And now for the awesome:
Yes, my friends, that is a current (as of this evening) screenshot of Counterpoint: Book I of Song of the Fallen cracking the Top 100 charts in the Gay and Lesbian Genre Fiction category. Thanks so much to all of you for supporting my writing, and especially to those of you who take the time to rate and review a book--be it mine or others', I love seeing M/M books get some love!--when you're done. Whatever small success I can claim is all because of my brilliant writing you :D
That friggin rocks! Congrats.
ReplyDeleteI think I took your poll last night, but I don't remember seeing the top 100 thing, but then.. I was in one of my flittering around to fast states. Over excited will do that to me.
Being the not quite normal chick that I am, you don't really have a choice that fits me, which is I pay attention to only the authors I like, helps with the stalking thing you know, but I get hit up by more authors than you could imagine so, delete and quit bugging me.
I'm a complex crazy girl.
Anyway, awesome on the Counterpoint rating. Congrats congrats.
Claymores and hand grenades babe =)
Wow, long winded comment. Looks like it could be one of those rambley days. =)
ReplyDeleteHaha, rambly days are fine. And thank you, m'dear for the explanation and the claymores :D I'm kind of the same way with events: I find it vaguely irritating to keep getting event invitations from people who have never even taken the time to speak to me, so I'll delete them without bothering to respond. But when it's from someone I'm friendly with, or an author I like or respect, I'll want to know what s/he has to tell me.
ReplyDeleteWhat I'm finding confusing, and the reason I put up this poll, is that I'm getting lots of people answering the invitation with "no." Since it's an open invitation (anyone can invite anyone) on a ten-day event, it seems reasonable to assume that just because you got an invitation, I'm not actually going to be waiting on any one person to show if they didn't specifically tell me they wouldn't. And if you're like me, polls that don't interest you essentially get deleted unread, not to mention unanswered. And the only reason I'd answer an invitation like that at all is to pass it on by having it show up in my update feed, so that writers who matter to me can get more exposure.
So in my (admittedly limited) worldview, I perceive the "no" answer with the update feed option specifically un-checked (so it WON'T show up, although it's quite possible that a "no" answer automatically doesn't go in your update feed; I don't know as I've never clicked no) as vaguely hostile, or kind of passive-aggressive, even though I realize it's really probably not 99% of the time. But see, that made me worry that I was pissing people off by sending out an event invite, even though it's the first time I've ever done it, and I even made a point of trying to make it clever and entertaining. I'm trying to figure out if I should be doing more invites in the future (not a lot, mind, just one here and there to promote new releases): is it good exposure, or does it just irritate people? I still can't tell.
I just went to look at mine, and oddly enough, I responded to the invite with yes, but it wasn't in on my recent update feed. Couldn't figure out why, so I went digging around and found I have my unchecked in the settings, along with most of the other things.
ReplyDeleteNow I remember why. That thing was updating my feed with so many things, most of which were stupid, who cares things, and I felt like I was bugging people to death with every little thing I did over there. I only had a few friends when I set that up, most of which were authors, and, believe or not, was more than a little author shy. LOL, didn't figure I needed to bug people like Aleks with "Amara just got 3 out of 4 questions right on that twilight quiz". lol, still don't.
Couldn't really tell you one way or the other about the rest of everyone, but I can tell you that personally... I despise author "hard sell". But then, back to doing things differently. I only pimp authors I like, or consider friends. Honestly, doesn't even matter if I like their books, I just want to help them sell, the more they sell, the sooner they... will be famous =D
I hate the author hard sell. I hate all hard sell, but since I started my blog, I've had the author hard sell thing happen way too much and I will run as fast as I can. Chances are I will never read their book. My book pimpin' is heart... not ad space. I get a lot of it over on FB and just realized I had some going on my goodreads wall. Buy my book, see my thing, tell everyone about my book. It drives me insane. I won't deal at all with them, and I will probably never read their book.
I don't know how the best way to promo stuff is, but... I do think the hard sell backfires. Can't just be me that hates the hard sell. Personally, I know what I like, and who I like. I look for books more through reviews and recommendations. Less from authors, and more from readers. If I see one of my blog friends raving about a book, I'll rush out an buy it. If I get a hard sell from the same author, won't touch it.
All that ramble being said, I think the blog tour is the perfect solution. And the people you have participating in it are big. Seeing your book on jessewave and places like that... is reader awesome. We like those places. We trust what they say.
BTW, since I put your cool ad thing up on my blog last night... I'm already getting emails from people that can't wait, I must have that book! lol, haven't even said anything yet. Good job on the button :)
lol, I need to stop coming over here. My comments are getting longer and longer. crap, I wrote you a novel! =D
ReplyDeleteNono, don't get all self-conscious on me now; novels are good! I learn from novels! That was a fab comment, actually.
ReplyDeleteAnd yeah, I'm pretty sure NOBODY likes the hard sell. I try to avoid it at all costs. I talk with people, join communities, make friends, give recommendations . . . that's the way to do it. And I couldn't figure if doing an event invitation for the blog tour would be considered a hard sell or not, because even thouh I have over 400 GR friends, I've probably not interacted beyond an initial "hello" with a good half of them, and I don't want to piss that half off.
Also, that's totally cool that you've got so many people already chomping at the bit for the book :D I'm thinking it's gonna be a really fun, exciting week for all of us. And yeah, Tal did a brilliant job with the jeweler's ad :D
LOL, believe or not, I'm always a tad self-conscious, usually AFTER I've rambled or blown a grenade off. Especially with people I've just met.
ReplyDeleteI'm a quirky little thing :)
For what ever it's worth, I think you're doing a great job with the promo. Not to much, not to little. At least from what I've seen. I wouldn't say a goodreads invite is hard sell. Hard sell is: A goodreads invite, book rec, and message. followed by FB wall posts on OUR walls, messages, group invites, and event invites. Followed by personal emails to every email account readers have.
That's hard sell. That.. DRIVES ME NUTS!!!!!! And yes, they do all of that simultaneously.
OMG are you kidding me? If an author did that to me, I would fly to wherever they live just to punch them.
ReplyDeleteLOL, yeah, here's me wishing I could afford the plane tickets.
ReplyDelete