Maybe I’m Just Not Good Enough
Deserts, AI and Self-Doubt
Building an Audience Can Be a Lonely Business
Last time I foreshadowed that I was up in the air about continuing my Facebook ad. I really did want to split test the link to see if it made a difference to download rates if people went to my landing page or BookFunnel direct, but then I got to looking at the ad I was using.
I like it, and the post even got likes and everything. But the more I look at it, the less it screams ‘sci-fi/fantasy’.
The wording around the image and the copy on the landing page do talk about magic, but because magic and cybernetics and enchantments are features of the world the story is based in, and not the focus, I didn’t want an image that was misleading.
Of course, I’m thinking I managed to kinda do that anyway…
How the ad is performing
The ad is going well. I now have 20 subscribers! And about 13 have downloaded the book. But now I’m worried that it’s a book they weren’t after.
I’ve not had any angry emails or unsubscribes, but that’s probably more to do with the effort of sending an angry email, and that I’ve not sent a heap of emails such that the volume might prompt an unsubscribe.
Or maybe they just haven’t read it yet!
So instead of trying out my split testing, I need to go back to the drawing board (or Canva in this case) and see if I can make a better ad.
Designing in the dark
I have no design skills. In this case, I’m also not entirely sure of the best way to pitch my novel — note to new authors, make sure when you pick which idea to develop you know the genre and what books/authors are similar.
And since I’m new and have no followers, I have no one to test the images on. But I’m not about to let that get in the way!
Regent is the prequel novella to my (yet to be published) series Royal. The prequel story follows the current queen of a country where people have magical powers. The setting is in the desert, and the crux is she needs to uncover an international plot, the result of which might be catastrophic for her country, but gets sidetracked by a murder. (I promise (hope) the blurb on my landing page is better. I didn’t use it here because it’s longer and doesn’t mention the setting).
So, with my distinct lack of design skills I opened up Canva and promptly spent a couple of hours searching their imagery for something along the lines of ‘lady in desert’, ‘magical queen in desert’, ‘magical desert woman silhouette’, and so on.
I even tried their AI driven feature, Text to Image. It’s literally what it sounds like — you type in what you want and the AI makes the picture. It was pretty amazing at making a picture that fit what I wanted by taking parts of other images and editing them together. But the blending wasn’t the best, some of the women were standing inside the railings (when I asked for ‘woman on balcony looking at desert’), and some of the faces were just…wrong.
I might have just gone with one of the AI images — when they’re small, the weird faces aren’t as obvious. But they didn’t do well when I tried to resize them. So I resumed my searching. Eventually I came up with two ads, neither of them necessarily great, but both decidedly more ‘magic-ey/fantasy-ey’ than the one I was running.
Decisions, decisions
Having spent a good chunk of time industriously trying to design an ad (*cough* procrastinating *cough*), I now have three options to pick from. Ad number one, ad number two, or no ads at all.
To be honest, as I continue to learn I’m thinking of pausing the ads altogether for now. I have my BookFunnel group promos coming up so I’ll be able to see how they go in finding people for my list.
And that gives me more time to make a better ad and then spend money closer to the proper release of Royal. And when I run those ads, I can investigate the split testing for my landing page versus BookFunnel’s.
Marketing is great, but don’t you need a product?
Of course, in doing all that I have successfully procrastinated once more from the actual point of all this. Writing books.
With Royal on pre-order and the other two books in the series about to be edited, I need to pick a new series to write. I have three projects on the go at the moment; one with a finished first draft, one where I’ve written a few chapters, and one with the world built.
I really like the idea behind the story with a finished draft, but I’m worried that I’ll have trouble placing it’s genre. Which was a problem with this first series. The issue is likely more about me and my lack of knowledge of genres, but there you go.
I also am enjoying writing the one with a few chapters done. But that one is going to be a crime thriller and so a complete deviation from what I’m doing. (I started it to take a break when I got frustrated rewriting Royal for the third time.) I’m going to keep playing with that (as a way to take a break when I need it) but I want to get myself established before I go genre-hopping. Or at least hop all the way out of the sci-fi/fantasy realm.
And the world that I’ve built is true fantasy. Lots of different factions and creatures and I can’t wait to get going on it.
So which one am I going to go and write? A completely different one. Of course. Not having released Royal yet, I’m super paranoid about how it’s going to go. I mean, I know I’m not going to be an overnight J.K. Rowling, and I also understand it’s just not going to be the book for some people. And that’s fine. I’m just worried it’s not going to be the book for any people.
And so the idea of having the next one also being a bit genre-ambivalent worries me. I want to have something that I can say ‘fans of [insert author here] will love this book’. Not just because marketing will be easier, but because then, if no one likes that book, I will know the issue’s my writing rather than the story. And while I’ll still write because it’s fun, I’ll know I need to look into other things to be when I grow up.
If I put out another book I don’t know how to market, especially when I’m still learning how to market in general, then I might have one very expensive hobby on my hands before I realise it’s not going anywhere.
To make money as an indie author, you need a level of persistence and a relatively thick skin. And I’m certainly not going to give up at the first hurdle. But by the same time, I’m a practical person. And so being spoiled for choice in the ideas that I’m eager to explore, I’m going to put my business hat on, and try to pick the most marketable one.
I suppose I’d better get to writing!
Cheers, K.T.
