My first novel has now been on Amazon and Goodreads for a month or so. Lovely reviews are slowly coming in but I ponder on how to reach a wider audience. What or who is my competition? It is a little disheartening to learn that the total number of self-published e-books and hardbacks with a registered ISBN number rose from 1.2 million in 2017 to 1.6 million in 2018. Only a tiny fraction of those ever go on to achieve mainstream success. The hard part for any author is marketing. Success depends on the time and effort getting it in front of readers.
Has anyone been successful, I ask myself? Surprisingly the answer is yes and even more surprising are some of these! When traditional publishing houses said NO, authors went down the self-publishing route.
* Beatrix Potter was told that women could not write books, so she self-published her novel, ‘The Tale of Peter Rabbit.’
*‘Fifty Shades of Grey’ by EL James was initially self-published before its meteoric rise to fame.
*'The Martian' started life as a blog by Andy Weir who had no thoughts of making any money. A traditional publisher found it, bought the rights and made it into a film starring Matt Damon.
The message here is to stay positive, keep plugging away, building up a fan base, focus on log term goals and hope that one day, an agent or publisher spots the potential in my novels.
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