Jo Walton ([info]papersky) wrote,
@ 2008-02-21 14:49:00
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Marketing: Over-rated
I know some writers are being encouraged to have blogs. This is going to work better with some people than others. Just saying. There are a couple of writers whose work I'll never read because of their online presence. Life is too short to read things by jerks, but if I'd never encountered them, I'd never have known they were jerks. Being a writer does not make you a nice person. Or even an interesting person. "Played sudoku all afternoon. Still suck." I try not to inflict posts like that on you unless I have something to actually say about it. But then I would anyway. My journalling behaviour is different because I am a writer only in that I sometimes talk about writing, or copyediting or whatever, because it's what I'm doing. Well, and because this is more public than it would be. I wouldn't have 900 people reading this, most of them people I don't actually know, and I can't help being aware of that.

Anyway, I know at least one writer who has been told by her agent to be more upbeast and positive about her work on her blog. But yesterday, while feeling excessively downbeat and negative, I linked to the Half a Crown listing on Amazon in what was probably the most negative way one could imagine, short of saying outright "steaming pile of shit" or "stinking pile of fish guts". I also said that the Amazon listing was just a listing, without any actual information. ([info]janni has a cover. But I have roses and chocolate. When I have a cover, I'll let you know.) Nevertheless, some of you went to Amazon and bought it, and I know this because yesterday it didn't have a sales ranking at all, but today it has the highest sales ranking of any of my books. I know Amazon sales rankings fall from the sky and don't mean anything, but even taking that into account, this one probably means that at least one person read my negative mention and rushed off and gave them good money for it.

Whoever you are, thank you. I feel more positive about it already.

Oh, and bellated happy birthdays to [info]jinian and [info]xiphias, who had birthdays in the last few days when I was head-down in the copyedit.

Sushi tonight.

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[info]xiphias
2008-02-21 07:58 pm UTC (link)
Thank you. And I read your blog because I find you interesting as a person, even when your life is being boring. I read your books because I like how you write fiction.

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[info]firecat
2008-02-21 08:59 pm UTC (link)
What he said.

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[info]readinggeek451
2008-02-21 11:59 pm UTC (link)
Yes.

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[info]davidgoldfarb
2008-02-22 12:16 am UTC (link)
Ditto. (I was enjoying your writing on Usenet long before you were ever published, of course.)

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[info]sylvia_rachel
2008-02-22 02:12 am UTC (link)
... and me.

Some people can't write interestingly even about prima facie interesting events. Other people can write fascinatingly and entertainingly about, well, anything. Which is perhaps one reason these people you are a writers.

Have not pre-ordered Half a Crown yet. Have not yet been paid for February, and am feeling more than usually impoverished. But will do so in about a week, to ensure that lovely hardcover of Ha'Penny will soon have a Companion.

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[info]mjlayman
2008-02-22 04:11 am UTC (link)
Yep, me too. I've been reading you for a long time.

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[info]mrissa
2008-02-21 08:18 pm UTC (link)
The people who use their blogs to be relentlessly upbeat about their books are more likely to put me off reading their blogs than anything else. I'm not necessarily going to be put off reading their books, but, "Yay rah rah, go team me, I write the greatest books EVER!!!!!" is not really what I'm looking for in blog reading. I'd far rather have, "Yarrrrrg, this copy-edit is crap!", by a long shot.

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[info]janni
2008-02-21 08:28 pm UTC (link)
I think blogs that are all "buy my book" get boring after a while, and tend to--not be put off, but to stop reading them. (I even worry that too much talking about working on writing is boring, except that then someone will say they enjoyed something I almost didn't post.)

It's tricky. I think it is true that you can't be too negative, but I also think it's true that you have to be honest. It almost feels like a filtering process for me: taking the whole mess that is my real life, and then choosing what portions of it to share with the outside world, and to what degree.

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[info]janni
2008-02-21 08:24 pm UTC (link)
Yes, but you can share your roses and chocolate, if you're so inclined, while I have to wait to share my cover.

Not that I'd be, umm, finding this difficult or anything. :-)

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[info]cynthia1960
2008-02-21 08:29 pm UTC (link)
Crap review be damned; when you said it was up for pre-order, I snagged one promptly. I didn't even look at the review.

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[info]ron_newman
2008-02-21 08:33 pm UTC (link)
There's only one other online place where I've interacted this much with the author of a book that I read: Readerville. Sadly, I've mostly abandoned my account there, for no particularly good reason.

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[info]ckd
2008-02-21 09:24 pm UTC (link)
I read your LJ (and before LJ, your USENET posts) because I like hearing about what's going on with you, what you're thinking about, and so on—and you write interestingly about even the "uninteresting". I buy your books because I like your books. There are very nice writers whose books I just don't read (not my genre/style/whatever), and while I hope their books sell well, I don't buy them just because the author is a pleasant person. (I'll often give an author I haven't read a try with a library book if they write well online

I didn't pre-order Half a Crown on Amazon, but since it has an ISBN I should see if I can pre-order it through my local specialty bookstore....

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Upbeast Marketing
[info]amberley
2008-02-21 09:36 pm UTC (link)
If I'm reading a book set in Britain I crave "baffling British idioms" — any imprecise usage is just a happy bonus. And I don't need to know the cover, just the author, to know I want to buy Half a Crown.

I started buying your books before friends pointed me towards your very interesting livejournal, but there are authors whose books I bought because they came to my attention through their online journals. But only if the book also sounded like something I might like.

"Everything one posts, all the code one writes, all the mail one sends, every document one publishes: all are advertising." — Marcus Ranum

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[info]ceb
2008-02-21 10:13 pm UTC (link)
I would dash out and pre-order a copy but I don't have room for hardbacks these days, the living room's lined with books as it is....

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[info]fledgist
2008-02-21 10:52 pm UTC (link)
This post reminded me to preorder Half a Crown and I've done so. Dunno if this affects your Amazon ranking, but you don't get my hard-earned shekels until they actually ship it to me.

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[info]papersky
2008-02-22 03:42 pm UTC (link)
Actually, I don't get them until May 2009 at the absolute earliest. But I appreciate the thought.

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[info]fledgist
2008-02-22 04:10 pm UTC (link)
I'm looking forward to it. I want to see how you wrap up the story, and what happens to Carmichael (and how he reconciles himself to running the 'Watch').

They delay payment that long? Good grief!

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[info]hobbitbabe
2008-02-21 10:58 pm UTC (link)
My mother's thank-you note for her Christmas present (Farthing) included the line "Have any of her books ever been submitted to the GGAwards or the Giller?"

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[info]papersky
2008-02-22 03:38 pm UTC (link)
Well, first thank you for giving it to her, and thanks to her for liking it.

I don't think I'm eligible -- even leaving aside issues of worthy -- for the GGAward until I'm a landed immigrant. (Any day now, I hope.)

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[info]msagara
2008-02-21 10:58 pm UTC (link)
I know some writers are being encouraged to have blogs. This is going to work better with some people than others. Just saying. There are a couple of writers whose work I'll never read because of their online presence. Life is too short to read things by jerks, but if I'd never encountered them, I'd never have known they were jerks. Being a writer does not make you a nice person. Or even an interesting person. "Played sudoku all afternoon. Still suck." I try not to inflict posts like that on you unless I have something to actually say about it. But then I would anyway. My journalling behaviour is different because I am a writer only in that I sometimes talk about writing, or copyediting or whatever, because it's what I'm doing. Well, and because this is more public than it would be. I wouldn't have 900 people reading this, most of them people I don't actually know, and I can't help being aware of that.

This is so me! Except for the sudoku thing, but I could easily substitute almost anything else there and have it work.


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[info]kalimeg
2008-02-21 11:31 pm UTC (link)
If I had any money I'd have done the same. Job starts next week.

:)

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[info]elissaann
2008-02-21 11:32 pm UTC (link)
You're welcome.

I did it out of selfishness. I want to know how it comes out.

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[info]veejane
2008-02-22 12:06 am UTC (link)
told by her agent to be more upbeast

I think I would very much enjoy it if my favorite authors were to turn into beasts. And ravened around the neighborhood, scaring children and chewing on shrubbery! And then came home and typed wittily about it, hitting the keys neatly with their needle-sharp claws.

That goes double if, in between bouts of, uhhh, beastliness, the authors in question provide interesting recipes.

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[info]radiantfracture
2008-02-22 02:07 am UTC (link)
I now intend to use "upbeast" in all of my correspondence.

{rf}

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[info]dichroic
2008-02-22 02:52 am UTC (link)
I suspect Half a Crown is one book for which what Amazon says doesn't matter much, other than the part where they say "you can buy it now". People who have read Farthing and Ha'Penny will want to read it and those who haven't probably shouldn't yet anyway.

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Sushi
[info]minnehaha
2008-02-22 03:20 am UTC (link)
"Sushi tonight."

Damn it. I didn't see this until after dinner.

B

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[info]jinian
2008-02-22 05:01 am UTC (link)
Thank you! It was a good birthday, even if I did look in the mirror and see a professor today. And your books are awesome.

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[info]carandol
2008-02-22 02:24 pm UTC (link)
I don't know if you count free book giveaways as marketing or what, but between manybooks.net and feedbooks.com "The Prize in the Game" has had 69 downloads, and "The Rebirth of Pan" has had 46. (20 and 19 of those respectively were in the last week, since they went up on Feedbooks). Don't know whether this will translate into sales for your other books, or whether all the hardcore e-book reader users will wait until Tor is selling ebooks. There's certainly a lot of excitement about the Tor ebook giveaways, and the fact that they seem to be listening to requests for different formats. Do Tor have electronic rights to your books, or is that a trade secret?

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[info]papersky
2008-02-22 03:33 pm UTC (link)
Well normally it would count as "try one, if you like it here are some more just like it" but in my case it's "try one, here are some more totally different" so I don't know!

Tor have the electronic rights.

And Farthing is going to be one of the books given away shortly to people signing up for the new website. But please encourage the people on your communities to sign up for the new website rather than just copy one copy of it, if you know what I mean.

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[info]carandol
2008-02-22 05:37 pm UTC (link)
Hopefully giving away Farthing will leave people wanting the sequels. I can't see why they wouldn't! And I should think people will sign up to the new site -- there's a very positive buzz about Tor at the moment, since the second free book is in several formats, and the first one is being sent in different formats to anyone who asks, which is seen as pretty good customer service for a freebie. Plus people with e-book readers seem to be the sort of people who like the sort of books Tor publishes.

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[info]darcydodo
2008-02-22 06:13 pm UTC (link)
Unrelated to this post (mostly), but there's a brief mention of the Farthing books being awesome over here.

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[info]readinggeek451
2008-02-23 12:28 am UTC (link)
That post appears to be friends-locked.

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[info]darcydodo
2008-02-23 01:27 am UTC (link)
It is, but [info]penmage has [info]papersky friended, so she should be able to see it.

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[info]elianarus
2008-02-22 10:15 pm UTC (link)
One of the things I love about your LJ is that you have a Midas touch with your writing - every topic you touch is fascinating to read about...

Pre-ordering on Amazon as soon as possible is very important! If they underestimate early sales and run out of stock, I want to be one of the first people in line! (I don't do delayed gratification well, and I've been hankering for this book since I put Ha'Penny down...)

Eliana

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