An article worth reading!
by Derek Haines 
on Just Publishing Advice:
Getting a self-published book to sell well is not easy
However, many self-published authors fail to give their books the best chance of success because they are in such a rush to publish that they overlook many of the basics.
In fact, quite a lot of authors new to self-publishing clearly get so many basic things backwards, upside down and back the front.
Getting a book or ebook published and available for sale on Amazon is the very last step in the process, and not the very first.
To give a new book any chance at success, a lot of planning, preparation and good old-fashioned hard work is needed before bringing a book to market.
It is the lack of this process that causes so many new authors to become disillusioned with self-publishing when they find book sales are very scarce indeed.
It…
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All I Have to Say 
And sometimes books just do not find the right readers to talk about and promote them. I read a review, just this morning, on a review blog I subscribe to, in which the reviewer apologized for just not liking a book at all. The review was brief and summed up the story line (which sounded to me as though it could have been intriguing). Yet the final paragraph of the review explained what had been wrong with the book – and it turned out to be all structural faults that caused the reviewer to have had a bad reading experience. I thought she was rather generous in awarding 3 out of 5 stars, after everything she had listed as drawbacks. Which leads me to believe that the book “might” have received 5 stars had it been structurally edited and properly vetted by beta-readers and other authors. As the blogger you’ve reblogged here says, Tricia, “many self-published authors fail to give their books the best chance of success because they are in such a rush to publish that they overlook many of the basics”. But in this case, extensive editing wasn’t just a basic – it was a necessity!
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I think you’re right that sometimes the problem is that books don’t find the right audience. Sometimes marketing can help with that, but not always. There are just so many, many books out there, it’s hard to get noticed. The author of the blog article definitely has some good tips to help your book have a better chance at being noticed and getting the right sort of attention.
Good point about editing, Susan. I think there are some new authors who might not understand the difference between the various types of editing services available. There are many authors who think editing is just a spellcheck in Microsoft Word, or a quick proofreading service. I think experienced authors who have employed sharp beta readers might be able to get away with just proofreading. A new author, however, who hasn’t had the benefit of critique partners and beta readers needs more than proofreading. They need a professional editor who can give them guidance on the structural aspects of their book. This type of editing can be very expensive, so many authors cannot afford it. Unfortunately, the reader can tell right away if the book has problems.
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I don’t buy into the excuse that authors can’t afford editing so they just don’t bother with it. You can’t afford to publish a book that has NOT been properly edited!! It’s just not worth all the other effort you’ve gone through to write and prepare your book to not do it absolutely and positively RIGHT! (And, as I know you have covered in your new book, Tricia, there are ways of publishing that are affordable to everyone.)
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thank you for posting this, I found it very helpful
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I’m glad I could help!
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