… the trick is figuring out which elements are right for you and your unique publishing path.
Mark Leslie (Lefebvre) is a writer, an editor, a professional speaker, and a book nerd with a passion for craft beer, who encourages writers to seek their own path. With over three decades of experience in writing, publishing, and bookselling, Mark recommends writers don’t look for holes that other writers have made to find success in the publishing industry and try to slip through them. Instead, he advises writers to be independent by focusing on their own unique hole based on their strengths and long-term goals.
Using the illustration of five-year-olds on a soccer field who all chase the ball, he challenges Indie writers to anticipate where the ball is going and define their own strategic path. Mark shares his experience with indie writers on his Stark Reflections on Writing and Publishing podcast and in workshops at international conferences. In his newest non-fiction books, Wide For The Win: Strategies to sell Globally Via Multiple Platforms And Forge Your Own Path To Success,Publishing Pitfalls and The Relaxed Author he coaches writers on how to strategize for long term success, avoid pitfalls, and prevent burnout.
Lyndi: You’ve noted that writers now have amazing power to push the publish button, but also suggest they need to learn the publishing business. With so much information available to new authors, how do they discover what they need to do to successfully publish and sell their books?
Mark: When I started in this business, pretty much the only path to success involved working your way up through the publishing ranks, slowly cutting your chops in magazines and regional markets until, step by step, you made it to the “big time.” With such a long and arduous road, you couldn’t help but learn about the business and continue to get better at your craft. But now, authors can skip that road and rush right to those main stages and platforms. So, I do caution authors to try to take the time to learn a little bit about this world they’re putting their work out into.
The good news is that, in the same way digital has helped publishing become more accessible to writers virtually anywhere, information about writing and publishing has similarly exploded. There’s no shortage of information out there available. It’s amazing just how generous writers can be with wanting to put out information to help other writers. I do love that about our industry. And so much of this information can be found on blogs, via podcasts, in books, and online courses. Virtually anything you need to learn about is easily accessible.
The trick isn’t how to find it – the trick is figuring out which elements are right for you and your unique publishing path. The first thing a new writer should do is understand and appreciate that the information, knowledge, experience, insights, tips, strategies, and tricks being shared are going to be varied.
I suggest that authors consider the source for any information they digest – and the specific bias it is derived from and understand that the advice being shared isn’t necessarily a prescriptive inflexible “this way or else” but something that can be adapted. Because every single author, and every single book they work on, may have their own unique journey, path, or route. Just because something worked well for one author doesn’t mean it’ll work the same way for another. Either the book is different, the audience is different, or, as often happens, the trends and waves of what’s hot, or what’s in demand, have morphed and shifted.
But the good news is, it’s not some pre-prescribed menu of options. It’s a veritable buffet of information. You can carefully curate, choose, and select the specific pieces that might work for you, and leave those other bits untouched at the buffet. Or, perhaps you come back for that piece you left behind when you return at a different time with a different plate to fill.
Just remember that, in this buffet of information, you can try something, taste it, and if you realize it’s not working for you, you don’t need to fill your plate with it. You can try something else out. It’s okay to experiment and re-adjust if something isn’t working. That’s all part of the learning process which never ends, no matter how long you’ve been doing it.
Lyndi: You warn authors about nefarious operators who make money off writers’ hopes and dreams by making promises they can’t deliver on. What are a couple of the common assurances new writers need to watch out for?
Mark: The first thing writers should be leery of is whenever anyone guarantees that the package, method or tactics they are selling with get them specifically guaranteed results. There are never any guarantees in the publishing business. Ever. Anyone who claims that if you do A,B, and C and you’ll always get X is most likely deceiving you. About the only guarantee I would trust is when a company offers you a money back guarantee for a purchase you aren’t satisfied with.
For example, Written Word Media, that runs the Bargainbooksy and Freebooksy promo newsletter feature spots never guarantees that purchasing an ad with them will result in a specific return on that investment. They do share the number of subscribers to their newsletters as well as the average number of sales or downloads that is typical for a promotion. But they never guarantee an author success. What they do guarantee, however, is customer satisfaction, and they offer a money back guarantee if an author is not happy with the results of their promo. Now that is the type of company that stands behind their work and is one I know I can trust.
The other things writers need to be leery of are companies that pretend to be a real publisher. Many vanity press outfits continue to change their names, use confusing terms, and an ongoing play of smoke and mirrors to hide the fact that their business is selling services to authors, not selling books. If they call themselves a “real publisher” they’re likely guilty of a “methinks the lady doth protest too much” situation. Real publishers don’t call themselves that – they are that, and it’s evident through the work they do. Authors often believe that having a publisher gives them proper street cred and will often pay a vanity outfit thousands of dollars believing that the company is going to perform marketing miracles for them. The reality is these companies make their cash selling publishing and marketing packages to authors. 20% or less of their revenue actually comes from book sales. If they were actually good at SELLING books, them the majority of their revenue would be derived from sales. But they hide that from authors, and instead sell them the sizzle, and not the steak.
Lyndi: Not all pitfalls come from the promises of other people. What other dangers might writers encounter?
Mark: Writers need to be leery of the things they can do to themselves when it comes to self-sabotage.
One of these is pride. I think the first thing we need to get over as writers – and this can be hard, particularly for a beginning writer – is believing that their book is for everyone; that everybody who reads will love their book. A close second is thinking that their book is so unique that it couldn’t possibly be classified by any conventional genre or book classification that exists.
Regarding the first issue, when writers don’t take the time to try to narrow down their ideal readership – instead of trying to sell it to everyone – they’re wasting a significant amount of time and effort. The more niche and narrower you define your audience, the more targeted your marketing efforts can be. I can spend thousands of dollars creating brilliant ads for my ghost story and horror novels, for example, but if they’re delivered to someone who only reads sweet romance, it’s time and effort wasted. And, if that sweet romance reader is somehow convinced to buy my book, they’re not going to like it and will likely give it a one-star rating.
And when it comes to uniqueness, yes your book is unique and wonderful. But people typically incorporate new things into their lives based on things they already know and like. Instead of saying your book can’t be classified (which means it appeals to nobody), think about how it combines this one element with that other element.
Think about the movie Speed with Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock. It was described as Die Hard on a bus. Why? Because it refers to a movie people know and understand already in popular culture. There was familiarity with newness. What about Sharnado. It was Jaws meets Tornado. Okay, action/disaster film tropes mashed together.
To use a personal example, I’ve described my novella Stowe Away as Planes, Trains and Automobiles meets Logan. It’s about a super-powered human (the werewolf from my “Canadian Werewolf” series) racing across the country on a trip to protect a young girl. Their adventure starts on a train, where she is a stowaway, and involves misadventures on the journey that require different transportation as they elude the stalker chasing her, as well as the humor the series is known for. And I referenced movies rather than books because it’s easier for potential readers to understand their likes based on the much shorter experience of a movie. (Movies take 2 hours to watch whereas books take 8 to 10 hours – chances are more likely someone is to have watched a movie than read a similar book.)
Lyndi: When authors publish through Kindle Direct Publishing, they are given the choice of remaining exclusive on Kindle Unlimited or going wide. What do you share in Wide For The Win to help writers decide if this is the best option for them?
Mark: This is, of course, a unique decision that every writer has to make for themselves. And, while Amazon is the world’s biggest bookstore, authors need to consider that there are people who only read on other platforms – such as Kobo, Apple, Nook, or Google Play. So, while being exclusive to Amazon Kindle may result in additional revenue opportunities, 100% of the readers who are loyal to those other platforms will never be able to read their work.
On the flip side, if an author wants to try exclusivity, it’s only for a 90-day period, and it’s best to start with Amazon and then publish wide afterwards – particularly if their tour of duty in KDP Select to get into Kindle Unlimited does little or nothing for them. It’s a lot harder to start with your books everywhere, then work backwards to try to get it down from the thousands of other retail platforms it’ll get to when you publish wide. It’s not quite as hard as this, but think of it like trying to put toothpaste back into the tube. It’s much easier to work it in one direction, rather than another.
Lyndi: You’ve written non-fiction paranormal explorations about hospitals, libraries, pubs and other historical buildings. Is there one story that stands out to you as being particularly eerie?
Mark: There are, of course, many that give me goosebumps. But one of the ones that comes to mind is the tale of some bizarre and unexplainable events in an asylum in Alberta, Canada that appears in the book Haunted Hospitals. The reason this one comes to mind is how I first learned about it. I was a guest on George Noory’s late night Coast to Coastradio program, and in the last hour of the show, we took calls from listeners to the live program.
The one caller relayed his personal encounter with a woman who was believed to be possessed because no matter what room she was put into the temperature dropped to an uncomfortably cold level, she often had to be sedated because of the almost supernatural strength she had when she would punch and bite hospital staff. It was the story of how, one night, the hospital attendant walked into her room to find her standing in her sleep – except instead of standing upright, her feet were on the wall, and she was standing completely horizontal out from the wall, bizarrely defying gravity – that sent chills down my spine. I was sitting in my apartment at about 2 AM with all the lights down, imaging walking into her room and seeing her like that. I was afraid that if I turned I might see her standing on one of the walls in my apartment.
That story, of course, had to make it into the book. So, I got the caller’s number from the show’s producer and arranged for a more detailed interview that took place a few weeks later. What was even more fascinating is, previous to this broadcast, the staff member had never shared the story. But after sharing it on the radio they felt they needed to talk to someone. It was only after they shared their story with a colleague who used to work at the same hospital that the colleague admitted they had seen almost the same thing – except the same woman was standing upright in her sleep; only she was levitating a couple of feet off the ground.
Lyndi: When readers are done reading chilling tales from your paranormal non-fiction, they can turn to your fiction thrillers and werewolf series. Readers have described your werewolf series as humorous and atypical. What makes these stories different from others in the genre?
Mark: One thing that makes my “Canadian Werewolf” stories different than others in the genre is the blend of action, urban fantasy, and humor. People are surprised, for example, that you never really see the wolf – merely the human trying to deal with the side-effects of turning into a wolf for the ten days of each month where the moon is at least 75% full.
My main character, Michael Andrews, is a shy and geeky apologetic Canadian. He’s a beta human who happens to also be an alpha wolf. His lack of confidence and mostly “fish out of water” experience of being a small-town country bumpkin living in one of the world’s largest cities makes for some amazing laughs along the way. I mean, if you regularly wake up naked, with no memory of the night before, a bullet wound in your leg, and the taste of human blood in your mouth, you have to either find a way to laugh at the situation, or go crazy trying to process it.
Mark Leslie Lefebvre has been writing since he was thirteen years old and discovered his mother’s Underwood typewriter collecting dust in a closet. He started submitting his work for publication at the age of fifteen and had his first story published in 1992, the same year he graduated from university. Under the name Mark Leslie, he has published more than a dozen full length books. He pens a series of non-fiction paranormal explorations and also writes fiction (typically thrillers and horror) and edits fiction anthologies.
When Mark worked in the book industry as a part-time bookseller, he was bitten by the book-selling bug. He has worked in virtually every type of bookstore (independent, chain, large-format, online, academic and digital). He has thrived on innovation, particularly related to digital publishing, and enjoys interacting with the various people who make the book industry so dynamic.
Mark has spoken professionally in the United States and Canada, in the UK and across Europe, specializing in advances in digital publishing and the vast and incredible opportunities that exist for writers and publishers.
More information can be found about Mark at www.markleslie.ca
