Give Away the Kindle Version to Sell the Print Version?

I'm trying an experiment, can I give away enough Kindle books to increase the sales of the print version of Teddy Visits Mitchell Farms(Link).

Hopefully something like this will happen:
Free downloads = Reads = Exposure + Shares = More Sales = Reads = Exposure + Shares = More Sales... Think of this as a circle with free downloads going in and dollars coming out.

To facilitate the free downloads I am using Kindle Select. That allows me to give it away 5 days per quarter. One free day was used after the Mississippi Peanut Festival, two more this weekend and two more next weekend. These dates were intentionally chosen to coincide with Mitchell Farms' pumpkin patch. My thought process on this was that people at Mitchell Farms might want a book about Mitchell Farms. Throw in some flyers on the counters of the farm's stores, a bitly address(Bit.ly/TVMFKINDLE), and some social media sharing and hopefully this will eventually lead to more sales. We shall see.

About Time, Thoughts about real life as an aspiring writer, Part 2

Continuing my series about my experiences, thoughts and lessons learned on my journey to becoming a writer is this second installment best subtitled "About Time".

Time can be seen as a gift or the perceived lack thereof can be seen as a curse.

One of my author bios says something like "he has always wanted to become a writer...". This is true, especially since I found that my childhood aversion to reading books was not the fault of the books but it was more of the "I'll do it but I won't like it" attitude I had toward compulsory assignments.  So this leads to the question, if I have really "always wanted to be a writer", why did I not start sooner? I don't know if I can pinpoint it down to one single reason (or excuse, take your pick) but here are a few:
1. I was too busy. I work a full-time job as a computer programmer, meaning 8-5 Monday - Friday and sometimes more. I have a wide and two children.
2. How could an unknown first timer break into the publishing world? I don't know any publishers. I can't afford the expensive fees I've heard about to get a book published.
3. Fear of failure. What if I wrote a book and everyone hated it? Could I handle writing something and it not selling? Would I end up with a stack of unsold copies?

Once I answered my own questions, I didn't any reason not too write. Here are my answers:
1. We all have the same amount of time in a day, its just a matter of prioritizing what we have to do with what we want to do.
2.  Simple answer, self-publish. When I found out that one of my co-workers sister made a full time career out of self-publishing books through Amazon, I set my sights on their sites kdp.amazon.com and createspace.com. This would allow me to publish a paperback and Kindle version almost for free.
3. Some fears are meant to overcome, and for me F.O.F. was one of those fears. It helped to make it easier to make the jump when I found out that Amazon self-publishing services are almost free. My thought process was that if I "failed" it couldn't really hurt me, just my pride. Sure enough, I'm not in pain, even though I have only sold into the double digits.

Another angle I could use to look at time in the process of writing Teddy Visits Mitchell Farms is the time I spent writing it. It took much longer than I expected to finish. I'm pretty sure I stayed up all night several times writing, working on the layout and editing the book.  I think it was all time well spent because I learned so much about the publishing process and I had a lot of fun doing it. I'm still having fun when I'm able to use some of my time to blog, post, or tweet. Today I took some of my day off and donated a copy of my book to the local public library, while I was there I got a library card.

Writing Tip:
If you have written something , a book, article, blog post, paper, report, anything, you need to proofread it. If you can afford the time, step away from it for a while and come back and read it again. If you can afford an editor, hire one. While I haven't yet taken my own advice on this, because I'm cheap, I plan to use an editor for any novels I write.

 The next part of this series might include something about character development.

Thoughts about real life as an aspiring writer, Part 1

Before I wrote my first book I thought that it would be easy. Somehow I had it in my head that I could quickly become a successful writer and be able to have a steady stream of extra income. Looking back now, I laugh and wonder how in the world could I have thought that writing would be easy or instantly successful. My experience with writing has been rewarding and has been a lot fun.

In each part of this blog post series I will share some of my experiences, thoughts and lessons learned.

One lesson I learned along the way:

Know you limitations and push them -

In my day job I am used to making software work. Both purchased software and programs I have written myself usually will eventually submit to my will and do what I need them to do. I knew I wasn't the best at the graphical side of things and I thought that I might have a little trouble with getting the images to look just right. I really had no idea how tricky it would be. My easy solution was to have someone do all of the images and split any profits from book sales with them. When this didn't work out I decided I would do the illustrations. I tried, but I don't have much skill at free hand drawing so my next idea was to try to use image manipulation software to alter photographs to make them look more like children's picture book illustrations. From here I started looking into the different software programs available and quickly realized the I was cheap and most image manipulation software is not. A friend recommended that I try a very affordable , aka free, called GIMP. This was exactly what I needed to finish turning high quality amateur photographs into the illustrations for my first children's book, Teddy Visits Mitchell Farms. Now I am almost ready to really start the process of taking a second book in the Adventures of Teddy series from first draft to published. This time I think I might push though my cheapness and hire a real artist to draw or paint the illustrations.

Quick Tip:

If you plan to put photographs in a book make sure the orientation matches the book format, before you finish taking all of them. Otherwise be prepare to do a lot of cropping.

The next part in the series will be "About Time"

Continued Effort to Put #morecontent On My Blog

Yesterday I posted that I would try to post more in an effort to increase my reach on the web. I also sent a couple of tweets out today. It looks like my efforts might be paying off. Yesterday's blog post had several views. This made me think, If I had not posted the blog post, it would not had any views.  It might sound funny or even corny but it is true.

Today's post will include #morecontent.(You might have noticed that I'm trying to emphasize the #morecontent hashtag)

Today's Fun Fact:
I was born in Sidney Montana. But I was raised in and currently live in south Mississippi.

Today's Writing Tip:

I have read other tips about not editing as you go when writing a first draft, but I want to take this a step further. If you have a story in your, head start writing it down! If you self-edit yourself so much that you decide your story is not good enough to put into writing, then you have might just kill what could be a good story that others might enjoy. If you don't try you will never know.

Follow me on Amazon and Goodreads!

http://amazon.com/author/jacobcstroud

https://www.goodreads.com/jacobcstroud     

Test Test Test, Can Anyone Hear Me?

I've had this blog, my Twitter account, and Facebook page going for a while now and the number of visitors, likes, and follows are still low. Also the number of book sales is low and number of Kindle version sales and number of reviews are both 0. I'm beginning to wonder if the only way to get likes, followers, and visits its to buy advertising.

I'm cheap and I try not to give up too easily so I'm going to try to create more content. Will more posts and tweets get more people's attention? We shall see! What about #hashtags, do they work, even outside of Twitter and Facebook? 

Question of the day: 

How many writers do you know of that are also a computer programmer? Hint: at least one. Please reply in the comments section.

Quote of the day:
"You can only get out what you put in." - Jacob C. Stroud, author of Teddy Visits Mitchell Farms

Cross linking:

Http://Facebook.com/jacobcstroudauthor

Http://Twitter.com/jacobcstroud

Writing from the other side of the country

I'm in the lovely city of Sacramento, CA for some training related to my day job. This is my first trip to California and definitely not where I am used to writing from. Normally I'm writing form where I feel most at home, in south Mississippi.

Last night I was almost asleep when I had a children's new story come to me. I reached over and turned on the lamp and scribbled down the basic idea on a "thought pad" that was on the night stand. Tonight I finished the first draft of a new Teddy story that I have been working on. I also wrote down another book concept that I thought of and a start to an adventure novel with a twist. I guess I can say this has been a productive trip so far for both my day job and my writing.

Good night from Sacramento.

Giving Goodreads Giveaways a Go

Have you ever entered a Goodreads Giveaway? I haven't. I just finished creating a giveaway for one signed copy of Teddy Visits Mitchell Farms and hopefully it drums up some attention and maybe even some sales. My givaway is open to USA, Great Britain, Canada, and Australia and if it is approved it will run from 4/6 to 4/10. I kinda hope someone far away wins it, sure the shipping will be more but it would also mean that someone who otherwise might have never seen the book will read it. 

If you would like to comment about you experiences with Goodreads Giveaways, please feel free to do so.

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Teddy Visits Mitchell Farms

by Jacob C. Stroud

Giveaway ends April 10, 2015.
See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win

Will people buy a Kindle children's picture book?

I have had my first children's picture ebook available on Kindle since the start of December but haven't sold even one copy. I'm not trying to complain, just stating the problem. In this series of blog posts I will attempt to find a solution.

When I first listed my book on Kindle, I priced it at $6.50. This was $5 below the printed version price. The price remained this way until the start of March. At the beginning of March I added Matchbook and dropped the price to $2.99. Matchbook is Amazon's way of letting someone who has purchased the printed version have the Kindle version for a reduced price or free. I chose the free option. To promote this I tweeted about it with the hashtag #IARGT. Still no takers.

As part of trying to better understand how to reach readers,i would appreciate any feedback you have and how you found this. Regardless of how you came across this blog series, please like, share, forward, or just tell some people. Let's see if we can take the Kindle book sales from zero to one-million!

Oh yeah, the link to purchase my first Kindle children's picture book, Teddy Visits Mitchell Farms, is
 http://www.amazon.com/Teddy-Visits-Mitchell-Farms-ebook/dp/B00QNAFDXA 

Thanks!

Teddy Visits Mitchell Farms on Amazon

Teddy Visits Mitchell Farms is fully available in print and Kindle on Amazon.com, Here!