Rapid Release and Launching Books - Beast Mode for authors?
HTML-код
- Опубликовано: 21 июл 2024
- What is Rapid Release when it comes to books? Why does it work so well? Most importantly: should you be doing it?
❤️ [SUBSCRIBE] More videos coming soon: ruclips.net/user/davidgaughr...
00:00 Introduction
01:40 Evolution of rapid release
04:02 Why it works so well
07:47 Key components of a rapid launch
12:05 My personal experience
14:33 What really drives success?
** RESOURCES **
No matter what strategy you adopt, your books must be in good shape. These resources will teach you how to publish like a pro and build your author platform so you can capture reader interest and grow bigger with every launch:
🎁 [FREE BOOK] My guide to self-publishing - Let's Get Digital - is FREE on all retailers. Get your download links here: davidgaughran.com/digitalbook
🐱👤 [NINJA TIPS] My weekly marketing newsletter for writers is very handy and you get ANOTHER free book as a sign-up bonus, all about how to build an author platform: davidgaughran.com/newsletter
👨🏫 [FREE COURSE] My free course Starting from Zero had over 6000 authors enroll in just a few months. It's very comprehensive and 100% free and covers knowing your niche, branding, email marketing, launches, and much much more: davidgaughran.com/startingfro...
Want to increase those book sales? Here are more resources for you:
🤓 [BLOG POST] How To Sell Books in 2020: davidgaughran.com/how-to-sell...
🐱🏍 [VIDEO] Want a guide to selling more books in video form instead? Here you go: • How To Market A Book -...
🚀 [DEAL SITES] Deal sites, reader sites, promo sites - whatever you like to call them yourself, you will find my curated, up-to-date list of the very best sites here on my website, broken down into useful categories: davidgaughran.com/best-promo-...
💪 [AMAZON] Interested in my book breaking down Amazon's algorithms and giving you marketing plans to take advantage of that? Check it out here: davidgaughran.com/books/amazo... 
Хобби
Ha ha, best video so far. 'Don't hit like unless you really like!' 'Hit all the buttons, no, wait!' So refreshing, David! Love it!
I rapid(ish)-released my epic fantasy series, The Drinnglennin Chronicles, over the past 10 months. Portents of Chaos (Book 1) was launched on Dec. 25, 2019, A Realm at Stake (Book 2) in mid-February, Bindings of Peril (Book 3) in March and The Wings of Dread on October 1st. This series was my debut as an independently-publishing author, and took me six years to write. During that time I also learned all I could about the marketing and promotional side of the business (greatly assisted by your excellent books, David!). I did make a sizable investment in each book-two professional edits, original cover art, a cartographer, a formatter, a website designer-before the launch, although spread out over the years I was writing the series. As a writer of a complex, multi-protagonist epic, waiting to publish until the last book was finished ensured that all plot lines were tied up to satisfactorily deliver for the reader, and I often hear from fans that they loved not having to wait a year (or more) for the next installment in the series to come out. #theageofbinge
:)
In June, I started advertising on BookBub, after reading AND re-reading your excellent BookBub Ads Expert, and I had an International Featured Paid Deal in July. Since then, I have continued to advertise on BookBub, and when I launched Wings in October, I also made use of the great promotional sites (Book Barbarian, BookSweeps) you mention in your resources. I’ve been riding a moderately successful halo ever since. Just yesterday, Portents had a "virgin" free promo with Freebooksy and The Fussy Librarian, and with over 3,000 “sales” over the past three days, resulting in a #1 ranking in 11 big fantasy categories in the US Amazon store, and just as many internationally as well, I’m calling my rapid-release strategy a success.
epic.
@@DavidGaughran :)
David Gaughran, you are an angel! Thank you for all your comforting words, as well as the straightforward advice for struggling authors. Bless you, sir.
I hit like because I really, really meant it. Thank you for all the videos and free resources!
I love that you mentioned we should enjoy the journey. That's the most important thing - writing because we love it!
Thanks! This answered my question, and really clarified my approach.
This is all around great but possibly the best thing is the Clonakilty Pudding t-shirt! Making me hungry as a fellow Celtic ex-pat...
Murder. I would commit murder for some right now. Actual murder.
Jenna moreci is how I found you and boy I'm glad I did
Thank you! love your newsletter, love your channel!
Awesome hair ! 😁
haha this is what happens when you go the whole year without a haircut...
@@DavidGaughran LOVE THE HAIR. I specifically mentioned your hair when I posted this video to my author friends on Facebook. Great video, by the way.
Great points! I think I fit the bill for someone who should rapid release based on this video. (I've written all six and plan to rapid release next year.) I really appreciate the reminder that I need to enjoy the journey -- that's definitely something I struggle with!
As a newer author, I like to work on a full series before publishing it because it's really one giant story. Today I made large revisions to Book 5 based on my critique partners' feedback... and also made changes to Books 2-4 for continuity and foreshadowing. Something I couldn't easily do if I'd already released them without confusing readers. Storing the books up allows you to work on the craft of writing in a unique way, though it requires so much patience and self-discipline, as you mentioned.
Of course, no one wants to write a ton of books on the hope that they will sell, only to have our hopes dashed as the whole series plummets in the rankings. Writing to market helps, as does getting timely reader feedback from the target audience. As soon as I incorporate feedback from my critique partners (fellow writers), it goes off for beta reader feedback. Then there's a round of editing and typo hunting with my reader team. I've made some MAJOR revisions thanks to readers in my target audience telling me what pissed them off... before the books are even published.
Publishing six books with a month between is the easy part... It's the marketing plans that are a nightmare. I've only launched one book (and some short stories), but I learned a LOT from my mistakes, especially in the realm of marketing. Flexibility helps keep your sanity. I'm not doing anything crazy like putting up preorders on all six ahead of time. I want the leeway if (when) anything goes wrong and I need to delay. To avoid overwhelm, I'm willing to pivot on my insanely stuffed marketing plan, and I have areas of focus based on your teachings. 😉
Like you said, marketing can work just as well long after the launch, so if my launches aren't perfectly smooth, I'm not going to beat myself up. If need be, I'll just save those promos or ads or what-have-you until the full series is live, and then keep beating that marketing drum when I have more time and sanity reserves later.
Well if you have all the writing tackled, that's fab and you are in a great position to test this approach. While you certainly want to give the first book a shove out the door, make sure to hold back enough so that you can step up your marketing with each release because you will get a much better return as you go along.
Love you David- you are awesome. Thank you so much for your enormous brain and delicious potatoe head. You are inspirational. Lovely Terry Toler directed me to you 🙏
Another great video! I love how you mentioned enjoying the journey. I've had to remind myself of that a lot!!
Always so helpful, David. Thank you!
Thanks David. Tons of wisdom in your advice. Some books which may have been minimal viable products a few years ago won't cut it anymore, so your counsel on craft and making readers happy is well taken.
This was so helpful, debunking myths about launching and rapid release that have hindered my progress in putting out novels at the pace I enjoy and can ensure they're worth a reader's time. Love your videos and books and courses! So generous and helpful.
Thanks for the awesome-and fun-info.
Love it! Thanks for the dose of reality!
Great Vid David - thanks!
You saved my life and my sanity with this video, David. Thank you! :) I would love to read some of your fiction books, if you can share a pen name.
So interesting. As a reader, if a book is part of a series, I won't buy until at least three are out. A) I read fast, and I get sorta addicted to authorial styles. B) Burned too many times by authors not finishing (for whatever reason).
My first trilogy came out over a year's time. My launches were underwhelming at best. The last book came out over a year ago. I've had my best month of sales (as in I made more money this month than I have in all the previous 2 years combined) because I am using ads. To be fair, I write MG and Christmas is a big time for kids' books. I am never going to be a super fast writer, but what I'd like to do is to release new books and be working on the next years' stuff so I don't always feel under the gun. So, this year, I'd put out my newest trilogy while writing the next series with the idea of putting that out next year. I can't ever see myself writing and putting out more than 4 books at the most in a year, but I'd still like to be a little bit ahead.
Finding the system which works best *for you* is most important. Some authors will thrive off the pressure of deadlines or pre-orders or even rapid release. Others prefer the security and order of having a plan and a calendar, or always being a book ahead. And then a bunch of authors will prefer winging it a bit more and deciding things on the fly. I definitely don't think there's a right way on this, and just wanted to ease some of the pressure authors feel around a strategy which could chew them up.
@@DavidGaughran I really enjoyed this video. There's a lot of pressure to put books out super fast and for those of us who aren't that fast, this video is a huge help! Thanks for all your great content!
This kinda took the pressure off for me. I can see how it would work for certain authors, but I'd rather get my book 1 out until I can get my writing speed up, at least!
Tremendous stuff. You can tell there's a ton of work that goes in to these videos. Quick question: what about a 'partial' rapid release, so having book two available for pre-order when you release book one? Or book one and two released quite quickly to build some initial momentum then say a six month gap? Surely a book a year (the trad model) makes it tough to get a series off the ground. Any thoughts?
Forgive the long answer but... it's complicated. So this topic could be a whole video in itself but in simple terms writing better quality books helps you a lot. Producing books faster helps you a lot too. But those things can often be in opposition to each other when starting out. Or to put it another way, trying to write and release three well-written books in quick succession before you have mastered the art of writing one well-written book is going to end in tears.
It's important to work on the craft. And it's important to increase production speed. But I don't see the point in throwing a load of poorly written books out the door. All you have done there is learned how to write bad books faster.
Aside from that basic consideration, it's important not to conflate producing a lot and the strategy of rapid release. Plenty of writers produce a lot without specifically using the rapid release strategy - which is specifically about banking books and compressing the release time so you launch them in quick sucession.
Personally I think that newer authors need to focus more on craft, and writing something that will resonate with readers, learning their niche, packaging their books in a way those readers will respond to, building their author platform, engaging readers with their list, and running a few promotions to boost sales.
When they have more experience and have handled several launches and promotions, and have built up their list and platform and marketing nous, then they can consider more advanced strategies like this - but they aren't a necessary condition for success, and might not be the best path to there for most.
Hi David I’m launching my books this year and so glad to find you. I’ve signed up for your course (like you I’m a long time marketer but books are different!!). I tried to get your free book however I’m a kiwi in NZ and it didn’t allow me to download. Have you got plans to list down this part of the world? Or is there another way i can get it?
Which one are you having trouble getting? If you use Amazon Australia for ebooks, you can pick it up here (also available for NZers on Kobo, Google Play, Apple etc.): www.amazon.com.au/dp/B08BTS57PC
Question: Is it recommended to space out a series if you already have it all done or just publish all books at once? Say you have 12 books in a series ready to publish. Is it better to publish all 12 at once, or do one a month? I always see the latter recommendation (spread out releases) but I don't get the logic. If you have a complete series, ready to go, isn't it better to just release ALL books so you don't ever lose a single interested series who's read book 1 and would gladly read all 12 books if they knew they existed? I'd love your feedback as this is the situation I'm facing. I would love to know if there are any drawbacks to publishing a massive amount of books at once that I, a new writer, maybe ignorant of. Thanks. 🤗
Very interesting. Timely video, as well. I'm presently writing five books in a series to be released a bit apart from each other, sometime next year, and never knew "rapid release" was a term or known strategy. I know nothing about book ads, nothing about book marketing, I don't have an email harvesting strategy, all I have are writing skills. Your description of the marketing process makes it seem as complicated as seven dimensional chess and expensive to boot. After watching your video it seems I shall write and publish these books and watch them all sink into a digital abyss. I'm learning marketing as I write. Good video. Discouraging as hell, though. :) Merry Christmas.
Don't be disheartened! Marketing _can_ be incredibly complex, but you can also make it quite straightforward for yourself. Plus you can get pretty far just by writing good books, having a place for readers to sign up to your mailing list (I would consider that truly essential), and then giving each book a little push out the door. Of course that "push" part can get as complex as you like, but that basic framework should be doable for everyone. Definitely get that mailing list set up!
@@DavidGaughran Muchos gracias, as they might say in South Dublin. I'll have to think of some brilliant things to say in a newsletter to harvest emails. Maybe I'll say David Gaughran responded to one of my comments on RUclips. That's one newsletter down. :) Merry Christmas and the most prosperous of New Years!
You think I'm kidding about that. I'm not. I'm posting my third entry in a new blog and name dropping David Gaughran with his great advice, above- with a link to your video- as I write on in this series and plan for the best. :)
@Lawrence Gleason Just put your reader sombrero on and talk to them one genre-fan to another. Share lots of stuff of mutual interest. Review books in the same genre, share some research tidbits, talk about movies in the niche, etc.
@@DavidGaughran Thanks for that. This is new. I have over 18,000 published articles as a news reporter, but novels are novel. The marketing side of indie publishing is all Greek to me and seems as complex as a labyrinth. Your book, Let's Get Digital, is a big help. I'm on my fourth read of it. Thanks for the reply. I do realize you're busy. I appreciate the information-filled videos and your helpful encouraging comments. It's almost enough to inspire me to rush out and buy a case of Guinness at 5:35 am. :) (No readers yet on my new blog, but I have name dropped, already! Your name is in print on it! www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/333654719828324182/7719170850483710486 ) Cheers, David, and Merry Christmas, to you and yours. Keep safe.
And I thought I had it all planned...While waiting for a redundancy payment in about 3 months, I've spent the last 5 months writing the books. So far a trilogy, now finishing a 5-book, and planning a standalone afterwards. Meanwhile, website is being made, fb author page up and running, and doing courses. So my plan once I had pro covers and the books edited was to rapid release them once a month. I've published short stories and 2 collections with no bad reviews yet and published about 40 stories in antho's, which tells me my writing ability can't be too bad. So now, after watching this, I'm wondering whether it's a bad idea or not, even if I have the money for deal sites, etc? I write horror, by the way which I know is not the most popular genre, so figured having 8 or 9 books published in less than a year would work--1 a month. Or maybe the standalone first to gauge reaction?
I have a friend who will soon have a series of five children's books. She has never published on Amazon or other platforms.So far she has been selling direct. I have been encouraging her to take the plunge. She says that she is waiting for the fifth book to be ready which will happen soon. Should she release them all at once, seperately, possibly a month apart? What would be the best way? She also intends to sell them as a box set. I will be helping her to publish on Amazon and possibly go wide. She also will have two other books, not aimed at young children but will have two aimed at readers aged 12+, one in the teen market and one as a YA. Should they be lumped together?
When rapid releasing, should you market your book one at all or wait until you have more product for paid promos and such?
As with launching normally, you definitely get more return from marketing when you have more books in the series out, but in the case of rapid release specifically, it's often a good idea to step up the marketing with each launch. It also depends on what marketing tools you can bring into play personally, but I generally like the approach of leaning on your list for the launch of Book 1, and just doing a little bit of testing with Facebook and BookBub Ads, and maybe running some lower level Amazon Ads to help nail down Also Boughts. Ramping up ads somewhat for Book 2. And then going hell for leather when Book 3 drops. And if there is something in the above mix I can't use (for example, if it is a fresh pen name and there is no list to speak of) then I will try and compensate in other ways - perhaps leaning on things like being price aggressive instead. Which might look like this: launching at 99c instead and then keeping the price of Book 1 artificially low until after Book 2 is out, and then running Book 1 at free for the launch of Book 3.
Hi David - It makes sense to drive traffic through FB ads to My ARC (Nonfiction book) on (Prolific Works; Booksprout; Story Origin; Book Funnel) in order to collect contacts and reviewers for my book launch? I'm afraid that, once they have the book (given the fact that, for nonfiction, people is looking for solutions to solve a problem)... I've uploaded my book on all these platforms but I've received few downloads...l
Hey, I have a video on how to get reviews here: ruclips.net/video/dFMZnSytO-k/видео.html
FYI: You have awesome hair. 😄
Great info! What's your preferred rapid release schedule between books...every two weeks? Three weeks? I think any longer and you lose reader momentum, no?
Every author seems to take a slightly different approach with this, but one a month is the most common - which gives you just enough time to have continuous new release visibility and gives you just enough space between releases to not go mad (no guarantees though!). I'm sure others will disagree with me on this point, but I actually think the retailer/algorithm considerations are a little more important for momentum than on the reader side. And I hear lots of contradictory information on that anyway. Maybe there is genre variance here, but I've heard authors say some readers want them faster, and others say that going faster can result in reader complaints - so pick the bones out of that! (My personal view: reader momentum is not so fragile.)
@@DavidGaughran maybe if it’s books in a series with cliffhangers authors release within 3 weeks of each other as readers want them sooner, but Yes yes tremendous variance as always! Thank you
@@catporter8417 Ah readers and cliffhangers - they CLAIM to hate them but secretly love them. Pesky readers!
@@DavidGaughran 😂 indeed! Especially in romance !
More
Sponsored by Clonakilty sausages.
Did I say sausages? I meant black pudding.
Wow you never actually told us the strategy. Do you realeas them on a weekly basis monthly or all at once which is best?
Do you ever call people and help them for about 15 minutes? Willing to barter poetry. --Kathryn