Kate Baggott's Blog: Cornfields of the Sea - Posts Tagged "chick-lit"

It's often said that you need to spend money to make money.

I'm not a gambler, but I do like the song and if there is ever a time to learn something from Kenny Rogers, especially via the Muppet Show, it's probably during this era of unrestrained hopefulness and rampant insecurity. Not that I am an advocate of casinos or any other kind of voluntary tax. In fact, I try to stay away from any business that might make organized crime another cent.

That said, I've started a $55 experiment on a Goodreads ad for Love From Planet Wine Cooler.

For most investments, self-publishing has been relatively risk-free for me. I had a lot of help from friends to do the cover and copy edit. Almost all of the stories had been published elsewhere before they appeared in the collection, so I got paid for writing them before I even tried to sell the book.

$55 is not a huge amount, but the difference between gambling and an experiment is writing down the observations and drawing conclusions based on those experiments. I will be sharing the observations about this experiment here on this blog.

To be honest, I have not followed the Goodreads ad best practices that they outlined in a Powerpoint slideshow I scrolled through.

According to their guide, I should have bid 50 cents per click-through and I only bid 11 cents. This will effect how often and at what time of day my ad appears on the site. I also put my own site, http://www.katebaggott.com as the destination of my click through rather than my Goodreads author profile. I will see how things go and switch to their way if things look really dismal.

I'm not sure if you can view my campaign dashboard, but as I write this, my ad had been viewed 13 times and has a 0% click through rate. Since it has only been up for an hour or two, that's not bad.

If any of the other authors reading this would like to share their experiences with a campaign like this, I would really like to hear them!

The days between Christmas and the New Year were made for reading. I insist upon it in my own life and try to make allowances for those who curtail socializing to stay in with a book. Really, reading fiction is wish fulfillment for grown ups. So are naps. And leftovers.

There are two stories I've written on a holiday theme for you to take a look at between naps.

For those of us who have lost someone too early, after too terrible an illness, after too much love to do without, I wrote The Last Bluebird. It is not a downer. It's about that cycle we all return to and must learn to accept.

And then, I wrote something completely different for another holiday season. Be a bit careful with this one because it might make you need a nap...with someone.

For those of you who got calendars for Christmas, here is what January might have in store, in the fictional sense, if you like firemen. This story also appears in my book, Love from Planet Wine Cooler.

A few years ago I found myself in desperate need of money. Like most authors in my position, my thoughts turned immediately to erotica. Like most authors, I was innocent enough to think there was money in the art. What I wrote is "very vanilla" as they say in the trade, so I don't think it will offend anyone.

That said, I wrote it and if I never see more than the $3 I've earned for it so far, I would like people to read it and review it. Tomorrow, as a gift to all my loyal readers, friends, followers and subscribers, I thought I would give you a late Christmas present.

The Critical Pose will be free on Amazon tomorrow for just 24 hours. I will try to keep my blushing in check and then, we will all forget that I ever wrote anything remotely smutty.