A question I hear from new or novice authors is often about why they aren’t getting sales. From Amazon to serial fiction, it’s always the same. They wonder why readers aren’t flooding their book spaces and why books aren’t flying off the digital shelves. Like anything worth doing, consistency and time matter.
Sure, every so often, there’s a diamond in the rough that becomes an overnight sensation. It’s rare and usually wasn’t exactly as simple as just putting a book up. Often, those “overnight sensations” were backed by money or by connecting to the right people. Speaking as a former talent agent, the majority of these overnight hits won’t be willing to tell you they had someone or something that helped them get where they are. It may seem like these people burst onto the scene overnight with quick success, but in reality, it took a lot of work and backing to get there, often with a substantial amount of behind-the-scenes effort. The fact of the matter is, who you know and how much money is available really does make a difference.
Often, in the age of quick gratification learned from social media and product marketing campaigns, everyone expects overnight success. But with authors, we soon learn that’s not an easy road to the top. Ten years in, and I’m still growing. I’m waiting for that one book to hit a massive following with readers. It would be a dream come true, but I’m still waiting.
Speaking honestly, I wasn’t an overnight sensation as I expected when I released my first traditionally published book through a small press back in the early 2020s. I had been self-publishing on apps and on Amazon prior, and I thought this was my big break.
It wasn’t.
A couple of years in, I realized that my dreams of being a household name as an author were going to take a lot more work. Many times, as authors, we expect big things, but when looking deeper, we realize that we’re not prepared.
BRANDING & MARKETING
Today, I came across an author asking what she was doing wrong because she wasn’t getting any sales. She said she was a new author with three books. Quickly, I went to her profile, and what I found were only a few friends on Facebook, a few dog pictures, and some outdoor images. There was nothing there that showed she was an author. What she described was basically throwing her books up on KDP/Amazon and expecting instant sales.
What she failed to realize is that when she has no presence in the book community, people can’t see who she is or what her books are about. Her first impression is that she isn’t an author at all. Branding is important, but marketing is what gets you seen. When we don’t show that we have anything available to readers, they don’t know you even have books at all.
Of course, people are going to say, I don’t want my friends and family knowing that I’m a writer. Okay, then maybe it’s time to start a separate profile completely dedicated to your work as an author. Gain friends in the writing community, build reader interest, work on your logos and social media posts, start a newsletter, share character inspiration, and most of all, be consistent. Posting once and disappearing isn’t enough. You have to show up, interact, and actually be part of the community you want to sell to. If no one knows you exist, they simply aren’t going to buy your book.
BUILDING AN AUDIENCE
Another hard truth is that you need people to sell to in the first place. Just putting a book out and hoping the right readers find it isn’t a strategy. You have to actively build an audience over time. That means engaging with readers, talking about your genre, sharing your process, and giving people a reason to care about your work before you ever ask them to buy it.
Readers don’t just buy books; they follow authors. If they don’t know you, they aren’t going to trust you enough to spend their money.
PRODUCT QUALITY
Then there’s the part many people don’t want to hear. Sometimes it’s not just visibility. Sometimes it’s the product itself.
If your cover doesn’t match your genre, readers will scroll past it. If your blurb doesn’t hook them, they won’t click. If your formatting or editing is off, they won’t stay. These things matter more than people like to admit, and they directly affect whether someone decides to buy your book or not.
You can have the best story in the world, but if it doesn’t look or read like it belongs in your genre, readers won’t give it a chance.
The reality is that Amazon does nothing to promote authors. Their job is a retail avenue that provides you a place to sell your books yourself, much like having a website of your own, but on a broader scale. Although they do provide marketing and advertising opportunities, you’re the publisher, and all marketing is up to you. Frustrating, but true. I see so many authors think that just putting their books on Amazon automatically will get them seen. They fail to realize that the books promoted are already best-selling authors or are being heavily advertised by the author or their team.
At the end of the day, publishing a book is just the beginning. The rest is up to you.
Loretta Kendall 