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Here at eBook Miner we are all about giving people what they want! Post any ideas that you have here on what you would like to see on the site and we will take that into consideration. Only Authors and publishers please, readers will have their own thread.

a featured section where new books by authors in the group are posted when they come out.

I would just love to be able to read new books by indie authors. I am also writing a book and could use some information as to where to go when I am done with it. I do not know if I would have the resources to publish it myself but if I talk to other indie authors I can get an idea of where to go. Thanks! Nice to be a part of this group.

Annemarie wrote: "a featured section where new books by authors in the group are posted when they come out."

Totally agree

Hi Anne Marie,

We are yet to have our meeting but discussions with other members of the admin team have occurred.

eBook Miner will be launched within the next few months. We are calling this stage one. Within 6-12 months after that, stage two will be implemented where a large amount of additional and new features will be added.

We may put a new book feature on the site, if so, it won't happen until stage two. We may look at putting something on Good Reads for authors who use eMiner. This will be discussed in our upcoming meeting. Thanks for the great idea!

Hi Mollydee, there are many resources for authors on the internet regarding self publishing. We may open a thread on here to assist brand new authors, it is something we are looking at doing. As for anything on the site, this would be stage 2/3 if it was implemented.

We are looking at going in this direction for the site eventually, we will have to discuss it at the upcoming meeting.

As an author, with only one novel, it isn't helpful for me that you only advertise free books. It would be helpful if you advertised new books by Indie Authors, particularly first time novels, that are not free. I think it is unrealistic to think that an author with only one book out should provide it for free. Now down the road, when I have several in my series, I could see offering the first one for a discounted price of 99 cents.

Hi Lilo,
thank you for posting. As a new author it can be difficult to work out what is the best marketing strategy. There is a lot of information out there and it is overwhelming.

At the moment, eBook Miner caters only for listings on Amazon. Amazon offers a program called KDP where authors can list their book free for 5 days out of a 90 day period. This is good for authors because it gets their work read which can be hard in such a competitive market. It is more beneficial for authors who have several books out because if a reader likes the one they got for free, they tend to buy more of that author's work. But, it can also benefit authors who only have one book for yourself, the downside to this though is that you have to list exclusively with KDP (Amazon) to qualify for this program.

We list their free days for authors on Amazon to improve their downloads and get more people reading their books. At the moment (stage one/launch) we will only do Amazon but in the future, we will branch out into other platforms. The reasons for this is we can test our systems with one platform, Amazon is very popular and our limited manpower should be able to handle the work load we anticipate from this. As we grow, we will look at other platforms and help authors there as well.

The good news is we do advertise cheap books, not just free ones. We offer a discounted book section on our site called, "bargain basement." You will be more than welcome to list there in the future. Books will be listed for a full week here, they will also be sent out via our newsletter and broad casted on social media. The fee for this service will be $5 per week, the book must have at least ten reviews on Amazon and a rating average of 4.0 to qualify.

The beauty of KDP is it is a good way to get reviews on Amazon. We hope this reply shows you what we can offer you and other options available for your book. :)

I offer the first ten chapters of my book for free on my website. Having a place on your website where Authors could list a good size sample of their debut novel for free would be another great feature. That way we have the opportunity to share our work. The reader has a chance to get a flavor for it at no risk. We don't completely lose the sale.

There are sites such as first chapter that offer that. At the moment, we won't, simply because we are going in a completely different direction. It is also difficult to do and takes up a lot of server space. We will have the book cover, link, review score and blurb for our listings at this stage but that may change in the future.

Perhaps down the line, we could offer what you are suggesting. We are open to it, but it also depends on manpower constraints (we are a very small team), server space, size of our audience etc.

Never say never though :)

Ahh, well, those are the suggestions that I have, as a first time author, that would make your site desirable for me. You can do with them as you will. Good luck to you in your endeavors.

Maybe down the line we will, but right now it is not feasible because of the previous reasons that were mentioned above. So we guess the question for you is how can we help you as a first time author?

There are many benefits for readers but we will focus on the main reasons for authors which I have listed below.

1. We will offer you several free and low cost programs that will benefit you as an author. We will list your kindle free days, offer a place for you to advertise your book even when it is not free and also (depending on what package you get) promote you extensively on social media.

2. We are currently building up our audience on several social media platforms. When we launch, we will have a solid base and predict that we will continue to grow stronger. We are committed to building a large subscriber and reader database. This will help authors by getting their work out to more people.

3. We will offer the best customer service for any service of our type. Where else can you get several answers to your queries on a same day basis? Our website and social media we utilize including this group will be extremely interactive.

3. We will be innovative, we have already locked in what we will do for stage one. Stages two and three promise to be even more exciting and cutting edge.

4. eBook Miner wants to stand out from the competition and become better. We take all suggestions on board but things take time, it is our aim to be the best at what we provide. We will be the best because of our work ethic, passion and determination.

5. eBook Miner will build a community for authors, readers, publishers, bloggers etc. We will strive to be able to provide authors with more services as we launch each new stage.

6. Several of our admin team have been writers and are published. We understand and are empathetic at how hard it can be for authors to make a living doing what they love.

7. In line with the above, we offer the "Break out program", it is a revolutionary feature that is dedicated to Indie Authors such as yourself. For more information please check the other threads. This program is unique, no other site to our knowledge is doing anything like this.

8. We offer a substantial amount of free spots per genre for authors to advertise their kindle free days. These are on a first come, first served basis. We do this at no cost to the author, we happily do this because we are genuine in our efforts to help writers.

9. eBook Miner allows authors to list up to one month ahead, so that their free days can be locked in. One month ahead is a long time, if authors are proactive then they can guarantee they snare one of the coveted free listings.

10. In the future, we will offer more advice for authors. We will partner with certain blogs/groups and experts in their fields to bring the best advice to you. We will offer dedicated advice and more substantial author services as we grow. In the interim, feel free to ask any questions you like about self publishing, writing etc and we will do our best to help you. If we are not able to answer, we will point you in the right direction.

As an indie author, I'm interested in what your site will be offering. I understand the reason writers offer their books for free to bump sales or get reviews during promotions but I wish so many writers weren't willing to do this. I think it's preferable to discount a book to .99 cents or above to at least acknowledge that our efforts are worth something. It makes it much harder to sell books when there are so many free ones available all the time. Thanks for being open to input! ~

Hi D,
Many authors offer their work for free because they have no prior recognition in the market place. I understand your trepidation regarding this but long term it is a very good strategy. If the quality is there, this tactic can pay big dividends.

eBook Miner caters for Indie Authors, we will have the break out program which to our knowledge no other site has anything like this feature.

We will give Indie Authors more free spots than any other genre on our website.

eBook Miner will encourage readers to review Indie Authors in order for them to get recognition. We will also use our vast knowledge as writers (some of us) to assist Indie Authors when possible.

In the future we will come up with a dedicated network of professionals to help Indie Authors. We will also have a review system that will be more reliable than the one we will in place for stage one. This is an ongoing, long term project and we are looking well into the future to deliver results.

Our customer service is second to none, we are prompt when answering inquires. This is extremely important to us and we will always endeavor to provide fast, concise feedback.

We will also offer the bargain basement feature, where you can list your book under $5. At the moment we are only focusing on Amazon, however it is our goal to branch out to other platforms in the future.

I hope this answered your question. :)

Thanks! I'm interested. ~

Check out our spread the word competition, you can win a book promotion package worth several hundred dollars. :)

D. I agree with you about giving books for free. Author's invest often up to a year of effort writing a book. They offer that effort to a reader at a very low cost. Often authors offer their book for free in the very beginning to get some reviews so that people know their book has value. I can see that and agree with it. But after a month or a few months when initial value has been established through reviews that readers should be willing to pay for the work. I also think that Authors should insist on payment of some sort. At least 99 cents.

I think .99 cents should be the minimum even if an author is unknown. Everyone can afford .99 cents. They can read an excerpt and blurb and get a pretty good idea before they risk .99 cents. I understand needing to get reviews and get some momentum going but a writer should get something for their efforts. There are so many sites dedicated to giving away free books. People never have to pay for books if they don't want to. It does all of us a disservice to give away books. Yet I know these sites will not go away and will create competition for any book that is not free. I'm still interested in the new site but will advertise at low cost. Can you post a link to the new site? ~

Lilo,
We can only give advice as experienced writers. What may work for one author, might not necessarily work for others.

It is definitely a buyers market out there. There are literally millions of choices for readers (as buyers).

We do not buy books to list them, we simply provide a platform for authors to be able to list their free and discounted eBooks easily.

eBook Miner has come up with several initiatives that I have mentioned several times which will be beneficial to Indie Authors.

Recently we posted five great author tips, I suggest all authors check it out as there is some great advice there.

We will list more advice in the future. I don't want to keep repeating myself so up above there is a ton of information on what we will do for authors, especially Indie authors.

The best way for an author to be successful is to persevere. Continue to write and publish more books of a high standard, you will develop an audience. As an Indie Author, a career in writing is more often a marathon, not a sprint. It can take a long time, to "make it." Sometimes this may not even happen, depending on a number of varying factors.

Once again, we DO LIST Books that are not free, this is called the Bargain basement. The cost to advertise here will be $5 per week per book. Books will have to have a minimum of 10 reviews and a 4.0 average rating out of 5 on Amazon to qualify. If it doesn't meet this criteria, it may qualify under our break out program for Indie Authors.

hello again D, at the moment we only list books that appear on Amazon. I have mentioned the reasons why this occurs several times. Please see the other posts on this GR Group for the reasons. In the future we will branch out to other platforms.

We don't list free books as such, we list books that have their free days on KDP which is a program Amazon operates. Normally the free days are 5 out of a 90 day period. If someone has a free book permanently, they would have to put it under the Bargain Basement program because it would not be under our free days feature.

eBook Miner offers Authors a number of paid and free options. We also offer outstanding initiatives for indie authors.

We don't dispute that authors should get paid, in fact we agree with it but we simply provide a platform for both free and PAID books.

Also D, I think your points are valid but misdirected. eBook Miner does not set the prices for books, directs the market or has any power over this.

Yes, I understand the services your site provides. My books are published on Amazon and are enrolled in KDP. I realize you don't set prices and provide a site for writers to advertise. It sounds like a beneficial site for writers with many resources. Can you provide a link? ~

A great post we have on the group is "What is eBook Miner". Please give it a read. We are beneficial for ALL writers, we are especially supportive of INDIE authors as you can see above in the ten point post and our unique Indie breakout program. (The only program of it's kind in existence to our knowledge.)

As for the link, once again, we have not launched yet. We are in the building stages and stage one (launch) will be completed by the end of the year. (Hopefully in the next few months).

In the interim, please have a good look around the multitude of information here and also on our facebook page here:



We have another great initiative that is potentially lucrative for INDIE Authors. This is our "Spread the word" competition, please check it out under our group forum.

If you have any further questions or inquiries please send us a PM so we can stay on topic in the forums. Thank you :)

My books are not on amazon but on smashwords which distributes to most Ebook retailers

Smashwords is a great site. Initially we will only be using Amazon for a number of reasons.

In the future, we will branch out to other platforms. You can still list your books on Amazon if they are on smashwords, you just cannot enlist them in KDP etc.

Can you message me when I can?

it will be updated here. we will also put out a group message :)

Okay thanks

I am relatively new to indie publishing, but I have just released my latest indie novel. There are a lot of sites where you can advertise your free or 99 cent book - and I think there is a huge population of readers who only want those books. I sell all my ebooks for $2.99 and I think that is a good price. Apart from a few giveaways, I am not going to give my books away because I believe they are worth the money. Do you think there is room in the market for quality books to be sold without being discounted?

Robert. There is. I'm selling mine for 4.99. It is getting 4.8 stars. I'm an Indie. I feel the same as you. I'll discount it on occasion, but I won't keep it permanently low. Also, I have noticed no difference in sales between the 2.99 and 4.99 price point. I started at 2.99.

Lilo

Hi Lilo - Excellent! We shall start a new movement! Quality at a price!

Interesting about your prices though. I started at $3.99 and then reduced to $2.99 and I am getting more sales. But the increase in sales is not necessarily connected with the reduction in price, so I shall think about moving upwards one day.

But the point is, a good story, well written (and that is my objective always) is worth a few dollars surely.

It is purely up to the author on how to price the book but I would recommend experimenting with price. There are so many authors out there, that readers can be reluctant to pay $5 for an eBook off an unknown author.

You say quality at a price and I am not disputing that but how does the reader know that they are going to be getting quality off an unknown author?

Being an Indie author is a marathon for most, not a sprint. Yes some get lucky and make it big straight away, most of us though have to plug away at it.

L.R. makes an excellent point.
There are a number of sites who offer discounted and free eBooks because that is what most readers want.

I will give you an example- With Kindle Prime, 99% of readers are going to be more inclined to download a book (for example) by Lee Child as opposed to a new writer.

They know the quality is there and that is if both books are free to borrow. If they had a choice between 5 well known authors/best sellers or 10 brand new indie authors, the vast majority of the time they will pick the first option. There is a lot of great new talent emerging but there are also some really bad ebooks.

We offer the Indie Breakout Program for Indie/up and coming writers. You can read more about it in other threads on here.

Just out of a matter of interest Robert, would you be prepared to have your book independently and professionally reviewed for a flat fee? On the proviso that if it was a book worthy of 4 + stars, it could be featured at a higher price on one of these websites?

I ask that question because I am interested in your opinion.

You all make excellent points here. There is something to be said for pricing your book high enough to reflect its real value - I mean, if indie authors keep selling their books for .99, eventually readers will believe that's all their worth. On the other hand, newer authors do have to be careful not to price themselves out of the market entirely. It's a very delicate balance, and difficult to know how to maintain. I agree that the best option is to experiment with pricing and see how readers respond. That is, after all, one of th beauties of being an indie author - you can make your own terms.

How about a section where people can leave testimonials regarding cover design artists, editors....

Christine wrote: "How about a section where people can leave testimonials regarding cover design artists, editors...."

Good idea.

I am considering taking my books down from Amazon. I know they are a large part of the market but I get very few sales from them and they have yet to price match my books to free for a year.

I'd like to set up an author's page prior to publishing. I will publish in mid July 2014 and I'd like to tweak my author's page before that. Could Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ, does Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ verify that I'm not just blowing smoke and let me set it up? If this is an option how do I get started? Thanks.

Allen- /help/show/1...

Christine, your idea has merits, we will be moving in that direction in one of the stages after we launch. Initially that won't be offered but we definitely want to move in that direction!

Louise it may be wise for you to take them down off that service as they can take a long time to price match.

Lots of good points here. The indie market is going through a lot of change, so we all have to experiment to see what works best. Quality control is a real issue - I read a lot of indie books that either should never have been published, or that require a lot more editing. My editing process takes a long time and I have some beta readers that I trust - but it is still difficult! Would I be prepared to have my books professionally reviewed for a flat fee? Possibly - how do you convince readers that this review is the 'gold' standard? Many charlatans out there ...

Robert wrote: "Lots of good points here. The indie market is going through a lot of change, so we all have to experiment to see what works best. Quality control is a real issue - I read a lot of indie books tha..."

I have to agree with much of the above. While it's great to have the control of being an indie author, there is a lot of sub-par work published under this mantle. I agree that you need to be in it for the long haul; I do believe quality work will have lasting sales, but it may take a long time to get there -- with so many titles flooding the market. I don't know about paid reviews -- I've read a lot of warnings against them. If, as Robert says, there's some way for readers to know the reviews are genuine and not a type of 'vanity' review, maybe...

I'm not sure if it has been mentioned, but you might also want to list Kindle Countdown Promos that Amazon allows authors to run. It's a great way for authors who don't want to go completely free (even if only for a little while) to discount their books and get some notice in the crowded market.

Hi Gabriel, we do have a discounted books section, authors can post directly into that folder.

Will that be on the site, once it's up, or somewhere here on Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ?