Sam’s Town, Las Vegas
November 6-8, 2018
Welcome to 20Books Vegas! Some of self-publishing’s best will be there in addition to many who have yet to publish their first book and all people in between.
From witches to werewolves, and the people who love them. Eyes watching from the dark. A checklist how-to. A boat floating on the open ocean. A young woman with unknown power. A man, frail in his old age. An alien, who’s not alien at all.
We tell stories. We offer advice. We are the indies, and 20Books is about indies supporting indies with the belief that a rising tide floats all boats.
Everyone is at a different place in their journey up the mountain. The mountain of success where we all have different definitions. Whether it’s money or fame or self-actualization, we are all here for one reason and that’s to do a little better than we did yesterday.
Our personal struggles, whether medical issues, family, money, or personal strife – those issues don’t define us. Our stories and our books are what the rest of the world will know about each and every one of us. What does your story tell them?
We publish, baring our souls before the world, in the hopes that we can make a few nickels, bank some cash to help us keep writing. We want to tell stories that the readers love, that the readers are willing to pay for.
We’re here together, to learn from each other, reach a hand down, and help the next person up. No matter where you are on your journey, there’s always another level.
Recently, I saw an ad for the ebook of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. Even JK Rowling thinks there is another level of sales when we think she is already standing at the top. Even a billion dollars in book sales isn’t the top. JK Rowling taught us that you can keep climbing.
Your world starts with the first sentence of your book, then the next and the next until one day the story is told. You write, ‘The End,’ and then you go back through it until you’re ready to puke, then you hand it off to an editor, almost throwing it at her like an unwanted pastrami on rye. She comes back with platitudes and recommendations. You fix it and then what? You look at your cover, your blurb, a marketing campaign. What happens if it’s successful? What happens if it’s not?
We’re authors, and we’ll keep writing. My first book sold 56 copies. That is its lifetime sales number. But I learned and moved on because I kept writing. Better words, better stories, better marketing.
Every one of you has it in you to make more money tomorrow than you did today in your author business, but if you start today, the fruits of your labors will show up in two or three months, just like planting your garden, success is nurtured, planted now to bear fruit later.
Many of you expressed concern about being in a setting like this, so many people, so many strangers. Don’t look at the differences, but look at what we have in common. When someone asks you how many books you’ve sold, there is only one answer. Not enough. Whether you write short stories for anthologies, have free reader magnets, sell everything at full price, write a book a month, or a book a year, there are all kinds of ways up the mountain. But understand, there is only a single universal when it comes to the business of being an indie.
People have to be willing to pay for what you write.
Storytelling, branding, marketing. There a million different ways, and no one person has your answer. That’s up to you to discover and put into practice. What we’re trying to do over the next three days is provide a smorgasbord of ideas, techniques, hacks, and information for you to build a better you, a better authorpreneur.
You are a small business, and Uncle Sam thanks you for your success! As a self-published author, you and you alone are responsible for everything you do and don’t do. It is an awesome responsibility.
Being an author is a lonely business. It comes down to you and your computer, memorializing your words and then putting them in print, casting them upon the digital waves of the universe. It is lonely, but you don’t have to be alone. 20Booksto50k shows that we are in this together, and our goal is that you take what you learn here and climb to the next level in your author journey.
Thank you for believing in the premise of 20Books, believing in yourselves, and joining us in Vegas for what is going to be a great show. Get out your pens and notebooks, it’s time.
Welcome to 20Books Vegas.
