Review: Too much spam!
Rating: 2 out of 5
Date: 05 17, 2012
I began following the author of this book on Twitter as soon as I downloaded the book. Before I was 10% in to the book, I had unfollowed the author again. Her timeline consisted almost entirely of the same message- buy my book. The tweets were on the hour, every hour (something she recommends doing in the book), and went on for days and days. I scrolled through her tweets on the day I unfollowed her- I had to go through two days of tweets to find one 'not 'related to one of her books (it was encouraging followers to buy a book by another author) and I think it took me another day of tweets to find a tweet (one, solitary tweet) which was personal, part of a conversation with another human being.It wasn't a good start to the book.While "experimenting" with KDP Select* the author wrote blog posts outlining what she was doing and the results she was seeing. While interesting, these were simply copied and pasted into the book- they weren't edited or reformatted. This was annoying to read, because it meant that what should have been links to previous blog posts appeared on my Kindle as a list of the posts, which I had read just three pages previously.The posts are interesting, but really, there's little in them which is applicable to the reader. It's all her experience, which is great, and I think seeing other author's sales figures is fascinating (BTW, if that's something you're also interested in,  you should check out are The Newbie's Guide To Publishing).The marketing advice bothered me, and is what brought the rating down to just two stars. It seems 'very' spammy to me. Let me give you some examples;When pitching them, say something like" I saw you liked (author). Me too. In fact, he inspired me to write (name of novel) (Amazon URL shortened)'Or....Since you enjoy (author) I think you may like (name of novel)(Amazon URL).Now, I've actually gotten a few tweets like this, and I have never clicked a single one, not even when the name-dropped author is one of my all-time favourites. Why? Because a) it's spammy, and who in their right mind clicks a suspicious looking link on Twitter? and b) it's rude.The author also advocates visiting your book's Amazon page, listing the books and authors listed under "Customers who bought this also bought..." searching for those books and authors on Twitter, and contacting them in the above way, with the caveat that the tweets should be worded differently each time, and made personal. If I got a tweet like that which included my name, I still wouldn't click it. It still feels spammy to me.The book also advocates scheduling tweets in advance using HootSuite, to go out hourly. This is the exact behaviour which made me unfollow the author. I don't recommend this to anyone. Now, I'm not a bestselling author, never will be, but I am your audience. Don't do this, please. If I had seen the author's tweets before buying this book, I would never have contemplated reading it.I should add that there is a paragraph in the book advising readers not to spam anyone, and another paragraph advising people to build relationships with Twitter users before contacting them, but I think the other advice outweighs it, and brings the overall spam rating up.There is a chapter dedicated entirely to finding friends on social networks. Some advice is sound- follow publishers, agents, reviewers, other authors. Some of it is a little strange- search for people who share your characters' names on Facebook and Twitter, add them as a friend or follow them, then comment on their wall "(for ALL to see). Let them know that they have the same name as your character. Tell them a but about this character and your book. Invite them to order it online- leave the link- and offer to send them an autographed bookplate or bookmark. You can do this in stages, replying to the friend."Now, maybe this worked for the author, I'm assuming it did, if she achieved the sales figures she says she did. I am not friends with anyone on Facebook that I have not met personally. I wouldn't add anyone as a friend unless I knew them, and if I added someone I didn't know, and then got a link on my page (for ALL to see) I would block them there and then.The author assures the reader that she has sent many autographed bookplates and bookmarks to readers who share her characters' names, and they're always thrilled to receive it. Maybe they are- but I wouldn't want an autograph from someone who spammed my page, and whose writing I haven't read (because if I had read, there would be no need for the author to spam me). Now, if it was George R.R. Martin, that might be a different story...The author makes it very clear in several places that she views writing as a business- she's trying to make a profit, and I take no issue with that. She is perfectly entitled to do that, and to market her books in whatever way works for her. I'm just saying, her ways absolutely do not work for me.The sales figures, though presented poorly (all words, no graphs etc. and copied and pasted from the blog) were interesting, and that's why this book isn't getting a lower rating. What really brought the rating down was the spam advice.