StoryOrigin Product Review

Like many writers, I started part time, snatching pockets of time to write my first book.

I regularly wrestled with self doubt and had to find ways to patch up my self-esteem when my well-meaning circle of influence poked holes in my dreams. 

My first meaningful conversation about books happened inside the celebrated Skoobs bookshop, a gem nestled in Monte Casino in Johannesburg. Sadly, the beautiful book store that launched hundreds of self-published author’s journeys did not survive the pandemic, but the advice of the grand dame of the book world, Deborah… has served me well over the years.

She said, “Kim, start a newsletter and build yourself a database of potential readers and build from there.” The newsletter was not a problem. I had worked with Mailchimp and Mailerlite before and knew my way around the programmes pretty well… but the audience, now there was the problem. I didn’t feel comfortable reaching out to my former business contacts. They were just in the wrong market, and I did not want to violate any anti sharing database laws. My database of people who knew me as an author was TINY and very few of them even read my genre.

As an entrepreneur and marketing graduate, I had completed enough courses and start up business programs to know that access to a market is a key component to success. As a business owner, I had won a prestigious business award, but as a new author, I faced a new, unknown market. No corporate big money or contracts, just a sea of faceless individuals who I had no clue how to find.

I realised why so many authors stop at writing their books when faced with the book marketing giant in their path. It is the reason that 45% of people I interviewed said that they sold nothing past their first month of launching their book on Amazon.

Those are disheartening statistics, and I did not want to fall into that statistical pool of despair. Eager to grow, I reached out to one of the writing groups I was a member of and they introduced me to StoryOrigin.

At first glance, StoryOrigin can be a bit terrifying.

The founder Evan Gow wanted to create one programme that would combine the many needs of a growing author. It was a worthy goal that I wholeheartedly endorse. However, servicing all these needs means that the dashboard has SO many things on it that it could tempt you to think you need a college degree or a World War II code breaking skill just to figure it out.

You have two options… One is to figure it out for yourself and there are enough excellent tutorials to help you.

You just allocate enough time to go through them.

The second option is that you could get an onboarding specialist to help you. Over time, I have become an onboarding specialist, but that is another story.

Or you could hound Evan, who is probably the best after sales person I have ever come across, but as the system grows, I would wager he is going to have more time constraints on his hands.

But let’s get back to the review.