When I published my first ebook, there were already lots of indie authors doing well, as evinced by their rankings at Amazon and their I’m-selling-XXXX-books-a-month posts in various self-publishing forums. I was a little worried that I was coming to the party late, and that the increasing number of ebooks in the Kindle store (and elsewhere) would make it hard to stand out. I was determined to do so anyway, though, and set myself the goal of selling 1,000 ebooks a month by the end of my first year (yes, I made it).
The thousand-ebooks-a-month-goal seemed to be a popular one at the time and something of an indicator of success (though now I suppose you’re not anybody until you’ve sold at least 50,000 ebooks total). Granted, there lots of other ways to measure success (I get my biggest warm, fuzzy grins from seeing readers interacting with each other and chatting about my characters on Facebook, Twitter, and the fan forum), but numbers are quantifiable. So, I put this list together based on my own experiences and from observations of other successful indie authors, some of them far more successful than I (at least in terms of sales numbers… I know nobody has cooler fans :D).
1. Successful indie authors don’t wait for others to pick them; they pick themselves.
The world has changed. The slush pile is out. The route to Big 6 publication and a large advance (if you crave such things) now goes like this:
- Get your work out there
- Establish a fan base
- Get noticed and bask in offers of representation
It’s happened to me (I turned my offer down in favor of staying indie), and it’s happening left and right to a lot of self-published authors out there. Hitting bestseller lists at Amazon isn’t the only way to “get noticed” either:
- Jordan Stratford attracted agent and Big 6 notice after rocking Kickstarter with a $90,000 campaign.
- Nathan Lowell, Scott Sigler, and Tee Morris were all picked up by publishers after building up fan bases by giving away serialized podcast (audio) versions of their books.
- Sylvain Reynard just got a 7-figure deal after establishing a rabid reader base on a fan-fiction site.
These people put their money (time) where their mouths were and picked themselves instead of waiting to be plucked from some agent’s slush pile. Now they’re reaping the rewards.
2. Successful indie authors don’t envy or belittle the success of others; they learn from it.
I have to remind myself of this all the time. It’s so easy to read the sample chapters of a book by an author who’s made it big and sneer at the person’s work. You think, “My writing is so much better than this. I guess she just got lucky. Or she got in at the right time. Or she sold her books dirt cheap. Or she writes for the undiscerning masses. Or she’s in a more popular genre than I am.”
This is useless thinking that won’t help us. It may even hurt us. Not many people luck into success. Those who have found it did something right (probably a lot of somethings right) to get there. And there are lessons to be learned from studying their roads to success.
3: Successful indie authors don’t talk about writing; they write.
As we’ve discussed before, most successful indie authors have multiple books out across multiple series. Self-promotion is good, and “building a platform” is good, but nothing will help your career more than getting more books out there. Momentum builds with each new release in a series, and each new series (or stand-alone novel) is a doorway through which people can find and enter your world.
Finishing a book is an accomplishment, but it’s the beginning of the journey, not the end, and successful authors write lots of books.
What are your thoughts? Are there any traits you’d add to this list?
Perfect post, Lindsay. And now off to explore #3 for a while 🙂
Me, too, Gene! The readers await. 🙂
Lindsay, I love your point #2. Envy gets a person nowhere fast.
I used to manage two art galleries (when it comes to working with artists– well, you’ve heard the phrase “herding cats” haven’t you?). All the time I had to deal with snide comments. One artist actually said about another, “Well, she’s just here to sell her work.” As if that was a bad thing!
Writers have to understand that one person’s writing success does NOT in ANY WAY threaten the success of anyone else. If anything, a popular series by one author helps to sell other writer’s books because people read faster than any one writer can write.
Speaking of writing fast… I can’t believe the pace you write Lindsay. And the books are all awesome. I can’t imagine I’d stand a chance as an indie author because of how long it takes me to write anything. You utterly amaze me.
Thanks for commenting, Elissa! It’s easy to get lots of books out when you’re fortune enough to be able to write full time. 🙂 How is Godfire coming? Is the end in sight?
It’s coming. Six or eight chapters to go on this revision, then I have to revise a bit of the earlier stuff to make it all match. After that… I’m counting on you for feedback on the full monty. 🙂
I don’t get envious, because at the moment, I haven’t released my first novel. I’m in the editing process (which is way harder than I thought, but I’m enjoying the process). Honestly the indy authors who have made it give me hope and inspiration. I’m normally a lot more negative, but being negative really hasn’t gotten me anywhere. Honestly, it made things worse for months.
I never, never looked at the business side of the indy author scene until this week. I’ve started implimenting a lot of advice to start on that aspect, because my art is important, but if I want to do this for a living, I have to sell the books.
Thanks for the article. I’ll try to put it to good use.
Nice. As someone who’s just starting to get started, this puts things into perspective for me. I admit I’m getting a bit lost in all the “how-tos” and “what-you-need-to-knows,” but #3 is the perfect reminder: just *write,* and go from there.
I agree with Elissa – I try to prod successful indie writers for every bit of information I can because I want to emulate their success.
I would say that successful indie writers are willing to experiment, and when (not if) an experiment fails, they move on to the next one.
Even Joe Konrath wouldn’t be where he is now if he hadn’t experimented with putting free book files up on his Web site. People who couldn’t read his PDFs asked him to put them on Amazon, which he did, because he is always willing to try new things. The rest is history.
Thanks, Lindsay, for a good reminder how to keep things in perspective. You are such a good role model 🙂
There’s so much truth in your post… I’d comment more, but I need to work on #3 🙂
I love how you are always analyzing how to succeed and do better and then telling us what you’ve concluded. Good reminders!
Hi Lindsay! Awesome post. I would add (since you asked) that indies authors stay positive. We endure a lot of stigma, but your new 3-step route to success is spot-on. Great writing will always count . . . but the path to getting it out there has changed, is all.
It’s amazing how success as an indie author comes down to similar principles as achieving success in other fields. The over-riding theme I see behind each point is to take action.
I agree with Ilana, staying positive is one of the greatest tricks since I personally find it hard to write when I’m feeling negative. One of the ways I do it is remind myself that while I’m not a huge success, people (real live ones? yes!) are actually paying money to read what I write. Not a lot of them but it is happening and it seems to be increasing (not on wood).
To play off a well know phrase: There’s strong, then there’s indie strong!
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Fabulous post, Lindsay! I thoroughly enjoyed your list and thought you were spot on. Keep up all the good writing!
This is a good post, I’m also an Indie author with a top 100 book on amazon uk. I wrote the book purely because I enjoyed it in my spare time. Sticking it on amzon kindle has been a real wake up call, I felt a tad embarrassed and thought I’d probably only sell a few copies to ‘pitying friends’! In fact, I’m 4 months in and just sold over 3k books this month! I don’t do ANY type of publicity, twitter, facebook, blog etc.. Which may be a huge faux pas on my part – but I’m a believer in what will be, will be 🙂
Currently writing my 2nd novel which is taking longer than I expected but my advice to all those looking to get their work out there is to write because its your passion and NOT because it can earn you £££s!
Good luck!