One of the most inspiring posts I see on my many author forums is when someone takes the time to share their story. Each Friday, I’m going to feature a different indie author to help inspire all of you!
This week, our featured Author fell through. Therefore, I decided to feature myself to fill in the gap! Works out as I have a new release coming out in a week!
What is your pen name?
Daphne McLean
What genre do you write in?
Cozy Mystery
How many books have you published?
6 total under different Pen Names. My third cozy mystery is coming out on 9/30/2020.
What inspired you to become a writer?
I always wanted to do something bigger than myself. It took me a long time and trying out various different businesses to figure out that writing was my passion. I might be dating myself but when I was in college I had the privilege of meeting Augusten Burroughs, the author of Running With Scissors among many other works. I was inspired by the fact that he wanted to be an author, and he just went for it. He didn’t even know about the process. He came from a troubled background, and was able to make it. I wanted to do that too.
What is your indie success story?
I’m still floored that I finished a single book much less 6. I’ve been able to pay for the production of my books on what I make from selling them. It’s not cheap to produce a book, and you don’t make much selling at $2.99. I’m hoping to learn ads and move beyond that in 2021.
What are your marketing and advertising strategies?
I’ll tell you what not to do… Write a book, publish it, and focus only on selling that one book in hopes to make a living. I should have pressed on to books 2 & 3 much sooner than I did to build off the momentum of Red Picket Fences. I cringe when I think about all of the times I made that book free to attract readers when I had nothing else to sell to them. DO NOT DO THIS. So then, I spent quite a lot of time and money writing a reader magnet. It’s helping build that momentum again, but it was a costly error.
I would have waited until I had a few more books written before I published my first.
The good news is, my backlist can make you money at any time. It’s not worth cringing or crying over.
I’m just going to keep writing and press on with ads. These days, you’ve got to pay to play.
What are you working on right now?
Plotting book 4, Death on Rugosa Bay, and a Christmas novella that will be free for newsletter subscribers.
Where can we find your work?
You can find all of my books on Amazon.com
Click the Amazon link above to view my series page. My book, Body In the Begonias can also be found on Amazon, or for Free (in exchange for your e-mail here.
As a thank you for following my blog, I wanted to send you some awesome (and helpful) self-publishing tools. Click the link below to receive the following FREE items:
Outline Template
Word Count Tracker
Self-Publishing Comparison Chart
Inspired by this author’s post, and want to start your indie author career? My book will give you all of the information you need to begin!
The Struggling Indie Author 