A cautionary tale

On September 20, 2020, OA's senior member J Lenni Dorner embarked on a journey into a promotion for a self-published book that has resulted in this blog post.

OA: How were you approached by Kindle Books Promo / Kindle Market LLC? Or did you approach them?
J: They followed me on Twitter. Because they followed me, I clicked on their profile to decide if I would follow back. I saw the pinned tweet with the promo special. At first, I ignored it. But then I thought it could make an interesting blog post either way, so I contacted them in a DM to learn more.

OA: Do you know which name is the correct name of the entity?
J: I did a Google search on Kindle Market LLC. I don't know if they're actually a limited liability company. I assume this is the name they're currently using on Twitter. The search did not provide any information to make me feel like this was a legit company. If not for doing an article, I would have blocked them on Twitter and walked away at that point.

OA: Do you know why they selected you to follow on Twitter?
J: I don't know why they followed me. But I interact with a lot of writers. I'm not difficult to run into for anyone who follows the popular writer hashtags on Twitter.

OA: What was the offer they made to you?
J: As per the screenshot, I pay them $25 (via Amazon gift card) and they would promote my book and guarantee 200+ sales during the one-week promo, or my money back.

OA: Did you do any research on this entity before deciding whether to take them up on their offer?  Please describe.
J: The research was the Google search I just mentioned. 

OA: What made you decide to give it a try?
J: I was willing to gamble $25 for an interesting OA article. I would not have risked $50.  They even agreed to answer some OA questions.

OA: What book did you submit for the offer?
J: On September 27, I submitted Fractions of Existence.

On September 29, OA member Dena Pawling sent an email to Victoria Strauss of Writer Beware which included the following request:
I did a search on Writer Beware to see if you had ever written on this entity, but I didn't find anything. Do you have any insight on this entity that you can share?

Her response, which she gave OA permission to include in this blog post:
I am _really_ skeptical. What actually is the promo, anyway? They don't have a website and their Twitter feed is all ads for their service; I see no promotional tweets at all. If that's all the information they provide, it makes no sense to pay for a service when you don't even know what the service will be. I would frankly be amazed if anyone gets 200 sales out of this, and I'm guessing it will be very tough to get them to honor the money-back guarantee. They won't answer the questions, either.

On October 5, Dena emailed the following to @KindlemarketLLC's email address:

Thank you for allowing J Lenni Dorner and Operation Awesome to ask you some questions regarding your services. As per your instructions, below are our questions. We'd like to include your responses in our planned blog post later this month. May we please have your responses by October 16? Thanks

Do you have a website or other social media besides Twitter? If so, please provide links.
How long have you been doing Kindle book promotions?
How many authors have you helped?
What's the average number of sales your authors report after taking advantage of this deal?
Exactly what are you doing to drive up the author's sales?
How do you encourage interested people to buy the books?
How do you encourage interested people to write a review?
Can readers sign up to be on your email list (or whatever you're using)?
Do readers get a book discount?
Are the readers (book buyers) from all over the world, or mostly one country?
Do books need to be enrolled in Kindle Unlimited?
Do you offer a similar service for books sold on Smashwords, B&N, etc? If not, are there plans to do so in the future?
How do you find authors on Twitter to follow?
Are most of the authors who use your services indie-published?
Do any of the "big 5" houses use your service for their clients? If so, which ones?
Who is the most notable or famous author that has used your service?
How would someone get their money back if fewer than 200 books are sold within a week after the 3 day processing period?
Have you had to give many refunds, or are most people genuinely satisfied?
Are there any satisfied customer reviews we could reference?
Is there any other information about your company or your services that you'd like us to share with our blog readers?

OA: Do you know what they did to promote your book?
J: I don't know. I asked if they followed Amazon's TOS, they said yes. They confirmed my order. I don't believe they actually did anything at all.

OA: Did you see any promo for your book in any online forum? 
J: I have a Google Alert set up for Fractions of Existence. Nothing has come up.

OA: During the promo period, how many books did you sell? Do you know how many of those sales are attributable to the promotion?
J: I sold one paperback copy of this book during the promo period. It was bought by my local NaNoWriMo ML, who ordered copies of several books published by local wrimos as some kind of prize pack thing she got for someone. I know because she told me she did this.

OA: Since you didn't have 200 sales, did you ask for your money back?  What was the response?
J: I have asked for my refund. I have not heard back yet this weekend [as of October 11].

OA: On a scale of 1-10 [1 being low], please rate your experience with  Kindle Books Promo / Kindle Market LLC.  Why did you give that rating?
J: I'll give a 2, because they did get back to me initially and were polite. However, they did not do what they guaranteed. This rating might go up or down a point, depending on if I get a refund.

On October 12, I tweeted this:
https://twitter.com/JLenniDorner/status/1315819382061314052
Supervisor at @KindleMarketLLC , I require you to answer my direct message. It is suspicious that you have stopped responding. I require you to hold up the MONEY BACK GUARANTEE, as we discussed. The order was placed on Sept 27 and verified. It is now Oct 12. There were no sales.

They blocked my Twitter account

(They also blocked OA member Amren Ortega's Twitter account, probably because Amren retweeted the above tweet.)

On October 13, I tweeted this:
https://twitter.com/JLenniDorner/status/1316129542210236419
How odd.
@KindleMarketLLC gave me a money-back guarantee. When they did not come through, and I asked for my refund, they blocked me instead of replying. That's rude and unprofessional. (And about what I expected.)

On October 13, I sent this email:
I have waited for the promised number of days.
My order was processed.
The $25 Amazon gift card was given.
For some reason, your account has blocked me on Twitter.
I am owed a refund.
I require the reply of a supervisor.
I have screenshots of the entire conversation if you'd like to see them.

On October 17, Dena began writing this blog post.  OA had not yet received emailed responses to our questions, so Dena sent a follow up email:
We haven't heard from you by our October 16 requested response date. Would you like to respond to our questions so we can include your responses in our blog post? If so, please respond by Wednesday, October 21 at the very latest. Thank you.

Dena went to @KindlemarketLLC to determine if she was also blocked.  She discovered that @KindlemarketLLC no longer exists on Twitter.  
https://twitter.com/KindleMarketLLC

Further research uncovered that this entity simply renamed its Twitter account.  Everything else about the account, including previous tweets, is the same.
https://twitter.com/SuperBookPromos

Here's how to find Twitter previous user names:
https://twirpz.wordpress.com/2015/06/16/how-to-find-twitter-users-previous-usernames/ 

Here's what other writers are saying:
https://twitter.com/search?q=%40superbookpromos&src=typed_query 

OA reached out on Twitter and two writers responded with their experiences:

Writer #1: They took my money then blocked me. As you know they keep changing names - who knows what they have come back as now.  [Another writer I know] has had an email telling him to f*ck off.

Writer #2: My experience was that I messaged and asked what they offered, they explained to me that they promote their book in closed groups of readers. They explained this all and, despite having a few reservations, I thought I would go ahead with it. They promised a refund if nothing happened so I assume, why not give it a try. They continued to reply to any and all queries I had even after having sent them the payment. I asked them again, during their 'promotion' and they told me that yes, if I hadn't had any sales, they would give me a refund. It came to the end and I messaged them asking for the refund. They were unusually slow to reply but told me to email the email address provided, asking for the refund. I did this and never heard back. I messaged three separate times over a ten day period, asking if I needed to do anything else. They never replied. So then I sent one telling them I knew they were a scam and that I had reported them to twitter and they blocked me. Luckily for them, I still had their email address so I sent them a few emails asking for the refund and got an extremely colourful response.

As of October 22, OA has not received emailed responses to our questions.

On October 24, Dena finished this blog post and checked Twitter one more time for this entity.  Not surprisingly, @SuperBookPromos no longer exists 

As of October 24, it's apparently @KindleClubPromo

OA: Is your rating still a 2?
J: As they haven't replied to anything and have now full-on ghosted....  about a zero or negative number.

OA: Do you have any advice for other writers who are looking to promote their books?
J: My advice is that there isn't an easy promotion gift out there, so be at least a bit skeptical when someone offers to sell you magic beans. I didn't go into this with high hopes that it would actually sell 200 books (or even 20 books). I went into this knowing that Operation Awesome would get a good blog post from the experience no matter how it turned out. If I also sold books, cool, then we could help authors with a new promotion. If it didn't, which I had a strong feeling it wouldn't, then we could help authors avoid the mistake of trusting this wolf in sheep's clothing.

By the time this post publishes, this entity will probably have a different name entirely.  Writer Beware!

Click here for an update!

A is for A to Z Challenge Co-host: An Interview with OA Blogger J Lenni Dorner #AtoZChallenge

Operation Awesome's #AtoZChallenge theme for 2018 is... 

OA to Z! We'll be correlating our usual posts with the challenge letters, plus, each weekend, you'll get a chance to get to know one of our bloggers better.

Thanks for interviewing me, Jaime!

Hello, readers. I'm speculative fiction and reference author, J Lenni Dorner. Here at Operation Awesome, I'm the Debut Author Interviewer. I'm also a co-host and the team captain over at the Blogging from A to Z Challenge - which is how I tie myself to the letter A.



1- What's your passion in life?

Writing is my biggest passion in life. That's how I connect with the world. I'm also passionate about the environment, especially the forests. As a Native American, I was raised to have love and respect for nature, to be at one with it. That's harder, but not impossible, in today's modern world. (It is also how I got the nickname, "Daryl Dixon.") The Lenni-Lenape tribe I grew up with taught me about gender equality, which is why the #HeForShe movement is another passion of mine. (Where people of every gender identity and expression acknowledge the ways that we all benefit from equality.) I also support We Need Diverse Books.

2- Would you share a picture with us of your latest book?

There's my book, Fractions of Existence, outside in a tree. In honor of the A to Z Challenge, the Kindle version is on sale right now for a limited time. (Amazon link)

3- What are three of your short-term goals?

• Leave comments on 300 of the blogs taking part in the A to Z Challenge 2018.
• Vote in every round over at WRiTECLUB. #WRiTECLUBDFW 
• Find more Debut Authors to interview.

4- What tip can you share to improve someone's writing craft?

Did you know that you can often cut that from a sentence without changing the meaning of that sentence?
You can cut a sentence without changing the meaning.

Other words to seek out are begin and began (meaning start). Watch the progression in this example:

• I begin to eat an apple.  
• I eat an apple. 
• I bite through the vibrant green flesh of a Granny Smith apple. The tart juice sprays over my lips and into my nose. I can't even eat a piece of fruit without needing a napkin! Joel was right, I am hopeless as a human being.

• I began to eat an apple.
• As I lifted the Honeycrisp apple to my lips, Godzilla busted through my kitchen wall, knocking the apple to the floor.

When we talk about editing word by word and line by line, this is what we mean. The Grammarly extension is fantastic for finding errors, but the job of strengthening sentences with valuable descriptions still belongs to the writer. Beginning or starting to do an action offers nothing to the reader. As the Nike slogan says, "Just Do It." Or, if your character is beginning an action that isn't going to be completed, quickly segway into why.

5- What is one question or discussion topic which you would like the readers of this interview to answer or remark on in the comments?

Stephen Hawking's final paper is on the theory of the multiverse. (A theory which suggests different versions of our universe existing in parallel with each other, yet each one different in some way. A version of Earth without environmental trouble, for example.)

Do you believe it's possible that parallel universes, the multiverse (or Omniverse), exists? And why or why not?

( 😉 By the way: According to the theory, there's a multiverse version of you with an opposing point of view. 😄 )

While embracing the ancient tribal traditions, J Lenni Dorner learned a legend originated by The Grandfathers. (The Existence book series is based on it.) In May 2016, J became a member of the Operation Awesome Team, running the Debut Author Spotlight on Wednesdays. Blogging from A to Z #AtoZchallenge co-host as of 2017. J weaves fantasy with lore to unhinge your mind. This speculative fiction and reference author is happily married and living in Pennsylvania (USA) on the original lands of the Lenni-Lenape people. When not reading or writing, J enjoys video games, funny cat videos, finding drawings of dragons on Pinterest, and watching movies.

Website: what-are-they.com
Blog: jlennidornerblog.what-are-they.com
Twitter: @JLenniDorner
Facebook: facebook.com/WhatAreThey
Pinterest: pinterest.com/jlennidorner
Instagram: instagram.com/jlennidorner
BookBub: bookbub.com/authors/j-lenni-dorner
Goodreads: goodreads.com/J_Lenni_Dorner

Meet J Lenni Dorner in this Debut Author Spotlight

Amazon

If you read Operation Awesome regularly, then you're already familiar with J Lenni Dorner, blog contributor. Today, however, you get to meet J Lenni Dorner, debut fiction author! We are so excited for the release of J's first novel, FRACTIONS OF EXISTENCE. Congratulations, J. We hope it feels good to be on the other end of the interview questions. :0)


1- What five words represent your most notable characteristic or values? #In5Words

Wordsmith, Lenni-Lenape, persevering, nemophilist, quirky

2- Can you share a story from your life that shows who you are as a person and why you are a writer?

I once wrote using a twig dipped in blood.

Wow, that sounded creepy, didn’t it?

My bio-parents weren’t “grocery store” types. I grew up in a hunter-gatherer environment. We used every part of the animal. The first time someone asked me where I got deerskin pants, I looked at them like they were stupid. At that point in my young life, I had never met someone before who lived another way. Now when someone asks me something like that, I just laugh and shake my head. I’m just barely “civilized.”

Of the people you know, I’m the Daryl Dixon.

3- What ignited your passion for writing?

Writing was how I connected the life I was raised in with the life I was moved into. It’s how make sense of the world.

4- Would you share a picture with us of some of your rejected book covers?



On a scale of 1 to 10, how terrible were those covers for an urban fantasy?


5- What are some of your short and long-term writing goals?

Short:

To get 50 reviews for this book.

Long:

To sell 90,000 copies of Fractions of Existence by September 2020.
To publish another fiction book by April 2018.
To write and publish the entire Existence book series.

6- What emotions do you hope your book will evoke for the reader, and is there a particular scene you hope will resonate with readers?

Wend has some “Ugly Duckling” moments in this book. She has no idea what Xavier might see in her, and wonders if he calls her beautiful just to be polite. There’s a scene in a garage restroom where this feeling hits her. The truth is that Xavier sees who she really is, and that makes a real difference. Wend spends this book as a square peg trying to fit into a round hole, not that she’s aware of this reality. I think there are readers out there who have felt like outsiders in their own life until they discovered where they belonged. Sometimes you just have to find your people or your niche.

7- Who is currently your biggest fan? What does that person love most (or "ship") about your debut novel?

Sandi. She loves the characters. Heath is her favorite in this book. She's a friend and was the first editor of the manuscript.

8- What's with the "What-Are-They"? It's the name of your website and the title of the last chapter.

I've based these characters off of a legend an elder in my tribe taught me. There are a handful (with fingers to spare) of us who know this passed-down story. I created a video of words that may enter a reader's mind while reading this and trying to figure it out. In book two, the characters will have a discussion about the question.



9- What most helped you to improve your writing craft?

Editing! It's interesting how finding the mistakes of others can make a switch go off in your mind. "Wait, did I do that too?"
The tool that made the biggest difference has been Grammarly. It's an extension in my Chrome browser, and an add-on in MS Word. I don't know how I lived without it. Grammarly doesn't just point out that something is wrong or might be wrong, it explains the reasoning behind it. For example, it pointed out that I was using the British version of a word. It also picked up on my using aloud instead of out loud. (Aloud is considered a more formal action. One reads a Bible aloud in church. This interview, however, you could read out loud to a friend.)

10- What is the most memorable trait or visual oddity of one of your characters?

That would be the eyes. I highly suggest paying attention to Xavier, Heath, Jez, and Wend’s eyes. (Caleb and Jun have impressive eyes, too. But that doesn't come up in book one.)

11- How is Jun pronounced?

http://www.pronouncenames.com/pronounce/jun

12- #DiversityBingo2017 https://twitter.com/novelparadise/status/808828422700998656 Which squares does your book cover on the card?

• MC w/ Underrepresented body
• MC of Color in SFF
• Contemporary World Arranged Marriage
• Free Choice = Native American Author

13- Which character has your favorite Personality Contradiction?

I've always been intrigued that Dumbledore is protecting Harry on one hand, and shoving him, unprepared, into danger with the other hand (the one that wore the ring).
What? Ohhh... no one else has ever answered with a character that isn't their own. Sneaky sneaky!
My honest answer to this question is Heath. But, until book two, I can't even hint as to why, or which personality contradiction I'm talking about!

14- Can you think of any small change in the world you could make to potentially benefit hundreds of other authors or readers?

I'm doing it already. Interviewing debut authors makes a huge difference. The more authors, the more books. More books, better odds a reader will find one to love. More readers means less illiteracy, and that means a better world for everyone.

15- As a reader, what most motivates you to buy a new book to read?

If it's by one of my favorite authors, that's the easiest sale. But I didn't realize my other motivations until I started the "Down the TBR Hole" blog prompt posts on my blog. It turns out that I'm most motivated to buy any books about the Lenni-Lenape, and any books that remind me of my book or my characters.

16- How will you measure your publishing performance?

I am ALL about reviews. Those are the rings in my tree. Sure, some rings show years where the forest burned or insects attacked; but every ring is earned by a growing tree.

17- What was the deciding factor in your publication route?

I self-published largely because I like having control. Urban Fantasy, all of Speculative Fiction, really, is hard to get agents interested in. Throw in that my book is lacking vampires, detectives, orphaned main characters, magic users, (and neither dragon nor shifter would be entirely accurate to describe Caleb)... and it's easy to see why agents replied, politely, by saying they didn't think they had the "right contacts" for my story. (And other similar rejections.)

I found a list with other clichés and tropes I avoided: renegade female loner, rebellious normal who “plays” with paranormals, and vigilantes/hunters/professional monster-fighters as the protagonists (mine are antagonists, and it's a religious sect…).

I considered throwing a disclaimer in the front of the book. "Warning: This Urban Fantasy isn't like the other ones."

18- What is one question which you would like the readers of this interview to answer or remark on in the comments?

I want to know what debut books you're looking forward to in the coming months!

19- Anything else you would care to share about your book and yourself?

Once they were humanity's exalted protectors— now they are being hunted.

Xavier will weigh all human life against Gwendolyn's ignorant happiness. The good news is that her choice can blow his away.

Omnipotent beings find each other while playing an online game. Xavier has been searching for Gwendolyn, his true mate and the missing member of the Existence. Only if reunited can the group regain the rest of their memories and access all of their powers. Hidden in plain sight, disguised as humans, they help who they can, as best they can, when they can.

The Eyes in the Shadows, a religious sect, has been trying to free humans from the “prison” of life on Earth for millenniums. The Existence has always been able to thwart them… until now. They've discovered a way to end the world that no one will see coming.

Gwendolyn has her future all laid out. There is a plan. She knows what her parents want for her and how to get it. Then Xavier, a friend from a virtual game, makes her question everything. He's full of secrets, one being an understanding of her fear of the wind.

She tries to suppress her intense attraction to the mysterious and frustrating Xavier. She's engaged, after all, and the thoughts she's having aren't proper. Gwendolyn is swept into a whirlwind of secrets, danger, and forbidden attraction. She'll drive across the country in her beat-up old car, not knowing if he's is genuinely interested or just being polite. (He refuses to kiss her!) Gwendolyn's journey is full of self-doubt, sacrifice, and dark visions that invade her sleep. Will she uncover the truth about herself?


Amazon

J is the Operation Awesome Team member who (usually) runs the Debut Author Spotlight on Wednesdays. (Thanks, Kara!)
The author attended Penn State.
J has won several writing awards, some which included publication in anthologies.
Learn more on the website:
http://www.what-are-they.com/

There's a giveaway! rafflecopter

Thanks for this, Kara. Putting me in my own hot seat has been an interesting experience!