The Heir of Futhark, book #4 and the final novel in The Futhark Chronicles, is still in the major edits stage, but I have plans to do a better job with this release. I've been watching and learning. I hope.
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| The first three books in the series. |
Timing can be important for books this time of year. My former publisher, the one I reclaimed my rights from for this series, had scheduled each book to be released January first for four years in a row. Is that a good time? Are people pretty busy on that first day of the year. Hangovers? Bowl games? Parties? Resting before returning to work the next day?
How about right after Christmas? All those new eReaders, tablets and other personal electronic devices are yearning for something to download. Why not one of my books? So is the Christmas season a good time to have a book released?
Or are people too busy from Thanksgiving until after the new year? Are potential readers spending their money on gifts for others and not buying books? Or can some good promotion convince them to spend a little on themselves?
Do you think a particular time of year is a good time to have a book released? What do you think of a holiday release? A New Year's Day release?
Oh yeah, I meant to say in this post, buy my books. See, I'm getting better at it.
18 comments:
I've heard the gamut of dates from 'experts'. About the only release dates I would hate to have is Christmas and New Year's Day. How many people even look at their computers then?
My personal preference is the spring--anywhere from March to June. My books that released then seem to make a bigger splash sales-wise than books that were released at other times.
I have no idea! I've had a book out in the fall and another late winter, and I don't think it mattered either way.
That's a great question. I have no idea.
I know that when I do actually have something to promote that I'm going to be terrible at it.
I've often wondered when the best time of the year for a book release would be. For some reason, I've always liked the idea of before summer or before winter. Maybe it's because I've worked in retail far too long and that when we always gear up for things.
I have no idea...but the first comment seemed to be reasonable. I'm still trying to get my formatting correct on Secondhand Shoes. PITA! PITA!
Hugs and chocolate,
Shelly
Promotion is all random (I think). For example...any promotion happening right now has a good chance of failure because millions of people have no power. So November is basically a lost cause to people wanting to sell books.
keep promoting you book!!
yes..just ASK!!
Jan to me seems a great time..the rush is over and people are looking for something to read, but really I have no idea.
good luck!!!
Oh gosh, timing is so hard. There are pluses and minuses to everything! Probably Christmas Day is the worst, I'd say.
yay---you are doing great :)
I'm not sure if one time is better than another. The series I started last spring is doing OK, but I think that has more to do with the first being a free book than timing.
They seem to put books out at all times of the year. But I'm hoping there'll be a Christmas rush of people wanting to fill their new gadgets with things to read.
Great question, Susan. It's difficult to predict any of it, for me at least. I'm happy to help with getting the word out though!
I'm working on submitting a book to my publisher every two to three months. I'm a full-time writer, but I make most of my money from articles. I believe that to fulfill my dream of becoming a full-time author within 5 years, I must be prolific. I don't know if there's a best time to release a book. It's all up to my publisher anyway. I do believe that promotion is important. I promote in these ways: Facebook author page, Twitter, Google+, Blog, Guest blog posts, Blog tours, Blog hops, Pinterest.
Jolie du Pre
Precious Monsters
No idea how to promote myself, but your post made me laugh, I loved the line at the end "buy my book". Lovely post.
I didn't know it could make a difference at all.
Sure, I wouldn't have a Christmas Carol released right before the summer solstice, but still...
There's always something new to learn!
One school of thought says that you shouldn't bother with promotion but rather use that time to write the next book. Dean Wesley Smith is a big advocate of this, but on the other hand he runs a popular blog so doesn't that count as promotion?
I see you got reviews in Publisher's Weekly and Booklist. Congratulations!
You'd probably want to promote and release before Christmas. There's always something happening somewhere, so I don't think power outages up north would be much of a factor right now.
I avoid November and December as new releases and so many Blogfests dominate those two months. I don't want to compete with them.
I'd love to know which days are the best. I'm told August is the worst month and the weeks from Thanksgiving to Christmas are the best, but it's a busy time of year then.
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