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[DIGEST] Ninc...
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I’m at NINC this week, talking about Author Ecosystems and the Future of Publishing Mastermind. I have basically back to back to back meetings all week, but it’s been a blast.
I’ve been trying to become a member of NINC for 7 years. Even though I’ve been a seven-figure author since 2017, because I mostly work in comics, and selling on Kickstarter and conventions, I have never been able to qualify.
It turns out that if you sponsor an event, you don’t have to qualify as a member. So, I’m very excited right now, but also very tired.
If you want to share how you are doing this week, then there are two ways to interact with this post.
1 - If you don’t want to say anything, or bristle at identifying yourself, then you can reply with this nifty poll.
2 - If you’re feeling very brave, then reply below and tell us how you are doing right now on a scale from 1-5.
Headed to NINC next week, which meant this week was very trying. 2.
What I wrote on Substack: This week, I wrote about the changing landscape of publishing, and how to take advantage.
An hour later, I was standing above ground with a group of Benny’s troops. The three orcs, decked out in battle armor, would lead the charge with their snub-nosed shotguns. Behind them, a dozen goblins would scale the walls and lay down cover fire while the dwarves and I broke through the front gate after the changeling blew the door clean off with a carton of C4. Meanwhile, the pair of elves perched across the street would take out the guards on the opposite roof. The whole plan should take less than two minutes beginning to end once we blew the door.
Candy wasn’t much of a fighter, so I convinced her to stay under armed guard with two troglodytes in Benny’s office. If we all survived, I would deal with her later.
“Don’t die,” Candy said to me.
“Very little chance of that,” I replied. “I’m quite hard to kill.”
She smiled. “I’ll bet you are.”
“Remember that, Candy.” I squeezed her hands tightly, almost violently. “That’s as much a threat as a fact.”
“I got it.” She turned toward the troglodytes, who brought her inside the drug store.
I motioned for the rest of the attack squad to gather around me. “Killing demons is tricky,” I said. “Benny equipped you all with special bullets made of black steel from the bowels of Hell itself. In a moment, I will bless and consecrate them. My mother was an angel, so I can do things like that.” I stared into the faces around me. “Before I do, I want to remind you that demons are fast and strong. They respect a show of force, but it also infuriates them. Demons are hard enough to kill when calm, and even if you do kill them, they just rematerialize in Hell. It might take them eons to get back out, but when they do, they’ll come back with a vengeance. So, don’t let them find out who you are, no matter what.”
New chapters are free, but paid subscribers can access the archives. You also get access to a bunch of free books and stories from my back catalog.
ENDING SOON: I have a Kickstarter live right now for my first new horror comic in close to a decade, and it’s ending
Do you love horror comics? Are you excited about dark and creepy shared universes? Are you ready for me to get back to writing horror comics for the first time since 2015?
Then you'll love Hospice: One Damned Good Thing, a one-shot horror comic about a terminally-ill prisoner who is sent to a hospice to live out his last days, only to find a horrible secret that threatens his very soul.
Upcoming article: Next week, I talk about the entire process of getting 101 paid subscribers and becoming a Substack bestseller. This is the culminate of about six months of work.
On Friday, August 25 at 9:12 AM, I got the email most of us have been striving for and became a Substack bestseller.
What does that really mean though?
Well, first off, I had actually become a Substack bestseller the day before, and as far as I can tell, you don’t actually need 101 paying members to receive bestseller status. All you need are 101 people who have agreed to either a trial membership, to start paying once their upgrade period is over, or to generate at least $1 in revenue from somebody without them canceling their membership.
At the time I received my orange checkmark, I had no less than 20 subscribers who hadn’t paid me even $1. How is that possible?
Eight of them were still in their initial “trial membership” of either 7 or 30 days, and another 12 had been comped a membership and agreed to upgrade once their comp ended.
That means, at the time of my “bestseller” status, I only had about 80 people who had given me any money at all.
Of those, another 17 people were on “hardship scholarships” where they pay as little as $1/year for their membership.
The day I got the email of my bestseller status, my gross annualized revenue was $4,211. That’s 83% of the expected $5,050 that a $50/yr membership should generate over the course of a year for 101 members.
Roundup: Here are some of my favorite articles of the week.
Business-y:
shows the cheap trick of disappearing work, loses their way after winning an Oscar, breaks down the Usage vs. Subscription business models, and sells buying music catalogs.
pitches pitching a movie, teaches AI to doubt itself, grew his Substack to 10,000 in six months, and and animate the Substack button.
Publishing-like:
learned a lot after three years on Substack, writes 25 books, is a creative integrity rebel, and is stuck in a publisher doom loop.
is setting an art trap. talks about about what it really takes to be a successful creator, and give a beginner’s guide to Substack.
infuses her art with storytelling, goes to war with social media, dissect a 10,000 unit book launch, and shows how to write a good email header.
Lifestyle-ish:
finds the right answer sitting by a creek, took six years to say two words, nearly missed having her kid due to anxiety, and upgrades her whole dang life in three steps.
has an Adventure in Wonderland, discusses memento mori, creates without knowing, and lives in the chaos of existence.
kid-proofs her friendships, is better together, makes bloody feet go viral, and loves Jim Croce.
welcomes the pause. takes a break, is enemies with a duck, and lives in a very, very, very small town.
UPCOMING KICKSTARTER: Get Your Book Selling Direct to Readers
Monica and I have been talking about direct sales for a long time, and many of you have asked us to put together another definitive guide like we did for Kickstarter.
So that’s what we did, and it’s coming in November.
Learn how to sell from your website, crush it on Kickstarter, make a profit at conventions, and generally succeed at direct sales. It’s going to be a monster book, and we can’t wait to share it with you.
If you like what I’m doing around here and want to check out the archives, you can do that with a 7-day free trial, or simply go straight to being a paid subscriber. You also get access to my alternate history YA mystery novel, My Father Didn’t Kill Himself.
They say my father killed himself. I don't think so. He was my best friend. He was my rock. He would never take his own life.No. Somebody killed him. I'm sure of it. I just have to prove it. If I don't, we can't collect on his life insurance. We're already in too much debt. Without that money, we'll lose everything.He would never do that to us. I just know it, and I'll prove it, too, even if I lose everything in the process.
Paid subscribers can access the entire archive of this series from the beginning, along with other series and every article I’ve ever written. If you aren’t a paid subscriber, you can access the archive for free with a 7-day trial.