A Marketing Story to Inspire Authors to Renewed Efforts

A Marketing Story to Inspire You to Renewed Efforts

By Carolyn Howard-Johnson, author of the multi award-winning HowToDoItFrugally Series of books for writers

I don’t think any author—or anyone with a profession or career or business—needs to be reminded that marketing is important. I sense, though, that they need a little inspiration now and then to convince them to keep at it or to utilize its magic to make whatever they are passionate about work better. Maybe to make it more fun. So here is a little story that recently took my breath away, convinced me anew that the net works. That Twitter works. That reviews work. And that even when we don’t see their charms on a daily basis, they (and their marketing sisters) are out there doing what they are supposed to do and doing it without asking us to recognize them, praise them, or pat them on their backs!

You see, I recently found a review floating around the Twitter platform at least a decade after it had been written,  a review I never knew existed. It was written by Author Anthony James Barnett (twitter moniker @ajbarnett) who is a fellow tweeter. Years ago he found me there, read my multi award-winning The Frugal Book Promoter (then it its first edition!) and reviewed it on his blog (http://bit.ly/irpv3) --all unbeknownst to me. I found it more than a decade later and it has haunted me because it illustrates so concisely most everything I have been trying to help authors do with my consulting, coaching, teaching, and my series of books. It proves the value of reviews (and, coincidentally the need for the third book in my HowToDoItFrugally Series, How to Get Great Book Reviews Frugally and Ethically: The ins and outs of using free reviews to build and sustain a writing career  which—I suspect—Author Barnett may not even know exists in this new decade!)

Every author needs to plumb reviews to launch books and to give their older books a new life—maybe make them into classics! I love that Author Barnett is still out there helping me help authors do that! I relished it. Tweeted about it and then, gasp! …. ! I realized that my marketing and blogging benefactor may no longer be alive.

I left Barnett a comment on his blog and it is awaiting acceptance—with no luck.  I’ve surfed the web for his name and the title of his book a bit. Now it seems I need help finding him. That’s my first choice. But if that can’t be done, I can use the web and marketing tools to keep the beautiful little secret gift he gave me years ago alive. And maybe to inspire other authors!

MORE ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Carolyn Howard-Johnson brings her experience as a publicist, journalist, marketer, and retailer to the advice she gives in her #HowToDoItFrugally Series of books for writers and the many classes she taught for nearly a decade as instructor for UCLA Extension’s world-renown Writers’ Program. The books in her HowToDoItFrugally Series of books for writers have won multiple awards. That series includes both the first and second editions of The Frugal Book Promoter and The Frugal Editor which won awards from USA Book News, Readers’ Views Literary Award, the marketing award from Next Generation Indie Books and others including the coveted Irwin award. How to Get Great Book Reviews Frugally and Ethically launched to rave reviews from Jim Cox, Editor-in-Chief of Midwest Book Reviews and others:

“How to Get Great Book Reviews Frugally and Ethically [and other books in the series] could well serve as a textbook for a college Writing/Publishing curriculum.”

Marketing as a Beginner

The shop of the bookdealer Pieter Meijer Warnars--Johannes  Jelgerhuis (1770-1836)

Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

With a new fiction novella out in October, I have been brushing up on marketing techniques. As far as I can see, the only certainty is that there is no certainty. What proves successful for one author may not work for another.

My publisher has listed the need for Facebook and Twitter and I'll set up new accounts for my author persona. But social media is continually evolving and the new algorithms always tend to favor the website creators. FaceBook changes have made it more difficult to spread your news and views to all the friends on your list. And not all authors can afford or wish to afford paid ads.

In a new article suggesting how to stop wasting time with marketing, Tom Buford notes that 90% of his business comes from just two strategies: peer endorsement meaning recommendations from friends--this may perhaps include
affiliates?-- and using education based webinars to sell his products.

With a two step strategy in mind, I am considering slideshare and an infoproduct how-to course as a thankyou gift for purchasers of my book.

To work on my website, I'm following Tiffany Lambert's day by day blog--One Year in a New Niche.

Her blog may not be everyone's cup of tea but she's a great marketer and her openness and techniques are built for selling.

That said, here at Writers on the Move we have some of the best book marketers in the business. I have my copy of Carolyn Howard-Johnson's award-winning Frugal Editor and the Frugal Book Promoter  and a folder of helpful ebooks from Karen Cioffi-Ventrice.

Blogpost of the Month

This one has so much help and information that I'm still dipping into it weeks after publication.  Cynthia Lindeman writing for Boost Blog Traffic lists

101 Writing Resources That'll Take You from Stuck to Unstoppable. I don't know how unstoppable I shall be as I'm still having such fun with the list that I haven't quite got started.

* * * *

Next month I'll report back on my marketing plans and updates.

In the meantime, any help and advice in the comments below on which book promotion strategies  work best for you will be greatly appreciated. :-)

 Anne Duguid is a freelance content editor with MuseItUp Publishing and she passes on helpful writing,editing and publishing tips from time to time at Slow and Steady Writers