Seven days into my ongoing experiment to become an indie author whose books actually get read and sold, and apparently I have decided the solution involves connecting myself to practically the entire internet.
Not sponsored by Coca-Cola. Tragically.
Field report by Lupe Farkas • Indie Author • Professional ARC Reader & Book Reviewer • Host of Imperfect Rebel
Rebellllsssssss, when I tell you I’m powered by Coke Zero, please understand that this is not a metaphor. This is operational truth.
So, Coca-Cola, hello…
You’re on LinkedIn, right?
Feel free to notice your girl here.
If you are reading this, my fridge is accepting applications for a lifetime supply of Coke Zero. I have evidence of consumption. 😂🥤
Because today, Rebels, was one of those “how the hell did I do all this in one lifetime?” kind of days.
And somehow I am still here.
Hydrated almost exclusively by questionable amounts of Coke Zero.
So. Day 7.
Today is the seventh day of The Indie Author Experiment, my ongoing attempt to find out whether I can build a real author platform, reach actual readers and eventually become an indie author whose books genuinely sell.
This is not a thirty-day challenge.
The experiment ends when I can show, with actual evidence, that the books are moving.
But because the numbers in these posts always come from the previous completed day, I cannot give you the first true seven-day verdict yet.
No cheating.
No closing the laboratory at four in the afternoon because the graph looks prettier.
Tomorrow I open the Week One file.
Seven completed days.
Website. Google Search. Instagram. Facebook. LinkedIn. Pinterest. Podcast. KDP.
What grew. What got worse. What reached strangers. What actually sent traffic somewhere.
And the question that has been sitting in the middle of this experiment staring at me since Day 1:
That is tomorrow.
Today?
TODAY I NEED TO BREAK THE INTERNET.
I said I need to break the internet…
Hello?
Are you there?
HELLLLLLOOOOOOOO? CAN YOU HEAR ME?
Feeling a little Adele right now.
Operation: Stop Copy-Pasting My Entire Life
The internet tentacles are connected.
Yesterday I said I was going to deal with the cross-posting situation.
Manually posting the same thing on every social platform is perhaps not the most intelligent use of the approximately seventeen functioning minutes left in my brain every evening.
So I did something about it.
I started connecting the little Lupe Farkas author ecosystem so more content can begin its journey from LupeFarkas.com instead of requiring me to personally escort every post across the internet like an exhausted tour guide.
Website first. Tentacles second. 🐙
Some platforms will still need their own keywords, hashtags and tiny sacrifices to whichever algorithmic deity is working that shift.
But the basic plan is finally becoming:
I publish on my website. The tentacles start moving.
Which means less time manually posting the same thing seventeen times and more time doing something deeply unusual for an author:
writing books.
The Voices Have Discovered Analytics
Apparently I am becoming a data person.
Then I set up a ridiculous number of things that are apparently going to help me collect data, understand what readers are doing and eventually make decisions based on something slightly more sophisticated than the voices inside my head.
Look at me becoming a King Kong marketing expert.
Set up, connected and tested. I opened LupeFarkas.com in a private window and Google actually saw me. I celebrated as if NASA had confirmed intelligent life.
Connected so I can keep watching how Google discovers, indexes and surfaces LupeFarkas.com in search.
Connected through Site Kit because apparently even my website now receives performance reviews.
I claimed LupeFarkas.com on Pinterest, so Pinterest now officially knows that the website belongs to this particular chaotic woman.
I cleaned the site-wide search-title structure so posts, pages, tags and archives connect their subjects more clearly to Lupe Farkas.
I also gave the homepage a proper meta description: indie author, professional ARC reviewer and host of Imperfect Rebel.
Profiles. Bios. Settings. Verification codes. Analytics. Google. Pinterest. Social platforms.
And somehow, after all of that…
nothing exploded.
Progress.
And Then Things Escalated
The ecosystem acquired more tentacles.
And because apparently the voices inside my head were feeling ambitious , today I also expanded the experiment’s little ecosystem.
Quite aggressively, actually.
Nobody panic.
I still have absolutely no idea what I’m doing.
That is precisely why this is an experiment. 😂
Monnett
Ohhh, you don’t know what Monnett is?
Well, Monnett is my new European social-media experiment. Look how posh I am. Very continental. 🇪🇺😂
Follow Lupe on Monnett
Tumblr
Apparently Tumblr is cool again.
Which means I have officially lived long enough to watch a social platform come back into fashion. Naturally, I brought the chaos with me.
Follow Lupe on Tumblr
UpScrolled
Apparently UpScrolled is having a moment.
Will book people find me there? Will it work? Will I discover that my entire audience is myself and one confused man in Belgium?
Excellent questions.
Follow Lupe on UpScrolled
Lemon8
Apparently the Lemon8 book ecosystem is alive.
Meaning there are actual readers, actual book posts and actual humans interacting instead of one lonely digital tumbleweed crossing the homepage every Thursday.
Follow Lupe on Lemon8But I’m not telling you about that yet. Some things still need to remain mysterious around here. 😈
Meanwhile, There Are Actual Books
Help me test the one thing this experiment is actually about.
While I am out here connecting myself to approximately three quarters of the internet, my books are sitting quietly in the corner waiting for somebody to actually read them.
So if you have Kindle Unlimited and want to participate in the Indie Author Experiment in the most useful possible way:
read Before October Ends: A Life for a Life.
It is Book One of The Tuscan Trilogy and is available in English, Italian and Brazilian Portuguese.
Read it. Turn the pages. Tell me what you think.
Recommend it if you genuinely like it.
Because I can collect impressions, clicks, followers, saves and seventeen different kinds of dashboard until my eyes fall out…
but the experiment is still about becoming an author whose books are actually read and bought.
The Little Lupe Ecosystem
If you made it this far, you might as well snoop around.
The Indie Author Experiment is only one part of LupeFarkas.com.
Around the books there are book reviews, ARC reading, author conversations, the Imperfect Rebel podcast, and a Journal documenting more or less everything that escaped the open tabs.
Apparently One Internet Was Insufficient
Find me in the other corners of the experiment.
Your Turn
Tell me what I should test next.
A platform?
A book-marketing idea?
Something you tried that genuinely moved readers?
A completely ridiculous experiment that you secretly think might work?
Send it.
But please…
do not write to me saying you are an expert and want to charge me to do X, Y and Z.
That is not the experiment.
If you genuinely have an idea and want to participate, tell me what you think I should try.
If I test it and it works?
You get featured in the experiment.
And potentially on the podcast.
That sounds considerably more fun.
Please remove the scammers. I want to believe people again.
It is becoming impossible to distinguish:
“Hello Lupe, I genuinely enjoyed your article”
from
“Hello esteemed author, your book has tremendous visibility potential and for the humble sum of €847 I can introduce it to twelve highly engaged readers in an undisclosed Facebook group.”
😂
Tomorrow · Week One
Tomorrow I open the first complete seven-day file.
Day 7 is still running, so I refuse to close the numbers early just to make a prettier recap.
Tomorrow I pull the complete first-week data from LupeFarkas.com, Google Search, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, Pinterest, the podcast and KDP.
I want to know what improved. What got worse. What reached new people. What sent traffic. What apparently accomplished absolutely nothing.
And most importantly:
did any of it move the books?
No cherry-picking.
No “EVERYTHING IS AMAZING!!!” recap because one graph happened to be green.
Seven completed days.
Real numbers.
Then I judge Week One.