Did you know that your expectations can negatively impact your relationship with others in the publishing industry as well? Rachelle Gardner, a literary agent who is very active online, shares some of the writer expectations she’s encountered and gives very direct reasons why they are not based in reality.

…there are many writers who hold on to unrealistic expectations long after reality should be setting in. This is an ongoing concern for agents, editors, and publicists who constantly find themselves not living up to writers’ expectations. In many cases (and yes, there are plenty of exceptions), the writer’s hopes and beliefs were simply too idealistic to begin with. –SOURCE: Managing Expectations by Rachelle Gardner

If you aren’t clear as to whether or not your personal expectations will damage your professional reputation or sour your experiences as a writer, be sure to read Managing Expectations by Rachelle Gardner. It’s definitely worth your time.

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Are You Providing a Service?

The idea that you, as a creative professional, are providing a service goes much deeper than making those quick decisions. Let me walk you through an example of what I’m talking about.

Let’s say I get hired to write a story set within the Hellboy universe. (Hah, I wish!) Because that setting is owned by Mike Mignola, I would not own the rights to what I’ve written. Since I already know the setting, I don’t need to spend a lot of time learning about Hellboy, so I wouldn’t lose a lot of time there. I would, however, need to research new stories within the setting because there’s already been a lot of myths covered. Then, there’s the time it would take to write the story and go through the editing process. Once the story was done, I can’t do anything else with it because now it belongs to someone else. Even though I wrote for a setting I love, I still produced an asset for someone other than myself. In short, I provided a service to develop something that someone already had a need for.

This example highlights how writing for a tie-in property typically works. The reality of being a creative professional is that we produce content for other people in order to make a living. I look at the process of developing an asset for someone else as our ability to provide a service rather than produce a deliverable. Other examples range from writing website copy for someone else’s business to graphic design to developing a game and pitching it to a publisher. The concept, though, is pretty simple to follow once you start tracking how the money is flowing to you. If you get paid up front for the work you’re doing, I feel that it’s helpful to look at your time as a service related to product development. You are, in effect, developing and providing an asset that someone else needs and will, in turn, sell.

Or Are You Creating an Asset?

When you design something for other people to purchase that you have more control over, then you’re creating an asset. An example of that is an illustrator creating a clip-art CD or offering prints for sale of artwork they own the rights to.

Now, there are advantages to both business models because, in many ways, an asset’s value increases depending upon how many people want that asset. I could design an interactive fairy tale for you, but if you didn’t want it, then it’s not worth anything and I’d lose money because I had just spent all that time creating something you don’t care about. The reality of developing your own assets, is that it isn’t enough “just” to create the asset. You need to figure out how you can get people to pay for it. For a writer, that means you have to develop a strong base of readers that will invest in your work.

A really good example of what I’m talking about here, are some of the arguments that self-published authors make. To those that don’t understand how publishing works, the publisher is greedy because they have too much control over the author’s asset (e.g. the book). What they don’t understand, is that the publisher is providing the author with a better chance of reaching readers which makes their asset more valuable. Even though there are many services out there that offer some of the same services as a publisher does, the majority of self-published authors don’t sell thousands of copies of their work for a variety of reasons. For starters, those services are not discriminate; they do not turn down an author based on the quality of the work. Publishers do, because they understand that books are assets that represent the author, but also their brand name, too. This is why authors who go through traditional models typically sell more books simply because of the way publishing works.

Then What?

Now, the examples I mentioned above may not apply to you specifically, but the idea is still the same. If you think about your time as your primary asset, then consider the following questions: Do I own what I create? If so, how am I getting paid for it? If I’m not getting paid what I’m worth, then how can I get paid more?

For myself, I don’t attach a “good” or “bad” value to providing a service versus offering an asset because I look at them in terms of different business models. Which is, realistically, what they are. I’d absolutely write a tie-in story for a property I’d love; on the flip side, I’d still want to write a fun story of my own, too.

Not sure about what you think about my post today, but I feel this idea is pretty important. That’s part of the reason why there’s so many changes going on here behind-the-scenes that I haven’t announced yet.

Deep thoughts today! Do these questions resonate with you? Why or why not?

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If you’ve ever been in the “I need to pay rent and I don’t like junk food” place that I’ve been in before, you’ve probably had these same discussions with yourself. Then, when any and all forms of writing assignments start piling in, you get excited because dammit, you’re a writer. Did it matter you just worked for three weeks on an article and didn’t get paid for it? Did it matter you don’t own the rights to what you just wrote? No. What mattered is that you wrote and got published, so you start to let a lot of things slide.

Then, at some point, you wake up and you smell burnt coffee. You get burned. Badly. Someone republishes your work and scrapes your name off the credits and expects you to shove your angst under the rug. A partner manages to “forget” you signed a contract and drops off the face of the planet, so you never get paid for weeks of effort. The story you handed in is different from the story that got published and you were never notified. An editor lost your manuscript. The pitch you handed in years ago is now a multimillion dollar book and no one believes it was your idea. The list of crimes against writers goes on and on and on.

Here’s a tough question for you: Would you quit a job if your boss was being an asshole? Then why on earth would you allow yourself or your work to be treated like crap?

Quite frankly, the cost of making bad decisions is a lot higher than you might think because writers are not paid according to the time and knowledge required for a polished manuscript. Not only is your name and your reputation attached to whatever it is that you’re doing, the time that you spend dealing with crappy projects means that you’re losing money because you’re spending less time on the projects that have a better chance of succeeding. When you’re new to writing, it’s great to experiment so you can find out where your strengths and weaknesses are. But what happens when you’re no longer new? Have you thought about turning down projects you don’t want?

Now, some of you might think that there should be some sort of database out there to pinpoint who the assholes are. However, that is not a professional thing to do because while you may have had a crappy experience with one publisher, a different writer may have had a great one. Yes, patterns can develop, but every situation is usually different because there are two sides to every story. You may be pissed off that you didn’t get paid, but the company could have been filing for bankruptcy, experienced personnel changes or has a policy against paying for delivered work past the deadline you were supposed to meet. Remember, too, there are cases where bad things happen not because a publisher is an evil bastard, but because you’ve experienced a breakdown in your communication with them. That last bit is part of the reason why I believe good, two-way communication is so essential to any writer’s overall success.

So what happens when you get burned? Well, first you have to rant about it in private. (Yes, you really do!) While you’re at it, order a very large margarita, go for a run or play a game. Then, at some point you have to learn when to cut your losses and move on.

In my mind, I don’t believe enough writers ask themselves why they are working on projects that they’ve committed themselves to. To those of you who haven’t gotten paid for your work yet, I understand what you’re going through. You’re hungry to get their name out there. I get that. I really, really do. If you are happy blogging or writing fan fiction and now you’ve got a ton of readers then that’s great! Are you happy writing for free or do you want your readers to pay you? Have you ever asked yourself how much you want to get paid? Are you being realistic with those expectations? Do you know what writing you can get paid for versus what writing you can’t?

The quick response to these types of questions is to say something like, “Well, so-and-so author ended up making millions by bucking the traditional system this way…” While that is true, those experiences are not typical for most writers. What I’m trying to convey in this post, are the questions the rest of us need to ask ourselves. Lightning can strike, but I wouldn’t bank my career on it. Would you?

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1. Is Your Next Writing Project Worth the Trouble? Use the K.I.S.S. System and Find Out!

On with the rant.

Before I get into why e-books are not liquid gold, let me say that it is nigh impossible to cover all of the myths surrounding e-books as a product in this post. I have heard (and read) everything from how e-books are cheaper to produce and/or sell than traditional print editions, how authors are greedy and should take less money so the price goes down, how they should be free to distribute because they don’t cost anything to make, etc. and so forth.

Do you know what are you paying for when you purchase an e-book? You are paying for your desired content through a specific means of delivery – in this case, digital. Books are priced differently because all books do not cost the same to produce, sell or create. Of course, you might know that all authors are not paid the same, but did you know that e-books don’t cost the same to produce either? Same goes for e-books and audiobooks. Audiobooks are priced differently because you’re paying for the story and the performance of it in an audio format. E-books are priced differently because you’re paying for obtaining the story in a digital format that is compatible with your intended device. Every retailer that offers you the ability to purchase or download an e-book also gets their cut, and that’s part of the price as well.

What pisses me off the most about e-books is that all of a sudden people think that they’re new and will somehow instantaneously change the entire publishing industry. They are, most certainly, not “new.” As soon as people could, e-books were produced via word processing software like Microsoft Word. Then, when PDFs first came out, people were using those to produce e-books that you could read on your laptop or your computer. The company OneBookShelf has been around for years, providing people with games, stories and comics in a digital format through DriveThruComics, DriveThruRPG, DriveThruHorror and other sites. OneBookShelf is interesting, because in many ways, the hobby games industry is way ahead of the curve for digital publishing, because they’ve gone through their fair share of changes before the rest of the industry has had a chance to. Keep in mind, that hobby games can be more expensive to produce than a novel, because of the time and resources involved. Advances in digital publishing have helped facilitate the access and availability of digital hobby games for gamers so OneBookShelf been able to thrive. Why? Because the demand was there and the readers were also receptive to it. The same, truly, can be said of e-books now. Regardless of what the publishers are doing, the popularity of e-books will only exist as long as the demand is there. Even so, it will take a long time before e-books replace print books because the market is not this giant, single-celled organism that moves at one pace. That “market” is comprised of individuals and their unique buying habits; not every person that’s out there will automatically “only” buy e-books without picking up a print copy. We’re not there yet.

Why then, are people freaking out about e-books by saying that they’re easy money or that they threaten to topple the industry? Well, again, for the first time we are not only seeing a change happen, we are able to discuss those changes as they happen. Right now, that short-term mentality is reigning supreme through topical articles and through a bit of a rebellious attitude toward the publishing industry, which is often viewed as this impenetrable monolith. Personally? I don’t care about the short-term. I care about the long-term. Conventional wisdom tells me that it is way too early to ascertain how e-books will affect the industry, because the market — not the publishers or people’s personal opinions — will decide how and when and where things will shake out. I’ve weighed in on e-books before and have also shown you how to calculate the cost of an e-book based on my experiences as well. However, to calm your fears, I’d like to point out another little piece of technology and how it revolutionized the way that books were produced and distributed. It’s called “the printing press.” Do you honestly think that when the printing press was invented that the effect was instantaneously? If you mean by twenty or thirty years, then yes.

The reason why e-books are not liquid gold, is because readers are not performing a bait-and-switch with their formats and many expect the e-books to be free. “Free” is not truly “free,” especially when it comes to books that take a long time to write, edit and produce in their final form. It’s so easy to point to a digital file and say “Hey, that’s easy and cost-effective to produce. Just throw it up on a site and charge ninety-nine cents and watch the profits roll right in. No physical materials required means they should be next to nothing, right?” Only, very few conversations about e-books I’ve read discuss the value of that product: the story.

If you were willing to pay in upwards of twenty-five for a hardcover edition of your favorite novel, what would you pay for that same story in a digital format? What would you pay to read a new story by an author you’ve never read before? If your answer is “zero,” perhaps you might want to consider why that might be and what would cause you to pay money for an e-book. After all, you are an important part of the market that will decide the shape of things to come.

Anyway, the culprit of said rant is none other than author Tobias Buckell who’s written books like “Halo: The Cole Protocol” and “Crystal Rain.” Good books, so go read them. Or, if you’re looking for a different e-book experience, check out “The Queen of Crows” which was written by yours truly.

Now that the shameless promotions are over with, I want to hear what you think. What do you have to say on the subject? Any coherent thoughts out there?

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1. Weighing in on E-Books
2. Calculating the Cost of an E-Book
3. Should Books Come With Content Ratings?

Due to recent trends in technology and on-line marketing options, it is easier for a writer to self-publish today than ever before. Whether entirely on their own, or with the help of a plethora of book printers and retailers that specialize in small print runs, Print on Demand (PoD) technology or electronic publishing, almost anyone can set out to publish their Great American Novel and have physical copies in their hands in a matter of weeks, if not days. Some publishers brand self-publishing as the demon-child of the mainstream publishing industry, an evil to be avoided at all costs. Others (often those who are trying to encourage authors to print books through their services) rave about the mainstream publishing industry as archaic and tout their avenues as the easiest and fastest ways to get published.

So, who’s right?

The answer is found, as it often is, somewhere in the middle.

There are times and circumstances where producing your own material is the best choice. And situations where it may seem like the best choice, but really isn’t.

Self-published work may be right for you if:

You’re writing for a very niche market.

If you are interested in creating either fiction or non-fiction materials for a very specific community or small interest group to which you already have established ties, self-publishing might be a good choice for you. If, for example, my parents wanted to write a book about calling and cueing square dances, they probably won’t be able to sell it to a mainstream publisher. The niche market for their book would be just too small for most publishers to consider. However, since they’re already well-established in that niche, and have both the contacts and opportunity to market such a book to its most likely audience, it might be a good opportunity for them to do so as a self-published project.

Histories of a local area, or other projects specific to a certain town, landmark or attraction may be a great idea for that area, but not marketable anywhere else. A friend of mine recently published a book on ghost hunting in SE Arizona, which is selling like hotcakes through her ghost tours and local shops, but would be of little interest to someone from Michigan who’d never been to the area.

Your work is not in a form that is easily marketable.

Poetry, flash fiction, novellas and short stories suffer from similar challenges when it comes to publishing. While there are certainly some publishers who produce these types of works commercially, the competition for a space on their pages is fierce. Many anthology publishers are seeking increasingly more “big name” authors to include in their collections, in hopes of boosting sales, which has caused lesser-known authors to seek out different markets. Unfortunately, several poetry, flash fiction and short story markets pay at or below professional rates (if they pay at all.)

If you’re writing for one of these genres, it’s a good idea to do your research and find out what is and isn’t working in the current market to apply that to your own publications. If five, long-time poetry magazines have folded in the last year, creating a cookie-cutter publication of that sort may be a challenging business model for you. Before you self-publish, find out what’s working and what’s not, and learn from others’ mistakes and losses to avoid suffering from them yourself.

You already have an established readership or distribution model.

Even for those who write in the traditional publishing industry, the restrictions on commercially-produced projects keep us from being able to release what, when and how we would like to. The bigger a publisher is, the more concern they have to have with the profitability of any given project, and the more likely they are to have to “think big” in terms of print runs, marketing, and overhead.

Self-published materials can get into an established audience’s hands faster and with less restrictions than if an author were to go the traditional route. Additionally, when you self-publish you can customize your project to your reader’s desires with a lot more flexibility than if that same project was published through a large publisher. As a self-publisher, your “share” of the profit can (but is not always) be larger. However, this approach really works best if you’ve got a readership or distribution model already in place.

While some creators may thrive on marketing their wares book-by-book, it can be very challenging (and depressing) to learn that folks who have never heard of you and don’t know anything about your writing are rarely interested in paying money to read your work. If the writer has used a traditional printing paradigm (i.e. you pay the printer then hope to sell enough books to earn back your investment and make a profit) it can be a very expensive lesson to learn.

If, on the other hand, you have an established readership, self-published materials can be a great way to provide additional content to them, especially work that wouldn’t be feasible to produce through traditional means. My recent fiction effort, The Shattered Glass Project, is an experiment in this sort of model–providing established readers with the opportunity to directly support and be involved with the creation process.

A short story read only by those who are willing to invest as its being created? A series of poems written from the perspective of an established character? A game “ransomed” and released when a certain fund-raising level has been met? A novella that acts as a prologue for an upcoming novel? All of these can and have been done successfully by writers with established readers who are hungry for more material.

Self-Publishing is probably NOT the right choice for you if:

You believe that self-publishing is a way to avoid all the challenges of the traditional publishing industry.

There are a lot of challenges that writers face when seeking mainstream publication. Even after you’ve finished your novel, edited and revised it, buffed it to a high polish and written that dreaded query letter, you still have to find an agent or publisher who loves it enough to invest time and/or money in it. From agents blogs, the average offer rate seems to be somewhere under one percent – that is to say, out of every 100 queries or pitches received, 99% of them will receive some form of rejection. And once a writer has found representation, there’s still no guarantee that the agent/writer team will be able to place the book with a publisher.

It’s no wonder that many authors think that self-publishing is the answer to their prayers. Someone who receives 100 rejections on the novel they’ve spent years writing and which represents the pinnacle of their creative expertise, often finds it much easier to think that something’s wrong with the industry, than with their work. When self-publishing companies and printers say things like “we can have your book ready in a week, guaranteed,” it’s an intoxicating siren-song to those who have struggled for months or years to get someone in the mainstream industry to give them so much as an approving word.

But easy is not always best.

While agents and editors may seem like stumbling blocks to publication when you’re receiving rejections, they serve as a filter to catch and weed out the large portion of submitted materials which are simply not ready for commercial publication yet. Those who, rather than working to improve their creation to publishable levels, seek to do an “end run” around these obstacles, may get to see their words in print (usually at a hefty cost to their own pocket book.)

But their true goal – becoming a creator of publishable works, and a professional writer — is unlikely to be obtained in this fashion. Producing a product yourself–one which you either have to sell personally, or which is only available by special order through mainstream bookstores–is not a substitute for being published through a traditional publisher. And, it isn’t the “foot-in-the-door” to other publishing opportunities that many self-publishing companies market it as. Traditional industry professionals don’t usually see self-publishing as “published”. They see it as “couldn’t get anyone else to take my work, so I paid to have it printed myself.”

Learn what is right for you.

Your greatest chances for success with a self-publishing project come when you are realistic about the challenges and opportunities that self-producing your work brings with it. Don’t turn to self-publishing because you’re frustrated with mainstream publishing and think it will be faster/easier/more profitable to do your own project. Learn what does and doesn’t work as self-produced material, and use those to determine if self-publishing is right for you.

About Jess Hartley

For the last ten years, Jess Hartley has worked as a novelist and freelance writer, editor and game developer.

She has created game material and fiction for White Wolf Publishing, 12 to Midnight Games, Mind Storm Labs’ and Margaret Weis Productions on the Supernatural RPG line.

On an independent basis, Jess also writes “One Geek to Another,” a weekly etiquette and advice column for modern geeks, and authored “Conventions for the Aspiring Game Professional, an e-book designed to help those who are interested in working in the industry. She also guest-hosts “Out of Character,” a weekly gaming podcast that is part of the Pulp Gamer Network.

Her current independent efforts include The Shattered Glass Project, a fae fiction experiment based on a reader-sustained, patronage model.

Jess lives in Arizona, with her family and a menagerie of other interesting creatures, where she participates in a plethora of strange and curious pastimes which often make her neighbors and acquaintances scratch their heads in confusion.

To learn more about Jess, visit her website at www.jesshartley.com.

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2. Guest Blog Post: Brozek on Editing Anthologies
3. Guest Post: Gender Portrayals and Genres at Apex Book Company

I feel that the topic is fairly complex, because many of the arguments I’ve been reading online don’t address piracy directly. Rather, the articles seem to talk “around” the issue by trying to determine either “why” piracy is occurring or justify “why” content should be freely shared and distributed. So, for starters, I’d like to pose the question, “Why is piracy so confusing to define?”

Say I go into a brick-and-mortar store and I find the coolest pair of socks that I simply have to have. Whether or not I “should” steal the pair of socks isn’t the issue nor is it open to debate. What matters is what the law states. If, according to the law, I take that pair of socks and don’t pay for them, then I am breaking the law. With digital piracy, some people do not believe that downloading a product is the same thing as stealing because pirates are taking a “copy” of the physical product and the product is not removed from a website. However, just like there are laws that define what stealing is, there are also laws surrounding illegal downloads. Read Piracy: Online and On the Street via RIAA.com as just one example. For the purpose of this post, when I refer to piracy, I’m referring to the situation when someone downloads or shares an electronic product illegally, either for their own purposes or with the intent to distribute.

Unfortunately, the arguments that advocate piracy are not only convoluted, they are downright frustrating to people like me. I feel that people standing up on the “pro-piracy” platform are demanding free content and cheap prices in addition to unlimited electronic distribution. For whatever reason, it’s become some sort of revolutionary cry to “teach” businesses what’s what by taking something that normally requires payment. Do illegal downloads make businesses sit up and listen? Sure they do, which is why there’s a few piracy crack-downs that are in development as we speak. Already, some of the telecoms are negotiating with different businesses to block internet access based on piracy — and that’s just the tip of the iceberg. While the law has not been able to keep up with the rapid changes in technology, the courts are working on it.

It’s no secret people are unhappy with the way that businesses, like the RIAA, are handling pricing and copyright in this digital age. Are copyright laws outdated? Yes. Do businesses need to adjust to the times? Absolutely. Are the laws challenging to understand? Yep. However, engaging in piracy and/or justifying illegal downloads is not a good solution, in part because “piracy” and “copyright reform” are really two, separate subjects that are being addressed in two, different worlds. Think of it this way: How is “I take without asking.” different from “What rights do I have to take?” If you don’t like the way the laws are now, then get involved! Contact your local representatives or join the appropriate advocacy group and help bring about positive changes.

Part of the reason why I have strong opinions on this subject is because piracy threatens the livelihood of the people who create the content you’re downloading illegally. Songwriters, artists, authors and others are directly affected by rampant online distribution of illegal content because of the way that they are getting paid. (If you want to see an interesting graphic, check out How Much do Music Artists Earn Online?.)

If an artist doesn’t get paid, then they can’t afford to keep creating their works. Remember, most artists (writers, musicians, etc.) get paid differently than people with full-time salaries. They often get paid by the download rather than by the hour. Do the math on that. Say an artist makes a ten percent royalty rate on a $4.99 product. Fifty cents may not seem like much to you, but it adds up quickly. The more people download a product illegally, the less money an artist makes, which means that they’ll have to work even harder to make up the difference. Most artists I know work well over forty hours a week just to be able to make ends meet.

As part of this discussion, I’d like to mention that William Aicher has written a book entitled Starving the Artist: How the Internet Culture of “Free” Threatens to Exterminate the Creative Class, and What Can Be Done to Save It. In the interest of full disclosure, I work on his team at Musicnotes, Inc. This work was not written as an off-handed anecdote, but from a business-minded individual that sees how the popular ideal of “free” threatens an artist’s ability to provide for themselves in order to keep creating. Also, I have seen the numbers and have heard horror stories from other artists that are directly affected by digital piracy. All in all, it is not pretty.

Of course, I can’t talk about piracy without briefly mentioning my thoughts on “free” products. Let me be extraordinarily clear on this: I believe that the topic of “free” is yet another conversation. For extra credit, check out my posts about Free, Freemies and the Undervaluation of Goods and Services, My Stance on Writing for Free and Puking Content, Plagiarism and Too Much Free.

In the end, I believe that it’s unfortunate that a lack of consumer education is affecting an author’s, artist’s and musician’s ability to do what they love to do in the way that they know how to do it. It is way too easy to point a finger and say that an artist is being “too greedy” or have long, sordid discussions about how the system is broken. The current system is the way things are right now, and that’s the one that we’re all trying to work with. Until things change, perhaps we can all push philosophy aside and simply abide by the rules.

No related posts.

Here’s the thing: most people online provide advice as a way to share what they know (or in some cases, what they don’t). I recently overheard a quote that proclaimed “unsolicited advice is self-serving.” Yeah, that’s really true, but without that “unsolicited advice” no one, including me, would have a lot of material to blog about.

Just because there is all this advice out there, doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t be afraid to make a mistake. I believe that the number one reason that many people stop writing or never submit is because they are paralyzed with fear. Paralyzed by it because someone out there is always better, faster, more connected or more visible than they are. So, if that writer makes a mistake, they feel like someone is going to find out about it and cross their name off the “I am a writer” list with a big, fat “X.”

If you want to write professionally, handling bad news and criticism in a way that doesn’t damage your soul for eternity pretty much comes with the territory. The only way you’re going to learn about this business is by getting out there and hoofing it. Yes, there’s a lot of conventional wisdom out there that is worth listening to, but that is up for you to figure out what’s meaningful to your career and what’s not. Your experience is going to be different than mine is, because you are a different person than I am. That doesn’t mean “you’re doing right” or “you’re doing it wrong.” If you find something that works for you? Great. If you fall flat on your face? Learn from it. Embrace it. Then? Get back up again.

For clarification purposes, please note that I do believe there’s a difference between reality and fantasy. Experienced authors make writing seem effortless, because they’ve got millions of words behind them. If you’re just starting out? You’ll probably need to focus on how to write rather than how to be a writer. In my experiences, writing isn’t about what you do on the first try, it’s a journey that you have to repeat over and over and over again. Yes, you’ll encounter bumps along the way, but who cares? I don’t measure my career by how many times I fall down, it’s about how many times I get back up. Of course, the irony of this blog post is not lost on me because that I’m telling you — flat out — not to worry about always making the “right” decision when it comes to your career. That certainly includes listening to anything I have to say. *smiles*

If you do one thing this week, I would like to encourage you to try something new. Have a hard look at a story you’re having a hard time selling, write something in a new genre, or give your manuscript to a brutal critic. Break out of your mold and be brave! BE BOLD! Become…a writer who isn’t afraid of making a mistake!

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1. Don’t be Afraid to Write like Crap

Reviews are easy to write, because in a review, I have the product in front of me and I can assess its value based on my personal opinion. However, reviews are also time-consuming and they are not the “only” focus of the site. Often, we reach out to people (or they reach out to us) to get different kinds of coverage like an interview or design notes, etc. One of the biggest challenges that I have, is that it is very rare when someone provides me with enough information to talk about their game, comic, book or movie. Nine times out of ten, we do not get a press release that explains the important points about a product or an author. Translation? We then need to research the product or the creator to find things to talk about. In some cases, creating a news piece about a new product takes longer than writing a review for this reason.

As careful as we are, this approach can actually translate into us asking questions that don’t help the audience uncover what they want to know about the person we’re interviewing. There are a ton of different ways to write an interview, too, that can range from a single product focus to a role at a company. So you understand our time constraints, we started a preview functionality, but on average, it takes us a few hours to manually code each one because we typically don’t get it in the correct format.

Although it’s certainly not the case, sometimes it feels like there is an underlying expectation that we should do most of the heavy lifting. (Believe me when I say, that if I was employed full-time in this role, making a decent salary, I would do most of the heavy lifting. In our roles, we do not get paid a salary. Our site is free for everyone to read and enjoy.) The truth is, most sites that can provide creators and publishers with the coverage they need are built on a “free” model so a lot of other sites like ours are in the same boat. There are sites that are owned by a corporation, but even then their content will, understandably, have a slant or an agenda that fits their goals. Our goal, simply, is to share content about the genre that we love so much.

What can you do to help? You know your product the best! When it comes to news releases, interviews, contests, etc. why not come up with a few, different press releases that tell us about you or your product. Why will your audience like it? Why not determine what the highlights are (e.g. talking points) and let us know when we’re taking a look at what you’re promoting?

We have worked with professional marketers that work at publishing houses as well as individual authors that don’t have a public relations agent. Regardless of “who” is submitting the content, it helps save us time and get more content on the site faster if we have it delivered to us in a web-friendly format. While we have a promotional schedule, it also helps if you tell us when your product is going to be released and whether or not you like more than one press release posted to the site.

In order for any website to provide you with the best coverage possible, my personal opinion is that you really need to be very clear and open with your communication. I know a lot of authors and publishers worry about that first week or first month’s sales, but in our experiences, you can’t be afraid to talk about something that’s an “old” product that your existing fans enjoy, too. It’s amazing to me that there’s a preconceived notion out there that if one website in cyberspace talks about your product, then you’ve “done your job” providing PR.

There’s three things I’d like to point out here: one, if you have a website or a blog, you will help your readers learn more about you if you link back to (or mention) the content that has been provided for you. Second, no “two” website audiences are alike. FlamesRising.com has its own market of readers which may be different from another site. Yes, there could be some overlap, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. We can help you tailor your content to our audience (which is what every website does) and we hope that you’ll work with us. Third, no matter how popular you are, not everyone knows about your work. That simple statement affects not only our content to our readers, but I hope that it sparks your imagination when talking about your products, too.

I hope that the things I’ve shared in this post today will help you on your quest to spread the word about your products and work. My goal here was to shed some insight on how you can manage your PR better by showing you the effect of poor communication.

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I agree with the message, here, and have seen how popular culture can actually “increase” someone’s desire to read or learn. In the world of music, for example, many kids are picking up instruments to play their favorite songs from video games or movies like TWILIGHT. It’s a good reminder to all of us: don’t make assumptions based on the customers you “think” you know. Good, relevant content is king.

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You see, I am concerned. I am concerned about the rampant misinformation and rumors that are circulating around the web whenever anything “happens.” Since Friday, I have heard nothing but questions and confusion when it comes to people’s perceptions about e-books and running a business. People that a) don’t work for an online retailer and b) consume products that they either want for free or at a lower price than what they’re already paying for it.

I am a bit conservative, in that I do not believe in 100 percent transparency with the customer. I feel that readers should not be privy to the inner workings between a retailer (like Amazon) and a publisher (like MacMillan). Why? because the minute you put that deal on the table, the customer is forced to pick a side. That customer isn’t an “informed” customer, because they shouldn’t have to know why things are priced the way that they are. They should, however, have a choice. That choice pretty much comes down to a) yes, I want to buy this product or b) no, I don’t. Their decision should be based on what they want to buy, not who they want to punish (or reward) by buying it.

However, this is the age of “too much” information. Some businesses don’t really have a choice “but” to offer their customers some form of communication because often their customers demand it. When a business doesn’t respond (or doesn’t say the right thing), sometimes customers believe that the entire business is evil. The truth is, most businesses want to paint themselves in a positive light. This is neither “bad” nor “good,” it’s just the nature of how businesses work.

The problem that I have with complete transparency, is that most customers don’t care about the “business” side of this communication, but instead have a pre-formulated opinion based on an “emotional” reaction. That “emotional” reaction often causes a lot of problems, because customers are sharing their reactions with other people as “fact.” We all know how powerful word-of-mouth advertising can be, but sometimes I think we “forget” that it’s easier to distort the truth than it is to spread the facts. Once the misinformation is out in the open, it’s next-to-impossible to try to correct it. And yes, before you say it — I have been guilty of it, too. We all have.

I’m not saying that customers “should care” about the business side of things; what I am saying is that they shouldn’t have to. They should not have to get embroiled in a war between two businesses or be privy to private information, because it takes longer than a single blog post to explain how an entire industry works. Instead, I’d love to see the true victim of these wars — the customer — treated better. Treat them like gold, and they will keep coming back. Treat them like crap, and they will go elsewhere.

Unfortunately, I feel that this will not be the last time we see things like this happen. Sloppy news reporting combined with clicking on whatever appears through search results (regardless of whether it’s factual or not) provides instant access to anything and everything. I know that a lot of writers naturally exercise caution, I just hope that everyone else remembers to do that, too. It’s certainly something that I plan to be even more careful with in the future.

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