I heard John Locke’s story - the first self-published author to sell a million ebooks on Amazon. (And only the seventh overall.) So when I noticed his book “How I Sold 1 Million Ebooks in 5 Months!” I decided to order it. While I won’t reveal his ‘secret’ here, I did want to draw attention to two points he made in the book.
The first one is something I emphasize at every seminar I teach.
Know your audience before you start writing. He says most people do it backwards - they write a book and then try to figure out the audience. Locke approaches it like a business - if you want to succeed, know your audience and write to them.
The second one you’ll either dismiss or a light bulb will go off in your head.
When someone starts his or her own business, no one thinks twice. Investing in stocks, a business, a project, real estate, one’s financial future - those are acceptable. Then why is it investing in one’s own book and self-publishing is not? Why has the publishing industry deemed this shameful? (And yes, John advocates spending a couple thousand on professional editing, formatting, and the book cover.)
Really think about that one! If no one ever believed in his own talents and abilities, if everyone required validation before they could pursue an idea, where would we? What if Edison or Ford had felt that way? When you really think about it, the idea is ridiculous. Even the music industry has moved past that issue and independent labels are everywhere now.
There are several other points he makes, but I’ll save those for another day.
You can’t deny the facts - he sold over a million self-published ebooks on Amazon in just five months.
What do you think about these points?
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