SWIPE RIGHT-DELETE

"Don't hate the player, hate the game."-- Ice- T

Going through the emails I get in my author account, I come across a dozen or so a day from campaigns soliciting marketing offers. One by one, I swipe-delete. Now and then, one catches my eye. Here is one from this morning: (copy-and-pasted, word for word)

Are you ignoring my message or are we in the middle of some weird literary cliffhanger?

Because if this is your way of building tension 10/10, author. You got me. 😅

I reached out because your book (and let’s be honest, all your effort) deserves better than the Amazon algorithm playing hide and seek. Yet here we are… I’m pitching real readers, real reviews, real visibility… and you’re giving me the silent treatment like I’m asking for your Netflix password.

Here’s the truth:

Most authors don’t get seen. Not because they’re not brilliant but because they don’t get the right support. I help change that with an actual network of real readers who leave thoughtful reviews and give books momentum.

So tell me honestly are you actually not interested?

Or should I just assume your reply is trapped in the same black hole as most indie book marketing?

Still here. Still obsessed with your book.

Still waiting to be un-ignored. 👀

Felicia Laurence

X-@FL_reviewglobal

This email came without my book’s title written anywhere in it. Not even in the subject line. The letter starts with no personal greeting. The body of the email is clever and catchy. It inspired me to respond. Here is what I wrote back:

Ahoy Felicia,

I love the creativity in your solicitation email. Very clever. It brings to mind some interesting things about the literary industry.

From the onset of the digital age and all things technology, came the online schools for self-publishing. That led to coaching on how to manage the ever changing platforms. This opened up the gates to a flood of authors. When these books hit the market, there was nothing to regulate them. The structure of the old way of publishing that used to weed out the crap is no longer in place. There are so many books being published each day and the readers have no way of knowing if any of them are good. Enter the review system.

The Amazon machine is a blessing and a curse. It gives authors an opportunity to be published but when a good book sits in a group of dozens of half-baked, rush-to-publish manuscripts, there is no way to stand out. In an effort to try and manage the chaos, Amazon comes up with the review system.

Assessing the quality and value of a book by keeping a tally of reviews, Amazons algorithm chooses what books will be seen and promoted. Based on volume, number of reviews, a book stands out. But it is not a true assessment of the value. Now we have machines spewing out reviews en masse. Reviews acquired under dishonest methods are no true measure.

This game has spawned the new and technologically improved marketing industry. A tsunami of online offers come in every day to authors whether their work is good or bad. Email campaigns don’t assess the quality of the work, the recipients are just an email address associated with a book.

Sidenote: I even got a marketing services offer for a book I didn’t write. The solicitor had attached my email address to the name of an author who wrote a recipe book. 🤣

I know a software program evaluated and inspired this email. A software program probably formatted the body of the email. I also know that a software program will evaluate my response and send a weak and confusing rebuttal. But it is entertaining for me so I will play along. Until I get bored. Then I will close my email program and get down to the quality writing I do every day, having gotten the mumbo-jumbo off my mind. Thank you and mic-drop.

Author Suzanne has left the building. 😄

I hope y’all enjoyed my brief journey down the rabbit hole. In our quest to find meaning, it is essential to indulge in the absurdity. But don’t stay here too long. It’s like having too many drinks with friends on the weekend after a particularly intense workweek. You will wake up the next day with a hangover, but when that clears, you will feel better. Getting fall-down drunk was a release, but don’t be fooled. Following on its heels was the awful regret and when that feeling goes away, it makes reality seem so much more appealing even though everything is still the same.

I have complete faith in the continued absurdity of whatever is going on.-- Kurt Vonnegut