GalleyCat contributor Jeff Rivera interviewed self-publishing success story Amanda Hocking for mediabistro.com’s So What Do You Do? feature.

When asked about why most writers who self-publish are not able to achieve what she has, she replied:

A lot of authors tend to over market or they don’t take criticisms very well. They think that their book is perfect. They don’t want to get bogged down with editing or covers, because they think their book is so good. Or they market too hard. All they do is talk about their book and nobody wants to hear, ‘Buy my book.’ They want to have a conversation with you … Also, new writers respond to negative reviews and have great catastrophic meltdowns. You can’t respond to reviews at all except to say ‘thank you for reading the book.’ That’s the best you can do; otherwise, you’re just going to look bad even if the reviewer is totally out of line.

Follow this link to read the rest of Hocking’s interview.

I’m posting this article from Media Bistro because I have been obsessed with the question of HOW these internet phenoms get so big. Lots of people publish their books on-line. How do you get to be McDonald’s? I want to know because I’m curious. I also want to know because I secretly burn to grow this blog. What I learned from the interview is that I have to be prepared to do a lot more than I’ve done or continue to do. Sending one or two paragraphs of smoke up the internet’s derriere every night is not going to cut it. Or getting chummy with some bloggers who will remain nameless. I haven’t read Amanda Hocking’s novels, but damn I respect her work ethic. When I was her age I could barely cross the room to look for rolling papers.

Honestly, how hard do you work at growing your business?