Help Indie Authors!

Indie authors do not have someone managing their book’s publicity plan or marketing. We don’t have the support of an organization getting our novels in front of retailers who will carry them in their store. Other than what marketing efforts we can cobble together on our own, we have only one source of publicity that can encourage others to buy our books, and that’s you, our readers.

Your word-of-mouth recommendation, your Facebook comment, your tweet, your Amazon or Goodreads review is likely the only way an unknown author will get the word out about his or her book.

Let me hasten to admit that the reader is certainly under no obligation here. If you don’t like the tale, or if the editing was sloppy, the cover or packaging amateurish, then by all means, don’t encourage someone else to read it. The last thing the independent publishing movement needs are products that fall short of genuine quality.

Even if you think the product is the best work since Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress or Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, you still aren’t obligated. Art doesn’t create a debt or obligation on the part of the viewer. You’re free to enjoy it and walk away.

But if you find a tale you like, and you’d like to read more by that author, give him or her a hand by letting your friends and loved ones know where they can get a good story. Post a review, send a few emails, tell a few friends. Once the word gets out, a good story will sell itself; but getting the word out is the challenge.

Indie publishing. . .

is a word-of-mouth game. When you self-publish on a budget, there is no ad campaign, no press release, etc. Although there are things one can do to promote a self-published book, much of the success of independent publishing is based on word-of-mouth contacts.

So if you happen to read Outlander, and think someone else would enjoy it, please tell 'em about it. The Kindle version is published with lending enabled, so I think you can loan it to someone without them having to buy it. I don't know whether or not that is true of the Nook.

By the way, the Nook version is published, and is available here.

The print version is not yet available, I expect it will be in a week or two.