Richard Levesque

French Press: Public Domain Photo by Yongbin

When I started blogging last August, I did it primarily because advice column after advice column said that having a blog was essential to the success of indie authors. I hadn’t done much to promote my first two releases, and the sales numbers showed it, especially with the first Ace Stubble novella, Dead Man’s Hand. So I thought, why not? I started the blog, built up the site, and diligently posted at least once a week.

I was new not only to blogging but also to WordPress and soon discovered the “Freshly Pressed” page and thought, That would be cool. Getting freshly pressed would drive a lot of viewers to my page, get a lot more people to look at my books. So in the back of my mind as I was creating posts, I’d wonder, Maybe this one’ll get Freshly Pressed. And, of course, they wouldn’t.

Not that it soured in me on the blogging experience. After a while, I forgot about getting onto the Freshly Pressed list. I was having a good time blogging, had picked up a handful of followers, and generally enjoyed having this as an outlet for my non-fictional writing.

Not long ago, though, I began to question the effectiveness of blogging as a tool for indie writers. You can see my post on the subject here, but in a nutshell, I wondered  about the goals of the fiction writer/blogger in relation to the needs of blog readers. I reached the conclusion that blogging may not help me reach my goal of attracting more readers, but it is a valuable thing in and of itself and may help me function more as part of a community of bloggers/writers/readers.

So that was the mindset I had going into this week when I published a post examining the issue of random chance and how it affects a writer’s success. I wasn’t thinking about the possibility of it getting freshly pressed or drawing in more readers or anything else beyond just what it was–a blog post that might or might not connect with other people’s views on the subject of writing and publishing.

And that was the post that got freshly pressed. The first day it had something like 49 views. Pretty good for me. My highest day before that had been 63. But then the next day I started noticing I was getting a bunch of new followers. And then the comments started coming in. That’s weird, I thought. After about an hour of this, I decided to look at the Freshly Pressed page at WordPress, and there was my post looking back at me.

That day, I had 341 visitors and over 500 views. The next day, I had 450 visitors and over 700 views. The comments kept poring in, along with “likes” and new followers.  Based on the comments, the post hit a nerve; lots of writers and artists have felt the same way about random chance as it affects success and many thanked me for coming out and saying it.

But what about the bottom line? Did getting Freshly Pressed lead to a lot of book sales? That’s probably what all the writers-who-blog are wondering. The answer is…nope. My sales stayed about the same as they’d been the week before.

Disappointing? Not really. It’s the kind of thing I’ve gotten used to. There have been several times over the last year where I thought there was a chance for something “big” to happen with sales: having links for my books appear on the pages of The Colored Lens, a magazine I’ve been published in twice; having Take Back Tomorrow selected by a large book club on GoodReads (resulted in, I think, 1 sale); paying for advertising on a major indie book site (resulted in 0 sales), etc.

The thing I’m learning is that people don’t necessarily go online looking to discover new books. They’re going for information. Most of the people reading blogs are other bloggers, and most of the people reading blogs about writing are other writers, not readers or potential readers. Sure, writers read, but they’re finding new books the way they always have–mostly through word of mouth, the number one thing the “experts” claim will lead to a writer’s success. They’re not clicking Amazon links on the blogs of other writers; instead, they’re looking to pick up a few tips and tricks that other writers have used to generate sales in hopes of doing the same themselves.

At least that’s one possibility. The other is that my website sucks and people aren’t clicking on my links because I’m no good at making them want to. I still have a lot to learn.

If I’m going to look at the commercial outcome of getting Freshly Pressed, I’d have to say it was a failure. But I’m not looking at it that way. Instead, I’m looking at the fact that my book covers crossed the screens of some 800 people over a day and a half, and probably a few hundred more in the days to come. Some of those people may have bookmarked the page, or put my books in their “to read” lists. Most didn’t. Most probably aren’t into science fiction, or at least not the quirky little sub-genre that I’m occupying.

And that’s okay. Because in the end, I’ve learned, it’s not about sales. It’s not about screaming “Buy My Books!” as loud and as long and as often as I can. Instead, it’s about making connections. And I’ve connected with a lot of people over the last few days, people who see writing the same way I do even if they’re not into science fiction. I have three times as many followers today as I did on Monday. And I’m hoping they stick around. A few of them are bound to like science fiction, or have friends who do. But even if they don’t, that’s okay, too.

Before I started publishing independently, I felt very alone in my endeavors. I don’t feel so alone anymore. Not being able to sell a book when I felt isolated was terribly depressing. Not selling many books when I’ve got this many people along for the ride anyway…that’s not so bad.

Like what you see? Please share!

Pinterest

Twitter

Tumblr

Facebook