How to sell a million books #writing

I remember Googling the title of this post when I first started writing and, after reading every possible post that mentioned selling 1 million books, decided I could never be one of the ‘elite’ who succeed in reaching such a mega milestone. After all, I was in the process of writing my debut novel and had no plans to write after it was finished. Being an optimist, (or a person with wildly unrealistic goals) I secretly hoped the book would be snapped up by one of the big five publishers and propelled to the top of the Sunday Times best seller list before attracting the attention of a film producer. Yeah… as if! 😂

Apparently, less than 0.003% of books published manage to reach this target. (Even some of those that you see heaped on tables as soon you walk through the doors of major bookshops.) So, how does an unknown writer sell over a million copies? For me, it has been a mixture of perseverance, constant effort, luck and a fantastic publishing house whose team constantly supports their authors’ works. And people: book bloggers, reviewers, book lovers and most of all readers. Oh yes, readers play a huge part in any writer’s success.

Such was the case when I reached out to Kim Nash, who I first met after she spotted an article about me in the local newspaper and contacted me, asking if she could read my debut novel, Mini Skirts and Laughter Lines. At that time, Kim was an avid reader and book blogger who not only wrote a rave review for the book but came to my first author talk at Samuel Johnson Museum in Lichfield. (One of five people who made up the audience!) She read the sequel (I’d caught the writing bug and written a second book, then spurred on by moderate success and a fantastic bunch of book bloggers and readers, kept writing.) She read all my subsequent books and generously supported me, even securing me interviews on local radio. While I was writing for a small publishing house, Safkhet, she gave up her job to become the marketing PR guru for Bookouture/Hachette. When Safkhet went bust, I was left distraught with no back catalogue to sell and a new manuscript written but with nowhere to place it, I reached out to Kim who immediately put me in touch with Lydia Vassar-Smith, an acquisition editor at Bookouture.

Lydia loved my comedy Life Swap and after publishing it and a second book, Take a Chance on me, I was invited to write another 3 comedies. I submitted synopses for them, and slipped in one for a crime fiction novel. Lydia rang me almost immediately asking if I could turn the crime fiction novel into a series and after much discussion, the comedy ideas were sidelined and the DI Robyn Carter series was born.

The series took off, Little Girl Lost soared in the best-sellers charts, foreign rights for the books came in and I was beyond delighted when I was again invited to write a second crime series. The DI Natalie Ward novels enjoyed equal success. Even today, I am always blown away by the response from readers to the books.

In short, my advice to every writer who wants to be successful is not only to stay active on social media and connect with your readers/fans, but keep writing. If one book flops, (I’ve had my fair share) pick yourself up and keep going. Marketing is important and I’ve been fortunate that Bookouture has such a fantastic PR team. They ensure every author’s book gets the publicity it requires and keep readers up to date with news and new releases for all of us. It is down to this winning formula that I can now type: I have sold over a million copies of my books published by Bookouture. Can I cheer at this point? 😊

As many of you know, I have other books that have been published by other publishers. I have had to shelve those earlier books that earned me my writing reputation because my ex-publishers were forced to close their doors, so in reality, I have sold many more books outside of Bookouture and if I were to add up the total can boast over 2 million sales. The person who set off on this journey and dreamt of this situation didn’t truly believe it would happen for her… But it has. Writing has become my vocation, my obsession and a huge labour of love and devotion with pitfalls and struggles, yet I love it. No… More than that. I am passionate about what I do and incredibly grateful to those people who purchase my books. You are the reason I write. Your enthusiasm and praise keeps me going even on the hardest of days.

To sum up, the answer to the question in the title of this post is to write, write, write. One book won’t get the results you hope for (unless you are exceptionally fortunate) but constant, good writing should. As long as you are passionate about your craft and determined to succeed, you will. It requires tenacity, dedication, patience and a huge amount of confidence in your ability because it won’t be an easy journey. That said, it will be incredibly worthwhile and every success will spur you on until hopefully you too will be writing a post like this one and will have sold over a million.

Wishing you the very best of luck xx