Using Vellum and Pronoun to Sell More Books
All authors are continually on the lookout for ways to sell more books. The bad news is that it’s damn difficult. The good news is that there are clever and innovative people looking for new ways to make it easier to sell more books.
I’m not referring to promotional opportunities. They seem to spring up every day. I don’t know if anyone will ever catch BookBub, but even BookBub is a temporary fix to the visibility factor. I say the visibility factor because that’s the biggest problem. There are well over one million books on all of the big retailers, with a few hundred thousand more being published every year. As a result, your books end up being lost in the shuffle. Unless someone is specifically typing in your name to search for, the chances are, they won’t find you. That makes it all the more difficult to sell more books.
The Best Way to Sell More Books
That brings us back to visibility the old-fashioned way—word-of-mouth. Write a book that people like or are intrigued about, and they’ll tell someone else, who will in turn tell another person.
Let’s presume for a minute, that word-of-mouth works. And there’s no reason to think it doesn’t; it’s been working since the Gutenberg press first began churning out books in the fifteenth century. Based on that wild, leap-of-faith, we’ll next ask “How do we get word-of-mouth?”
It’s Easier Than You May Think—And More Difficult
It’s easy to write a great book—relatively speaking—when compared to a book that will get people talking. A great book may leave people satisfied. It may even be so good that no one complains about it. But that doesn’t mean it will be the subject of discussion around the water cooler on Monday morning. That may be reserved for a more controversial topic, and one that wasn’t written nearly as well.
I made note in another book I wrote called How to Write a Bestseller that of the most recent bestsellers in several genres, all of them had more than their fair share of one- and two-star reviews.
What Is the Secret?
How do you sell more books?
Taking a stand on one side of a controversial subject may be one way, but trying something new may be another. Using Pronoun as a distributor, and using Vellum’s ability to create gorgeous eBooks, allows you to make any book loaded with pictures. And Pronoun’s deal with Amazon ensures that Amazon won’t charge for the size of the download. I’m just putting the finishing touches on a visual grammar book that has 200 images! It makes for a large file size, but now I don’t have to worry about the charges from Amazon, as I use Pronoun.
Because of that, I have begun inserting images into all of my books, mysteries included, and so far the feedback has been great. It even seems to be helping sales, though it’s still too early to tell.
Below is a screenshot from one of my new mysteries. It shows the slum area where one of the characters lives. For people who haven’t seen that it gives them a good picture.
The next screenshot is a bridge over the lake close to where a murder was committed. The police are searching for the gun, and this would be a logical spot.
The next screenshot is of the center of the bridge. It shows how large the lake is, and therefore, how difficult it would be to find a gun thrown in there.
And the final picture from the mystery books (at least the final I’m showing) is of a house where one of the characters lives.
The next image is from an upcoming fantasy book. It shows the image of a violent storm on one of the worlds.
I don’t know about you, but I like images in a book. It breaks up the monotony and, for some people, it helps them visualize things better. You’ve all heard the saying “A picture is worth a thousand words.”
This is a chance to put that saying to the test.
If I were you, I’d stop what I was doing and go buy a copy of Vellum so that I could make my own gorgeous books. If you don’t have a MAC, have no sweat, I can do them for you, and probably as inexpensively as you were paying but for a better job. And don’t worry, it’s guaranteed. Check out the terms here.
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Giacomo Giammatteo is the author of gritty crime dramas about murder, mystery, and family. And he also writes nonfiction books including the No Mistakes Careers series as well as books about grammar and publishing.
When Giacomo isn’t writing, he’s helping his wife take care of the animals on their sanctuary. At last count they had forty animals—seven dogs, one horse, six cats, and twenty-five pigs.
Oh, and one crazy—and very large—wild boar, who takes walks with Giacomo every day and happens to also be his best buddy.
He lives in Texas where he and his wife have an animal sanctuary with forty-five loving “friends.
Mike Landis
Giacomo Giammatteo
Mona Curington
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