Confessions of a Hybrid Author | WTF?

Stop spending money on marketing. Seriously, put your credit card down and back away from the computer, this is not a drill.

Confession Time: I’ve written a couple of books that you’ve never seen or heard about because I don’t have them linked to any of my social media accounts, nor do I have them listed on my Goodreads or Amazon Author Page.

Why?

Because they’re old, excessively under-edited, and my publisher pissed me off (multiple times), so I decided that I was going to let them hide under the radar until I’m given my rights back. I can be a petty bitch that way.

How does any of this relate to marketing?

Because, they freaking sell! They sell even though I have done EVERYTHING in my power to keep them from selling. My publisher doesn’t provide marketing services – which is common with ePubs – and I have never advertised these books. They weren’t given to beta readers, I didn’t announce their release dates, and they have ZERO reviews.

If you were to go off the advice of every well-known, respectable marketing guru in the world, there is absolutely no way these books should be selling at all, let alone more copies in a 6 month span than my highly-marketed Indie books with 5-Star reviews!

I’m so gobsmacked right now. I just got my 6 month sales report and all I could do was stare at the print out like WTF just happened? First and foremost, it was not a good surprise – I’d been banking on NO book sales helping me get my rights back sooner. Secondly, it totally blew all of my beliefs right out of the water that it’s lack of MARKETING hurting my other book sales.

What a load of crap. Just stop. Don’t bother wasting your money. Apparently, if you want your books to sell, authors, all you have to do is try to make them NOT sell.

❤ And, I’m out.

p.s. If by some weird chance you decide to put this exercise into practice and it actually works, please, please let me know! It would be a trip to find out that I just inadvertently stumbled across the real secret to selling books – and yes, I’m still unhappy about it.