All Blog Posts Tagged 'creatures' (167)

I used to think I was a really strange person. While everyone else was out socializing and going to concerts, movies, and having meals out, I would stay home and sit in my room and write stories. I thought I was even odder when I got older and went to college. While I did my fair share of partying, I never got into that whole social clique thing. While my friends would be outside playing football or Frisbee tag, I’d be in my dorm room cranking out poetry (that’s what I was into at the time)…

As my five dollar blog ads end I can reliably say that they resulted in maybe a dozen sales. Since I only get like thirty-five cents a book the result wasn’t worth the expense in monetary terms. But it’s all about exposure. This brings me to the next level of my experiments in marketing. After reading forums on the pros and cons of making your ebook free to the public, I decided to do just that. Kindle Direct offers a program where you can offer your book free for up to five days. I’m doing…

That is the goal of most novelists. Not so much because of the greed factor, but that money affords the life of being a writer. Indie publishing can make it happen! That said, here are the final results of my relatively expensive blog ad campaign. I got maybe twenty extra sales because of it. So my advice would be only to place ads that are cheap and give great exposure. My mistake was that I jumped right in with the $40 ads instead of doing more research and finding numerous little ads for…

Since my website and blog pages are getting so much attention I’ve decided to submit SILENT INVASION to try and get an agent, again. Though, as I said before, it’s more of an ego thing than anything else. I figure with my sites getting so much traffic I can use that info in my query as a great platform. Since most agents won’t even look at an author unless he’s got the basic WWW promotion down, at least I might spark someone’s attention. Although I’ve made money from my books, it would be…

Yeah! Sales are increasing! My blog is now averaging about 75-100 hits an hour. My Facebook Fan page has almost 3,500 “likes” and my Authors Den profile is averaging 100 hits a day. So, here’s the breakdown of all my promotional and marketing efforts so far. The newspaper article scheme did nothing for sales but probably exposed me to a few new people. I would recommend against it. The ads I paid good money for, like the Litopia and YA Reads.com did almost nothing for sales. Perhaps, I got a…

As some of you may have noticed the counter for my blog has exploded. For the last week, I’ve been averaging about 600 hits a day and it’s going up. Yesterday, I got 1,700. It seams the search engine optimization is kicking in after all, and it will only get better over time. It’s a bit overwhelming to think that so many people are reading my posts and checking out the kinds of books I write. Every morning I jump from bed, come down to my office, and check my stats on my various sites. It’s…

The first ads of my winter campaign are live. The combined cost for both was $100. They will run for the next two weeks right on the home pages of these sites. This should give the ads about 100,000 views at least.

http://litopia.com/

http://www.yareads.com/

Now, I’m not expecting to sell 250 books because of these ads, which is what I’d need to break even, what I’m looking for now is exposure, plain…

I just put together a Facebook fan page for Author Neil D. Ostroff. http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Facebook-Page-of-Author-Neil-D-Ostroff/124794694205967?sk=info

I sent out a bunch of notices through social marketing and guess what? I already have almost 2,000 likes. The internet is just amazing! Anyway, I’ve got everything in place for my winter marketing blitz. I’ve got…

It’s done! I’ve just put money into promotion. A pretty good chunk, actually. I’m starting with Kindle Nation Daily site. I’ve done some research and heard a lot of positive things about this site and what it can do for your sales. They even have a statistics page that shows you all the books whose ranking went down after placing ads. I signed up for two campaigns. One, the bigger one, won’t start until March, which is fine because hopefully there’ll be many more Kindle owners by then. The…

My brother sent me an article the other day that inspired me beyond belief. I’ll attach it at the end of this post. Basically, it’s the story of a self-published success. I know, I know, I’ve read a thousand of them, also. But this one struck me different, mainly because this author did everything I have done to market and promote with one exception. She used the pay promotion on her sites and I have not. See, I’ve been mistakenly foolish with my numbers. I was putting book sales in…

Been doing the interview thing a lot lately and I think it’s starting to pay off. Not only does my name come up more often in search engines but I’m noticing visits to my blog and website are increasing. Of course, this could also be the result of my article experiment, which I’m waiting for the final stats. Speaking of my Author’s Den website, I recently signed on with GoDaddy to build a website myself that I can update, and let me tell you, it’s not nearly as easy as they claim. I spent…

Do you know if you write a page a day that within one year you will have written a book? How many times have I heard that one? If that one book takes a year to write then the revision process would have to take many years. Truth is, writing a first draft is the easy part. I can usually belt one out in a few months. But the revision; forgetta’bout it. That’s the time consuming stuff, though I am getting better at it as I get older (and hopefully wiser). I’m also getting better as a…

Hit 6,000 words today on my new novel. It's an easy and exciting write because anything can happen in a world that isn't real. I see the book getting a little deep in the philosophical area once the characters begin to realize the nature of their existences and how it all could just disappear. We'll see where the story takes me. Right now, I'm still developing characters and relationships and setting the scene for a wild ride through the possible and impossible.

 …

As some of you know I started a new book a few days ago. The title is IMAGINATION and it’s the wildest concept I’ve had yet. Here’s the preliminary tagline: (What if everything around us, our friends, our surroundings, the universe, what if all we experience is just a figment of someone’s imagination? And what if that someone is dying?) I’m very excited about this one as I’ve been thinking about this possibility for a long time. The book will be written in the style of one of my earlier…

Okay, well… here it is. The $55 article written for me. Now,

the next step is the company will send this to three hundred article submission

services, and people, and companies looking for content. My Blog address and

Author’s Den address will be attached to the article so readers can connect

with me. I reset my site stats to zero and will closely monitor that over the

next ten days (the run I was promised). I average about twenty-five bio hits a

day on my AD site and…

It’s raining today. Drops slide down my window like translucent

snails. Water puddles in the street. Worms

tunnel up from drowning liquid and sprawl across the sidewalk. And here I sit

in front of my computer belting out another novel. I forget who said it, but I

remember a quote that summed up the writing life completely. The quote went

simply; being a writer is like having homework every day for the rest of your

life. And that’s true for the serious, passionate…

I just did something that I’ve never done before. Something

I ignorantly hoped to avoid but always knew would happen. I just paid hard

earned dough to promote my books. Well, not my books individually, but my blog

and author’s site. I signed up for two marketing ideas that I believe may

actually work. I also have a third PR person in line to do search engine

optimization. Who would have thought being a writer and selling books could get

so complicated. The first site…

It’s happened! I’ve finished a new book (DREAM TRAVELER) and

it’s about to go live. So, what do I do now? Well, besides all the marketing

and promotion I’m planning in the coming weeks, it’s time to start a new novel.

I’ve had this one simmering in my brain for a long time; about thirty years.

What’s it about? Well, I learned long ago not to talk-out a book before you’ve

put it to page, but I have come up with a tagline. ‘You and me and the world we

live in is nothing…

Happy Thanksgiving to all! That said, I have to tell you

that since I’m in the service industry, I work every Thanksgiving. So today,

black Friday, is my day to celebrate. Oh it’ll be a hoot. Got the family coming

over, got friends of the kids stopping by, got lots of food and drink. By the

time most of you read this I’m going to be knee-deep in overindulgence. But for

now, I must write. This post is only the beginning of about two hours I’ve set

aside this morning to…

So, you married yourself a writer, eh? You bought into the

romantic notion of the two of you sitting fireside, you drinking a glass of

pinot noir while your significant other sits beside you writing the next great

American novel. The only sound is the crackling fire and the tapping of their

keyboard. Every once in a while your significant other looks up from their

masterpiece and flashes you a smile that makes you feel like you’re the most

special person in the world.…