Go to ThisPlagueofDays.com for more information.
Or better, go ahead and grab it here and now:
Get all of Season One for jut $3.99.
This Plague of Days: This is creepy and whimsical
Get all of Season One for jut $3.99.
Get all of Season One for jut $3.99.
This Plague of Days: The mind virus is spreading. Have you caught it yet?
This Plague of Days pits an autistic boy against a rising zombie horde. As the world we know comes apart, the infected become cannibals. Take elements of The Stand and Cell, mix in World War Z and 28 Days Later with a terrorist plot and a strange boy with an obsession for Latin phrases and wham! A zombie apocalypse you’re going to love. Find out more at ThisPlagueOfDays.com.
Get it week to week and episode by episode for just 99 cents or get all of Season 1 at a discount now.
- Spread the infection.
Throttling You: And some of this isn’t very nice
Find Part 1 of this post, Amazon Throttled, on ChazzWrites.com.
Skip to Part 3: Me, Full Throttle for another answer for finding readers.
Time to wrestle and tell the dirty truth.
What else can you do to find readers for your books and give them the best chance in the Marketplace of Awesomeness? And what sucks? Here’s my take:
1. Are blog tours really doing it for you? Are blog readers converting to book readers? They should…but I don’t think they do nearly as much as we hope. If they did, I’d have certainly sold more books by now. Blog tours can work, but it takes a lot of work to provide unique content to each blog. Do that if you’re going to tour and hit the largest blogs first. (Also, once it’s posted to one blog, don’t repost it on your blog. Bad SEO.)
2. We complain readers focus too much on Free and reap the benefits without commitment. Oddly, we’re hoping to win over the world without paying a dime. We don’t have advertising budgets. It’s time to get real and set a budget and pay for help selling your books. Yes, we all want it to happen organically without extra work or money. We all just want to write. That’s not the way to bet. Grow up, stop wishing and spend money to make money.
3. Don’t do another author interview on yet another small blog unless you’re going to make it different and/or funny. Go for funny because those interviews all sound the same and yes, I know, we all drink coffee. I win for most caffeinated. What else you got? I’d rather hear about your choice of lingerie than endure another answer to the question: “How did you start writing and where do you get your ideas?”
4. Don’t do another blog post about how “content is king.” It’s either self-evident or it doesn’t really mean anything. I need more meat than that to click the buy button on your next marketing book.Â
5. Don’t ask me to read another interview with one of your characters. I might be interested in that, but only after I’ve already read your book, not before. I’d love to know what happens to the main character in Fight Club after the book hits “The End”. However, before I knew what that book was, he’s just be another guy struggling with macho bullshit issues and a sleep disorder.
6. Will you please just take my advice and get Kit Foster to help you with your book cover? Get a graphic designer to help you. Do not do this yourself. Don’t even do it yourself if you’re a graphic designer. Please! Sweet baby Jesus, I’m begging you! Help me help Kit help you! Great book covers do not suck. Bad book covers hurt you. We all judge books by their covers.
7. Revamp your website. Get a custom banner. (Kit does those, too. Look at the top of this page.) Also: White field, black type, no exceptions. Your pretty pastels and all those flowery serifs are repelling me from your site and making me squint so, perhaps unfairly, your book doesn’t get a shot.
8. Be bolder with your next book. Come up with a new angle. There are no truly original stories, but you have to find something fresh to sell us. Have you read a single description of a romance book that doesn’t sound like hundreds of other romance books? Do something different and experimental. Whatever you do: Stand up and stand out! Start thinking audiobooks, for instance. (But it’s still way too early to bother with setting up an app for your book. People aren’t using the medium that way in any numbers.)
9. Work harder with your editorial team. Expand your beta reader bunch. Make it cleaner. Don’t wait for perfection, but excellence will do nicely.
10. We write to be read. Shyness is not helping you. Do something to promote your books every day. Do not whine that this is necessary. If you aren’t going to promote, you may as well write for your desk drawer. That’s okay, if that’s what you want. (I sincerely doubt that’s what you want.) And stop tweeting book links without imagination.
11. Use video more. We are visual creatures, so use YouTube more on your website or try Vine. If they’re quick, video blogs are interesting. (WordPress allows you to do audio blogs pretty easily, too.) Reach people in new ways. Buy Six Seconds, The Unauthorized Guide to How to Build Your Business with the Vine App by Robert Chazz Chute. (I told you it didn’t pay to be shy.) The Vine app is an example of a new way to reach new readers. It’s video Twitter and the time to jump in early is slipping away. Join now.Â
Podcast: The Christmas Apocalypse Edition
In this pod, I cry: Murders Among Dead Trees (free ebook!), My Life as a Spy, Newtown, Bad Media and sex & violence in a reading called Another Narrow Escape.
Grab the ebook, Murders Among Dead Trees, before Friday Dec 21st at midnight and it’s free. If you love suspense and paranormal stories, please review the book. (See the link below to learn more about the book.)
Need graphics for your website, advertising, Quote Art or book cover? Go to our sponsor, the great Kit Foster of KitFosterDesign.com.
This is Episode #62. Episode #63 of the All That Chazz podcast appears in the new year. Thanks for listening, for your donations and for your kind emails. Especially, thanks for buying my books! Merry Christmas and see you in January, 2013! Happy New Year!
The Bigger Than Jesus Finale
Jesus versus Salvador Dali and the FBI! These are the last two chapters of Bigger Than Jesus by Robert Chazz Chute: The Man You Are Not and The Man You Are. Enjoy!Â
Next episode: I interview Scout Trooper, master unicyclist and videographer/marketing genius Brian MacKenzie. Then we start a new reading: Higher Than Jesus. Expect explosions, jokes, sex and violence and funny surprises. Bad guys will burn! Um…I’m talking about my next crime novel, not the Brian MacKenzie interview. It will all be fun.
Check out our sponsor, Kit Foster of KitFosterDesign.com, for excellent web banners, Quote Art, book covers and more!
Another Free Book!
Another free ebook! Has Chazz gone mad? Plus, in this chapter of Bigger Than Jesus, our luckless hit man is captured by Vincent and in the sights of a SPAS-12.
Higher Than Jesus is free for you to download until Nov. 23! It’s hardboiled sex and violence with lots of funny dialogue. Jesus is in Chicago killing a bad guy on Christmas Day, brokering an arms deal and failing miserably at group therapy. Grab the ebook as it races up the hardboiled and suspense lists.Â
A shout out this week goes to new newsletter subscriber PC Zick of pczick.com and author of Live from the Road. Want a mention in the podcast for your website, business or book? Subscribe to the AllThatChazz.com newsletter.
This is podcast is sponsored by the amazing graphic artist Kit Foster of KitFosterDesign.com. He can do amazing work for you, too!
Chazz Comes Undone (+ a free ebook)
A free ebook for you! The Dangerous Kind & Other Stories (2nd Edition) is available free from Nov. 14 to Nov. 18. In this podcast, Chazz hits the wall hard. Mm, actually, it’s more of a bug hits windshield situation. (Check out the tags I’ve put on this post. Yeah, it’s like that.)
This podcast is sponsored by Kit Foster of KitFosterDesign.com. Check out his portfolio and use his services for book covers, web banners, Quote Art, book trailers, promotional videos and all your graphics needs. He’s the best!