Don’t Read Your Reviews
Many authors try to avoid reading their reviews, but few authors are capable of not peeking.
From the moment our book is published, we have that need to see what others thought about it.
We know it is good.
We think it is good.
We hope it is good.
The doubts creep in each time we check to see if there is a review.
We finally see that a review has been posted. We frantically scroll down to read it.
If it is a five star review, we dance a little jig and fist pump the air.
If it is a four star review, we wonder what was wrong with that reviewer.
If it is three stars or less, we slump back in our chair trying to convince ourselves that one of our enemies is out to get us by lying on a review.
Yes, there really are people out there who get a kick out of posting bad reviews. Sometime they are competitors. Often they are just people who have found a way to make themselves feel better. If they can take down someone else, they feel their own self-worth goes up.
Occasionally, it is an honest reviewer with an honest opinion. You will know that review. It will still make you feel bad, but there will be a little tickle in the back of your head that says something like, “Well, maybe you are a little right, but I couldn’t afford an editor.” Or “I was hoping nobody would notice that I forgot to change the dates when I edited that section.”
The honest reviews are the ones that can help you. They tell you exactly why the reader didn’t like the book, and tell you how you can fix it.
With each new book, our skin gets thicker, but bad reviews still hurt. Negative reviews crush our creativity. They make us second-doubt ourselves and our worth as writers.
If you are a writer who simply can’t get past a negative review, you need to refrain from reading your reviews. At the very least, train yourself to check them only once a week or once every few days. Never check them when you’re in a bad mood. Perhaps sit down to read them with your favorite comfort food. A bowl of chocolate ice cream with hot fudge. A plate of cheese and a glass of wine. Or maybe just a candy bar.
If there is only one piece of advice I can give you let it be this:
Never, ever, ever respond to a negative review.
I mean it. NEVER RESPOND IN ANY WAY TO A NEGATIVE REVIEW.
If you don’t have a problem reading negative reviews, read them often and use them to your advantage. If the reviewer mentioned something specific, pull out that original doc file, make a few changes, log in to kdp and upload the new file.
Your original book will still keep selling until amazon finishes converting your new file. Then it simply replaces the old file with the new file and you don’t lose any sales.
The take-away for this post is simply to help you understand that we all get negative reviews. Every single author gets negative reviews. How you handle them is what makes you as good or better than the next author. Learn to use the negative reviews to your advantage. Use them to help make you better!
Now, go write!
