The Three Ingredients of Indie Success

There are a lot of different success stories out there, but the failures outweigh them by far in terms of sheer numbers.  So what's the magical formula for Indie success?  As far as I can tell, there are three key ingredients to Indie success.

A Great Book:

If you want to be successful, you need to start with first things first.  You need a great book.  This means that editing, formatting, and even the cover should be the absolute best that you can produce.  Never settle for OK.  Your book needs to scream five-stars from all angles.  Take the time.  Invest the effort.  Pour every ounce of your creative genius into that baby, then refine, refine, refine until it is as close to perfect as you can get.

Luck:

Yeah.  I know.  I don't like this one either.  But let's face it.  Luck plays a huge part in this game.  The market is constantly changing, so marketing tactics that work one minute don't work the next.  Add to that fact that the market is entirely flooded with Indie books.  Add to that fact that many of those Indie books probably shouldn't be published yet because they are full of errors, etc, (sorry, but it's true), and thus readers are wary of even picking up an Indie book in the first place....  Luck plays a huge role.  The chances of someone finding your book are right up there with the chances of finding the proverbial needle in a haystack.  Yay.

Persistence:

Out of all the factors, this is the one that you have the most control over.  Sure, you control the effort you put into the creation of your book, but there are certain innate talent factors that we have no say in.  We can refine our skills, but each of us have a limit, whether we like it or not.  It's part of being human.  However, you have total control over your actions, and that is where persistence comes in.  You must stubbornly refuse to give up.  I've said it before, and I'll say it again.  You have to be like a rabid pit bull.  You have to hold on to that thing that you believe in, and not let go, no matter how discouraged, how hopeless, how incredibly lost in the sea of Indie authors you feel.  When you feel like giving up, you need to give yourself a pep talk along the lines of "Hell no!", keep your chin up, and keep going.  This is a marathon, folks.  Quitters are automatic losers.  Only the ones who keep going ever have a chance of running into magic ingredient #2, Luck.