No One Knows What They Want Until You Give It To Them

There is this weirdly pervasive idea among the general populous that authors are just allowed to do whatever they want with regards to their work. Whatever whimsical ideas come to them, they can just follow those ideas however far the muse leads, and then when the book is done they hand it over to the company, and they get handed a big fat check to go off and do it all again.

Oh, if only. Unfortunately, this is the made-up, manic-pixie-dream-girl version of being an author that only exists in TV shows and movies, largely as a way to make a very boring job look exciting to those outside the author's own head. In reality, authors who are trying to make a living are bound by the market, and even more explicitly, by the tastes of their audience. And I say this with all the love in my heart, and as someone who still has a lot of sensory issues surrounding food, but a lot of readers are particularly picky eaters. Until they aren't.

And that means we have no idea if what we're doing is going to work or not... which is frustrating, because we still have to try to predict the future like our lives depend on it.

Which we've found, time and again, is basically impossible.

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!

Nobody Knows What They Want Until You Give It To Them

I raised a lot of complaints a few years ago in my post Variety May Be The Spice of Life, But It's Often Too Risky (As A Creator), and it mainly focused on the issue of how so many people will find one thing that they like, and then stick with that one thing come hell or high water. And this takes a lot of different forms. You'll have readers who only read a very specific niche of books, or even a single series of books over and over. You see this habit in gaming where, as an example, you'll have players who enjoy the World of Darkness, but they only ever play 1 of the dozen interlinked games set in that world, and they don't even want to look at the others. Or you have people who played Dungeons and Dragons once, and decided that was the only game for them, they aren't interested in anything else.

And as a creator, this can be a truly double-edged sword. On the one hand, if you find something that resonates with an audience, then you have folks who will buy your books, watch your videos, listen to your podcast, etc. However, if you try to go off in a different direction, or to do something unexpected, you may find they aren't interested in coming along with you. It's the equivalent of people who only want to hear their favorite band play their greatest hits, but nothing else. However, even if you stay within that wheelhouse, people might get bored with what you're making, even if it's ostensibly what they want to see, and what they were asking for.

And you can get trapped into playing things safe, even if that's no guarantee that you're actually going to get the interest, attention, views, and sales that you want.

What floor was it supposed to be on, again?

I feel some examples might work best here to illustrate my point.

Consider the supplement 100 NPCs You Might Meet At The Tavern. This was my 11th supplement I'd written for Azukail Games, and it is one of the most generic supplements one could ask for. It was the latest entry in a rather crowded field, and judging by the numbers it should have sold all right, but not amazingly.

 

This is the best-selling supplement I've written, and it's currently Platinum on Drive Thru RPG.

Why is that? Was it the format? The subject matter? The fact it was general use for most high fantasy games? Was it the low cost? Was it that it hit the market before generative AI flooded everything so badly? Or did the preview just jive with enough Game Masters that they wanted to snap it up? There is, unfortunately, no way to know, or I'd be rich right now.

Trying to interpret those sales is maddening, but trying to read the tea leaves is an unfortunate necessity of the job. And I'll fully admit that while I've written dozens of NPC lists in the same vein as this supplement, none of them every did that well. And some of them, like my recent 100 NPCs To Meet After The Zombie Apocalypse, still haven't even cleared the Copper level requirement of 51 copies sold.

Unfortunately, audience input isn't usually any more reliable as a source for decision-making. As an example, a lot of readers have wanted me to write more adventure modules, particularly for my Sundara: Dawn of a New Age fantasy setting. However, for all the requests, my recently released A Night At The Slaughterhouse Inn hasn't received much in the way of interest. I have a vocal contingent of folks who enjoy the stuff I've written for Changeling: The Lost, but while 100 (Mostly) Harmless Goblin Fruits and Oddments To Find In The Hedge has hit Electrum status (one of my top sellers on Storytellers Vault), the follow-up supplement 100 Unusual Things To Find At A Goblin Market barely cleared Copper status despite members of my audience directly, and repeatedly, asking for it.

What makes this even more complicated, though, is what's riding on the outcome. Both my publisher and myself have bills to pay, and we pay those bills by writing games, supplements, and in some cases novels, and selling them to the public. If the things with my byline on them don't move copies, neither of us will be able to stay in the black. And since we don't have much of a discretionary budget, we need to make sure that, even if we don't put out hits, they can't be duds. Which means that when something seems to do well (even if the reason why it did well is a completely unreliable guess) it's a straw we have to grasp at because it seems like a better idea than closing our eyes and firing blind into a dark room, hoping there's a target, and that we can miraculously hit the bullseye on it.

When you've only got nickels and dimes, you can't afford to lose them.

So how do we avoid this damned-if-you-do-damned-if-you-don't sort of situation? Well, that is where you all come in as the audience! Because you are the ones who have the power to actually move the target in front of the shot so that it lands.

The Power Is Yours (Literally)

While publishers, studios, and marketers know how to play the game when it comes to manipulating keywords and pushing their products out there so that as many people as possible see them, they don't have the ability to force something to be a hit. All you need to do is look at the number of huge blockbusters that didn't even make back their budget, or the number of books that were supposed to be bestsellers that left the reading public cold and indifferent (you know, like the Robert Galbraith novels before it was revealed what famous phobe was behind that pen name) to see this in action. It is you, the audience, who decides whether or not something is or isn't successful.

Because it doesn't matter who wrote something, or how much hype was put into it, if people collectively shrug and ignore it. And, on the other side of the coin, it doesn't matter how small an indie creator is if people collectively decide, "This thing. We like this. We're going to tell all of our friends about it!"

Let's have some fun with math. I've done this before, but for a laugh let's do it again. And the number we're going to use here is 10,000, because according to some of the folks I've spoken to over the years, 10,000 sold books was the standard for a New York Times bestseller. It's arbitrary, but possible when discussing something blowing up in terms of support.

 

- 10,000 copies of a full RPG like Army Men: A Game of Tactical Plastic? I'd be looking at something like $110,000 in my pocket, and I'd be immediately working on fresh supplements for it.

- 10,000 copies of a novel like my sword and sorcery tale Crier's Knife? I'd be looking at something like $30,000, which isn't buy-a-house money, but is absolutely get-started-on-that-long-promised-sequel money.

- 10,000 copies of an RPG supplement like World's Oldest Profession: A Baker's Dozen of Brothels? That would still be worth around $3,000, and that would be one hell of a weight off my shoulders.

- What about 10,000 reads on one of my Vocal.media articles? Well, that would be $60... not huge, but not nothing, and hey, it's free to all the readers out there!

- 10,000 subscribers on YouTube is 10x the number of people it takes to unlock monetization, and if all of those people watch at least half an hour of content on the channel, it becomes an earner overnight!

- 10,000 followers on one of my social media platforms? That's usually around the time the platform monetizes you as a creator, allowing you to make money for posting on Facebook, Instagram, etc.

Take a moment, and realize just how small 10,000 actually is, as a number. A decent weekend at a mid-sized convention has 10,000 people in attendance. I've met people whose high schools had nearly that many people in them when class was in session. There are college campuses that easily have 10,000 people on them. I'm a part of dozens of Facebook groups and subreddits that have FAR more than 10,000 members in them. Now ask what 20,000 people all acting together could do. Now think about 50,000. How about 1,000,000?

That's the point I'm making here, and it's the same point that every army and labor organizer has been making for centuries. Because any one person only has a limited amount of influence or support they can provide. But as the chain letter says, if you tell 2 friends, and they tell 2 friends, and they tell 2 friends, then 30 connections down the line there's going to be a massive word of mouth about a particular author and the things they make.

So don't be a passive consumer of content who lets the algorithm decide what to feed you. Go out there looking for new art to experience, and when you find something that you think is great, tell people about it, and support the creators however you can. Because at the end of the day, all we can do is make the art... we need you, the audience, to participate for it to actually allow us to make a living.

Spare A Moment, and Click A Button?

Speaking of the power of a mobilized audience, I wanted to tag a call to action (or a request for help, however you read it) at the end of this week's post. Because my audio drama series that I launched in partnership with Alice Liddell, The A.L.I.C.E. Files, has been struggling uphill, and we're on something of a deadline. We just finished Season 1 a little bit ago, and we're gearing up to push the story forward... but we need your help.

In order for a YouTube channel to be monetized at all it needs to have 500 subscribers, and 3,000 watched hours. In order for it to be fully monetized (which means you get ad revenue, as well) it needs to have 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 watched hours.

Right now we have 380 subscribers, and just over 1,800 watched hours... and we need to get those numbers filled up by the end of the year, otherwise YouTube is doubling the requirements, which is going to effectively lock a lot of smaller channels and creators out of ever getting their piece of the pie when it comes to being paid for the traffic their free videos bring in.

I just outlined the power the audience has, and I talked about trying new things to see if something outside your usual shows, books, and games actually piques your interest. So even if audio dramas aren't usually your thing, give this one a few episodes to grow on you! We've got weird Westerns, collections of two-sentence horror stories, Victorian nightmares, and more, all of it wrapped in a sci-fi reimagining of Alice in Wonderland!

So give it a chance to surprise you. If you like what you see then give the videos a thumbs up, leave a comment or two, and subscribe to the channel! And if you make it to the end of Season 1, leave a question on the Ask Me Anything About The Carroll Institute.

Support The Literary Mercenary

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Also, if you're curious about how to write for tabletop RPGs, don't forget to check out my show Tabletop Mercenary, which you can find on both the Azukail Games channel above!

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.

Authors, Thanks To Algorithms, You're Going To Have To Repeat Yourself To Be Heard

I've been comfortable calling myself an author for about ten years and change now. For most of that time I've had an Amazon author page where people can find my work, I've had The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page for those who want to help support what I do, and I've regularly posted all across my social media channels about my projects.

Despite that, every month or so I have a conversation with friends (and even followers) that feels like talking to an elderly relative who's hearing has started to go. Because no matter how clearly I've posted the links to my projects, or how often I talk about them in the forums and groups I'm in, there's always someone who pipes up with, "Wow, I didn't know you have a book/Patreon/archive of articles! That's great!"

Speak up, will ya son? I can't hear what you're saying.

On the one hand, this can feel exasperating when you've been bending your efforts to getting the word out so that people know what you've got on the market, and what you're working on. However, the way algorithms are designed actually stops a lot of people who would be interested from seeing your posts.

As a result, you're going to have to mention something multiple times if you want everyone to get the message.

Huge Potential Reach (With Problematic Connections)

Social media has a potentially infinite reach, which is kind of like saying that playing the lottery could make you a millionaire... it's technically true, but sort of overlooks the fact that you're really betting against the market if you expect that to be your meal ticket.

If lottery tickets were a good investment, rich people would buy them instead of stock.

For example, say you have a few hundred people who have decided to follow your Facebook page (my Facebook page has just over 700 folks on it right now, but you could boost that number a bit if you had a sec). Ideally you'd think that when you post something on your page that a majority of those folks would see it... after all, they liked you, and they're actively following you, so surely the site lets them see your content?

No. Not really.

If I put something on my page that generates a lot of activity from my followers, maybe 200 of them will see it. Of those who see it, maybe 70 and change will interact with it. The average interaction is significantly worse, with maybe a third to half of those numbers. And the stats are even worse when it comes to forums and groups. Because even if you post something that's really popular on a social media page or in a forum, it will only be seen by folks for a few days at most. That means anyone who wasn't on, who hadn't joined yet, or who wasn't particularly tuned-in during your brief moment in the sun missed what you had to say.

Think of it like a commercial. Most of the time the people you're trying to reach just walk into the other room and ignore you, even if you're selling something they want. But then the fifth time your post comes around, you manage to catch their attention, and without fail the first thing they say is, "Hey, that looks great, how come nobody told me about this?"

Well, I was trying. But the algorithm wouldn't put my call through until just now.

Repeat, But Don't Get Repetitive

The challenging part of marketing is trying to remind yourself that you still have a valid product that not everyone has seen yet. Because when you've been telling everyone who will listen about your book, your game, your YouTube channel, or whatever other endeavor you're working on for more than a year, it can feel like you must have reached everyone.

You haven't, trust me on that.

But there are going to be folks who heard you loud and clear the first seventeen times.

The thing to keep in mind here is balance. Because if you only talked up your book before its release, and then a brief weekend spot when it first came out, then a lot of people haven't heard about it through the social media grapevine. However, there are going to be people, groups, and forums who are going to get sick of seeing you post the same thing all the time if you keep harping on it.

So while you should endeavor to keep things fresh, and talk about new releases, new blog entries, and new projects, don't be afraid to toss out a throwback on the regular. Acknowledge it's been out for a while, and remind folks to leave a review if they liked it. Or to share the link with a friend who hasn't gotten their copy yet; a call to action never hurts!

This is sort of like how your book seems boring and stupid to you, because you've read it ten times before it went to the editors. Just remember, someone out there will be hearing about your work for the first time... so phrase your posts accordingly!

Speaking of which, check out my links below, and see which parts of my sprawling archive have escaped your notice thus far!

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!

You Get Better Results When You Tell Your Audience What To Do

We've all heard this age-old joke. A man is sitting on the couch, watching TV. His wife joins him. She turns to him, and says, "Well, we're out of toilet paper." He nods, acknowledging that her message was received. She waits a few moments, then says, "Yep, there is no more toilet paper in the entire house." Her husband nods, and this time adds a monosyllable that isn't quite a grunt to show that he got the message. After ten minutes or so goes by, she gets up, and storms out of the room. He is confused by her behavior, and left scratching his head.

We, the audience, understand that when the wife said, "We're out of toilet paper," what she meant was, "I would like you to go to the store, and bring back some toilet paper." Why didn't her husband do it? Well, because she didn't put her request into words that he would recognize as a call to action.

Wait... you wanted me to do what, now?

If you're a creative professional, you cannot be subtle when interacting with your audience. You need to tell them what you want them to do, when you want them to do it, and how to get it done.

Keep it simple, straightforward, and make sure there's no way to miss the directions you're giving.

Calls To Action, And You

In marketing, the term for telling your audience what to do is a call to action. It's why every commercial ends with something like, "Buy now!" or, "Call us today!" Even something as simple as, "Follow us on Facebook," is a clean, straightforward call to action because it's clear what the advertiser wants you to do for them.

Buy my book! Or at least check out the free sample.

Think of your marketing like getting a hit in baseball. You have good form, you swing, and you connect, but you need that follow-through. Without follow-through, a perfect hit loses all its potential, and plops right into the dirt. That's your call to action; the follow-through that turns a solid hit into a home run.

Where Does It Go?

There are a few different schools of thought on this one. For instance, some marketers say you should tell your audience to do the same thing three times throughout a piece of content, because by the time they reach the third one you'll catch everyone willing to do what you asked. Other people argue that telling your audience to do something more than once is just going to annoy them, and you should save your call to action for the end of your post. That way you'll only deliver it to audience members who were well and truly hooked by your content.

Seriously, did you go buy my book yet?

Where the schools of thought agree, though, is that you need to make your calls to action blatant, you need to explain what the audience gets out of it, and you need to ensure they can accomplish the action in as few steps as possible.

As a for-instance, if you wanted to support me, and get your hands on a collection of dark, steampunk noir stories, I'd tell you to go buy a copy of New Avalon: Love and Loss in The City of Steam.

In that single call to action, I laid out everything the audience needs to know. I told them I have a book for sale, what genre it fits into, and that they should go buy a copy if they want to support me as an author. That's the difference between saying, "Hey, my book is out there," and, "Hey, if you haven't read it yet, go get this specific book." Lastly, anyone who clicks that link will go right to the Amazon purchase page, so all they have to do is throw the book in their cart, and checkout. It can be done in a matter of minutes, and takes a minimum amount of effort on the part of the reader.

That final part is more important than most people think. Because no matter how much someone wants to help, or how little it costs them to do so, nothing will botch up your audience's follow-through more than making it inconvenient for them. You want them to click one link, or follow one social media page, or do something else equally simple. You don't want them to have to go through more than one loading screen.

Put another way, someone is usually more than happy to take a step to the right to support creators they care about. But if you ask them to step to the right, open the door, create a new account, fill in their credit card details, and then take a survey before they're allowed to help, they're going to quit somewhere around step three, leaving you high and dry.

Marketing is like writing, in that you should follow the K.I.S.S. method. Keep It Simple, Stupid.

That all for this week's Business of Writing post. Hopefully it helps folks out there who are trying to mobilize their audience, and herd them toward a particular goal. If you like this piece, show some love by stopping by The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page to become a patron today! Pledging at least $1 a month buys you a free book, as well as my everlasting gratitude. Lastly, if you want to stay in the loop, then follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, and Twitter to get all my latest posts.