The Value of a Negative Review

Lindsey Rietzsch

If you haven't yet experienced the stab to the gut feeling of reading that first negative review of your first beloved masterpiece - well, don't hold your breath...sooner or later you will.

It's funny how more than often it doesn't matter that you may have received ten or more wonderful reviews from your loyal readers - when that blow to your heart & soul strikes all those other excellent reviews seem to go right out the window. Strange how that happens.

Well, here's a valuable lesson I learned from taking a negative review and turning it into something good. Yes, you read right - turning something negative into something positive. It can be done!

I remember getting my first negative review on my most recent book, and being frustrated that the reader gave me a bad review because the characters in my book were of a non-denominational Christian upbringing and this particular reader was an atheist. I didn't think that was fair for her to give my story a bad review because she didn't agree with the beliefs of the characters.

After a few days of letting off steam and receiving a few more similar reviews, I finally realized the value of this harsh review. My book was categorized under "paranormal" as it is very much a suspenseful, paranormal book. However as much as it mentions demons and dark apparitions, it also mentions angels, light and miracles. I realized that most paranormal readers prefer dark stories without the happy feel good endings. My book needed to reach readers who prefer happy feel good endings where good triumphs over evil. I needed to re-categorize my book under  Christian Paranormal.

Yes, my friends - that made all the difference. I realized that these other readers were angry. As much as they wanted a good ghost story they didn't want to hear any mentioning of Christian influences. They just wanted the ghost story. As soon as I changed my category I found the right readers and it was a match made in heaven. The good reviews began to pour in. My new readers became big fans and had nothing but great things to say about my book!

Had I just been angry about those bad reviews and left it at that, I would have continued receiving more bad reviews. Instead I chose to listen to what the reviewers were saying  - I was targeting the wrong readers. After becoming proactive I saved the repuation of my book.

You see, all reviews especially the bad ones, tell us valuable information about our book. They give us clues as to what we can do to avoid more bad reviews. Whether it be that we need to have our book better edited or just that we have it placed under a more fitting genre - we should listen to what those readers are telling us.

With that I offer a small caution. There are certain instances when readers are not being respectful or helpful with their reviews. Instead it appears as though they are just plain bullying you and your book. Go ahead and Google "authors bullied on goodreads" and you'll see what I mean. It happens quite often.

I remember with my first book How to Date Your Spouse - one woman gave it a low review because it didn't save her marriage. She said that her husband was unwilling to read the book and try any of the date ideas. She did however state that it was "a great book" and she learned "all kinds of stuff". Now it didn't seem fair after saying it was great, that she would rate it low just because her husband didn't want to read it and try the ideas. Also in the beginning of my book - it states that it's not for couples with serious marital issues. But I have no control over that and as an author I have to respect her rating. I can rest at ease however knowing  that most people who read her review will take it with a grain of salt realizing her circumstance.

I will admit from personal experience that goodreads reviewers are much more harsh than Amazon reviewers. It's not uncommon to have a higher rating on Amazon than on Goodreads in regards to the same book. When this happens you just have to bite the bullet and disregard the comments or it can destroy you if you let it. Bullying behavior can be reported but there is never a guarantee that it will be dealt with by Goodreads or Amazon. For the most part, if the majority of your reviews are wonderful than you really shouldn't let a couple of pointless bashing remarks bother you.

Take the reviews that seem honest and see what you can learn from them - even if you disagree with them. There is great value in doing this.

Happy Writing!

Learning as We Go

Elsha Fornefeld

This article is really a Behind the Scenes truth since I am going to share the truth about three items: how I launched my book the first time, the results, and how it turned out.  I am currently relaunching the same book with some changes.

This summer I launched over seven books for new and upcoming authors, all of them doing fairly well and some of them even becoming best sellers in a few different countries on Kindle. The biggest shocker for me was that my own book did not achieve the same success. To be honest, my book has been out less than a month and some books do need time to grow and become popular. This all depends on your demographics, genre. Then there are several bestselling authors whose first book that they put on kindle did not go very well at all, then with another book or through an agent they were able to achieve success.

I did the $0.99 promotion for the first weekend and sold fairly well selling over 100 copies. After that however, it was slow going only about five to ten sales a day. I really have posted quite a bit on facebook and haven't even bother with twitter nor did I use good reads as much as I knew I could.

I can’t tell you how many people would text, call, IM, or come up and tell me how much they loved my book. So, I would tell them thanks and ask that they put a review on kindle. For some reason I never got very many. Soon I realized two very important things. First, my book is extremely difficult to put into a genre while all my other friends were clearly defined, such as historical romance. Second, is that Kindle may not let your family or friends post a review. There were people having problems posting any sort of review and even downloading my book. So, make certain that Kindle doesn’t have any technical problems on your end.  In the end, I have realized that my fan base has been word of mouth. I've had huge response and people love the book. 

Since realizing this, I have updated my blog, had one of our amazing editors do a complete re-edit to the book, then I stuck in a sneak peek to the second book. Next, I printed off business cards and local businesses have been awesome about letting me leave them there. Overall, I have sold 500 + copies in a month, which is not terrible. Still I know I can do much better. Giving my book a really good edit and now having utilizing all of my avenues to relaunch has already helped things pick up a bit.

In conclusion,  it's important to keep on top of your marketing so your book does not die. When you get it on Kindle make sure that all avenues checked (especially those that are technical) so your fans get the best possible service. 

I really hope this helps you in your publishing venture. 

Now, here is the relaunch and fabulous redoing of The Altar: Timeless Generation.  

http://timelessgeneration.blogspot.com/ 

 

(I should probably use my own blog as a marketing tool as well) If you like the book I would ask that our great followers leave a review of my book on Kindle. I have made sure that Kindle will let you post. Thank you and good posting!