). I've just learned I can't get series' pages for them because not all the titles are published through Kindle.
Between mid-January and this month, I've re-released all my small-press titles: A stand-alone urban fantasy novel ('Spirited'), three novella-length 'Team Guardian' stories, and a box-set version of all three stories, and I also re-released two short story collections of Fairy Godmothers' Union short stories with new cover art and created an anthology edition including all those stories and one additional tale.
I've done some InstaFreebie, Mail Chimp and Author Cross-Promo events to build up my mailing list. As of this month, my Author Rank has been zig-zagging between 131,308 (peak) and 307,661 (valley). I'm hoping to keep it from sinking too much before I start releasing more titles. I have another book for which I'm seeking reversion, and three NEW titles planned for this year.
Kensington still has one of my titles, though it's doing them no good, and no good for me in their hands. Zero sales. It's a story involving a young man gifted with super-powers by his fairy godmother, to help him win the hand of the girl next door - and they have it categorized as plain Contemporary Romance. I can't see what they've done with key words but I bet I could do better in making them more specific to this book. Their cover art suggests the hero is a suit-and-tie businessman. He is actually a geeky grad student who doesn't own a suit and tie. Their branding ignores the fact that this book is part of the Fairy Godmothers' Union series. All very frustrating to me. I requested reversion in January; legally, I should be entitled to reversion as of the end of February, but they've been slow in giving me a response.
The present situation and plea for advice:
I want to re-issue 'Wonder Guy' with a pre-order period and good chance of getting some more advance reviews, so that when I issue 'Thanksgiving' (another Kindle-Scout-Rejected title), (which ties in to the Fairy Godmothers' Union books, but starts a five-book series called Holiday Enchantment), I'll have hope of getting a Bookbub ad for 'Wonder Guy' to boost visibility for 'Thanksgiving.'
Or would it be smarter to do something else? What do you think? Book Two of the Holiday series ('Yuletide') is in the works, presently at 30,000 words (aiming for 80-90,000) but I hope to have it ready for release the month following 'Thanksgiving' (I want to release both books ON or just before their name-sake holidays.)
Meanwhile, I'm currently wrapping up the first draft of 'One of Me is Missing' which is another YA in the same world as 'The Winter Knife.' I'm hoping to have it ready for release in early June. I'm also hoping to get enough reviews for 'The Winter Knife' in order to try for a timely Bookbub ad for the release of 'One of Me.' Any suggestions for increasing my odds to make TWK and 'Wonder Guy' Bookbub eligible? Ideas for fallback plans for the releases of the new books?
Thanks!