Tag: Amazon

2025 Marketing Plan: Trying to Get Organized!
Audiobooks · Book Promotion · My Books · My Thoughts · Self-publishing

2025 Marketing Plan: Trying to Get Organized!

Larada Horner-MillerLeave a comment
Things To Do Before 2025

My 2025 Marketing Plan has been hard to figure out this year. Being on gabapentin and dealing with the nerve pain, I haven’t been able to focus! Now is the time though! 2025 is slipping away!

So, I have three prongs to focus on:

  1. Face-to-Face sales
    1. Paperbacks
    1. Hardbacks
  2. Online sales
    1. Books
    1. Cookbooks
    1. Audiobooks
  3. Free Poetry Chapbook
Vision Board - 2025

My Nine Books

If you have forgotten the titles to my nine books, here they are and the titles are links to their Amazon page!

My Seven Books - 2025
Two new books - 2025
  1. This Tumbleweed Landed
  2. When Will Papa Get Home?: A Story of Hope In the Midst of Prejudice
  3. Let Me Tell You a Story
  4. A Time to Grow Up: A Daughter’s Grief Memoir
  5. Just Another Square Dance Caller: Authorized Biography of Marshall Flippo
  6. Coronavirus Reflections: Bitter or Better?
  7. Hair on Fire: A Heartwarming & Humorous Christmas Memoir
  8. Was It a Dream?: Navigating Life’s Journey Through Poetry
  9. Is My Truth Universal?: A Woman’s Poetic Odyssey

Face-to-Face Sales

Right now, I have a surplus of books on hand, especially copies of Flippo’s biography, Just Another Square Dance Caller: Authorized Biography of Marshall Flippo.

I overbought copies at what I thought was the end of the pandemic May 2021. Our annual square dance festival, Hot August Nights, was coming and would be a great venue to sell more of Flippo’s books, so I loaded up for that event! It was canceled, so that ended that. And I ended up with extra copies, both hardback and paperback.

Another factor contributing to my excess inventory: Flippo passed away November 8, 2018, so he died before we published the book May 8, 2020. At first, I had a run on orders—mostly through my website because of the pandemic. Fans stayed engaged for a couple years, but two years ago, I went to the CALLERLAB convention in Reno, Nevada and several callers didn’t know who Flippo was! Callers and dancers haven’t forgotten Flippo and the importance of his life to the square dance world.

So, this continues! During the holidays, I offered the paperback and hardback half-price and got little movement.

So, I have extended the half-price sale on all my books except my new poetry book, Was It a Dream?: Navigating Life’s Journey Through Poetry. Visit my Etsy Shop, Larada’s Reading Loft, https://www.etsy.com/shop/LaradasReadingLoft, to take advantage of the sale on most of my books, but not my cookbooks.

Etsy Shop & Shopify Store

Do you want an autographed copy of one of my books? Then you need to go to my Etsy Shop, Larada’s Reading Loft, or my Shopify Store, Larada’s Bookstore, and I will do that!

Online Sales on Amazon

Are you a regular at Amazon? I’m proud to say I have eight books on Amazon and three audiobooks. You can buy paperback, hardback, e-book or audiobook of three of my books. I plan on focusing on a different e-book each month with major discounts, so read everything you get from me.

My Audiobooks

My three audiobooks are available on Amazon, Chirp and other audiobooks sites. See the listings below for your favorite distributor.

My Free Chapbook

Download Is My Truth Universal?: A Woman’s Poetic Odyssey at https://www.amazon.com/My-Truth-Universal-Womans-Odyssey-ebook/dp/B0DKDKWSJZ. It’s a free prequel to my four-book poetry series. Sample poetry from younger days.

2025 is my eleventh year of self-publishing my books! You have two choices if you are interested: buying directly from me through a face-to-face event or from my two online stories or buying from Amazon or other distributors online.

So, the question is: have you bought one or more of my books? If you haven’t bought one, now would be a great time to buy one or two or more. Don’t hesitate!

Hair on Fire

Hair on Fire: A Heartwarming & Humorous Christmas Memoir e-book on sale for $1.99

Was It a Dream?: Navigating Life’s Journey Through Poetry e-book on sale for $.99

Is My Truth Universal book cover - 2025

Is My Truth Universal?: A Woman’s Poetic Odyssey e-book – FREE

Buy My Audio Books:

This Tumbleweed Landed

This Tumbleweed Landed audiobook cover

Let Me Tell You a Story 

Let Me Tell You a Story audiobook cover

Hair on Fire: A Heartwarming & Humorous Memoir Audiobook

Hair on Fire: A Heartwarming & Humorous Christmas Memoir audiobook cover

Setting a Book for Free on Amazon: Not Easy!
My Thoughts · poetry · Self-publishing

Setting a Book for Free on Amazon: Not Easy!

Larada Horner-MillerLeave a comment
Free e-book

Setting a book for free on Amazon is not easy! Remember I am creating a lead magnet for my four-book poetry series. Yes, I finally have it up on Amazon, but now I need to set the price. It’s not straight forward!

Preparing a Book/E-book on Amazon

First, on kdp.com I created a new book and identified the name of the book, subtitle, author and a description. Then I uploaded the manuscript and the cover. After that I ran a preview program to make sure it looked the way I wanted it to as an e-book.

Before starting this task of creating a new e-book, I used a program, Publisher Rocket, to identify the three categories and the seven keywords/phrases that might attract more searches and ultimately more readers. From this research, I took my two lists and entered them on KDP.com. These two pieces contribute to the success of my book, so I take time to be sure I have them right.

Next, I have to price the book. This is where I ran into trouble. Remember, I want this chapbook/e-book, Is My Truth Universal?, to be free as a lead magnet to my four-book poetry series. Why? Remember, it’s free to entice readers to sample my poetry and then, hopefully, purchase my four other books. (Three of them haven’t been published yet!)

This felt like a roadblock, but I did what I always do when I need help. I googled how to price an e-book free on Amazon! Well, it gets complicated at this point, but I found a tutorial and remembered somewhere in my eleven-year journey of self-publishing there was a way around it.

Why and How to Make Your Book Permanently Free on Amazon – Updated for 2024

Here’s what the tutorial said:

  1. Price the book as $.99 on Amazon and do not make it KDP Select.
  2. Go to either Barnes and Noble or Kobo and publish the book and set it free.
  3. Then go back to KDP and go to the Help Center and find Price Matching and email them to match the price of where you published it.

What I learned

I have to give Amazon and the other company time to publish the e-book, so it can take 72 hours, but it usually doesn’t. (It didn’t take 72 hours. Amazon has published it within hours.) My next steps: wait for Kobo to show it in their store. The email in the KDP Help has a template, asking for specific information that comes from the listing like: ASIN / Kindle Store: .COM, UK, DE, etc. / Current competitor region link(s) / Current competitor price.

So, now I must wait for Kobo to do their work, then I will send the email and Amazon will drop the price from $.99 to $.00 because they price match. Whew! What a journey!

UPDATE FROM LAST WEEK ON COVER

Wat It a Dream? cover - Free

Last week, I told you about the cover for my new poetry book, Was It a Dream? where I found two mistakes in the text. The cover company who created my beautiful cover, 100covers.com, came through again in two days, fixing the mistakes and helping me get the book done. Hopefully, the book will be published this week as an e-book and the paperback will be available in a week or so.

So there you have it! The intricacies of self-publishing keep me hopping for sure! I’ll let you know when my chapbook/e-book is free on Amazon and you can sample my poetry and make a decision about purchasing my first book in the series!

Podcasts & My Interviews

Buy My Audio Books:

This Tumbleweed Landed

This Tumbleweed Landed audiobook cover

Let Me Tell You a Story 

Let Me Tell You a Story audiobook cover

Hair on Fire: A Heartwarming & Humorous Memoir Audiobook

Hair on Fire: A Heartwarming & Humorous Christmas Memoir audiobook cover

Great Book News: An Award & #1 in Three Categories!
Christmas · Christmas · Coronavirus · My Thoughts

Great Book News: An Award & #1 in Three Categories!

Larada Horner-MillerLeave a comment
News - Great Book News

I’ve had great book news recently. This week, two of my books have received critical acclaim. All my hard work pays off.

Great Book News #1

Coronavirus Reflections: Bitter or Better? won the 2023 New Mexico/Arizona book award in the category of Self Help/Guide. This book was also a finalist in the health category. Last year, it also won the 2022 New Mexico/Arizona book award in the category of Body, Mind & Spirit (health/humor).

This blog became the foundation for that book—the inspiration because I wrote the core in this blog during the pandemic. It saved my sanity as I processed what I went through during the pandemic. I wrote in poetry and prose format. The reader has a choice: read it from cover-to-cover, or the chapters stand independently. Each chapter begins with a thought-provoking photo and quote. Then the chapter ends with a reflection question to ponder. Read, reflect and respond—so we can move on to better, not bitter.

For those interested in buying this award-winning book, choose of one the links below:

You can also buy it from me and get your own autographed copy. Contact me at Larada@LaradasBooks.com for the details.

More Book News

My newest book, Hair on Fire: A Heartwarming & Humorous Christmas Memoir, hit #1 on Amazon in three e-book categories:

  • Christmas (Kindle Store)
  • US Historical Biographies
  • Christian Inspiration

Again, some of my blog posts make up a foundational part of the book with many additional snippets of my Christmas memories.

I love Christmas and this seemed like the next nature book for me to write. The hard part—editing, revising and creating it in July! I put on Christmas music and enjoyed the season out of the season!

My E-book of Hair on Fire

Yes, I got the e-book published before we went to Germany and Austria—Bavaria (more about Germany starting next week). Being super-organized, I had to set up all the promotions before we left, so I had busy days ahead of that trip. 2916 readers from nine countries downloaded my new e-book from: USA, UK, Canada, Australia, India, Germany, Mexico, France, and Italy. Those numbers pushed it to #1 in the three categories.

My Paperback of Hair on Fire

So, while we were in Germany, I finally got the final cover, so I uploaded it one night. I proofed the book online, but there was an issue. It said that the trim size (size of the book) didn’t match something, so they adjusted it by resizing it. I knew the trim size of the interior of the book and the cover matched so it could have been an international issue. That night I order a “proof” copy and it arrived on Thursday, the day after we got home.

Oh, no! The text was like shrunk to the center of the page, leaving a large margin all the way around. I spent several hours proofreading it that day, and I realized the “proof” didn’t have the Table of Contents! Oh, no, again! In my rush before we left, I had not selected the Table of Contents to be printed in the print copy of my book. I fixed that easily.

But I had another issue—the cover fit a book of 230 pages. After adding the Table of Contents and fixing a layout problem, I had 224—fewer pages! Now, how did that happen? So, I spent several hours going through and enlarging pictures and doing what I could to rearrange parts! Finally, I ended up with 230 pages, so I uploaded the revision, ran it through the Previewer online and published it.

The print copies will be here on Tuesday, October 2, so I’m excited.

On Thursday, when I opened the package with the “proof” copy, I got all choked up! The first time I see my book in print seems surreal! My words, my stories, my poems! What an emotional experience.

So, I will spend the next two months promoting it before Christmas and I will have a book launch sometime soon. Listen for the details.

Finally,

My seventh book published! Great book news this week about two of my books! Life is good!

If you’re interested, catch the e-book at this discounted price of $1.99 for a limited time at:

You have a choice for the paperback: either buy an autographed copy from me at Larada@LaradasBooks.com

Or

Go to Amazon. The price is the same: $15.00.

Because this book would make a great Christmas gift for everyone in your family, keep tuned in. I’m going to have some great prices for the purchase of three books or five books. Buying five copies will be the best price!