Help! Where should I spend my time at my stage in the writing journey?

Writing and publishing books is a huge learning curve.

It’s not helped by the multitude of voices telling us what we need to do: from writing more books, to advertising, to building your newsletter subscribers, to … many more things. Sometimes we want to curl up in a ball and forget the whole thing.

The problem is that much of the advice is for people at different stages in their writing journey or writing different kinds of books, for different audiences. How do we work out what to do at our stage of the journey?

When my first book was published in 2009, it was with a small-ish Scottish publisher. I had no idea that I would publish more than one book. One was more than enough in my mind. Many authors are the same and so we tend to stumble along learning as we go and making loads of mistakes.

What are realistic expectations at each stage of our publishing journey? And where should we be spending our time at each stage?

This article will seek to answer these questions. It will focus primarily on self-publishing (which has more control over each aspect but also has more to learn and more possible mistakes). As someone who has had two books traditionally published with a small and medium-sized publisher (U.S.) and then a series of six self-published novels and two self-published non-fiction titles, I will share some of what I’ve learned along the way.

Unpublished author

This can be a longish stage that can range or several years to a decade or more. The main things to focus on are:

• Work on your writing craft. Whether you write fiction or non-fiction, spend your time learning to do it well. Ask author friends what are their most recommended writing craft books and search for things on the internet. DON’T sign up for expensive courses without asking for recommendations.
• Find other authors in your genre. I have found many helpful groups on Facebook including this one, and Christian Indie Authors … Early on in my journey, I also belonged to American Christian Fiction Writers and signed up for their critique groups. I had to critique others (this develops writing skills too) and they critiqued me. Another place to find out more is to attend a local writer’s conference like the Omega Christian Writers Conference in Australia.
• Read as many other authors in your genre as possible. Review their books after you’ve read them and write personally to authors whose books are in your genre and whose work you’ve appreciated. This is the start of your networking.
• As you get closer to publication, work on a website. Look at other authors’ websites and note down all the things you like (or don’t like). Base your website on the best practices. At a bare minimum, your website should have a main page + author bio/about + books list and a way that people can contact you. Ask other authors you know or in one of the Facebook groups for recommendations for which is the best website company and host for your country. I use a paid wordpress.org site.
• Grow your subscriber list. This post suggests how to get started. I have used both MailChimp and MailerLite and have loved MailerLite. It is much cheaper, but you don’t need to worry about price for your first 1000 subscribers and you’re very unlikely to have that many before you’ve published a few books.
• Consider the pros and cons of being exclusive to Amazon for ebooks or being ‘wide’. I am ‘wide’ by philosophy and choice. Whatever you choose, make sure you have a reason for it.

Only one book published

Major on:

• Building networks with authors in your genre. Keep reading and interacting with them wherever you can. Ask questions and learn from them via their websites and in authors and readers groups.
• You might start approaching an author or two in your genre and at your level (new authors) and do a simple giveaway with them using something like Rafflecopter.
• Website – make sure you’ve updated it and have added something like My Book Table (look at other authors’ websites and ask them what they’re using) so people can find out about your book and click through to buy links.
• Write the next book – preferably in a series. Read this article for why.
• Newsletter – subscribe to a few authors in your genre and glean ideas for your own newsletters. Perhaps keep an ideas list.
• Work out how to put up your author profile on BookBub and start recommending your top reads in your genre. BookBub will become important after you have more than three books in a single series released.
• Work out where you want reviews and look for ten to twenty people (or more if you can find them) to be on your launch team. I use a google form so that people can sign up. I don’t accept every applicant and if they don’t review as promised and don’t let me know why, they won’t be invited to sign up next time. I’ve found that many people need to be led through the process of how to review and where and why. I wrote this post to help readers.
• My original review priorities were Goodreads and Amazon. Recently I’ve been requesting reviews on Google Play, Kobo, Apple, B and N, and BookBub.

** At this stage your single book might only be selling ten ebooks a month.

Don’t waste your money on advertising anywhere at this stage.

Two to three books (preferably in a series)

Things can still feel slow with the second book. Don’t become anxious. Just keep putting good foundations in place and rejoice that you are not under the pressure of huge success – you still have time to make mistakes and they’re usually much less costly at this stage.

• Subscribers- concentrate on increasing your subscribers. Participate in a subscriber list building. Bookfunnel has many and you might also want to choose your genre on BookSweeps/Ryan Zee. I grew my list by about 500 over several of these promotions and many have stayed. Make sure you have a welcome automated series of emails for new subscribers. Check out how other authors do theirs by subscribing to their list. Mine is here.
• If you don’t yet have a gift to welcome new subscribers – now would be a good time to develop one. A short story or a prequel novella or a list of something related to your non-fiction.
• Keep building networks with authors in your genre. Run another giveaway and invite more authors who are in your genre and stage. Maybe even have the courage to invite an author above your grade. They can only say no.
• Keep your expectations about sales at a realistic level.

It’s probably still too early to advertise.

Four to six books

• Advertising – this is the time to start advertising. Ask around for who are the experts. Many of these people have free or fairly cheap courses to get you started.
• Apply for your first BookBub featured deal – perhaps start with the international version as it is much cheaper. These are a great way to make sure your wide sales on Google Play, Kobo, Apple, B and N … begin to grow. The reason for waiting is that you need at least three books in a series (preferably more) because the money from these deals is made not from the first book which might be selling at 99c or even be free, but from the read-through to full-priced books.
• Experiment with some of the other promotion sites. I have tried each one at a time and thought deeply about whether to make the deal free or 99c for the first book in my series. You want to check that your back matter leads the reader clearly to the next in the series. I now include the title/cover and the first chapter of the next book in each book. Some people just do multiple promotions close together (called ‘stacking’) but I’m glad I didn’t. I have worked out that only a few companies are worth it for my books and that has made things much simpler.
• I now run a twice-yearly giveaway and have grown that to about sixteen authors. Each round has increased our reach.
• Plan another series, using all the things you’ve learned from making mistakes with your first series.

Multiple books in more than one series/genre

By this stage, you should have mastered all the basics. Just keep growing and learning.

What advice have you received that has been helpful for your stage (please include which stage in the answer) of your writing journey?