Everything Works and Nothing Works in Self-Publishing

All along, we've been asking the wrong damn questions.

This is an excerpt from my upcoming book The Artisan Author.

---

When people ask for my best tips as a self-publishing veteran, I bore the living hell out of them.

I say, “Write great books that people love.”

I say, “Be nice to the readers you meet.” Or ideally: “Be nice to everyone.”

I say, “Answer readers when they send you emails.”

I say, “Be professional, and do what you say you’ll do.”

When the frustrated person I’m talking to then tells me, Yeah, yeah, I know all of that. What I want to know is how make more sales!, I say:

“If you want to make more sales, let more people know about your books and why they’re cool.”

Yeah, yeah … but where? How? What’s the trick? Do I need to be on TikTok? Do I need to run ads? Should I switch email marketing software? I hear list swaps and group promotions are a big deal. Should I do those? Should my books be shorter and faster-paced? Which keywords should I use? Should I collaborate with someone more popular? What genres are hot right now? Should I be in Kindle Unlimited? Should I run a Kickstarter? Should I offer different versions of my book cover? Should I push harder for reviews? Should I make my book free for a while?

And I’ll answer, “Sure. You do you.”

The thing nobody wants to hear is that there’s no real answer to those questions. A lot of how-to is taught on the basis of something always working, but in truth the answer to any how-to or should-I question is “it depends.”

It depends on your books; it depends on you as an author; it depends on your customers; it depends on your brand; it depends on what you’ve done and said in the past and where you want to go in the future. It depends on your risk tolerance and whether or not setbacks bounce off of or shut you down. But nobody talks about how much depends, because when you say “it depends” too much as an educator, people stop buying the Easy Button you’re selling. That’s why a key focus of this book isn’t about what to do, but instead to figuring out exactly who you are and where you stand … or, in other words, on determining exactly what “it depends on” for you.

Let’s try something, you and I.

As a thought experiment, forget anything you know about self-publishing for a second. Nothing you’ve ever read, or heard, or seen, or been advised about writing and publishing exists right now. Make your mind a clean slate for a moment — a tabula rasa, as John Locke (no, not that John Locke) called it.

Okay. Now, as someone who knows nothing at all about selling books, pretend you have a book that you want to sell. You wrote it, but without considering its marketability. You aren’t so rasa that you forgot how to write, so it’s a great book … but it came from your artful heart, not your businessperson’s brain.

How would you sell that book, with no knowledge of how to do so?

Well, the first thing would be to find someone who likes to read, right? Someone with at least twenty bucks or so of disposable income. No matter how vacant we are, that seems like a logical place to start.

Then, you’d tell them about the story. Assuming you like the story (which you should; otherwise, why did you write it?), you’d be bright-eyed and enthusiastic about it. You’d tell it with heart. With fervor. And sure, your introversion might get in the way for a while, but once you got into a groove, you’d have no trouble. You’d tell your audience about the cool twists, the amazing characters, and some of the other whiz-bang that inspired you to put it all down in the first place.

Eventually, you’d find a few readers who thought the story sounded interesting. More, though, they’d find you and your passion for the story interesting. And so they’d pull out their wallets, and they’d risk the cover price to give your story a shot — partly because you described a story that intrigues them, but partly because of the energy you clearly put into it.

Now: Was that an interesting thought experiment? I hope so, because it’s the core truth of how books get sold. That simple, brainless, no-ninja-tricks approach is all that truly matters in the end.

Not the latest and greatest tactic being talked about in online writer groups.

Not ads.

Not social media.

Not writing to market, or being wide, or being exclusive to Amazon, or being an Artisan Author. What matters is a reader, a writer, and interest shared between them. Nothing else.

And sure: Tactics do enter the picture at some point to help authors sell better, but that’s secondary, not core. Every tactic only works when it serves a deeper, more core ideal.

Social media works if it augments your natural style of sharing. Ads work when you’re able to use them to put your book in front of more of the right readers in a way that works with your brain. Hell, Rapid Release works for plenty of authors, but only because it delivers the reading experience those readers want: high frequency, a specific style and content they can count on, and low prices. Every tactic is a vehicle for some deep and dead-simple core truth, not magic that stands on its own and therefore works for everyone all the time.

This is why I tell people “It depends.” It’s why, when I’m asked about my own strategies, I bore people. I have nothing mind-blowing to share, and that includes the information in this book. I mean … I have no love for Rapid Release, but should you use it? Well, that depends. It depends on the kind of author you are and the kind of readers you want to serve. I don’t want to be that kind of author or serve those kinds of readers, so it’s not for me. But is it for you? I doubt it, if you’ve read this far, but who knows?

Being an Artisan Author might feel revolutionary to some people, but that’s only because so much pointless bullshit has accumulated between us, as authors, and the readers we serve. See through the bullshit, and you’ll see the exact same elements that are at the core of any strategy that works for at least one author.

We write. They read. We’re human and they’re human. Humans want experiences, and good books deliver experiences. Humans want connection — if not to other people, then to a purpose, an ideal, or a temporary escape. Humans want to feel that they matter, too, which is why books that validate their experience tend to be loved … and why the best tool in my fan-building toolkit is simply answering reader emails. If you don’t answer emails and are successful anyway, it’s because you’re validating your unique fans in other ways: delivering connection through a fictional worldview they share, or delivering vicarious love in the pages of a romance novel.

No matter what approach you take to being an author, there are only a few root truths in play. We tend to forget that because being an author is hard and lonely, and clinging to someone else’s strategy gives you company and a plan to follow. Problems come, though, when we follow without thinking. Someone else isn’t you, so why would their strategy work for you? If their way depends on them, wouldn’t it also depend on you?

Let’s all take a deep breath and back away from every strategy there is (yours, mine, other authors’, or the strategies peddled as universal truth in your author group) and actually think for a second.

Think about you, and your work.

Think about whichever tactic you’re considering, and its pros and cons — not universally, but pros and cons to you and your career, as individual and unique.

And most important of all, think about the core truths we discussed back when you were pretending to be a tabula rasa: about how putting the right book in front of the right reader in exactly the right way at the right time is all that matters. No one technique “works.” What “works” is using any technique that best puts your book in front of the right reader in exactly the right way at the right time. What works is anything that, unique to you and your work, best teases and then delivers the experience that your specific readers are looking for.

The author community tends to focus on methods, which is a fair first step in deciding what to do. The problem is that few authors take the second step, which is the critical thinking described above. Instead, we get dogmatic. We decide — and then declare to others — that this one thing is THE WAY success gets done.

Will this method work? you ask.

And if you’re smart, the answer should be: It depends on me. It depends on my readers. It depends on whether that method, in my hands and delivered to my readers, will serve the core truths that underly everything. Will this method deliver the experience those readers want?

No? Well, then you’ll need to change yourself, your readers … or find another method.

But we don’t do that. We follow blindly. Oh, I need to run Facebook ads. Oh, I need to write to market. Oh, I need to be on Instagram. None of those things are true. What you need is to match your unique reader’s needs to your unique writer’s talent and disposition, and match both of those whichever methods you employ.

Here’s another question: Which road should you take to drive from New York to Los Angeles?

Funny how nobody’s dogmatic about roads, even though it’s the exact same idea. Which road? Well, that depends. Do you want to avoid tolls? Take the scenic route? Get there as fast as possible? Are you a nervous driver or someone who handles high speed and gridlock with ease? Do you care about the world’s largest ball of string? Because if not, why would you ever take that road?

And so at this point, we have to ask: Is being an Artisan Author better than Rapid Release?

Sure. Yes. No. Because it depends.

It depends even here, in this book. Even here, where Rapid Release is discussed as if it’s a vortex of doom. Even in my mind — the mind of a guy who wouldn’t do Rapid Release if his ass was on fire and Kindle Unlimited readers held the only buckets of water.

But it does depend. It’s not wrong. It’s just wrong for me and other authors like me, here in Artisan Author land.

If Rapid Release is perfect for you, and works great for you, and you’ve duly and critically considered its pros and cons and remained focused on the core truths of publishing instead of its secondary methods and dogma, then godspeed. You, oh Rapid Release author, should definitely keep doing you.

But if it doesn’t suit you — and man oh man, have I heard from a lot of authors it doesn’t suit but who’ve been brainwashed into believing there’s no other way — then take heart.

There are other ways. There are other readers that Rapid Release authors aren’t even trying to reach. Amazon is not the only river in which we can fish. Ebooks are not the only format that sells. Online buyers — and especially not America-only online buyers — are not the only readers out there.

To quote Hamlet because I’m just that high-brow: “There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.”

When did self-publishing become so dogmatic? Watching us talk, you’d think there’s only one right way, one right audience, one right kind of book, and one option to succeed.

But that’s bullshit. Speaking for myself, I’ve always hated being told what to do.

We came to self-publishing for the creative freedom of it all, and the good news is: That freedom is still here.

You just need to get your head out of the same-old garbage for long enough to see it.

---

If you want to learn how rule-hating authors can succeed without the Rapid Release pressure-cooker, check out The Artisan Author here. But let’s be clear: following an Artisan Author philosophy is not THE ANSWER because nothing is THE ANSWER. Hell, Artisan life might not be right for you at all … but at least this way you can do what you want, hold onto your love of writing, charge what you’re worth, and live or die by your own damn choices.