Tuesday, October 25, 2011

I'm rocking my sales!

Words: 5,124
Time: 3pm - 9:30 (.5 break)
Mood: Good
Impression: It might have crossed a line... yet again.

So my sales have been rocking. Yet today was a mediocre day and I started to feel just like I did when I was making no sales. Apparently I can't be happy when I check my sales. I think I might have to ban my checking of sales again. I have to say that it's fun when I'm making more than 30 sales a day. When it's less I don't feel great.

I guess the issue is that at the beginning of the month I set a arbitrary goal. Apparently it was a good goal because now at the end of the month I am super close to making it and not making it. Right now I am just short of it. If my last release would have taken off like every other book that I've published I would have made it. But it did.

The book I wrote today is the third book in a franchise that is doing well. If I get it out before the weekend I could make goal. Tomorrow though I will be writing a third book in another series. If I can release both books I'm sure I'll make my goal.

But there's only so much I can milk that franchise. I am going to have to come up with a few new ideas. It will be a challenge.

I have decided that I need to get back to having a life. That's big talk on my part. Personally I don't think you should believe me at all. I talk big but usually when it comes down to it, I wuzz out and spend my day working. I'm just a work-a-holic. And now that my hard work is paying off, it is hard to resist.

I was thinking the other day, I have never had hard work pay off before. Don't get me wrong, there was never a time (after age 17) that I wasn't a hard worker. My father ingrained it in me very heavily. Everyone I've ever worked with has noticed it. But I never remember it actually paying off.

I certainly got opportunities because of my hard work. I've gotten a lot of offers. I just have never accepted any of them. And the opportunities that I really wanted I wasn't offered. So as a result, I've never truly benefited from my hard work before. All of the opportunities that I have actually gotten have been because of who I know... from hard work, not so much.

But with the books, when I write and release them, people buy them. And the more I write the more people buy. Okay, except for the last book. I've only sold 3 so far. I have to work on that. But this just feeds into my work-a-holic tendencies. Because no matter how much I work on myself or whatever, I still rarely find someone I can connect with, and because I'm a little nuts, the girls I find are nuts too and have interests elsewhere.

Okay, this is making me unhappy when I should be the happiest I've ever been in my life. So I'm going to stop this blog now and go watch an episode of True Blood. If I don't fall asleep after that, I will mentally outline what I will write tomorrow.

Monday, October 17, 2011

Finished my 3rd story in two days.

Words: 5792
Time: 4:30 - 2:30am (1.5 hrs break)
Mood: Great
Impression: It's good.

Today I wrote book 2 of my second most popular book. I think it's a pretty great follow up. I think that it represents the title even more so than the 1st book. I found the cover models first so I know that it won't be as appealing as my first book (my cover images are super great for the first book). But I think that those that will buy the 2nd because they liked the 1st one will be even more pleased. So now if I want to write nothing but crap for every other book in this series I can, because my readers will give me a pass knowing that the first two were so good... I'm just saying.

Ya know, there's one thing for sure. When you spend your entire day writing, there's not too much to blog about. So I'll just say that my plan this week is to get these 3 books published. I was thinking that 3 would be the magic number allowing me to generate my necessary income. That would give me 9 books. I would like to write 3 more before the end of the month giving me 12. I would then create 3 anthologies giving me 15 titles total. That wouldn't be bad for a month's worth of work.

We'll see if I can do it. I'll just take it one step at a time.

Sunday, October 16, 2011

I wrote 2 short stores today. I'm back!

Words: 8,961
Time: 2am - 3:45pm (1hr break)
Mood: Great
Impression: It's good

So it's been a while since I have posted. That is because I haven't been writing. I've been editing. Since my last post, I edited 2 short stories and 4 novelettes. Today was the first day that I got back on the writing train and I did it with gusto.

Here's an update on how my career is going. In short, I am now an erotic fiction writer and any books that I write outside of erotica, I have to consider a hobby. That was actually what was so painful for me before. I had come to the realization that I had to consider my writing as a hobby because I wasn't making enough money at it to sustain myself. And the truth is that no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't make it generate real money.

That has now all changed. I have released 6 erotica books and they are all selling well considering that the first one was released 18 days ago and the last one was 2 days ago. In short, I see a very short path to how my book earnings can cover all of my monthly expenses. There is even a possibility that it could happen this month.

I have stopped checking my revenue on my best sites for sales, but after the first week of sales I was making enough per day that if it continued I would make enough to pay my bills. That was with 2 books. I stopped checking those sites when I realized that my sales were dropping there. Apparently, those sites are great for new releases and that's it. So instead of watching the dream die, I decided to only watch the ones that matter for long term success, Amazon and Barnes and Noble. And on those sites, I have only been increasing my sales per day.

My rough guess told me that if I were able to release 3 more books this month, I had a shot of generating enough per day to earn my living. However, something unexpected has happened. In my calculation, I completely disregarded my 4 book series. You might have read in earlier blogs how I decided that those books won't sell well. So I have been counting the entire series as one book. Well, on Amazon, Book 1 of that series is my best selling book. And even if I add up 2 through 4, that combined number would still be my best selling book. In other words, my series can carry the load of at least 2 books.

But if I added 3 more books that are just as popular as my current books, my monthly expenses are met. That is also assuming that my Amazon and B&N sales don't increase or decrease. Because of internal marketing factors sales on those two sites tend to increase over time. But even if they just stayed the same, I can earn my living writing. I can't even tell you how great that would be. :-)

But what is great on top of all of that is that I have come with a really great idea for a book. The title is great, the story is intriguing and alluring and I'm sure that I will create a great cover. And on top of that, the book is in the most successful erotica sub genres. All of my other books are in a less popular sub genre. So I think that this new book will become my best selling book. That would be awesome because this book is the first in a series of about 8. It would all be good.

So, today I wrote 2 short stories. One is the one I just described and the second is a book two under the same title of one of my other books. Tomorrow, I will try to either write a third book in the series I added to today or write a book 2 for my other title that I haven't mentioned. If I were superman I would write both books like I did today. We'll see.

And to address something that I wrote about in my last post, I broke my word again. I had said that I would edit all of my books before I wrote again.That would include Samurai Zombie Hunter. I scrapped that plan when I realized how well my erotica was selling. I can't put my hobby ahead of earning a living.

On a personal note, I have been working exceptionally long days. However, I have been at peace more now than I have in years. After so many missed successes, this one success validates me in a way that I needed. And now I feel great because of it.