Chantal Potter Music @cpottermusic - Tumblr Blog

Had a photoshoot a few weeks ago with Antony Harp! Would have posted these sooner but with the Holiday season, it totally slipped my mind that I could!

These are the best shots from the shoot, and the moral of the story is that I look way better when I just relaaaaaaaaaax.

They/them pronouns please!

#Photos #About the singer #actuallyautistic #Chantal Potter

adventures-in-a-world-of-fiction

A Resolution for You

If you haven’t set New Year’s Resolutions yet, here’s a suggestion for one: write more Amazon reviews.

As an author, I can tell you that Amazon reviews are worth gold to authors. Literally, they make a huge difference to how a book sells.

It probably doesn’t matter if we’re talking about something like Game of Thrones, which currently has 3609 reviews on the UK Amazon. But the amazing On the Edge of Gone by @corinneduyvis (probably the best book I read in 2016) only has 9.

7 of those 9 reviews are 5 stars, the other 2 are 4 stars, but here’s the thing: Amazon doesn’t start including books in their “recommended” lists until it has more than 10 positive reviews (positive meaning 4 or 5 stars). So this fantastic book isn’t being suggested to new readers because it doesn’t have enough reviews.

Another book with an autistic protagonist, Viral Nation, has 8 reviews on the UK Amazon.

One of my own books, Omega Rising, has 5 reviews. They’re all 5 stars, but that’s not enough to tip it over Amazon’s threshold.

Well-written reviews can help people decide whether or not to buy a book, but any review at all can count towards the total reviews and determine whether the book shows up in the “also purchased” lists and “recommended for you” sections. It’s also worth noting that reviews are counted separately on the different regional sites - so On the Edge of Gone mentioned above actually has 28 reviews on the US version of Amazon, but those don’t count towards its UK total.

So if you’ve enjoyed a book, especially a book by a new or independent author, leave a review. If you buy a book and notice that it has less than 10 reviews, make a note to come back when you’ve finished reading and give your opinion. You don’t have to write a lengthy essay. A detailed review is fantastic, but for some things, it’s quantity rather than quality that matters, so ticking 4 stars and writing “good book” is still going to be a massive help to an author. It will help get the book in front of new potential readers and mean that the authors can spend more time writing and less time wondering how they’re going to pay the rent next month.

In 2017, when you go to browse Amazon for new books, take a minute to go through your old purchases and leave a few, short reviews. Your favourite authors will love you for it.

marthawells-deactivated20181223

This is very true. Though the number of reviews it takes to get Amazon to start recommending the book varies. On Amazon US, I’ve heard it’s anywhere from 20 to 50. And they don’t have to be positive reviews, any review counts toward the magic number, whatever it is.

seananmcguire

It is also an unfortunate truth that people are more willing to write bad reviews than good ones (and more likely to write fake bad reviews than fake good ones, which further damages a book’s numbers–not that you should be writing any kind of fake review, period).

Actually, taking the fake review thing out of the parenthetical: I do not “police” my own Amazon reviews, because Amazon is the place where “the book cover had a crease in it, one star” is considered good and valid, and that makes me very mad and sad and is unhealthy for me to see. Do not poke your own bruises. But on the occasions where I have looked at my Amazon reviews for whatever reason, I have consistently found one star (and sometimes two star) reviews by people who clearly never read the book. My favorite sadly did get taken down, which was “Feminist bitch thinks she’s a writer.” Eh-heh.

So if you can leave an honest review, please do. If you can leave a positive honest review, that’s even better–there are people who refuse to read anything without a four-star aggregate rating–but really, just having reviews by people who’ve read the book would be amazing.

jumpingjacktrash

i never read my amazon reviews because the Did Not Read contingent pisses me off – i don’t mind if people dislike my work for itself, but inaccuracy gives me sperg rage. anyway, i didn’t know the number of reviews affected listings like that. interesting.

cpottermusic

I don’t know if this also applies to music, but if anyone who’s listened to my song would like to leave a review on my amazon page, I would be incredibly grateful. I want to know what people think of my music! Honestly!

#Self promotion #Sorry not sorry

jaxonkreide

you know there is this one great site to really distract yourself from everything…

https://en.shindanmaker.com/671644

I’M A SUPER ULTRA DIFFICULT BOSS THAT IS KINDA CREATIVE, BUT LACKING IN EVERYTHING ELSE

roachpatrol

cpottermusic

Don’t mess with me

I have FIVE Health bars and my difficulty is OFF THE SCALE.

I have arrived, how dare you not tell me how pretty your voice is 8u

Oh wowie I only just noticed this sitting in my inbox!

And thank you very much! I grew this voice myself. I’ve kept it watered and made sure it got plenty of sunlight, protecting it from frost in the winter and chasing away any pests. It’s nice to see it finally come into bloom. I’m very proud of it.

Now I just need other people to see it!