Expanding into Audiobooks by Mellanie Szereto #WordWranglers

The Wranglers are so pleased to welcome author Mellanie Szereto back to the corral with more great information. Read it. Learn from it. While you're at it, pick up one of Mel's books and give it a try!

Mellanie Szereto

Are You Thinking About Expanding Into Audiobooks???

As authors, we’re always looking for ways to gain new readers and super-fans, which can be challenging on the best of days. Social media takes time away from writing, and advertising can be expensive and hit or miss in its effectiveness. How do we best use our time and resources?

Diversification can be an effective way to expand our readerships, by offering both print and digital versions of our stories. One of the fastest growing markets in publishing right now is audiobooks, but the process and choices can seem overwhelming. Let’s break it down into steps of what you need to know and do.

Preparation:

The first step is the same, no matter how you plan to make your book available to readers. It’s also the most difficult. WRITE THE BOOK. You’re already on your way if you’ve made it this far!

Make a habit of recording all character names and descriptions (ages, personality traits, accents, voice mannerisms, speech idiosyncrasies, etc.) as you write. Use a notebook, a Word doc, a spreadsheet, or software/app (Notion, Scrivener, Plottr, etc.) to organize the information. Narrators need to know your characters to portray them well. 

Think about your narration options. Do you want a single narrator, dual narration, or duet narration? A single narrator recites all POVs, both narrative and dialogue. Will a male or female voice convey the story better? Dual narration consists of narrators for two POV characters. Books with more than two POVs may increase time and expense of audiobooks for additional narrators. Duet narration has a narrator for each of two POVs, with the POV character/narrator from each scene reciting narrative, as well as dialogue from all but the other main character/narrator, and the other narrator recites only his/her/their corresponding dialogue. Duet adds time and expense to the recording, reviewing, and editing process.

Important: When choosing dual or duet narration, be sure to create a document with the POV for each chapter and scene as a guide for the narrators. This indicates who speaks during each part of the book. 

Select an audition sample. The sample should be 500-1000 words with strong interactions between characters and dialogue from at least the main characters to get a feel for the narrator’s tone and voice flexibility. 

Audiobook covers must be sized to 2400x2400 pixels. This may require adjustments to images and text on the e-book cover. Consider adding “Narrated by” on the audio cover to recognize the narrator(s) contributions to your product. They’re more likely to help promote with that recognition. 

Choices:

Consider your budget. Costs vary greatly, based on your choices, and depend on the narrator(s) experience and how in-demand he/she/they are. 

Select a platform. ACX, Findaway Voices, and Spoken Realm are a few platform options that help authors connect with narrators/producers. The author puts out a call for auditions, reviews auditions, and signs contracts with narrators. Payment for narration may be an upfront one-time payment or royalty share. Royalty share means the narrator receives a portion of the profit from each audiobook, sharing the proceeds with the author. Experienced in-demand narrators like this payment method only with authors who have shown substantial previous sales or have a very large established fan-base for guaranteed income. New and less-experienced narrators may be more willing to agree to a royalty-share contract with a new or less-established author to gain experience and exposure. The one-time payment can be a financial burden to many authors, and royalty share allows a two-way investment in the product and its promotion.

Another upfront payment option is to hire a production company to manage auditions, communicate with and contract narrators, review and oversee edits to the final recording, and, in some cases, help the author with promotion. Costs vary greatly, but fees are based on a per-finished-hour rate, typically ranging from $375-550 or more per finished hour. To figure approximate finished hours, divide the total word count of the book by 9300 words per hour (average spoken rate). A 20K is typically about 2.2 finished hours, 50K is about 5.4 finished hours, and 90K is about 9.7 finished hours. A finished hour includes recording, reviewing, and editing—usually about 6-7 hours of work for each finished hour.

I’m working with The Audio Flow and have been very impressed with their roster of narrators, professionalism, and my finished products. While my initial financial investment is significant, I know I’m getting a great product and support, including social media posts with narrator announcements, audio samples, and release information—plus easy networking connections with narrators. I can also purchase optional extra promotion services.

Platforms and production companies do not automatically distribute. Authors are still responsible for uploading and submitting the finished product to their chosen retail distributor(s), choosing to be exclusive or non-exclusive, and completing book and tax information. 

Casting, Recording, and Reviewing:

When choosing a narrator, pay close attention to pacing, clarity, tone, and pronunciations while listening to auditions. Audition samples can be 5-15 minutes long, depending on your platform/production choice. Does the narrator fit the characters and perform the book? Also consider the availability of the narrator. Some are booked several months or even a year out, so plan ahead or have a backup choice.

Once the chapter recordings are complete, the author should review the audio files and note any corrections—like missing or wrong words, mispronunciations, improper inflection, etc. This step is particularly important to ensure a good reader experience. Edits are made to the files, and the corrections should be reviewed again for final approval.

Audiobooks have opening credits that include the title of the book, series title and book number if applicable, author, and the narrator(s). Next comes the story/content. That’s followed by the closing credits, which restates the information in the opening credits. These are included in the narration cost.

Submission:

Once the project is complete, the author uploads it to distributor platform(s). ACX/Audible offers exclusive and non-exclusive options, much the same as KDP offers Kindle Select/KU or non-exclusive, with distribution to Amazon, Audible, and iTunes at a slightly higher royalty rate for exclusivity. Findaway Voices distributes to iTunes, Hoopla, Chirp, Nook. Kobo, Google, and many other retailers, including library distributors. Choosing exclusivity at ACX means the audiobook may not be sold through any other distributor and limits sales to Amazon, Audible, and iTunes. A perk of choosing ACX-exclusive is the availability of free audio codes to use for reviewers. Findaway Voices also has free audio codes, but they don’t include access to Audible.

Set up accounts at the distribution platforms you intend to use if you haven’t already. Be sure your information is complete and accurate to receive timely royalty payments.

Upload the finished audio files and cover, complete the book information, choose distribution preferences, set the price if applicable (ACX sets its price.), and submit.

To set the price, look at comparable books—genre/sub-genre and length.

Wait. Wait some more. Review and approval of files takes approximately 4-8 weeks.

While you’re waiting, connect with your narrators on social media to help promote your upcoming audiobook. Their success is your success and your success is their success!

 ***

When her fingers aren't attached to her keyboard, Mellanie Szereto enjoys hiking, Pilates, cooking, gardening, and researching for her stories. Many times, the research partners with her other hobbies, taking her from the Hocking Hills region in Ohio to the Colorado Rockies and the Adirondacks of New York. Sometimes, the trip is no farther than her garden for ingredients and her kitchen to test recipes for her latest steamy tale. Mellanie makes her home in rural Indiana with her husband of thirty-four years and their son.

Catch up with her at  her website: https://www.mellanieszereto.com

Books page: https://www.mellanieszereto.com/books

Sign up for her newsletter: https://www.mellanieszereto.com/subscribe

Like her on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/authormellanieszereto

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Follow her on BookBub: https://www.bookbub.com/authors/mellanie-szereto

Follow her on Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/mellanie_szereto

The Homegrown Café Book Club

The women of The Homegrown Café Book Club are over 40, single, and loving it. Fate, however, has a different plan with a younger man for every last one of them.

Makin' Bacon (The Homegrown Café Book Club 1) in e-book and audiobook!

https://books2read.com/makin-bacon

The Farmer Takes a Husband (The Homegrown Café Book Club 2) in e-book and audiobook!

https://books2read.com/the-farmer-takes-a-husband

The Butcher and the Baker (The Homegrown Café Book Club 3) in e-book and audiobook!

https://books2read.com/the-butcher-and-the-baker

When Harry Met Wally (The Homegrown Café Book Club 4) in e-book and coming soon to audiobook!

https://books2read.com/when-harry-met-wally

And Baby Makes 2½ (The Homegrown Café Book Club 5) pre-order in e-book and coming soon to audiobook!

https://books2read.com/and-baby-makes-2-5