Hi indar9

My first 2 books were published by established publishers - total earnings to date about £40 (including almost £8 from Public Lending Rights). Both took 18 months from signed contract to appearing on the shelves. As you can well imagine, sales have been paltry at best. Promotion by both publishing houses was close to zero.

Fast-forward 5 years and I've self-published another 9 books (6 novels, 2 short story collections and a poetry collection). All with CreateSpace as was (now KDP) - all available for purchase as paperback or e-book within less than 3 days from pressing the 'Publish' button. I've not suddenly become rich and famous, but 3 of the novels have sold respectably (+250 paperback sales mostly in local bookshops - all print on demand so no need to hold any stock - and more than 5000 e-book sales on Amazon translating to almost a hundred-fold increase in royalties).

What I spent on self-publishing = £0.
What I spent on promotion and publicity = £0.
As long as you generate regular sales on Amazon, their algorithm means they will automatically recommend your books to customers who have already purchased other books in the same genre. Also, once you start generating reviews Amazon will promote your book even more widely. The best way I've found to kickstart sales when a new book is published is to run a free promotion on Amazon for a day or two. Even though these freebies earn no revenue, each download is counted as a new sale. . . and so the marketing ball starts rolling.

Interestingly, I recently acquired the rights to my second book 'DreamGirl' from the original publisher who proved to be worse than useless. I uploaded it to KDP and within a month had earned more royalties than in 3 years through conventional means. All it takes is a little patience and preparation. Setting up your document and cover art takes time and there will no doubt be a few false starts before you press the 'Publish' button (although you can make as many changes as you want before or after 'publication'). But once you have one book on KDP, as long as you keep a copy on your laptop you can use the same formatting template for each subsequent publication.

Good luck,

H3K

Thanks so much for the valuable information, Hillwalker !

Any suggestions for KDP "keywords" etc. so the story pops up in Reader searches?

It depends on the genre.

thriller - hard-hitting - murder - gritty - noir are some of the key words when writing a crime novel, but also look for an original twist so that someone interested in say 'rock music' might find themselves redirected to your book because it involves the murder of a rock star.

H3K

Thank you so much Hillwalker for your generous input.

I wrote my book in a rinky-dink program called Apache Open Office. What a daunting effort this seems to be, I have no idea how to convert it to a publishable manuscript or what else I need to do for that matter. I have looked at some services such as the below link. Has anyone ever used any of these? I blew a bunch of money for an "editor" who I thought would be able to convert it--all she did was run the manuscript through some automated writing program that was less than helpful. She then suggested I employ a service to convert it. Has anyone used one of these?

https://amnet-systems.com/amnet-techenabled-services/author-services/

Believe me, this is the first and last book I will ever write :) :) I submit my poetry to journals and annuals and let them worry about all the tecnical stuff. I make as much money off of that as i expect to make off my book. But I spent 3 years writing, interviewed over 50 women in the dairy industry, researched the predicted future of agriculture, modern farming practices and spilled my guts about life as a visual artist. I want to make all that work count for something.

Quote from: hillwalker3000 on May 17, 2019, 10:14:10 AM
It depends on the genre.

thriller - hard-hitting - murder - gritty - noir are some of the key words when writing a crime novel, but also look for an original twist so that someone interested in say 'rock music' might find themselves redirected to your book because it involves the murder of a rock star.

H3K

Thank you!

Quote from: indar9 on May 17, 2019, 04:48:59 PM
I wrote my book in a rinky-dink program called Apache Open Office.

Oh dear.

This might help

https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=how+to+change+apache+open+office+documents+to+word+documents&docid=608015781401003978&mid=A08FEF7AA4F3510A6D5AA08FEF7AA4F3510A6D5A&view=detail&FORM=VIREHT

as might this

https://forum.openoffice.org/en/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=57011

and this

https://calibre-ebook.com/

H3K

Again, thanks, this will take me a while to sort out ;)

Wow, Hillwalker, great information, indeed. Thanks for helping Indar and accidentally helping me. Now if I can only help myself.  :-\ :D