Other Stuff

I’ve used PayPal for about a decade, and since all my businesses are online, I figure I’ve paid about $20,000 in PayPal fees. Recently I opened a new account for my wife, linked to her bank account in Taiwan. It worked fine for a little while, then Taiwan decided it couldn’t let PayPal accounts be linked to just any bank …

This past month I’ve been thinking big and buying up online platforms related to publishing and book design. My little blog gets some traffic, and my book cover design business is doing fine – I just want to be a bigger player. A couple weeks ago I found a little blog network for indie authors – it had a website …

This is a guest post from my friend Sean, who’s an expert on writing books by dictation. I asked him to send me some more information, since using dictation to write books is potentially much faster and may help avoid writer’s block. Simply put, Tonguenastics™ harnesses the power of your tongue and the spoken word instead of traditional typing to …

I’ve written before on the cult of failure; but in case you’re new here, let me lay it out: The “follow your passion” paradigm leads some entrepreneurs to success, but most artists and authors to failure. Passion may be a necessarily ingredient IF you have a strong business idea and a product. But if all you have is passion, and …

You’re writing a book. You want to make sure you do the marketing part right so people know about it, buy it and read it (so that they can rave and tell their friends about it). You know having a “Social Media Strategy” is important, so you might be thinking about setting up a special Facebook page for your book …

A lot of indie publishing gurus talk about being an Authorpreneur or Entreprenauthor – basically referring to the importance of treating your writing and publishing as a business. But something real entrepreneurs are very familiar with is the guy going through the motions of business without actually doing anything. Trying to act like a ‘real business’ and getting everything done …

I put out “Book Marketing is Dead” almost 2 months ago and haven’t thought much about it. It’s doing pretty well and earning positive reviews. Then I showed it to some indie author friends in Puerto Galera, Philippines this week and they both commented on the title: After the main title, the subtitle was all lowercase. That’s also the way …

Most people have goals. They want to write more. Produce more. Start a business. Do the chores. And if you really want to do something, and you enjoy doing it, you may not face too much of a motivation challenge. Except that the things worth doing probably involve some stuff that’s not too much fun. Like editing your book or …

A couple nights ago I met up with Hugh Howey Fan Fic writer Wes Davies over pizza and beer in Tainan, Taiwan; as indie authors we discussed marketing and pricing strategies. The best plan (I continue to affirm) is cheap or free – especially at the beginning, and especially as a lead-in to a series. Lower prices = more downloads, …

I recently had an “Aha!” moment reading Sebastian Marshall’s Ikagai. I’ve written earlier about how “chasing your passion” is bad business advice, but I still essentially cling to the idea that happiness is a worthwhile goal. We have absolute freedom, so – given the option – why not be happy? Surprisingly, there are many reasons. But the biggest one is …