90booksin90days: The second Valentine offer: Against all odds

With one Valentine's offer focusing on Love and Doubt, I wanted another theme for the second one. A theme that fits with the books: Qui sine peccato est and Primam lapidem mittat. Books about two countries with a troubled past and complicated present. Countries I have made up, but every reader knows that the situation is applicable for too many countries in our world.

Are these political novels? Not only. They are, like all my books, also filled with adventure and love.

Since Ingelrike and Arniak are not only separated by their past but also by water (Arniak is an island) I agreed with Lisbeth from Kantza smycken that necklaces with sailing boats would be a good fit in our second Valentine offer.

What about the title of the offer? Against all odds? If you are old enough, you may think of the 80s film with the same name:

The film did not receive good reviews, but with Against all odds by Phil Collins in the soundtrack, it is not easily forgotten. I am fond of the song, so it should come as no surprise that I included it in my debut novel Jenny, Jenny.

When it comes to the odds in the books about Ingelrike-Arniak, being in love with "another man's woman" is just one of many odds against the love...

I am proud and happy to present the second Valentine offer:

Mot alla odds

I hope many will like it!

Previous posts about my challenge:

Join my journey

Annika are you never satisfied?
Rapid Planning Method
You need to dare more Annika
The problem statement
The first branches in the issue tree
Selling to existing customers
55 sold, 35 to go
Maybe you nee to get to know them?

Are thoughts real?

35 books left to sell - in 44 days
Is it easy to get to know me?
Is it easy to understand what I have to offer?

YCDBSOYA

Partner up - cooperation with Kantza smycken

New idea: Literary music events
Introducing the first Valentine's offer
Getting Ideas is the easy part

90booksin90days: Getting ideas is the easy part

"If I go to an investor with my idea - do I need to have them sign something so they will not steal it?"

The question came from an entrepreneur who was about to meet possible investors. He asked the question on a radio show where a man who had invested in many different start-ups provided answers.

I could hear in the investor's voice that he found the question naive, maybe even silly.

"Noone is going to steal your idea. There are thousands of great ideas out there. Getting ideas is not the problem. Finding people who can turn their ideas into reality is the tricky part."

And even those who turn their ideas into reality may not find a way to make it profitable. Spotify and Dropbox are companies whose services are widely used and in demand - still neither one of them is making a profit.

So if you are a person who comes up with plenty of ideas. Great! If you are also the type of person who can turn them into reality - even better! If you know how to make your implemented ideas profitable - spread the word! A lot of people will benefit from learning from you.

My own challenge, within my 90booksin90days challenge is to turn the idea I have about literary music events based on my books into reality (working on it) and eventually profitable (the tricky part).

Musician Kristin Fornfela and myself, discussing how to make Literary Music events based on my books

I hope you have plenty of ideas that you will turn into reality and make profitable!

If you have missed the previous posts in this journey, you can find them all here.

Join my journey

Annika are you never satisfied?
Rapid Planning Method
You need to dare more Annika
The problem statement
The first branches in the issue tree
Selling to existing customers
55 sold, 35 to go
Maybe you nee to get to know them?

Are thoughts real?

35 books left to sell - in 44 days
Is it easy to get to know me?
Is it easy to understand what I have to offer?

YCDBSOYA

Partner up - cooperation with Kantza smycken

New idea: Literary music events
Introducing the first Valentine offer

90booksin90days: Introducing the first Valentine offer from Kantza smycken and Annikaslol

So here it is, the  first Valentine's offer from Kantza Smycken and annikaslol:  Kärlek och tvekan (Love and Doubt).

I am happy that I know Lisbeth, a gifted woman who creates lovely jewelry and decorations in glass. When I asked if she wanted to create a Valentine's offer with me her answer was immediate.

"Yes, of course. What do you want me to create?"

I said I would like to have hearts (Valentine´s Day is called "alla Hjärtans dag" or "the day of all hearts" in Swedish) for the Kärlek och Tvekan offer.

Shortly after Lisbeht got started. Out of this raw material:

She created 10 necklaces with  hearts.

These ten unique hearts are now part of the Valentine offer Kärlek och Tvekan.

Jenny, Jenny is a book with a lot of love and doubts

"He can´t possibly love me, he loves his freedom more"

"She will never love someone like me, we live in separate worlds"

"How can I ever make her love me when she just sees me as a friend?"

Ursus-dit rättvisan inte når is an action filled love story with a lot of doubt as well. How could it not be, when two brothers are interested in the same woman? And two best friends?

I am happy I can offer my readers one book for themselves, one for their friend and, as a bonus, a unique and beautiful heart from my friend Lisbeth.

Kärlek och Tvekan

Interested in the second offer? Follow me on Facebook and keep an eye on this blog!

Here are the previous posts in this challenge. I hope you will join me and challenge yourself :)

Join my journey

Annika are you never satisfied?
Rapid Planning Method
You need to dare more Annika
The problem statement
The first branches in the issue tree
Selling to existing customers
55 sold, 35 to go
Maybe you nee to get to know them?

Are thoughts real?

35 books left to sell - in 44 days
Is it easy to get to know me?
Is it easy to understand what I have to offer?

YCDBSOYA

Partner up - cooperation with Kantza smycken

New idea: Literary music events

90booksin90days - one of the new ideas: Literary Music events

I have asked you to follow my journey 90booksin90days. Both by giving me advice and ideas and by challenging yourself so we can do the same journey. Different paths and goals, but at the same time.

One advice I received was to get in touch with Kvillehyllan: a different kind of shop that sells vintage and provides an easy way for customers to sell their things. They also arrange different kinds of events in a nice atmosphere.

I checked out the shop on-line, learned more about their concept and values and liked what I saw. What could I offer them?

They have had book signing events before. Great! I would like to offer something even more special. I am very fond of music (as anyone reading my books is likely to notice) and it would be great to team up with a musician and offer a combined music and literary event.

Congerdesign, pixabay

I visited Kvillehyllan to discuss this and to check with them if they had a network of musicians?

They were very happy about a cover band they had used before. However, paying them would most likely be so costly that even if I would sell a few books it would be a loss for me.

I like the idea of creating a combined literary and music event and I am sure this could be offered to more small businesses. Maybe book shops, maybe cafés... The next step for me will be to find a musician who want to try this out with me (in a way that is financially sound for both of us) and to contact small business who may want to arrange these type of events.

To be continued...

Here are the previous posts in this challenge. I hope you will join me and challenge yourself :)

Join my journey
Annika are you never satisfied?
Rapid Planning Method
You need to dare more Annika
The problem statement
The first branches in the issue tree
Selling to existing customers
55 sold, 35 to go
Maybe you nee to get to know them?

Are thoughts real?

35 books left to sell - in 44 days
Is it easy to get to know me?
Is it easy to understand what I have to offer?

YCDBSOYA

Partner up - cooperation with Kantza smycken

90booksin90days - partner up! Co-operation between annikaslol and Kantza smycken

Thank you all who follow my 90booksin90days journey! One of the advice I received from you, was to partner up with others. After all, collaborating with others was one of the keys to my successful bookrelease of Primam Lapidem Mittat.

I am happy to let you know that I have agreed on a collaboration with Kantza smycken!

Together we will offer you the Valentine packages:

Kärlek och Tvekan (Love and Doubt) 

and

Mot alla odds (Against all odds)

Keep your eyes open for more information :)

Here are the previous posts in this challenge. I hope you will join me and challenge yourself :)

Join my journey
Annika are you never satisfied?
Rapid Planning Method
You need to dare more Annika
The problem statement
The first branches in the issue tree
Selling to existing customers
55 sold, 35 to go
Maybe you nee to get to know them?

Are thoughts real?

35 books left to sell - in 44 days
Is it easy to get to know me?
Is it easy to understand what I have to offer?

YCDBSOYA

YCDBSOYA

Are you familiar with the acronym YCDBSOYA?. My husband was not, so when he received this tie pin for christmas he looked confused.

I believe the members of Jack Cohen's management team were equally confused when he gave them tie pins like this a long time ago.

The letters on the tie pin are there to remind us that:

You can't do business sitting on your ass

When it comes to my challenge 90booksin90days, I have not been sitting on my ass.
This is what I have done so far (with the blue arrows showing activities that I have started).

Well, I admit. Literally I have been sitting on my ass when doing these activities. My brain and fingers have done most of the work with the help of the vast opportunities internet provides.  Opportunities that were not yet there when Jack Cohen built the retail business Tesco. 

Do you doubt your ability to start a thriving business? Remember that Jack Cohen started with selling surplus army material from a single market stall. We can all start from where we are and still go far.

I hope I can reach my goal by working hard behind my computer. If not, I may have to literally get off my ass and go selling door to door...

Here are the previous posts in this challenge. I hope you will join me and challenge yourself :)

Join my journey
Annika are you never satisfied?
Rapid Planning Method
You need to dare more Annika
The problem statement
The first branches in the issue tree
Selling to existing customers
55 sold, 35 to go
Maybe you nee to get to know them?

Are thoughts real?

35 books left to sell - in 44 days
Is it easy to get to know me?
Is it easy to understand what I have to offer?

90booksin90days - Do you know what I have to offer?

There are many books for sale. In bookshops, on the net... how can I sell 90 of my books in 90 days to people who have never even heard about them?

Well, first I need to make it easy for people to understand what I have to offer.

I created web pages for my books; for Jenny, Jenny, Ursus-dit rättvisan inte når and for my two books about Ingelrike-Arniak.

These web pages describe the books, including what my readers think about them. A lot of people (people like myself) want to make up their own mind, regardless of what others say. For them I added recordings of the first 5 chapters so they can hear if the books are a good fit for them or not.

Still, a web page does not make much of a difference if people don't find or look for it. I decided to get reviews of my books, so people will hear more about them.

Some of my books have (thanks to my publishers) been reviewed by papers, bloggers and libraries. Nowadays there are also bookstagramers and booktubers. I decided to contact some of them and ask them to review my two latest books.

I contacted two bookblogs and one bookstagramer. Result? Zero response. Not a "thanks but no thanks" response, just silence. 

Sometimes I wonder if people have understood the purpose of the message function on Instagram or Facebook, or even the purpose of e-mail. They are not just there as a decoration, they are there for communication. Two way communication.

Anyway, I am learning about Mastering Influence (a Tony Robbins course) and I got ideas about how to make my mails / messages stand out more.

The results were a lot better with my new approach. I sent five mails and received three answers - great and friendly answers. One of them made me extra happy - she said she would like to review my books!

I will wait a while and see if the remaining two will answer. If they do not answer, or if they say thanks but no thanks, I will contact 5 more. And then 5 more. Until I get some 3-4 reviews of my books.

Meanwhile I am very happy that Kajsas bokblogg will review the books I sent!

Is it easy for you to understand what I have to offer? Do you have ideas on how I can make it easier? Please let me know!

Here are the previous posts in this challenge. I hope you will join me and challenge yourself :)

Join my journey

Annika are you never satisfied?

Rapid Planning Method

You need to dare more Annika

The problem statement

The first branches in the issue tree

Selling to existing customers

55 sold, 35 to go

Maybe you nee to get to know them?

Are thoughts real?

35 books left to sell - in 44 days

Is it easy to get to know me?

90booksin90days -is it easy to get to know me?

You may be one of my existing readers or listeners already. If you are, it may be hard for you to answer the question in the title. You already know me! Maybe not in a "we have been friends all our lives" kind of way, but in a "I feel like I know you and understand what you are about" way.

Or maybe you and I are strangers? In that case I would love to hear from. You may wonder why I want to know what you think. I want to know because in order to reach my 90booksin90days challenge, I want to:

Turn strangers into friends into customers into fans.

To do this I updated my annikaslol web page with a bio and a photo. Originally I planned to put this collage there, to make it even more personal:

In the end I decided to only use the picture in the middle - it gave a cleaner look to the web page.

I also updated the bio (the description about myself) on several different platsforms; LinkedIn, my Facebook page, Instagram and my blog.

Another action I took was to add more of a personal touch to my posts, going from purely sharing my thoughts, to also share more of myself.

What do you think? Is it easier to get to know me? If you have more ideas on how I can turn strangers into friends into customers, please let me know!

Here are the previous posts in this challenge. I hope you will join me and challenge yourself :)

Join my journey
Annika are you never satisfied?
Rapid Planning Method
You need to dare more Annika
The problem statement
The first branches in the issue tree
Selling to existing customers
55 sold, 35 to go
Maybe you nee to get to know them?

Are thoughts real?

35 books left to sell - in 44 days

The Beauty of Art part 14: The answers

As promised, here are the answers to the Beauty of Art part 14:

The painting is called:

Dancer with a Bouquet of Flowers

Many of you saw that  this was the work of a French impressionist, even though you  did not know which one.

The painter is...

Edgar Degas, born 1834 in Paris.

Degas (originally called De Gas) is considered one of the impressionists - even though he did not see his art that way.

The painting in this quiz is typical for the artist. Degas often painted dancers. He enjoyed showing motion in his pictures.

Apart from painting dancers, he was also known for painting his subjects from unusual angles, like in the painting Waiting:

Degas had yet another way of painting that made him special: he could crop the paintings in unusual ways, leaving out what many painters would have left in the painting. For example in L'orchestre de l'Opera where we only see the legs of the dancers.

Degas was without a doubt a gifted artist. From what I read about him, I am not sure he was a nice person to be with.
He believed that

"the artist must live alone, and his private life must remain unknown"

and he never married. He did not mind being seen as a misanthropic (someone who has a contempt for mankind) bachelor.


What you think about the painting:

It makes you exalted and gives a glimpse of how beautiful, good and wonderful life can be
It gives the same feeling as when looking at John Bauer paintings - with a kind troll.
It makes you curious. What play is this? Who is she?

I really like the painting myself, the motion in the picture, the colours, the feeling - and yes, since I love dancing I like the motif a lot :).

If you want to read more about Edgar Degas and see more of this art, take a look at:

Wikipedia and Artsy

Thanks for participating!

90booksin90days -35 books left to sell - 44 days left

In previous posts I have shared what actions I plan to take. I have started executing on the actions and I follow them up using a kanban board, detailing the actions I plan per week.

Do you ever take actions, yet you do not get any immediate results? At work or in any chosen challenge in life?

Most likely you do, from time to time. There are times when actions lead to immediate results and there are times - especially when you do something new - when you try out actions without seeing any results.

For my 90booksin90days challenges it is getting more and more exciting as the days to conclude the challenge are getting fewer while the amount of books to sell remain the same since X-mas. Despite the many actions I take.

At times like these, it is important to stick to the goal but be prepared to change approach. Prepared to do more or do something different from the original plan.

I have plenty of actions left to take, a lot of new ideas about what to do - some of them thanks to you, my lovely readers and listeners :) - and I have plenty of time left. 44 days to be exact.

How hard can it be?

Previous posts in this challenge:

Join my journey
Annika are you never satisfied?
Rapid Planning Method
You need to dare more Annika
The problem statement
The first branches in the issue tree
Selling to existing customers
55 sold, 35 to go
Maybe you nee to get to know them?

90 books in 90 days - Are thoughts real?

Many ask me how I am doing with my goal 90booksin90days. Is it working, am I selling my books?

Yes, I have sold books, I am happy about every book I have sold, every new reader :). But I have no idea if I will be able to sell the remaining ones before the end of February.

I am used to uncertainty at work, that is part of working with Research and Development. We estimate, experiment, work, check where we are, adapt and work some more. But that is SW engineering and we are SW engineers. We know what we are doing even if we do not know exactly how  our current challenges will work out.

When it comes to markering and selling I have little or no experience, little or no historical data to rely on. When I told my coach that I feel unsure about achieving my goal, she interrupted me and asked:

"Are thoughts real?"

Le Penseur by Rodin. Wikimedia Commons

Well, no they are not. I know that. A thought is just a thought. Even though we often make them a lot more powerful than that.


"The only way you can find out if your activities will take you to the goal, is by doing them and see what happens."


Yes. I know that too. (Our talk made me think that the job of a coach or mentor is to tell you the things you already know but have somehow failed to fully understand.)

Will I make my goal? I don't know. But I know what actions I will take. I have described my actions related to selling to existing customers in previous posts. Here is the branch of the issue tree that describes my actions to sell to new customers.

As you can see I have one box, one branch of the tree, still open for "Great ideas yet to come".

Any ideas you may have that can fit into that box are very welcome :).

You can find the previous posts of my journey here:

Join my journey
Annika are you never satisfied?
Rapid Planning Method
You need to dare more Annika
The problem statement
The first branches in the issue tree
Selling to existing customers
55 sold, 35 to go
Maybe you nee to get to know them?

The Beauty of Art - Part 14

Here it is - the first Beauty of Art quiz for 2018!

Who is the painter? 

What is the painting called?

How does it make you feel?

Let me know, either as comments in this blog or as messages to my annikaslol Facebook page !

The answers and a summary of your impressions of the painting will be published next week.

90 books in 90 days - Maybe you need to get to know them?

Thank you for the tips you have provided so far! About partnering up with others and about book signing opportunities. I will keep you up to date about my progress in these areas. :)

So far I have sold 55 books to existing customers and to new customers. Wonderful :).

However, I have not yet sold to persons who do not know me.

How do I sell my books to strangers?

When asking this question out loud when visiting my parents, my father said:

"Maybe you need to get to know them?"

Illustration by John Hain Pixabay 

Shortly after, I listened to one of the many podcasts on eofire (if you are or want to be an entrepreneur or a sidepreneur, I recommend these podcasts) and I learned the following:

"You need to turn strangers into friends, into customers into fans."

That makes a lot of sense.

"But how can I turn people I have not met, and may not meet in real life, into friends?"

Figuring that out is one of many challenges included in my 90booksin90days challenge...

Are you already skilled in this area? I could use your advice!

Are you, like me, challenging yourself? Let's do it together. Then we can support each other!

You can find the previous posts of my journey here:

Join my journey
Annika are you never satisfied?
Rapid Planning Method
You need to dare more Annika
The problem statement
The first branches in the issue tree
Selling to existing customers
55 sold, 35 to go

90 books in 90 days - 55 sold, 35 to go!

Thank you all who have contributed to the current status in my challenge:

55 books sold, 35 to go before end of February!

Those of you who have followed my 90 books in 90 days challenge, know that I have challenged myself to sell 90 books in 90 days (in addition to the books sold via my publishers).

You can read about the journey so far in these posts:

Join my journey
Annika are you never satisfied?
Rapid Planning Method
You need to dare more Annika
The problem statement
The first branches in the issue tree
Selling to existing customers

You may think that the rest of the journey should be simple, since I have sold more than half of the 90 books in a bit more than a third of the 90 days. Well, unfortunately I do not think these sales can be described by a linear function.

There are two reasons the first sales were easier than I expect the coming sales to be:

1. I have sold primarily to existing customers, customers who already know they like my writing
2. A lot of people have bought my books as Christmas presents

What I need to figure out next, is how to sell books to people who don't know me yet, and who are not looking for Christmas presents. 

Any tips you may have are very welcome!

90 books in 90 days - sell to existing customers

Welcome to the 90 books in 90 days challenge! Are you challenging yourself as well? Working towards a goal? Maybe we can learn from and support each other on the way!

Here are the links to the previous posts regarding this challenge.

Join my journey
Annika are you never satisfied?
Rapid Planning Method
You need to dare more Annika
The problem statement
The first branches in the issue tree


Let's go higher in the branch about selling to existing customers. How can I sell more to my existing customers?

My existing customers already have one or more of my books, so my focus will be to sell them my latest two books. The first thing to do is to make sure my existing customers know I have released a new book. This is one branch of my issue tree. The second branch on this level will be to make it easy to buy the books.

These branches are Mutually Exclusive, there are no overlaps. But are they Collectively Exhaustive? Will spreading the word and making it easy to buy the books make me sell more to existing customers? Most likely, yes. Enough? That will depend on how well I handle the actions on the next level of the tree.

Spreading the word to existing customers means using the channels I have already. My distribution list, my facebook page, this blog - and of course direct contact with those I meet, or contact via others who meet my customers.

With some good actions in the leaves of this tree, my existing customers will know I have released another book. The next step is to make it easy for them to buy it.

They can of course buy the books on-line, on normal book selling sites like Adlibris, Bokus and others. My publisher is taking care of that. The challenge I have started is for the books I sell myself, in addition to the ones sold via my publisher.

Making it easy to buy from me includes making the books available in my own web shop and to include a pick-up option. I can also bring the books when I meet my customers, for instance at work and I can have books brought via others who meet my customers.

There we are! A lot of actions defined. Time to execute!

Are you joining my journey with a journey of your own? I hope you do, then we can support each other and celebrate together when we have come all the way!

90 books in 90 days - the first branches in my issue tree

Welcome to the 90 books in 90 days challenge! Are you challenging yourself as well? Working towards a goal? Maybe we can learn from and support each other on the way!

Here are the links to the previous posts regarding this challenge.

Join my journey
Annika are you never satisfied?
Rapid Planning Method
You need to dare more Annika
The problem statement

It is time for the M, in the Rapid Planning Method. M as in Massive action. Massive action without knowing what actions to take makes no sense. A lot of people are busy and do a lot of things all the time - without achieving results. They do not achieve results since they fail to connect their actions with what they want to achieve. We will not make that mistake.

To ensure I take the right kind of action, I will apply the approach I recently learned in the course Driving Strategic Impact: An issue tree. For more info on issue trees, check out The importance of pruning your issue tree.

The root of  an issue tree is the problem statement, so for my 90 books in 90 days challenge, the root is:

How can I sell 90 books in 90 days in an enjoyable way?

The intention with an issue tree is to create branches that together answer the question at the root. The branches should be MECE: Mutually Exclusive, Collectively Exhaustive.

The two first branches are fairly straight forward and come from a basic rule in business:

You can sell more to existing customers and you can sell to new customers. 

These branches are Mutually Exclusive, meaning they do not overlap and they are Collectively Exhaustive meaning together they answer the question at the root.

To get to the massive actions, we will go higher in the tree, all the way to the leaves, in coming blog posts.
.

Are you joining my journey with a journey of your own? I hope you do, then we can celebrate together when we have come all the way!