Writing Books And Selling Books Are Two Completely Different Skills (And You Need To Be Able To Do Both)

I've said this before, but it's always been in passing. Because of that I thought I would dedicate this week's entry to addressing this misconception that a lot of people seem to have. Because being able to write good books does not actually give you any insight whatsoever on being able to actually sell books, good or otherwise.

These are two separate skills... and while you can make money with the latter by itself, writing a book no one buys isn't exactly helpful if you're hoping to buy yourself some time to write more books. Or tacos. Or a house. Or anything else, really.

This is just a daydream, if you don't have a plan to make it happen.

Before we get into the nitty gritty this week, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Lastly, to be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree!

Lastly, don't forget to check out my Vocal archive for additional fiction, articles, explorations of weird history, and more! And, of course, check me out on Blue Sky, since that's what we're talking about today!

Addressing Some False Beliefs (So You Can Avoid These Pitfalls)

First of all, right out of the gate, you need to accept that the quality of your book has precisely dick all to do with how well it sells. Good books can go completely undiscovered and ignored, and absolute drek can achieve bestseller status and make the author fat stacks of cash. So before you do anything else, put the idea out of your head that writing a quality, entertaining book will magically guarantee you sales. It won't, and if we're all honest, it never has.

Alice went into a little more detail than I did, and you should subscribe to her channel at Alice The Author.

Secondly, if you're an author you need to realize that sales isn't just going to get "taken care of" by someone else. Unless you have so much disposable income that you can hire a publicist and a PR team (or at least a social media manager to run everything on your behalf), then you're going to have to get stuck in to do things yourself. Trust me, none of us want to do this part of the job, but it's kind of necessary if you actually want to sell books and make money.

Thirdly, sales isn't something you can just fire off in a few minutes before going on about the rest of your day. Honestly, the first half of my day is generally spent making social media posts for promotional purposes, and then a lot of my blogs, videos, etc. are made to get my books and other projects in front of readers. It's an exhausting process that's a never-ending wheel that you have to keep pushing like Arnold Schwarzenegger in the first Conan film.

I have a video on this very topic over on The Azukail Games YouTube channel, in fact. I'd subscribe there, if you haven't.

You Need A Plan (And You Need To Be Realistic)

You know how the advice in writing books is that random chance can always make things worse, but it can never make things better? Yeah, that's the mindset you need to go into when it comes to actually selling books. To that end you need to figure out what you can do, and what you can afford, to ensure that you are doing everything in your power to sell as many books as you can... and that you are never expecting to just "get lucky" so you can come out ahead.

Now, I live in poverty, and I'm an author. So, I do not have a budget to throw at anyone, nor do I have a team of people from any of my publishers who handle sales and marketing for me. So, I will tell you all what I do, because I feel it's a solid basis for those who are starting from nothing.

- Social media posting (I use FB, Reddit, MeWe, and Discord as my primaries, with a few extras thrown in from time to time)

- Blogging (I write about a lot of my books on here and my gaming blog Improved Initiative)

- YouTube (I contribute to Azukail Games and The A.L.I.C.E. Files, and have appeared on other channels as well)

- Bi-weekly newsletter (every 2 weeks I put out a newsletter with all my latest releases)

In addition to those regular marketing efforts, I've also taken my books to a dozen regional conventions, and appeared on several podcasts and YouTube channels for interviews. What I have not done is taken out website ads, or paid for a book tour... and not because those things can't work, but because I just don't have the money to gamble on them.

If you can't afford to lose it, don't risk it.

This is the central thing to remember when it comes to selling books... everything is a gamble. You never know what will work, because things that look like a waste of time might net you big gains, and options that looked like certain moneymakers might end up leaving you with a bunch of extra bills and a big, fat goose egg on your earnings.

As an example, I could make a post on Reddit today, telling people to go buy copies of my tabletop RPG Army Men: A Game of Tactical Plastic, and that post could just lead to a landslide of sales. Maybe it was a veterans' day celebration that I wasn't aware of. Maybe someone famous saw my post and thought the game was cool so they boosted the signal. Maybe I just so happened to start a flame war in the comments that kept my post relevant for days on-end, but whatever it was it got seen, and people bought copies. Or, alternatively, the post just vanished into oblivion, and no one saw it.

In the case of the former, a few minutes of work and zero up-front cost just netted me a big win. In the case of the latter, I didn't make any money, but I didn't lose anything except half a dozen minutes of time and effort, either.

The more a marketing endeavor costs you, the more pressure there is on it to succeed, and the more money you're going to lose if it doesn't. And you should always go in assuming that this isn't going to work, because if you start telling yourself that you're going to make bank, then you're going to start justifying expenses that you can't afford because it will be okay when you make all the sales that only exist in your head.

Don't pay a bunch of money to someone claiming they'll get you a lot of sales. Don't go into debt to attend a convention in the hopes that you can sell books. Don't blow a bunch of money on Amazon ads when you don't know how to build a campaign. And even if you are familiar with a convention crowd, an advertising platform, or anything else, you need to always have that voice in your head asking what happens if this flops... because sooner or later something is going to flop. And it's probably going to be sooner instead of later.

The advice I would close with is to start small, and build up. If your book is traditionally published, then contact your publisher and ask if they have any resources to help you market your book. Reach out to author communities online and start making connections. See if there are local events you could attend to a small fee, or no fee (I'd check your local library and farmer's markets). Reach out to your local newspapers and radio stations and send them a press briefing to see if they'll interview you about your book. Become active in any existing social groups you have, and stretch out to others as you can.

Marketing your book and making sales is not easy. It's grueling, often repetitive work, and it can feel like you're swinging a sledgehammer as you try to mine out a hidden vein of gold. You can't just throw money at the problem and fast-forward to being a bestselling author, though. Or, if you have that much money, you probably aren't concerned with your books paying your bills.

In the end, do the work, and approach selling your book with the same seriousness and purpose that you approached writing it in the first place. After all, you did the work to make it, now do the work to get people to read it.

Support The Literary Mercenary

If you want to see me produce more work, consider some of the following options!

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Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Business of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list.

The Steven Seagal Effect (Because It Takes Someone Else To Make You Famous)

If you've watched more than the 3 or 4 Steven Segal movies that are actually enjoyable, you've probably noticed that he isn't much of an actor, or an onscreen presence. And if you've listened to any of the behind-the-scenes stories about him, he appears to be a bully, a misogynist, a homophone, and he has both physically and sexually assaulted a huge number of people. You add in his cozying up to dictators, his likely ties to organized crime, and more, and you might wonder how the hell a man like this ever rose (even briefly) to the top ranks of Hollywood action stars.

Well, if Hollywood legend and Fact Fiend are to be believed, it's due to a guy named Michael Ovitz.

We're talking about the Hollywood machine, but rest assured, this applies to writers as well.

Before we get into the nitty gritty this week, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Lastly, to be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree!

Lastly, don't forget to check out my Vocal archive for additional fiction, articles, explorations of weird history, and more!

The Myth of The Kingmaker

If you've never heard of Michael Ovitz, it's probably because you're not the sort of person who pays attention to the doings in Hollywood. However, with a roster consisting of a real who's-who of actors, directors, etc., Ovitz was thought of by many as a super agent. He had a real talent for finding people, and turning them into stars that dominated the box office.

And according to the stories told about Mr. Seagal, Ovitz is the reason he had a movie career at all.

Because we're about to get into a story of ego, power, and influence.

As the stories go, Mr. Ovitz had quite a high opinion of himself, and his abilities. An opinion backed up by results, but a high opinion all the same. He even went so far as to boast that he could make anyone a star. No matter how unpleasant, how unlikable, or how uncharismatic they were, he could make it happen. This supposedly got a little out-of-hand, and someone bet him to prove it.

And it just so happened that at the time, Seagal was Ovitz's personal trainer, as well as being one of the more uninteresting and unlikable people he knew.

In Seagal's own words, he had no real interest in acting at the time Ovitz picked him to use in this bet. But Ovitz made him the offer, laid out a handful of scripts, and told him whatever one he picked they would get made, and he would be the star. And this led to Seagal starring in the film Above The Law. Which, if you've seen it, does not scream "new action hero of a generation".

Seagal did become famous though. Film after film came out with his name on them (also due mostly to the influence of his agent), and even to this day he produces tons of direct-to-DVD garbage. This illustrates an important point. In short, even if someone has no talent, no charisma, and the work they produce is drek, if you put someone's name in front of an audience's eyes enough times, they're almost bound to succeed... sometimes even despite themselves.

What This Has To Do With Authors

Now, as I said, the above account of events is a long-time Hollywood rumor. However, it also illustrates a very important point when it comes to being an author. Namely that it doesn't matter how much talent, drive, dedication, skill, or charisma you do or don't have, if no one knows your name, and your work doesn't get pushed into the spotlight somehow.

Numbers... it all comes back to numbers...

Consider, for a moment, the sheer amount of pull, power, and influence that having a big-name publisher at your back can have. Because if your company decides they're going to make you famous, they could pick up the phone and get you on TV shows, popular podcasts, talk radio, and a variety of other venues. They can put commercials for your book on TV, they can reach out to reviewers at important publications, and they can make deals with bookstores to ensure that you are front-and-center in their store setup.

They can make it all but impossible for you to fail, in terms of sales figures and return on investment.

Even if your book is middle of the road, or outright bad, that amount of hype is going to draw people to it. And there are going to be people in that audience who like it, and become fans of yours. If the numbers get big enough, you may even get a movie, TV, or streaming deal out of it. But don't forget that your sales numbers are not a reflection of your skill, craft, or story. Sure, all of those things help, but how well you sell is (more often than not) a reflection of the amount of resources put into promoting you.

And that is why when you're a self-published author, or you're published by a small company, you basically have to depend on social media, creative marketing, and the support of your audience.

It's All Up To You, The Readers

I know this is a soap box I climb up onto in most of my blog entries, but it's a message that not a lot of people seem to understand. Because most of us as authors aren't going to be lucky enough for a super agent, or a huge publisher, to pluck us up and decide to make us into the next big thing. As such, we need people to all combine their voices, and help us claw our way up onto that kind of platform so that people can find out about our work, and we can keep doing what we do.

As an example...

Take my novel Old Soldiers. Novus Mundi is a relatively small press, so they can't exactly act as a kingmaker, even if they did give me a great new cover, and a snazzy blurb to re-invigorate my novel's second release. However, of the folks on my social media lists who've seen it, let's say that even 500 of them got copies. E-books or paperback, both are equally acceptable for this example. Now, that's not a lot of sales when compared to what big publishers can manage (though it would be a lot for me), but let's say that each of those people also left me an Amazon review, and shared it on their social media platform of choice.

That would be colossal in terms of giving me a boost. Not only would that mean I'd have a pretty sizable royalty check (likely the biggest I've ever received), but Amazon starts promoting your book when it hits 50 reviews... so if it had 500 reviews, that would kick the algorithm into gear, and make sure my book started showing up on all kinds of people's shopping pages. At that point the rolling stone could potentially cause an avalanche as more people check it out, tell their friends and family members about it, and so on, and so forth.

A lot of small actions, if they happen close together, can be the boost we need. Just something to keep in mind.

Support The Literary Mercenary

For folks who just want to do their part to help keep me making more content, please subscribe/follow me in these locations:

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Like, Follow, and Stay Tuned!

That's all for this week's Business of Writing!

If you'd like to see more of my work, take a look at my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my sci fi dystopian thriller Old Soldiers, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife as well as my recent collection The Rejects! You can also check out my Rumble channel The Literary Mercenary for free audio dramas!

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!

Don't Make The Mistake of Equating Popularity With Quality

Before we get into the meat of this week's update, I want to be clear that this is not about bashing popular fiction, or declaring that just because something has a diehard following that it's inherently of lesser quality. People are free to like what they like, and to enjoy what they enjoy, as long as they aren't hurting anyone. However, as authors we often equate earnings and popularity with our worth and skill as creators... and I think it's important to regularly remind ourselves that just isn't the case.

Your books mean nothing, I've seen what you cheer.

As usual, before we get into it this week, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Also, if you've got a bit of spare cash that you'd like to use to help keep the wheels turning, consider becoming a Patreon patron!

Lastly, to be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree!

Being Skilled and Being Famous Aren't The Same Thing

There is a question almost every author out there has asked themselves at some point in their career, and while it's usually a rhetorical question, it's one that I feel we should look at, and try to answer.

"Why is that author being paid hundreds of thousands of dollars, and being read by millions of fans, but I'm not?"

Because there are all kinds of answers to this question.

A lot of authors will ask themselves this, and begin to fill in the blanks with their own perceived failings. Their story isn't good enough, their writing is flawed, their characters are derivative, and so on, and so forth.

And while that might be true, it's important to remember that it isn't necessarily the reason. After all, there are a lot of hacky stories, cliched characters, and predictable prose that's made its way onto the bestseller list over the years. And even if your writing isn't perfect, that doesn't mean it isn't entertaining, and that it doesn't speak to the hearts of your readers. No, what is more likely is that you haven't found your audience. The problem is that there's only so much you can do about that, and the deck is stacked against you.

Let me give you an example.

This is an audio adaptation of my short story Field Test from the YouTube channel A Vox in The Void. The story itself has just over 200 some odd reads in its original, text form, but if you check the view count on the YouTube channel it has 65,000 listens and counting!

That disparity is a perfect example of what I'm talking about this week.

While I wrote the original text of the story, I have maybe a couple dozen hardcore followers, and at best a hundred or so casual readers beyond that. A Vox in The Void, at time of writing, has over 43,000 subscribers, and it's growing every day. So the channel has a bigger platform, draws a bigger crowd, and presents a format that people can listen to while painting minis, cleaning the house, or doing other tasks that are impossible to do when reading. There's also the matter of that channel's name carrying more weight with the community, and feeling more legitimate to a lot of folks, who despite listening to the story may still have no idea who I am.

And, you know, the presentation is beautiful. That helps, too.

Why didn't I draw 65,000 reads when I first posted the story? Well, I don't have that kind of a fan base. Vocal, as a platform, doesn't draw the kind of audience a popular YouTuber can. The algorithm is more likely to draw eyes to said YouTube channel than it is to bring readers to the text version I posted. There's the name and brand recognition that I lack. The list goes on and on.

So the next time you start getting down on your work and questioning whether you're really good enough to do this, I want you to take a moment and think about all the famous people you've heard stories about that claim they got their big break from someone who opened a door for them. Whether it was Stephen King turning his audience on to the works of Clive Barker just as he was about to fade into obscurity, Dolph Lundgren getting early acting gigs through his association with Grace Jones, or anyone else who has had to seize opportunities as they come, remember, none of us are self-made successes.

Write the best stories you can, and work hard to master your craft. But remember that if you don't have a marketing budget measured in the thousands, a huge audience that means the algorithms automatically promote you, and a name big enough to get you radio, podcast, and talk show spots, people aren't going to psychically know that you wrote an amazing story that they've yet to discover.

I Could Also Use A Little Help (If You Can Spare It)

If you made it this far, and you'd like to help an author who's fighting the algorithm every day, please consider doing the following:

- Follow My Facebook

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And if you happen to have some spare dosh lying around, consider become a Patreon patron, or leaving a tip by Buying Me a Ko-Fi!

Also, if you're interested in even more free fiction, gaming articles, weird history, and more go give my Vocal archive a browse. It's got 263 entries at time of writing, and each read helps me earn a little bit of cash to pay my bills.

Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Craft of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list. 

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!

Victor Hugo, Notre Dame, and The Power of Prose

When you think of the cathedral of Notre Dame, chances are good you imagine the modern incarnation of it. With its spires and gargoyles, its artistic splendor wowing tourists from around the world (at least before the time of Covid-19, that is). And chances are that when you see it, it immediately brings to mind one of the most memorable and tragic figures in fiction... Quasimodo, the hunchback of Notre Dame.

If you listen closely, the bells still call his name.

This tale has been so firmly lodged in our consciousness, from its original blockbuster success as a novel, to stage productions, to movies and musicals, that we all tend to forget something important... that this tragic tale of lust, greed, and longing might actually be the reason Notre Dame still exists today.

How Victor Hugo Saved an Entire Cathedral

Notre Dame the structure was first built in the 1100s, and the construction lasted for decades. When it was finally completed, it was an amazing sight to behold. However, as the Washington Post points out, the cathedral was in a shambles after the French Revolution, and when it was handed back to the Catholic Church it had become an eyesore, and it was poised on the edge of being torn down because there just wasn't the interest in saving it from the hammer.

Until Victor Hugo clapped his hands, and got everyone's attention.

All of you, listen up! I have a tale to tell...

In the 1820s, Hugo started in on the now famous tale of Quasimodo and Esmeralda. His work about finding the beauty and the heart beneath a frightening, unlovely exterior was more than just a lesson in not judging people... it was a tale about the cathedral itself. Hunchbacked and half blind, the modern dissolution of the beauty and splendor Notre Dame had once had was reflected in the book's protagonist.

Whether the readers at the time dug that deeply into the symbolism, or whether they just got wrapped up in the beautifully-told tale, Hugo's work managed to focus attention on the plight of Notre Dame. It started the avalanche of public interest, and outcry, that led to the cathedral being restored. Because now people were interested. They were paying attention, and it wasn't just an ugly old church from the medieval period anymore... now it was their cathedral. It was where a major bestseller took place. It was the epicenter of this fictional legend.

And that legend exists to this day, judging from the number of people who regard Notre Dame as a place of awe and wonder.

Your Work Can Change Things

Now, before we get ahead of ourselves, it's important to point out that The Hunchback of Notre Dame was not some random, breakout novel. Victor Hugo was an established, popular writer, and he used his platform to draw attention to a cause he believed in. The fact that he had skill and passion for the project is probably one reason Quasimodo's tale resonated as hard as it did, but we must remember that he wasn't some struggling writer no one had heard of, looking up at Notre Dame from the gutter and trying to save her.

With that said, don't even let someone tell you that writing can't change things. That it can't make statements, draw attention to issues, and plant ideas into the minds of the public. The fiction we create often impacts the real world in meaningful (sometimes unexpected) ways.

Wait! I was just trying to get that fish!

As Gizmodo points out, the film Jaws terrified people so much that sharks have been killed in record numbers despite posing very little threat. Some people point out that Robin Cook's medical thriller Coma actually made people stop carrying organ donor cards because of the organ theft plot shown in the book, convincing many that it was a massive, extremely common occurrence at hospitals. To be clear, organ theft does happen, but the idea that medical personnel will just let you die so they can harvest your organs is nonsense.

So the next time someone tells you that your reader doesn't care about your book's politics, or how you depict people doesn't matter, remember that one of the best known landmarks in Paris only stands today because Victor Hugo decided to write a novel about it.

The power of writing is ephemeral, but it's no less real despite that.

Incidentally, for those interested in more unique and unusual places round the world, consider checking out some of the following:

- The Gardens of Bomarzo: A Renaissance-era park filled with bizarre statues and strange art, this Italian attraction is breathtaking.

- The Winchester Mystery House: A bizarre home in California, legends of ghosts and insanity are lurid and interesting... but it's likely they were just made up whole cloth.

- The Chicago Pedway: A series of tunnels beneath Chicago's busy streets, these tunnels are far more real than the Undertown that Jim Butcher created, and they feature prominently in my short story "Heart and Soul" found in my recent release The Rejects!

Like, Follow, and Stay Tuned!

That's all for this week's Business of Writing! If you'd like to see more of my work, take a look at my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife as well as my recent collection The Rejects!

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!

Getting Paid While Giving Away Free Books (It Can Be Done!)

Most authors I've met have done some kind of discount or giveaway on their work. People love a bargain, and there's no better way to get your book into someone's hands than just letting them go download one for a price anyone can afford. However, having done a few giveaways myself, there is no escaping the feeling of mild depression that settles in as you watch your numbers climb, and start mentally doing the math for all the royalties you could have earned if those free downloads had been paying customers instead.

700 downloads over two days... yeah, I was doing the math...

While I can't hand you a magic wand that gives you instant success, there is a bit of a trick you can tuck up your sleeve to make some money the next time you have a giveaway on one of your titles. What's even better is that you can do this for your own giveaways, your friends' giveaways, or just books by authors you like that you think more people should know about.

All You Need is an Affiliate Account

I talked about this back in If You're An Author, You Really Need An Affiliate Marketing Account, but I'll summarize it for all the folks who are just joining us. When you have an affiliate marketing account for a website like Amazon, it lets you create special links that tag traffic that comes through your shares. Then when people make a purchase, you get a portion of that sale because you're the one who drove that individual to the website. In short, if you sold something, the website you have your account with gives you a finder's fee for helping close the sale.

How does that help if they downloaded something for free?

What makes affiliate marketing so "sneaky" is that once you've tagged someone, it doesn't matter what they buy once they get on the site. So I could put out a link to buy my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, for example, and anyone who goes through that link to Amazon gets tagged with my information. But say they don't buy a copy of my book... instead, they decide to finally get that sweet pair of Doc Marten's boots they've been looking at. As long as they're earmarked as coming through one of my links, I still get the credit for that purchase.

No matter how big or how small the item someone buys is, as long as they got to the site through one of your links, you're the one who gets the credit for it. The difficult part is, of course, getting someone to click-through and start shopping.

That's where the free stuff comes in.

As an example of what I'm talking about, I recently wrote a review on my gaming blog titled Consent in Gaming (If You Haven't Downloaded This Book Yet, You Really Should). The post was a review of the recently released gaming supplement titled Consent in Gaming, which was free to download off of Drive Thru RPG. Even though the supplement itself was free, the link was still tagged with my affiliate ID. So if any of the thousands of people who read my review clicked-through to take a look at the supplement, or maybe to download a copy for themselves, I had myself locked in as the person who got them to walk in the door (so to speak). All they had to do was buy something else while they were on the site, and I'd get credit for that purchase.

10 Percent of The Time, It Works Every Time

The advantage of this strategy is that people love free stuff, and the bigger your giveaway gets, the more chances you have to nab some runoff earnings... even if you're giving away free stuff. Of course, the flip side of this is that there are going to be a lot of people who just show up for the free book, download it, then go about their day.

The thing to remember here is that if you just gave away a book the old-fashioned way, there was no chance you could turn a profit off that transaction unless someone read it, liked it, and came back for more. This way there's at least a chance that if you caught someone in the middle of a shopping spree that you could get yourself a new fan in addition to earning some credit for the gaming PC, video card, and motorized wheelchair they were also buying on that particular day.

And, as a closing note, I should state that affiliate earnings come from the website, not from the customers. You're not raising the price and skimming off of the customer; this is a finder's fee being paid to you by the business for increasing their sales. Just in case that wasn't crystal clear.

Like, Follow, and Stay Tuned!

That's all for this week's Business of Writing! If you'd like to see more of my work, take a look at my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife!

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!

Writing a Bestseller is Like Winning The Lottery (How Facing Facts Can Help You Beat The Odds)

Have you ever stopped to consider what the odds of writing a New York Times bestseller actually are? Well, in case you haven't looked it up yourself, both Forbes and Free Money Finance say that your odds are about 1 in 200. On the one hand, those odds are significantly better than winning the Powerball (about 1 in 238,000,000 in case you're thinking about buying a ticket), but those odds still aren't great. Especially if you've got to put in sweat, blood, creative juices, and years of hellish effort just to get that one ticket ready.

Come on, baby, papa needs a new laptop!

It's pretty easy to find that discouraging. However, if you can face the facts, and accept that you probably won't beat the odds, you'll actually find the game is a lot easier to play.

Ancient Greece, Acceptance, and Spinning The Wheel

In case you're not an etymology geek, the word happen comes from the Greek hap, which referred to chance and fortune. While today we think of happiness as something we have, as a commodity generated from inside ourselves, in the ancient Western world happiness was something that literally happened to you. It came and it went much like luck, ebbing and flowing with fate and favor. And while people still had bad times, the philosophy of the language was basically that you accepted what the gods and chance gave you, because there was nothing you could do about it one way or the other.

And you would be amazed at how freeing that can be in a professional sense.

Let me give you an example.

As a quick for instance, not long after I released my pulp fantasy novel Crier's Knife, I held an ebook giveaway for it. As promotional devices go, these giveaways are a smart bet. People like free stuff, it increases the traffic to your page, and you see a lot more action than you otherwise might. I moved 700 copies over a weekend, which at the level I work at was a pretty decent success. My previous giveaway, which was for my steampunk noir collection New Avalon: Love and Loss in The City of Steam barely hit 500 copies, so I was making clear progress.

Was I involved in that process? Absolutely. I was the one who decided when to host the giveaway, I was the one who made the social media posts, and I was the one who made sure the book was ready for prime time, so to speak. I kept the comments going on the forums, and I was the one who drew as much attention to it as I possibly could. At the end of the day, though, the downloads were only partially determined by my efforts; mostly, they were determined by raw chance.

Every part of this process was affected by so many factors that were outside of my control. Facebook and Reddit's group algorithms decided who saw my posts, and more importantly who didn't see them. I also had no control over the reaction people had to my post. If they were in a good mood, or a bad one. If they decided to download my book since they liked free stuff, or if they down-voted my post because they didn't like something about my description. I had no control over who shared the link with other people, who actually read the book once they downloaded it, and of the people that did read it who left a review.

I was tossing a message in a bottle out into the ocean, and hoping against hope that a YouTube influencer with millions of fans found it, then told all their followers to go buy a copy. That didn't happen, but at the same time there was no guarantee that it would. No magic assurance that my book would become a success if I just tweaked these words in the description, or posted it on this platform as opposed to another one. There is no magic formula to bring a stampede of people with their dollars held out for more of your story.

And the sooner you accept that, the easier it will be to keep trying to make that very thing happen.

You've Got Enough of The Burden as It Is

Don't misunderstand me, here; this is your job, and you are a big part of what goes into it. You're the one who writes the book, helps with the promotion, and who is the face of your brand. You're the one turning up at shows, making your pitch, and getting people interesting. You are, in other words, the one who is buying the ticket.

You simply have no guarantee that the ticket you buy is going to be a winner.

You can, however, stack the odds in your favor.

I said this back in If You Write One Story It May Be Bad. Write A Hundred, And The Odds Are In Your Favor, but it bears repeating. The more you create, the more your put out, and the louder your signal gets, the better the odds you have of people actually discovering you. Much like how buying one ticket might only have a small chance of winning big, but if you buy a few hundred, or a few thousand, well, the odds are looking better all the time.

Because if you put out one book, one article, one YouTube video, etc., your odds of going viral overnight are pretty slim unless you already have a massive fan base of people interested in your work, or you have a gigantic budget to pay for the advertising machine it would take to acquire all those eyes. However, little successes add up over time, and every person you win over as a fan is one more snowflake to stack on your mountain. You pile them up slowly, and eventually there are enough of them to cause an honest-to-goodness avalanche.

Sure, there are some people who buy one lottery ticket as a goof, and win millions of dollars by sheer happenstance. Just like there are people whose books just happened to be in the right genre, or who told just the right story at the right time to get everyone's attention. There's no rhyme or reason to it, because it happens to good books and bad, to books that are heavily promoted, and indie darlings no one has ever heard of.

But don't you worry about that. Because whether the odds are with you, or against you, doesn't matter. Because sometimes your luck will be good, and sometimes it will be bad. But if you focus on telling good stories, on spreading the word, and on cultivating your little crop of readers, you'll get there eventually. Even better, you'll get there without "what-iffing" yourself inside out, wondering why other books got more attention, sold more copies, or got more likes than yours did.

Are there factors you can quantify? Sure there are. But they're only a tiny slice of the pie, and the sooner you learn to accept that luck is a huge part of whether you succeed or fail, the sooner you can get back to work without that huge weight of worry on your shoulders. Do your best, and let the rest take care of itself, because you cannot force fortune to turn your way.

Like, Follow, and Stay Tuned!

That's all for this week's Business of Writing! If you'd like to see more of my work, take a look at my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife!

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!