Be Patient, Wait... It'll Happen. Adventures in Self-Publishing

"Be patient," I tell myself.

"Wait," I tell myself.

"It'll happen," I tell myself.

It's been nearly a year since I wrote and published two children's books, The Cloud Show and The Little Bear and the Lollipop Tree, but since my friends purchased Little Bear when it first came out I haven't sold anything more. Not even one copy.

Yes, I've been a bit lazy in the promotion department lately mostly because of frustration at having no results. I did advertise one of the books once which created some traffic, but still no purchases. I've come to the conclusion that I need to pay for advertising on Facebook, Nextdoor, as well as my website, Visages Gift Store on GoDaddy.

I was hoping for better results without using money I can ill-afford to spend. It appears as though that's not going to happen.

So, this is what I'm doing to bring in more income so that I can afford a small advertising budget. First, I amped up marketing my Zazzle store, Visages Gift Store. Again, I don't have an advertising budget for my store, but I'm doing more blogging and I'm making a sale here and there. It takes a bit to reach my payout threshold, but I eventually will which will give me a little for advertising.

Second, I've begun taking surveys at GoBranded.com. Sure, it takes a few hours out of my day to earn a buck (per day), if I'm lucky, but that money goes toward my grocery bill. I don't spend a whole lot for food and such. Last week, the $17 I earned doing surveys went toward my $28 grocery bill. This week, $14 went toward my $20 grocery bill. What I don't spend on groceries will go towards advertising this year.

So, between Visages Gift Store on Zazzle and leftover grocery money, I'll be able to begin advertising.

As always, I try and keep my blogs short and sweet. I don't want to overstay my welcome. Hopefully, I'll have some good news in a few months.

The Little Bear and the Lollipop Tree

The Cloud Show

 Another Dream Come True

I had a list of things I wanted to accomplish hanging on my closet door. The list wasn't anything too far out of reach. I didn't include wanting to be a millionaire (because I don't really want to be one) nor did I include travelling to Scotland (where my ancestors are from) and staying in a luxury hotel. My - we'll call it bucket list - was simple.

I wanted to write songs. I wrote one for my brother converting the letters of his first name and that of his bride's into music notes. For instance, the letter K converted to a musical note would be F on a music scale. It was my wedding present to them.

I wanted to sell my paintings and get commissioned. It happened to my delight. I also wanted to sell my art on products available through print-on-demand. I currently use Zazzle and have been categorized as a "Bronze Pro". I've sold assorted products in several countries in Europe and to someone in Australia, and - of course - the U.S.

I've entered writing and art contests and won prizes.

But the biggest of all my wants on my bucket list was to write and sell a book. Well, I've written it and it's in the midst of being published on Amazon and Barnes & Noble as an eBook. It takes three days to become live on their websites, so I don't have links to either yet. Below is the cover of The Little Bear and the Lollipop Tree.

I still have a few more publishers to upload to, but it's a chore. It isn't as easy as bloggers make it sound and believe me, I've read a lot! You have to jump through hoops providing a W-4 and other personal information. But that wasn't my problem.

'Just upload your book and earn money' is a load of crap. Well, except for Amazon's Kindle Direct Publishing. Amazon has its own free book-making software you can download. It was easy to upload my illustrations and paste in my text then hit "publish".

Barnes & Noble was another story. It took two long days of trying to accommodate their requirements. The problem was my book is illustration heavy. That means if your book is text only and created in Word, you'll have no problem. If you want pictures, you're better off creating an EPUB. Did I mention Barnes & Noble doesn't accept PDFs? And, they don't have their own software like Amazon's Kindle Direct Publishing.

The end of my story (because I don't want to make this too long) is that I spent over 17 hours figuring out how to turn my PDF into an EPUB. (Barnes & Noble doesn't recognize Amazon's book version.) Oh, it's done. The configuration isn't exactly the way I want it, but it's on its way to being published.

Sadly, after it's published, I need to make a correction. One of their mandatory questions I had to answer was "Contributor" with no clear explanation of what that even meant. I took it to mean who helped me with my book, so I included my brother's name because he proofread it. Turns out that they listed him as the author and when I tried changing the name in the "Contributor" section, I couldn't because it was currently under way of being published. At this point, I'm banging my head on my bed's headboard.

Maybe one day I'll blog about the assorted software different bloggers (who make themselves out to be experts) convinced me to use and that turned out to be utterly useless.

Still, another of my dreams has come true! How exciting is that?