marketing – Jennifer Hallock

Covering the Sugar Sun series

One of the themes of this May’s #RomBkLove series on Twitter was covers. Whether I am at an author event live or just chatting online, the feedback I hear most often about my books is how much people like the covers. If that sounds like a brag, you should know that I do not design my covers. I have some input—more than a traditionally-published author has, probably—but the real credit goes to the unsung hero of Little Brick Books Publishing, Mr. Hallock. (A former professional photojournalist and now a ghostwriter for a consulting firm, Mr. H is also one of my editors, as well as my marketing advisor, business manager, and accountant. We are still happily married, a modern day miracle.)

But we’re here to talk about covers, so let’s get started. I’m going to be giving the inside scoop here, which I hope doesn’t detract from the magic of the final product. Given how many people are choosing to self-publish these days, I thought a little transparency might be helpful. All images were purchased from Shutterstock.

Disclaimer: Always defer to your designer’s technical and professional judgments, as this post is not a step-by-step how-to. Even Mr. H knows not to bow the author’s every whim. The cover is not totally about the book, remember: it needs to project the genre, mood, and theme. For me that meant:

Genre: cross between historical romance and historical fiction
Mood: politically and emotionally charged, with explicit sex
Theme: heavy themes (e.g. war, colonial policy, PTSD, and more)

I am not qualified to instruct you comprehensively on design elements, but here’s another piece of advice: the cover must scan well and read clearly as a thumbnail. Okay, so here goes a short tale of four covers:

Under the Sugar Sun

When we first started this venture, we had some ideas of creating virtual three-dimensional images of dresses, but the technology in 2015 just wasn’t there yet—nor was our expertise. So we started looking at stock images. Since the heroine of Under the Sugar Sun has red hair, I built a collection of redheaded women in vintage (or retro) dress styles. We were paging through them together when Mr. H stopped on the image above. “Easy,” he said.

Easy, I wondered? I loved her hair and the corset, but nothing about the original surroundings of the model was what I wanted. (What kind of bedspread is that, by the way?) But the very next day, Mr. H showed me the crop that would become the cover, including the blacked out background. Instantly, I was excited. Yes, the hooks in the corset are not really true to period, even if you keep in mind that my period is 1902 not 1814. Moreover, my character never wears a corset in the book . . . but never mind! You cannot be too literal, remember.

“So,” you ask, “what did you do to make this cover happen, Jen?” Not much. I did choose the title font, which has become the signature of the Sugar Sun series (which is why I am not naming it here). I searched through font after font, typing in “Under the Sugar Sun” in generators to see what (a) looked turn-of-the-century and (b) struck the right balance of stylistic elements and readability. Mr. H was not sold at first, but he ultimately agreed. A cover was born.

Hotel oriente

We knew this image was a winner when we saw it. It had one of the key attributes Mr. H looks for: texture in the lace of the dress. Colors are important, but textures are best because they give the image a story within a story. The cropping left a challenge for text spaces, which Mr. H solved by inverting title and author name. This is the only book in the series (so far?) that has author name at the top, not bottom—and I love it.

Tempting Hymn

Tempting Hymn had to be a little sultry, though not because Rosa is the temptress she is accused of being. With a title like this one—and a story centered on two people of faith who sing in a choir together, complete with chapter titles from those hymns—this book needs a little sex upfront to warn readers of inspirational romance that this isn’t one. I have no problem with closed-door romance; I just do not write it. This book is open-door. Wide. Open. Door. (I am not afraid of bad reviews on this score. A review saying there is too much sex in a book is pretty much the best kind of negative review to get. However, I do not wish to make people unnecessarily uncomfortable.) Mr. Hallock had to do a lot of work to make this a cover—see the above note about nail polish—but I love it.

Sugar Moon

It took a really long time to find this photo. A really long time. Not quite as long as it took to write Sugar Moon, but honestly almost. I did not want to compromise this time by cutting off the face of a non-Asian model. In fact, I wanted a Southeast Asian model in (potential) period dress, which was as picky as I thought that I could be. Mr. H and I both loved the image right from the start, but it took my husband’s expertise to make it the cover you see above. I’m all heart eyes. It is my favorite so far, and that is saying something because I do love them all.

Thank you, Mr. Hallock!

Discoverability: A Sneak Peek from the History Ever After Survey

(In preparation for my presentation, “History Ever After: Fabricated Historical Chronotopes in Romance Genre Fiction,” I created two surveys, one for readers of historical romance and one for those producing it. Now the results are in. Do you want to sneak a peek?

I am not going to spoil the whole presentation now, but I will show you a little bit from the reader’s survey. Here were the questions asked:

Question four is my topic of the day: discoverability. That’s the toughest nut to crack in today’s market so authors, listen up! Below are the options available to the respondents. (They also had a write-in option.)

I wish I had a drum roll for the big reveal here, but since I don’t here goes…

I know what you’re thinking: Social media recommendations won? Woot woot! I’m gonna throw promo around my favorite Facebook groups like graffiti! Well, hold on there, friend. Let me make an important disclaimer before you do. My survey link was distributed via social media, especially Facebook groups and, to a lesser extent, Twitter.

It makes sense, then, that the survey respondents would take book recommendations via the very same channel that suggested the survey, right? So let’s not overvalue that response. But what can we learn from the results?

As you might expect, book blogs do sell books. If you can get reviewed by several of these sites, especially the big ones, terrific! (It does not matter the grade they give you, believe it or not. I have heard both Sarah Wendell and RedHeaded Girl from Smart Bitches, Trashy Books say that—according to author feedback—the books with the biggest sales boosts might be those with the lowest-scoring reviews. Keep in mind that while the reviewer might not like bear-shifter-billionaire-alpha-hole-holiday-baby-surprise books, Jane the Reader might want to devour them like, well, a bear.
Beyond book blogs, though, almost as many people find books through random browsing online. You can pay to promote on retail sites like Amazon, and how often your ad shows up depends on how much you bid for the spot. The real gold mine, though, is when a retailer promotes your book for free, especially in search results. To do this, you need to make friends with a nasty beast: the algorithm. How? Well, being a bestseller already is good. That’s helpful, right? To sell books you need to have sold books. Great, Jen. Thanks. Okay, how about this: a connection to another bestselling novel helps, too—those coveted “also bought” features. Outside of this survey, I have been tracking bestseller lists for three months, and I have noticed that sales on Amazon are strongly affected by our next marketing tool…
Promotional newsletters like BookBub, Bargain Booksy, and others have changed the publishing industry. Initially, BookBub was a resource targeted at independent authors, but its tremendous success (millions of subscribers) meant that bricks and mortar publishers quickly got on board. While the big New York houses do not like to discount their books too close to publication date, they do use BookBub and others for their backlists. For example, Julie Garwood’s The Wedding, first published in 1996, was discounted to $1.99 this past week, advertised on BookBub on Tuesday, and now (on Thursday) it is still number 67 in the Kindle Store. That means it is on target to sell approximately 1500 copies today, according to Dave Chesson’s Kindlepreneur calculator. Before you rush to submit to BookBub, know that they do not accept everyone’s request for promotion. And, even if they do take your book deal, a spot in their newsletter is not cheap: from $66 to $4,000, depending on your genre, market (US or international), or book sale price. Is this worth it for an indie author? Maybe, after you have enough other books in a series to sell at full price to the new readers you attract.
Speaking of newsletters, an author’s newsletter still has cache! (Did you know that you can sign up for mine here? Just checking.) In fact, author newsletters came in above promotional newsletters in the survey, but I put the paid ones first on this list because of their success in pushing sales. (By the way, I will be writing more about my bestseller tracking results after IASPR this summer.) Just keep emailing your readers—and do recommend the books that you enjoy reading, too, because people are listening. Read on…
Fourteen people wrote in “recommendations by other authors.” This result could be compromised by the place I solicited for responses—two of which were big author pages—but I do think it is interesting that four percent of my respondents wrote in the very same idea (and that they felt it was distinct from other social media recommendations). So endorsements work. But you need to find an author with a big enough following to matter, and this is not always easy for debut authors without the support of a good agent or large publisher.
Giveaways are popular in this survey, too, but I have a question about those: will entrants buy your book if they lose the giveaway? Anecdotal evidence from my friends says not necessarily, but I imagine that if your goal is to create name recognition, a giveaway on a site like Goodreads could work for you. I have no data to back this up, other than the relatively strong showing on this survey.
Even digital people have a real life. The next response people gave was browsing in bookstores, superstores, grocery stores, libraries, and (yes!) yard sales. Obviously, this distribution channel favors print books; those who publish digital-only miss out. The deck is also stacked for traditional publishers who have distribution networks that reach into Walmart, Target, Barnes and Noble, and more.

That’s all for now. I am still analyzing the results of this survey, and these are just my first thoughts. Do remember that this is a survey for historical romance, and the results may have been different for readers of contemporary, erotic, inspirational, paranormal, or other romance subgenres. I will put this survey together with my other research to examine the most popular settings, plots, and characterizations in bestselling historical romance—the chronotopes—and see how flexible the market is. More to come!

[Background photo used in header taken by Jerzy Gorecki, used with permission under the Creative Commons CC0 Universal Public Domain Dedication 1.0 license.]

The Business Workshops of #RT17

Last week, I told you a bit about the craft workshops and panels I attended at #RT17. This week, I’m all business. This is long, so you might want to digest it in chunks.

This workshop was led by Smashwords founder Mark Coker. You can read a comprehensive recap of all ten trends at author Cecilia Tan’s blog here, and most of it you already know: digital publishing has democratized publishing; romance has led the way in professional-quality independent publishing; and that there is a glut of high quality, low-priced books. The ability to inventory digital books for basically free means that everything stays in print and on the market forever. This increased supply has pushed down prices, especially for new authors.

Coker ended the presentation with a call for author mobilization against KDP Select, Amazon’s exclusivity program with subscription-based pricing. He portrayed KDP’s system as predatory pricing, a monopolistic practice that threatens to put Amazon’s competitors out of business. This threatens the newly-found independence and choice of independent authors. We have just been released from bondage to the Big Five, and now we’re in bondage to Amazon, according to Coker. While this may be true, he did not fully recognize the prisoner’s dilemma that Amazon presents to authors. If we all stood up together as one and refused to participate in KDP, we would all be punished equally by Amazon’s algorithm—meaning none of us would be punished. This might put KDP out of business. But without collective action, pulling out of KDP will only hurt the individual author who takes the stand. Your books will be buried in Amazon, and other authors will be thrilled to take your spot at the top of the bestseller lists. In this prisoner’s dilemma, no one chooses the collective good over their own self-interest. That’s human nature, and Amazon knows it.

This presentation was less ideological and more data-driven than the first. Some of the data followed the trends seen in his 2016 survey, but let me recap what I found particularly interesting. Note that all of this is based on averages, so your mileage may vary. The survey showed that among his authors:

Write as long as you need to. The top 70 bestselling romance authors at Smashwords average 92,000 words (excluding box sets) and 113,000 words (including box sets).
But keep the titles short. The top 100 bestsellers at Smashwords have 24.45 characters on average in the title, while the 900-1000 bestsellers have 30.11 characters on average. The last 100 surveyed (bestsellers 9,900-10,000) average 35.5 characters.
How much should you charge for your ebooks? Free books still get the most downloads, but among books for sale, the best range is still from $2.99-$4.99. The spot at $1.99 is a dead zone. It seems to be better for Smashwords authors to price at $0.99 or $2.99 than $1.99.
If you write a series—and, yes, they still dominate the romance market—you should give away the starter for free. 7 out of 10 of the bestselling series on Smashwords have a free starter. Interestingly, 4 of the 10 did not have any new book in the series published within the survey period (a year), which shows the persistence of series, even when complete or on pause.
Should you put your books up for preorder? Especially in the iBooks store, yes. They count your preorders as first day sales, unlike Amazon where they are counted on the day the purchase is made. Coker found that of the top 1000 bestselling authors, 61.7% released at least one book on preorder. There could be other factors at work, like the fact that the most professional and organized authors might be the one getting their act together for preorders. Maybe they have nicer covers, better writing, and better advance marketing, he suggested.
Should you do a box set? “Box sets are not the path to riches, but they can be a nice complement to your publishing strategy,” Coker said. Authors participating in at least one box set—whether alone or with other authors—are highly represented among bestselling authors. However, in my opinion, this may be more a function of catalog size than actual box set sales. Authors with more books in the backlist tend to have higher earnings and more followers, and these are the authors who have the material to create a box set. Moreover, the best selling box sets are $0.99, which is a pretty low value on that many words.

This workshop featured two executives of Written Word Media, the team behind FreeBooksy and Bargain Booksy. It was a little free-form, but here are the takeaways that I think may interest fellow authors:

Perceived value was a very interesting concept to me. Giving a book away for free without any hurdles not only loses you revenue, but it also lowers the “perceived value” of your book. But if you take an email address from a reader in order to get the book, that adds perceived value. Perceived value can also come from a reader pay to attend an event. Another trick is to keep the price on the back of the book the same as others in industry, and then put “special price” stickers on it. This way you can give special sales at specific events while still keeping the perceived value of your book high.
Covers are important, but they do not make the sale. They need to accurately represent the genre, general theme, and relative professionalism of the book—but NOT the whole plot! The point of a good cover is to get someone to read the blurb. The blurb sells the book.
In terms of ebook sales, the panel sees people making the most at the $2.99-$4.99 range, which agrees with Coker’s findings. (And, by the way, Coker joined the panel informally.) Bargain Booksy thinks that middle-range prices ($4.99) with flash sales (“for a limited time only”) is a good strategy.
Not surprisingly, it is easier to bring prices down than up. If you need to increase prices, do so incrementally.
As you might expect, pricing will expand and contract based on the number of books being released. This is supply and demand. The last two years have seen a lot of people fall out of the market, which is why we see prices going up a bit.

Romantic stock photo of couple in the jungle with a moon from Shutterstock for Sugar Moon spoof Jennifer Hallock steamy historical — You do NOT want your cover to describe the entire plot of your book. Case in point: this Shutterstock image has so many elements that are perfect for the story of Sugar Moon, including two reasonably good models, a jungle setting, and a big frickin’ moon (or is that a white earth?). But no. Just no.

To be honest, this workshop turned into an infomercial of why we authors needed a traditional publisher, especially Sourcebooks. Even though I am fond of Sourcebooks because they published a few of Laura Kinsale’s books, I was still annoyed by their attitude. Nevertheless, there were a few interesting bits of data:

There are impulse buyers out there! In a Neilsen study of romance book buyers, 23% planned to buy one specific book at specific time; 23% planned to buy the one specific book, but not at a specific time; 26% planned to buy a book at a specific time, but not any particular book; and 30% didn’t plan to buy anything at all, making it a total impulse purchase.
How do readers first find you? Browsing the store accounts for 15% of first discovery. Reader recommendations account for 15%, but it needs to be recommended three times. Your author marketing accounts for 14%, but people need to see your materials at least twice. Finally, print and other analog (non-internet based) publicity counts for 13%, but it needs reinforcement 2.5 times. Bottom line: your marketing has an impact, but it’s best when reinforced by another source.
What do readers want to hear in your marketing? 31% of book purchases are based on book message. How do they like the sound of your story? 26% buy because they like your other books or the rest of your series. 15% is based upon reader recommendations. Only 8% of purchasing decisions are based upon special pricing alone, so don’t just drop your prices without a plan. Make sure you have a good book message, too!
Sourcebooks’ data also suggests that “freegans” will not convert to “paygans.” Just because people download your book for free doesn’t mean they will purchase more. This seems to contradict Coker’s data. (See above.)

Much of what I learned in this workshop is hard to describe because it was based on the attendees pitching to ReShonda. She was brutally honest in her advice, but it was totally warranted. ReShonda was definitely the best teacher at the conference. I’m a little bit in love with her. Here are a few of her points:

Twitter has become a requirement in many newsrooms today. Follow your local reporters and know what they cover. This helps you find the right person for your story.
When you call or contact a newspaper or television station, there is no “my book this” or “my book that.” Have your assistant call the newsroom, even if your “assistant” is you (under a different name). First talk about a critical issue the reporter should be aware of, and then reveal that a local expert (ahem, that’s you) wrote a book about this very problem. Give your pitch as a story, not a summary.
Email a pitch for a weekend feature first thing Thursday morning. If you try to do it late Wednesday, it will get buried in the pitches that come after you. And if you wait too long, they will be working on other things before yours. And why Thursday? Because it gives them time to consider your book for their weekend story planning, when it is hard to find news.
The email subject is your hook. Never say “new book” in your hook.
Paid news service promo agency stuff gets ignored. Do it yourself instead. Write a text email and attach a press release, if you have one. Do not bother sending books or promo kits. They will be thrown away.
Follow up. Don’t be a stalker, of course, but follow up two to three times by email. Call once if you need to.

You’ve reached the end! If you’re still here, I’m impressed. I learned a lot about the industry at #RT17. Not enough to justify the price tag, of course. In fact, that was maybe the most important business lesson: national conferences do not make financial sense if you have to pay your own way. I didn’t go to make money, though. I went to have fun, and I did. But I hope you’ve been more frugal and gotten your #RT17 value from this post. Next year, you can do the same for me.