Ever wondered if should write under a pen name? Or why some authors choose to write using a pseudonym? In this post, you’ll learn why you might want to write under a pen name (or not) and how to navigate having multiple pen names.

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A year ago, I tried an experiment.

I found a genre that was selling well where I thought I could find success. I didn’t really want to use my already-established email lists and social media, so I started almost completely from scratch.

You can see how that worked out after one year in this post. (Spoiler alert: month to month it’s up-and-down, but has been four figures–sometimes closer to five-figures–a month for over a year.) 

So why write under a pen name?

For me personally, it was more about marketing and testing the waters than anything else. In terms of marketing, I have a few nonfiction business books under my own name. These are NOT the same genre as the clean romance I wanted to write as Emma St. Clair. That can provide a muddy brand and reader confusion. A new name seemed like a good option.

To test the waters, I wanted to know if I could use the knowledge I’ve gained over the past however-many years in this online space to find success self-publishing without using my already-established platform.

I’m actually about to launch a second pen name (Sullivan Gray) who will do Young Adult paranormal and contemporary books. I’m planning the same strategy as I used to launch Emma and we’ll see how it goes.

EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT PEN NAMES

Listen to Episode 169 – How and Why to Write Under a Pen Name

Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or your favorite podcast app!

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WHY DO AUTHORS WRITE UNDER A PEN NAME?

Authors might choose a pen name if the subject that they’re writing about might cause conflict with their actual life. I’ve seen this a lot when authors write steamy romance and don’t necessarily want their mom reading it. Some steamy romance authors also write clean romance and don’t want any crossover.

In this case, authors will be very careful to keep their pen name completely apart and separate from everything else they write. It’s a lot more hidden.

Authors might choose a pen name if they write in multiple, unrelated genres. This is the main reason I chose a pen name. When we shop online, we don’t realize how many quick snap decisions we make on things. Having a pen name can keep ultimate clarity in terms of branding.

Are my sweet romance books that different from my Christmas devotionals or my book on email lists? No… but the readers aren’t the same. The crossover is likely minimal at best. And when a reader glances at my author name and the books that customers also bought on the Amazon sales page, it presents a problem to see unrelated books. It would be confusing to see a romance book next to a book on business. Readers need quick and easy cues with clean author branding.

Whenever you’re as big as Stephen King or JK Rowling, you could write whatever and people will buy it. (Big authors still sometimes write under pen names!) But when you’re starting out, it’s much easier to have one author name PER GENRE for crystal clear marketing and branding. I’ve seen personally how well this has worked for me and I’ve also seen authors struggle trying to keep multiple unrelated genres under one name as they start out. It was HARD.

• Some people in the space (whom I really respect) say that you don’t need to worry about a pen name. I disagree when it comes to branding and marketing, but if you want to see another side to this, check out this great post by Anne R. Allen. 

WHEN SHOULD YOU NOT USE A PEN NAME?

Amazon will only let you have three pen names under one Author Central account. It isn’t TERRIBLE to have multiple pen names (more on that below), but if you can keep things easy, DO.

If you’re writing books that are related or might have a larger crossover audience, then don’t do a pen name. An example might be writing clean romance and clean romantic suspense. These are the same steam level in terms of sexual content (which matters to readers), though the audiences might not be a 100% match.

That said, my Emma St. Clair clean romance books will have a similar steam level to my YA content, BUT the YA books will have more violence and intense action. Some have paranormal elements. The crossover might be there (I read both genres!) but it’s going to be a way smaller number. Just look at what these different covers convey!

You can see how these are likely not the same audiences, right? Everything from the color to the tone of these book covers sends signals to the readers, even subconsciously. Pen name = good plan.

If you don’t NEED a pen name and already have an established brand or public-facing name that you could use, don’t create more work for yourself.

If you don’t care as much about branding and sales and just want to write for the love of it, put it all under your name.

If you have a HUGE platform under your name and people will buy whatever you write, then don’t worry about a pen name.

If you know it would be easier to write under pen names but you can’t handle the idea of juggling them all, you might want to consider not writing under pen names.

 

HOW DO YOU HANDLE MULTIPLE PEN NAMES TECHNICALLY SPEAKING?

Speaking for Amazon, you can create up to three pen names under one author central account. That means that you’ll be getting paid in the same place and don’t need to worry about technicalities or weird legal stuff. Publicly, they are separate. Privately on the back end, they’re all under your account.

That said, some people want more separation even than THAT. This post talks about ways to find more separation.

If you want to know how to set up a new pen name in an author central account, here’s a brief video I made walking you through the process.

WHAT DO YOU NEED IN TERMS OF AUTHOR PLATFORM FOR A PEN NAME?

Now we’re getting into the nitty-gritty of what it takes to juggle multiple pen names. It’s less than you think! This also may vary wildly depending on how you want to promote books. With my pen names, I’m not very actively blogging (if at all). I don’t post much on a Facebook page or Twitter. My main focus was email list (which sells more books), a FB page for ads, and a FB reader group.

My basic suggestions for a pen name: 

• Set up an email list (this is my main focus and I use and am an affiliate for Mailerlite)
• Set up a web page with yourauthorname dot com or something similar (I use Siteground for hosting and am an affiliate: SIGN UP HERE)
• Set up a Facebook page (so you can run ads)
• Set up ONE social media account that you’ll use (this could just be the Facebook page)

Important note about Facebook: It’s against Facebook’s terms of service to have two personal profiles (where you add friends vs a business page where you get “likes”). Don’t create a personal profile for your pen name! You could get completely booted from Facebook. A page may not see a lot of organic growth or reach, but if you want to create ads, you need a page. Plus you can use a small page with few likes to market to a broad audience.

That’s really not that much to do. For one of my pen names, I own AuthorSullivanGray.com, but if you go there, you’ll just get a landing page to sign up for my email list. I don’t have a full web page set up.

I focused on growing my email list through Bookfunnel and other author promos and I send weekly content to subscribers. I barely post on my Facebook page, but do run ads. My social media focus is Facebook groups and I am working to build active reader groups where I share my books, teasers or bonus content, other people’s books, and have discussions.

HOW DO CHOOSE A PEN NAME?

I think it’s a good idea to check your genre. For some, gender (or perceived gender) may send a signal to consumers. (Joanna Penn talks about that in this post under #3.) I personally chose names I liked that fit more with the genres.

Emma is like everyone’s BFF. You can’t hate Emma! So of course, she writes sweet romance.

Sullivan is a great name. (We almost used it for our fifth daughter!) It’s tough, cool name that generally is a last name. Because it’s not as common as a first name, I think it probably might speak to being a guy’s name, but could be either. This felt like a great, edgy pen name for my more intense YA.

• Dave Chesson at Kindlepreneur has a great post on choosing a pen name.

DO YOU NEED TO CREATE A WHOLE PRETEND PERSON FOR YOUR PEN NAME?

The answer to this goes back to whether or not you’re trying to keep things separate for marketing purposes or SECRET. If you just want some separation, then it doesn’t matter as much if you use the same photo or you have the same bio. If you’re trying to keep it a secret, then you’ll want to consider how to handle the personal info, bio, and images for that person.

I like to create a PERSONA for my pen names. Emma St. Clair is still me. It’s just the part of me focused more on clean romance than the part of me that loves sarcasm and shows like Arrested Development. In my Emma emails, I don’t talk about my love for horror movies, but focus on romantic comedies or Hallmark romances.

Emma isn’t untrue, but is more an edited bit of who I am. We all have a lot of facets to our personality, so for me, I let the pen names shine a light on a facet that relates to the genre.

Some people might be fine with creating a fake person, but it’s hard to keep secrets in the digital age. Just be aware of that. I’d be fine for anyone to know that Kirsten is Emma is Sullivan.

• If you’d like get a fun avatar made for your pen name, I’ve used this artist on Fiverr and been really happy with their work.

 

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So… do you need a pen name?

Maybe. Maybe not.

I think there are strong reasons to create pen names for clear branding and marketing in different genres, especially if you are newer. I don’t think you have to do a ton of work to create a pen name. Keep it streamlined and simple. Don’t feel like you have to be all the places all the time. Do what sells books.

One day, my own personal brand might be a large enough umbrella to house everything, but for now, I’ll keep my own name and the two pen names to write and publish books across multiple genres.

For more discussion on this and other topics, join the Create If Writing Facebook group!

Want to get weekly news, tips and tools? Subscribe to the weekly Quick Fix email. 

This post comes after the news that Mailchimp is making some big changes in 2019. I’ll break down what these changes mean for YOU and whether or not you should switch. Spoiler alert: YES. I’d recommend changing. 

When I very first got started with email in 2013, I used Mailchimp. I heard a speaker talk about the importance of an email list and that’s what she recommended. They had a free plan for up to 2000 emails and were a trustworthy company. I stayed with them until 2015, when my goals were different and Convertkit won me over with their fabulous features. I haven’t looked back.

I’ve still recommended Mailchimp to readers as an okay place to start, though they aren’t my favorite. But coming on the heels of their announcement in May 2019, I’m changing my tune. Here’s why and what YOU need to know.

WHAT’S CHANGING IN MAILCHIMP

Mailchimp has been providing a service: allowing businesses big and small to send emails to their customers. (LEGAL emails. Read more about being legal HERE.) 

Now Mailchimp is moving to become a “marketing platform.” They are adding features that allow them to be more of a CRM (customer relationship management) tool. That tells us a lot. The keyword being: CUSTOMERS. 

In simplest terms, Mailchimp is moving its focus toward bigger businesses and business as a whole. Not mom-and-pop blogs or authors (as much as we really are running businesses). Most of the email services I’ve recommended handle that ONE thing: email. Other big companies like Infusionsoft call themselves a CRM rather than an email service provider. The difference is a different features and a heckuva lot more money.

For most of us, Mailchimp is not focused on providing our needs. But they’ll still provide email, right? Yeah. But I wanted to look at the big picture FIRST–they aren’t here to serve YOU, the author or blogger or creative with a starting-out to average income and business.

Now let’s break down some of the specific changes.

WHY SHOULD YOU CARE?

If you are still using Mailchimp and don’t have more than 2000 subscribers, you’re probably thinking that you’re find and can just stay. You CAN. But there are current and coming changes that will affect you. 

What’s changing:

• (as noted) the focus is now on bigger businesses as a CRM
• free subscriber count now includes unsubscribes as well as active users
• limited audiences for free plan members
• pricing/credits for month-to-month users
• changes to automation (looks like you can’t add new ones now on the free plan)

More things WILL change, but we simply don’t know yet. My guess would be that they lower the free plan to 1000 or less. There is no need for them to keep people on who are just using them for the free plan. Plus, if you’ve been cleaning your list regularly to stay under 2000, those emails you cleaned will now still count. Under that, my old list wouldn’t be a free plan anymore.

If you’ve been on the legacy PAID plan, you’re grandfathered into their pricing. If you are on the FREE plan, when you hit paying levels, you’ll be getting the new pricing. And the month-to-month users’ credits will stop being active.

In short, you’re getting less bang for your buck.

SO, SHOULD YOU LEAVE MAILCHIMP?

You don’t HAVE to. I mean, if you have 200 subscribers, you’re probably thinking, why waste my time moving?

Here’s the thing: before this, I was barely recommending Mailchimp. Their features are clunky and should be way better and easier to use for as long as they’ve been around. They are a powerhouse and should have had features where you could click a link in an email to add a tag or move you to a group. That kind of thing is so hard in Mailchimp that even after watching tutorials on merge tags, I didn’t get it.

They kind of try to hide this by calling some of their features automations and tagging, but where other companies have sophisticated features called the same things, Mailchimps features just don’t do the job.

The best thing about Mailchimp has been the giant free plan. That will likely change, and fundamentally does now that they are counting unsubscribes.

With average features, they are trustworthy in terms of a reputable company, but their goal isn’t to serve YOU. They don’t even have customer service AT ALL for the free plan.

If you have considered a move, I think this is the kick in the pants that you should use to just do it. 

WHAT EMAIL SERVICE PROVIDER SHOULD YOU USE?

I’ve tried all the biggies. Well, almost. I haven’t tried Send in Blue or Active Campaign or Infusionsoft. But I’ve tried Mailchimp, Mad Mimi, Tiny Letter, Aweber, ConvertKit, and Mailerlite. That’s a lot. I’ve paid for plans to test things SO YOU DON’T HAVE TO.

Here are my top two recommendations and who should try each one. I’m an affiliate for each and will share my link, which won’t cost you extra. (And NO, I’m not promoting them because I’m an affiliate. I became an affiliate because I USE and LOVE them.)

Cheapest and Simplest: Mailerlite

This email provider gives you 1000 free emails. They also have features that Mailchimp doesn’t. Their automations are much more powerful and do more. Much more. Once you start paying, it’s not that much AND you have customer service on the free plan.

I use Mailerlite for my Emma St. Clair list, where I essentially have an easy entryway onto my list and sell books. The end.

TRY MAILERLITE! 

Most Powerful and Amazing: ConvertKit

I’ve long been an advocate of Convertkit and still am. Their features are fantastic and streamlined. Easy to use and powerful. If you are simply selling books, this is more than you’ll need. But if you have other things going on like sales funnels and lots of lead magnets and things like that, Convertkit’s features beat Mailerlite’s.

I use Convertkit for my Create If Writing List, where I’ve run webinars and hosted live summits and set up sales funnels.

TRY CONVERTKIT!

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If you’re still unsure, you can check out my post where I go more in depth on which email service provider you should use. READ IT HERE.

You can also read more about Mailchimp:

• David Gaughran-  Big Changes at Mailchimp
• Written Word Media- Mailchimp Changes: Everything Authors Need to Know

For now, you CAN stay with Mailchimp if you’re way under the limit. But you might not want to. Eventually, you WILL want to move and it’s much easier to move now than move later. Trust me.

LISTEN TO EPISODE 166 – SHOULD YOU LEAVE MAILCHIMP?

Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or your favorite podcast app!

 

Also, stay tuned. I’m going to be updating my book, Email Lists Made Easy. Soon. (Every time I want to update, there are new changes…) 

Advice I hear frequently in passing (but apparently not in Google search) is that it may be a good idea NOT to promote your first book until your second book is out. What gives? In this post I’ll tackle whether you should promote your first fiction book AND your first non-fiction book. 

Some of you may have already heard this advice passed down, especially from indie authors. Others of you might be scratching your heads. Why wouldn’t you want to promote your book? Isn’t every book a special snowflake that deserves all the love we can give it?

I want to clarify before I dive too deep that I’m mostly talking paid promos and GIANT promotions that take tons of your time, effort, and calling in favors from other people.

Books won’t generally sell if you just upload them to Amazon. Even if you have great keywords and all the things. We aren’t living in the “if you build it, they will come” era. So, don’t mistake this post to mean that I don’t believe in promotion or that you can sell books without promoting.

I really want to save you money. So this post is for you guys trying to decide when to INVEST in paid promotions for your books.

(And when it comes to paid promotions for your books, you can read this post.) 

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WHEN YOU SHOULD PROMOTE YOUR FIRST FICTION BOOK

Let me start by saying that it matters whether we’re talking first book EVER or first book in a series. If it’s your first book EVER and not in a series, yes! Promote.

If it’s your first book ever and it IS in a series, yes… promote. But maybe don’t pay as much until you figure out what you’re doing.

If you are publishing on a more traditional publishing schedule of like once a year or something, also yes! Promote.

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WHY YOU MIGHT WANT TO WAIT TO PROMOTE YOUR FIRST FICTION BOOK

You might want to wait to promote your first book if… 

…you’re totally new to all this. 

…it’s part of a series that has to be read in order.

…you’re releasing books more quickly.

First of all, I often recommend bootstrapping and starting slow. If you think that you’re going to write multiple books, not just the one, it’s a learning experience. You’ll get better at writing and you’ll get better at promoting and basically all the things. It can be helpful to wait on your spending until you know what you’re doing.

I’ve seen posts from authors who spent hundreds and thousands on books that didn’t ever bring in that return. In some ways, a first book is testing a concept. Can you write? Do people want to read what you’re writing? Are you writing in a niche that sells?

Secondly, if you’re writing a series, you might consider waiting to promote the first book until you’ve got the second one either published or on preorder. Why? Because then when you promote the first book, you are more likely to make more money because if you’ve done a good job hooking readers, they will read through to your next books. The money you spend on promotions will have more ROI because you have more books to buy.

Lastly, if you are releasing books more quickly, it can make more sense to wait. When you’re on a more traditional publishing schedule where you release once a year, this idea of waiting to promote would be crazy. You might promote AGAIN with the second book coming out, but waiting a really long time is silly.

If you’re writing a book a month or every two months, you could more easily wait to invest money in promotions when you have more books to buy. With my first two books, I got way less ROI when I paid for promotions. I sold some of those two books. The end. Now that I have something like ten books, I see a bump in ALL sales (especially other books in the series) when I promote one.

LISTEN TO EPISODE 164 – SHOULD YOU PROMOTE YOUR FIRST FICTION BOOK?

 

 

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SHOULD YOU PROMOTE YOUR FIRST NONFICTION BOOK?

The answer here is a little bit (maybe a LOT) different. I feel like there is a vast difference in how promotion looks for fiction and nonfiction. I’ve found WAY more free options for promoting nonfiction books.

Why? 

Well, nonfiction books (other than creative nonfiction, like memoirs) often contain information that can be parsed out and packaged into other content. For example: I have a book on email lists. I have written a TON of content on this blog on email. (Find that here.) Many of the posts allow me to link to the paid book. I can also write guest posts where I gain authority and promote the book on email. I’ve heard tons of people go on podcasts to talk about the topic they wrote about in their nonfiction book.

Nonfiction books also may have a different purpose. Rather than just sales and money for the book, many authors write nonfiction books to gain authority. Want to start a speaking career? Write a book on something you know. Want to sell coaching packages? Write a book related to what you’ll be doing in your coaching packages.

You can also use your nonfiction books as a sales funnel. I could use my book on email lists to sell a course (which I used to do, but don’t anymore). Or coaching packages (which I also don’t currently do). Your $4.99 nonfiction book could help sell your bigger-ticket items.

All that being said, your nonfiction book may be serving other purposes than just making money in and of itself. That makes the promotional aspect a little different ballgame.

Readers also don’t read nonfiction in the same way. They might read a how-to book on a topic they’re interested in, but they aren’t necessarily going to go buy ALL of that author’s other how-to books. They’ll buy if they’re interested in that topic, whereas in fiction, if readers like that writer’s story, they’ll want more of that AUTHOR.

In case you missed it, YES YES YES YES YES promote your first nonfiction book. Yes. But before you dump in a bunch of money, realize also that you have a ton of other kinds of opportunities to promote that book for FREE by guest posting and going on podcasts.

LISTEN TO EPISODE 165 – SHOULD YOU PROMOTE YOUR FIRST NONFICTION BOOK

Social media is an ever-changing beast. We are over the hype of social media and maybe a little burned out. But it’s still important. So how should you  handle social media in 2019? 

I want to put a big caveat into this post. I’m writing it from a place of social media privilege. I have a solid following on several platforms. When I’m not locked out of my account, I have just shy of 10k followers on Twitter. I have something like that also on Pinterest, last I looked. (Note: I haven’t looked in months.)

I don’t remember how many Facebook page likes I have on my two pages. It’s something in the thousands on one and a few hundred on another. My Facebook group is around 2500. Instagram (which I never use) is something over 1000.

To some of you, those numbers will look small. To others, big.

I bring it up because you need to know where I’m coming from. These numbers matter because they could make you discount my attitude about social media, which is: chill out and stop freaking out about your numbers.

Sure, you might think. Easy for you to say with your 10,000 Twitter followers. 

I get it. But to that, I say: Those 10,000 followers do NOTHING for me. Nothing. I sometimes talk to people on there. But it does not sell books. It does not drive traffic. It may make me look more legit and people might find me there. But it does NOT MATTER OVERALL TO ANYTHING WITH MY BUSINESS.

Actually, I’ve been locked out of my account daily on Twitter for much of the last year, due to some glitch on their end that tells them I’m suspicious.

So, as we get into this and I tell you not to worry about social media, I’m not resting on my laurels. I’m telling you this because I’ve got followers and for the most part, it does very little to help my bottom line and overall goals.

Wow. How’s that for a caveat??

Let’s get into how to handle social media in 2019.

LISTEN TO EPISODE 163- HOW TO HANDLE SOCIAL MEDIA IN 2019

Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or your favorite podcast app!

HOW TO HANDLE SOCIAL MEDIA IN 2019

When it comes to handling social media in 2019 (or 2091 if it’s still a thing), first you need to step back and look at your big goals. What is your big goal?

Even beyond your specific goal, take a moment to realize that your overarching, general goal is to grow an audience that will support whatever content you are creating. You want buyers and readers and supporters for your creative work.

The audience will look different based on your specific goals.  If I need someone to buy 99 cent books, it’s different than needing people to buy a $1000 course. You may have some crossover, but generally, those are different audiences. That will impact where you hang out on social and what kind of content you create, but in general, we are all looking for an audience for our bigger work.

That means that social media is NOT the goal. It’s not the finish line. It is a tool. Social media is a conduit. It’s a means to an end. It is not the be-all, end-all, but a way to find your audience, to connect with them, and to allow that audience to support you.

(The exception is if your goal is to be a social media influencer, which means you’ll be getting sponsored posts and money based directly on the number of Instagram or other followers you have. Still, though, you’ll want to have some other way of connecting and reaching your audience. Cough. Email. Cough.) 

HOW TO BUILD A SOCIAL MEDIA FOLLOWING

We get caught up in the numbers, and it CAN be about that–whether it’s Instagram followers or pageviews or podcast downloads. But more than the numbers, it’s about cultivating the right audience to connect with the content you’re creating. Yes, those numbers represent people. But we should think of them as people, not as followers or numbers or likes. That’s where you start.

Here are my recommendations for building your social media profile:

• Pick a platform you enjoy. If you don’t enjoy it, this will all be harder. If you don’t enjoy it at all, try to find one you can learn to enjoy. Or tolerate cheerfully. Don’t be a grinch. It’s not that bad!!
• For tips on how to use the platforms, look for people who are experts in the space. There are a LOT of them in every space. Find a few. Follow them to see whose advice rings true for you. Do what they’re doing.
• Create interesting content related to your overall goals. Be consistent.

Oh, and above all this: Build your email list. When social media has burned and gone away, email will still be there. (You should really listen to the podcast to hear my analogy for this, by the way…) Email is more permanent and can be more powerful. It won’t change the way social platforms do and is a direct line to them, whereas on social platforms, that platform “owns” your followers.

THE FINAL WORD

In 2019 when it comes to social media, I think we’re all over the hype. We’re a little tired of chasing numbers and the hamster wheel of working to do that.

Let’s get back to basics. Find the platform that feels right to you. Find the one that allows you to connect with people. Follow experts on those platforms to see how best to use it and keep up with changes.

Overall: keep your eyes on the prize. And that prize is NOT your Twitter followers.

This is a topic that comes up every week day in Facebook groups: What do you do when you get bad reviews? (Especially on Goodreads…) So, what’s the answer? I’m not going to give you ONE, but a few options when you’re dealing with low reviews on your books. 

LISTEN TO EPISODE 162 – WHAT TO DO WHEN YOU GET BAD REVIEWS?

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FIRST UP: EVERYONE GETS BAD REVIEWS

 

We’ve all been there. And if you haven’t yet, you WILL. Even great classics have one-star reviews. I promise. Just for funsies, here are some screenshots of actual reviews of Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte:

Oookay, then. Feel better? That’s a classic. (If you ever need a boost, just go read the one-star reviews on great classics. It’s therapeutic.) Point made: we all get one-star reviews. The end.

But knowing that doesn’t always take away the sting. You know you’re in good company, but what should you DO about those pesky low reviews?

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WHAT TO DO WHEN YOU GET BAD REVIEWS

 

There are basically two main options when it comes to reviews: Read them or don’t read them. When authors talk about their bad reviews, the advice often comes hard and fast to avoid reviews at all costs. Especially on Goodreads. (The culture there just seems a little more harsh and reviews tend to be lower.) I want to give you some reasons why avoiding your reviews can be healthy, but also why you might want to read your bad reviews.

Why you might want to avoid reading reviews

There may be a time and a place to read bad reviews, but there is also a time and place to avoid all reviews. You might need some emotional space because you’re having a bad day/week/year. You might be easily wounded and find yourself falling too quickly into despair over things like this.

If you feel like your reviews are having too much of a negative impact on your writing or your person, STEP AWAY. Give it a rest. Don’t read the reviews. Pretend they aren’t there.

Even if it’s just for a short period of time, ignore them. Step away. Give yourself permission to have some space.

WHY YOU SHOULD READ YOUR REVIEWS–ESPECIALLY THE BAD ONES

 

I think it can be very helpful to read through your bad reviews. Yes, it can also stink. It can be discouraging. But you might learn something about your writing OR your readers. Maybe both.

Read through your bad reviews with an open mind, doing your best NOT to get emotional about the content. (Yeah, I know that’s not super possible. Just try.) Take a few minutes to let things sink in and then maybe give yourself a day or two (or a few hours or a week–just depends!) and let the critique sink in.

Come back when you’re less emotional about it. Then think about the words and what the reviewer is saying. Ask yourself some questions and try to answer honestly.

• Is there anything constructive in the review?
• Does anything ring true to you?
• Are there any repeated themes/words/critiques in the bad reviews?
• Can you identify an expectation that readers had that you didn’t fulfill?
• Is there any room for you to grow as a writer from the reviews?

You may not find anything helpful in your low reviews. (Just scroll back up to the Jane Eyre ones!) Sometimes people just won’t jive with your style or your characters.

BUT. If all the low reviews say the same thing, you should really take some time to think about the validity of what they’re saying. You might have missed a genre expectation or you might have some editing issues that need attention or you may need to work on giving your characters more depth.

As an example, when I first started writing as Emma St. Clair, I wrote a Christmas short without having read in my genre. (Don’t do that!) I then wrote a second short that was to connect with a full-length novel to release in the spring. I learned from my reviews that I made a few BIG mistakes. I might not have realized as quickly or been able to examine what I could do better if I hadn’t read those reviews.

I’m not saying you should take every review and change your writing or book. But if the reviews have merit, you can change things going forward OR edit your current work to be a better and stronger work.

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WHAT YOU SHOULD NEVER DO WITH YOUR ONE-STAR REVIEWS

 

I rarely say never. I usually say that you should do what works for you. But in this case, there are a few important things that you should never do. I mean it!

Do not engage. I repeat: do not engage. 

As an author, you cannot spend your time going around responding to bad reviews, explaining yourself, or arguing with reviewers. You will not win. You will just look like a jerk and turn off readers. Resist that urge!

Also, do not get your followers to engage with bad reviews. 

We are living in a time where the mob mentality online is strong. Too often I’ve seen authors or influencers online enlist their followers to take an action that quickly gets out of hand. You do not want to ask all your followers to try to get bad reviews taken down or to otherwise attack or engage with people who don’t like your writing.

Again, it makes you look bad. It also is like bullying. I don’t like the mob mentality in general. It’s damaging and can be dangerous. Be careful that you aren’t abusing your influence.

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PARTING THOUGHTS ON BAD REVIEWS

 

I want to circle back and remind you that we will all have bad reviews. You might be able to learn something from them or you might need to ignore them. But you definitely shouldn’t spend time getting emotionally invested in them or getting your readers to join in the ganging-up mob culture that happens sometimes online. If you can learn something, learn it. Then move on and keep writing.

What do YOU do with bad reviews? Read? Ignore? Something else?