Jason Howell asked Mike Robbins:

Mike, I'm asking this of several writers, some friends, some strangers... Follower counts, blog traffic, Amazon rankings: vanity metrics. Numbers that have cosmetic value, but aren't necessarily meaningful in and of themselves. Have you ever found yourself chasing these numbers just to run up the score? Or does comparing yourself with peers who appear to be "winning" ever become a problem? How do you deal? Thanks.

Mike Robbins No - not interested in chasing figures like that. Even if your Amazon sales figures are bumped up into four figures for 48 hours, it won't really sell books. Only word-of-mouth recommendations do that. I do arrange review copies for people who genuinely want to review a book, and I appreciate their interest. But it is not a priority.

I write because I want to. No-one would bother doing it to get rich. Spend too much time worrying about marketing and you won't be writing much that's good.

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