We reached the halfway point of the summer semester of #ACXU2016 with this Wednesday’s panel, our Studio Gear Review. We covered the four essential pieces of equipment in your recording chain, showcased budget and high end setups, and learned what Audible Studios uses to create their Grammy and Audie award-winning productions.
The Studio Gear Series – The ACX Blog – Want to learn even more about audiobook home studios, recording chains, and production best practices? Read our previous posts on the topic here.
The Worst Acting Advice Ever– Via Paul Strikwerda – What separates a professional from a wannabe behind the mic? The answer may be more basic than you think.
How to Write Subtext in Dialogue – via Helping Writers Become Authors – Find out how to write masterful dialogue that comes alive in your narrator’s telling.
7 Easy Ways tob Connect with Readers – via The Write Practice – These days, more writers means a more competitive marketplace than ever for the eyes and ears of your fans. A successful author will actively think about how they earn their attention.
ACX University 2016 – via ACX – Classes start Wednesday! Find out about upcoming topics, download calendar reminders, and get ready by watching last year’s panels.
What AGE is Your Voice? – via CourVO – What are your thoughts on the debate between the importance of how old you are vs. how old you sound?
Summer Heat Can Make You Sick – via Dr. Ann Utterback – Don’t let the dog days ruin your voice. Get the doctor’s ten tips for vocal health this summer.
Have you heard the news? We’re taking ACX University online, with six interactive, live streamed panels coming your way Wednesdays this summer starting July 13. Subscribe to our YouTube channel to get notified about our interactive sessions covering audiobook production, performance, and business topics. Then, check out our favorite links from the past week below.
For Producers:
[VIDEO] ACX University 2015 – via ACX – Get ready for this year’s event by catching up on our panels from last year.
Recharging the Batteries– via Rob Marley – Learn how even a small break from focusing on your voiceover routine can pay dividends.
Busting Five Voice-Over Myths – via Nethervoice – Learn the truth behind the most common misconceptions about a career in voice acting.
For Rights Holders:
How to Develop an Author Website and Blog – via IngramSpark – “Your author website is the center of all activity for promoting your writing. Done right, it provides the foundation for success in marketing and promoting your books.”
Online Marketing for Authors – via BookMarketingTools – From content marketing to SEO, this comprehensive guide covers many of the digital marketing topics authors need to learn.
The First Wave – via CreateSpace – What is your first wave, and why is it so important to your marketing efforts? Click through to find out.
5 Things Most Self-Publishing Authors Overlook – via Book Marketing Tools – “To avoid making the common mistakes, review the following 5 things you should always check off your pre-publishing list.”
Do Writers Offer A Dialogue Or A Rant? – via BookMarketingBuzzBlog – “The good author…tries to think like the reader and understands the assumptions, standards, and knowledge that such readers operate under.”
Do You Need a “Change of Pace”? – via VoiceBank.net – This post outlines a simple exercise you can add to your practice routine to help control the speed at which you read.
Marketing Tip: Keep Your Email Signature Clean – via CreateSpace – “When authors try to include too much about themselves and their books in their signatures, it looks messy, really messy.”
For Producers:
Voice-Over’s Seven Deadly Sins – via Nethervoice – Do you need to confess to committing one or more of these voiceover vices?
Picking the Right Royalty Share Projects – via The ACX Blog – Author/producer Craig Tollifson discusses how he reviews potential royalty share productions. Click through to read or listento his advice.
Like to listen? Click on the player below to hear this post in audio.
As an author, actor, and audiobook producer, Craig Tollifson brings a unique perspective to ACX. His publishing industry background has allowed him to make the most of the time he spends auditioning by putting his effort into the most promising titles. He joins us today to share his tips for picking the best Royalty Share projects.
ACX Author/Narrator Craig Tollifson (aka Andrew Tell)
The first audiobook I narrated went on sale in early 2015. It sold 11 copies. Since then, I’ve narrated 19 other titles, learned a lot about narrating, and learned even more about choosing good Royalty Share projects. This month I’ll pass 10,000 total sales, and recently averaged over 1,500 sales a month. And those numbers just keep going up. Not bad for a beginner!
I got my start on ACX as an author. I had my novella, The Junior Arsonists Club, produced as an audiobook by the talented Amy McFadden. I was interested in eventually narrating my own work, and had experience as a stage actor, so I decided to jump in and try it myself. Now I’m a full-time audiobook narrator and no one can say it’s weird that I sit in a giant box and talk to myself all day.
Having been on the other side of the fence as an independent author has helped shape my choices as a narrator. I knew from the start I wanted to pursue Royalty Share projects. For years I’ve followed the indie publishing scene and noted a parade of successes, like Hugh Howey, Michael Bunker, and many more. The potential to earn more than a regular Per-Finished-Hour rate over the long term and gain passive income was very appealing. I also knew that I had to be smart in choosing the right projects. I had to get good at picking the books with the most potential for success.
ACX gives you the basic research right on the project page. Now, let’s assume you’re skilled at narration, you’re interested in the project, and your voice is a good fit for the work. Here are some of the key points to consider:
The Amazon sales rank can be very important for predicting success. This number represents sales per day compared to every other book in the Amazon store. Audiobook and eBook sales tend to rise and fall together. Remember, this is one product on two platforms. The lower the sales rank, the better! Without going into too much detail: a sales rank under one hundred is amazing. Run to the booth and start auditioning! A sales rank in the thousands is pretty great (remember there are over a million books in the Amazon store!). When you get over a hundred thousand, or two hundred thousand or more, well…that’s not so great. But remember: this rank is only a snapshot of one moment which represents that day’s trend. Message the Rights Holder on ACX to see how the book has been selling historically. Oftentimes, a great rank can be the result of a recent promotion, and when the promotion’s over it can completely sink again. Also, make sure the number you’re looking at is the paid rank. If the book is free, the rank loses a lot of its meaning and is not a good predictor of audiobook sales.
The more reviews the better, and the reviews should be mostly positive. Take some time and read some of those reviews. I recommend reading the most recent reviews, as early reviews are often solicited. Click through some of the reviewers themselves and check their profiles–if it’s the only book they’ve reviewed, it’s likely they are friends or family of the author and shouldn’t be considered. Reviews are also great for quickly getting a sense of the story, often more so than the author’s description, or first few pages of the book.
Length of time on sale is a great metric when combined with the number of reviews and sales rank. A book that’s selling great, and has been on the market for, say, two years may have better potential than a book that’s only been out for two weeks with the same sales rank.
Evaluate the rest of the author’s catalog–every last book–with the same criteria as the one up for production: sales rank, reviews, etc. If they have other audiobooks, even better. Ask the Rights Holder how many copies the other audiobooks have sold. Or, check to see how many ratings the other audiobooks have on Audible. More ratings mean more copies have been purchased.
Now that you’ve done your research, you need to define success. Though you’re not working for a Per-Finished-Hour (PFH) rate when producing Royalty Share projects, you should still be thinking about how much you hope to earn. What is your time worth? Recording usually takes around 2 hours in the studio for every finished hour of audio. Then there’s editing, proofing, and mastering, which can add 3-4 hours (or more!) per finished hour of audio. You could easily be putting in 6 hours for every finished hour. With all that in mind, come up with your ideal PFH rate for the project. Multiply it by the length of the book in hours. Now, divide that total with a ballpark royalty and you’ll see how many copies you’ll need to sell to be satisfied that you’ve made a good decision. Do you really think the audiobook can sell that many copies? Does the Rights Holder? If you’re on the fence about a project, I find that thinking about earnings goals can help cement a decision.
Once the book is produced and on the market, you and the Rights Holder both have a stake in its success. Before you jump into your next production, spend some time marketing. I spend time every week promoting titles via giveaways and soliciting reviews. Social media can be a great resource if you find the right communities. There are a ton of places online that fans gather to discuss their favorite genre, like Goodreads, reddit, and many Facebook groups. Get yourself into those communities. You’ll meet fans and authors, both of which will help your audiobook career.
The last thing you’ll need is a little bit of luck. All the points of research can add up to the best looking potential project on the planet, and you can do great promotion, but still…the audiobook may not sell well! Royalty Share comes with an element of risk. Your job is to find the ones with the best odds.
I hope that the research tips I’ve given you today can help you choose the best bets for success.
Craig Tollifson is the author of the Kindle Single the Junior Arsonists Club, the forthcoming novel Happy, and has written for Mystery Science Theater 3000. When he’s not writing or performing on stage, he narrates audiobooks under the name Andrew Tell. He lives with his wife and kids in sunny Los Angeles, California.
10 Tips To Target Your Demo (and Voice Over Business) For Success – via Marc Scott & Anne Ganguzza – “[P]otential customers may have varying degrees of experience in hiring voiceover talent, and the more you can help to educate them in the process, the closer you will be to booking the job!”
What Are the Ingredients of a Successful Marketing Plan? – via Digital Book World – With more people going out of their way to avoid ads, content marketing is the future of book marketing. Learn six key aspects of content marketing success.
On Author “Brands” – via The Bookseller – “[H]ow do you maintain your brand while also delivering a story that feels fresh and enticing? Should this even be a concern for authors?”
We’re back to close out 2015 by highlighting some of our best pieces of the year. Some will educate, some will inspire, all should remind you of the awesome opportunity audiobooks present as we look towards 2016.
For Producers:
Mastering Audiobooks with Alex the Audio Scientist – Our resident audio expert brought his “A” game to the blog this year, educating producers on a range of recording and production topics. This post tackles one of the more intimidating aspects of post-production with an illustrated, step by step guide.
ACX University Presents: Finding Your Voice: Part 1 – This May, we hosted our third annual ACX University, which offered 70 producers in-person courses on audiobook production and performance. All of the sessions are available to watch on our YouTube channel, including this performance intensive featuring Audible Studios producers and Audie Award-winning narrator Ellen Archer of Orange Is the New Black.
ACX Storytellers: Anna Parker-Naples– One of our first UK producers shares her inspiring journey from the stage of the Royal Shakespeare Theatre to self-made audiobook success.
Archive: This Week in Links – Our weekly look at the best audiobook-related links from around the internet provided a range of perspectives, advice, and entertainment. We featured over 150 links for producers, so take a scroll through some of the best the voiceover industry had to offer in 2015.
For Rights Holders:
Market Smarter, Not Harder: The Personal Touch – Author Ryan Winfield dove deep on the ways he invested his time and reinvested his audiobook earnings to forge a personal connection with his listeners that paid off in the form of a loyal fan base.
You Kept Your Audiobook Rights – Now What? – Three top authors discuss the varying benefits of self-publishing your audiobooks or selling the rights to an audio publisher like Audible Studios.
ACX Storytellers: Joanna Penn – The “author entrepreneur” offered an inside look at what a writer who want to narrate their own work need to know to succeed.
Creating Your Custom Audible 30-Day Free Trial Link – Authors (and producers!) can learn how to create a powerful marketing tool for their audiobooks – a custom landing page on Audible.com featuring any of your ACX projects.
ACX Storytellers: Sandra Edwards and Regina Duke – Two ACX authors share their takes on the value of a mentor/mentee relationship, as well as their top tips for audiobook publishing and marketing success.
Here at ACX, we’re proud of the work you’ve done creating thousands of audiobooks in 2015. We hope the education we’ve shared this year has helped make you a better audiobook producer, publisher, and marketer. Before we look forward to 2016, we’re counting down the top links – based on your clicks – published in our This Week in Links series this year.
4. The Twitter Secret – via BadRedheadMedia – Learn how online fan acknowledgement could be secret ingredient in your successful author platform.
3. Six Magic Phrases You Can Use to Sell More Books– via where writers win – Learn key words to use in your “Amazon sales page, your website, your book announcement press release, your e-mail announcement, and other promotional materials that will help you sell more books.”
2. How To Promote Your Self-Published Book On The Cheap – via Book Marketing Tools – New authors may not have the robust marketing budgets of the established players. Use these tactics to jump start your promotions.
2. What’s Your Production Process? – via Wayne Farrell – The Audible Approved Producer shares a step by step guide to his production method. A must-read for new narrators.
e better, and the reviews should be mostly positive. Take some time and read some of those reviews. I recommend reading the most recent reviews, as early reviews are often solicited. Click through some of the reviewers themselves and check their profiles–if it’s the only book they’ve reviewed, it’s likely they are friends or family of the author and shouldn’t be considered. Reviews are also great for quickly getting a sense of the story, often more so than the author’s description, or first few pages of the book.