Member Self-Publishing Q&A w/ Joanna Penn & Orna Ross: October 2015

Ep#22: Orna Ross and Joanna Penn answer members' questions on writing, publishing and promoting books.

Here's the questions posed to Orna and Joanna this month:

• Q: I'm writing my first book and I'm overwhelmed by all the other self-publishing and indie author tasks I should be doing like blogging and marketing. What should I focus on?
• Q: I've never written a book before, and wanted to know if I needed to hire a lawyer to look over the self-publishing contracts from IngramSpark and CreateSpace?
• Q: What are the pros and cons of using ACX?
• Q: What are the pitfalls of creating a 2nd Edition version of a currently published novel?
• Q: I've marketed my book in the UK and the US in the same way, but have had minimal sales success in the US. Is this market a harder nut to crack?

Our weekly Self-Publishing Advice broadcast is brought to you by ALLi, the Alliance of Independent Authors. This Member Self-Publishing Q&A is one of four regular shows, which include a more advanced salon, a beginners' salon and a special guest highlight presentation from the Indie Author Fringe, ALLi's free online author conference.

Find more author advice, tips and tools at our self-publishing advice center, www.selfpublishingadvice.org. And, if you haven't already, we invite you to join our organization and become a self-publishing ally. You can do that at www.allianceindependentauthors.org.

Now, go write and publish.

About your hosts

Joanna Penn is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling thriller author, as well as writing non-fiction for authors. She is also a professional speaker and entrepreneur, voted as one of The Guardian UK Top 100 creative professionals 2013. She spent 13 years as a business IT consultant in large corporations across the globe before becoming a full-time author-entrepreneur in September 2011. Connect with Joanna on Twitter @thecreativepenn

Orna Ross launched the Alliance of Independent Authors at the London Book Fair in 2012. Her work for ALLi has seen her named as one of The Bookseller's "100 top people in publishing". She also publishes poetry, fiction and nonfiction, and is greatly excited by the democratising, empowering potential of author-publishing. Connect with Orna on Twitter @OrnaRoss