New Website is up and running!

Exciting news for BBP Co!  The new website address http://www.brainybpublishinghouse.com/ is officially up and running!  This new interface will allow indie authors to check out our new and upcoming titles as well as check out issues of This Midlife Thing Magazine.

Also, should new indie authors wish to join with us in making their publishing dreams come true, we would be happy to have you aboard!

Check us out! http://www.brainybpublishinghouse.com/

Who is reading eBooks? Show me the market!

According to GfK MRI, the country’s leading provider of magazine audience ratings, multimedia research data and penetrating insights into consumers’ behavior and motivations, eReader ownership by adults has tripled in less than two years and women prefer eReaders.

GfK MRI describes eReaders as “a portable, wireless reading device that allows you to download and read electronic books, magazines and newspapers. It is not a laptop, cell phone or PDA.”

Approximately 5.9 million US adults own an eReader, according to the latest data from GfK MRI; this is up from 2.1 million owners in the March-October period of 2009 when GfK MRI first began asking consumers about their usage of devices like the Amazon Kindle and Sony Reader.  The most recent data shows that now 49% of eReader owners are male and 51% are women.

According to Anne Marie Kelly, SVP of Marketing and Strategic Planning at GfK MRI, “while electronic tablets have created lots of buzz amid increased competition in the market, eReaders continue to be very popular items.”

What are eReader owners reading on their devices?  Books are still the medium of choice among eReader owners.  An overwhelming majority of the eReader owners interviewed by GfK MRI in the last 12 months of ending October 31 2010 (74.9%) had read a book on their device in the last six months, compared to newspapers (17.6%) and magazines (15.3%).  Women are 23% more likely than men to have read a book on their eReader in the last six months.  Drilling down to the brand level, the Amazon Kindle appears to be the reader favorite as women are 63% more likely than men to own an Amazon Kindle and are twice as likely to own a Barnes and Noble Nook.

What does this mean for the indie author?  In the past, traditional publishing had barred the gates into the market for many new authors.   The invent of eReaders levels the playing field and  increases the possibility of getting your independent works noticed by potentially millions of readers to whom a new writer would have had no exposure to before.  Now, any author can get his or her works published and made available. Publishing independently blows the gates wide open for new indie authors wanting to get their works in front of this ever-increasing reader base.

So what do you have to lose?  Keep writing!  Stay Independent!

Become a fear-less writer!

Self Publishing Superstar, Seth Godin, published an amazing blog entry today titled “Waiting for the fear to subside”.  Seth Godin has written 12 bestsellers that have been translated into 33 languages including “Poke the Box” and “Linchpin-Are You Indispensible”. 

According to Seth, there are two problems with the strategy of waiting for the fear to subside.  He states, “by the time the fear subsides, it will be too late. By the time you're not afraid of what you were planning to start/say/do, someone else will have already done it, it will already be said or it will be irrelevant”.  

Haven’t you ever read an article or release about an upcoming title and said to yourself “Hey, that was my idea!” or thought that you could have done a better job with the subject?  Well, why don’t you just do it?  Now?  Are we afraid, as Seth says that something might happen?  Something good? 

Seth states that the “fear certainly helps you do it better. The fear-less one might sleep better, but sleeping well doesn't always lead to your best work. The fear can be your compass; it can set you on the right path and actually improve the quality of what you do”.  Fear can serve as a catalyst to the independent writer.  A motivator to move us in the right direction, fear as a motivator can force us to make our own publishing dream an independently published reality.

Lastly, Seth urges us to listen to our fear but do not obey it.  I say we go one better, we kick fear to the curb.  Oh, believe me, it will stick its head up repeatedly, but we will have to fight it back every time.

That is the “blessing” in being an independent writer, as we are willing to “go it on our own”, we give the boot to the fear of “oh, no one will like it, “ or “there’s no market for this type of work” or the whole mess of negativity that has previously kept us from publishing our life’s work. 

Become a fear-less writer! Fearlessly send your work out into the world! Stay Independent!

Happy Independence Day!

Happy Independence Day to all indie authors and publishers!  Doing things your way, making your publishing dreams come true, have a safe holiday from all of us at BBP Co.

Keep Writing!