11 Comments

Yes, it's each man/woman for him/herself and all for the publishers who publish for us. Book publishing has come a long way. And so are writing and writers. The market is overpacked and that isn't really a bad thing. It allows many of us to grow, compete and be better, be more creative and give our imagination a boost. I know mine has. Thanks for the ideas. I will look into it. Hope you doing good today.

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I am, Annelise. Thank you! Hope you have a wonderful, creative day!

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Thank you. same to you.

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I like the idea of directly supporting creatives. But even with Patreon and Substack, the writer is left to do all of their own promotion. And realistically, there are only so many subscriptions most people are willing to do each month. If you can find superfans willing to support you, it's a great thing. The hard part has always been getting those fans on your own. As you said, there is an ocean of self-promotion on social media. And few people want to swim in it. Yet you have to build a loyal audience before subscriptions or fundraisers work. Promotion is the necessary evil in writing. Fortunately, word of mouth still works. A genuine recommendation by someone is probably the best advertising you can get. Jimmy should be paying you. 😉🤣

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I agree that self-promotion continues to be the difficulty, even on platforms like Patreon and Substack. The difference I find here is that followers tend to be real followers. On Medium, people spam follow, hoping for follow-backs. I might have had over a thousand followers there, but that never translated to reads. Here, for the most part, a follow seems to be real. The audience I do have is real. I've done no real promotion yet, but am planning on putting a little effort into Facebook Ads on a trial basis and see what happens. I'll let you know!

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Agreed. I have 2.6k followers on Medium but I doubt if 2.4k of them have ever read one of my stories. I have 95 subscribers on Substack. So it is probably the same number of actual readers on both. I got my initial followers from Medium. Then a slow trickle from weekly Twitter promotion. Then Elle Griffin mentioned my newsletter in her newsletter and I have gotten about 70 subscribers in the past two months. So having someone popular recommend you is huge. Of course, you have to have good content to keep them...

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Exactly. I'm slowly growing, even without promoting, so feeling okay about what I'm offering. It will be interesting to see if it changes when I put some effort into it.

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It's a thrill to be able to publish for my 200+ subscribers every day, and also a responsibility that can be daunting but that I cherish. Not every reader is going to love every story, but I know if the stories are told with honesty and passion they will touch someone. And that's all a writer can ask for, though more someones to help me pay the rent would be a beautiful thing. And at about 25 cents a day for a monthly subscription , Roulette Weal is like having a fiction vending machine. Thanks for your support from day one.

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You deserve far more support than you receive, Jimmy. You're a true talent and dedicated to the craft. I wish you thousands of paid subscribers!

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A thousand subscribers would be amazing. 10 new monthly subscribers and I could fill my gas tank and get a sammich :)

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Hoping you pick up a few from this, but people who think nothing of buying Starbucks every day won't spend even a few pennies to support the writer whose work they read.

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