Must Promote!

May 2017 Blog

This is the Fifth month in a row I'm posting my blog on time. It's almost a habit.

Must Promote!

Writing outside in the wind and the sun today. A welcome change after yesterday's all day rain. No, I didn't write outside in it. Sadly, I didn't write at all yesterday. But now, the sun is shining and the wind is easy. I sit and contemplate the volunteer sunflower growing where it shouldn't and I write.

Must Promote! A Haiku

I would shine my light

For all to see, but I fear

It is not worthy.

I'm actually still on track with my mantra for the year:

Must Write! Must Edit! Must Publish! Must Promote!

And this month's post is "Must Promote!"

The above Haiku should be entitled "Hesitation", but I hesitate to do that since the previous month's titles reflected the theme of the month's blog.

This month's blog is not an easy one to write. I know little about promotion, except for the advertisements I am constantly bombarded with across all media. I know even less about self-promotion, except that I was discouraged as a child from bragging or boasting about my accomplishments as if doing so were a mortal sin.

Unfortunately, that attitude has stuck with me to the point where I have hesitated even to acknowledge a compliment over the years.

If I am to have any kind of financial success as a writer, that must change. I need to accept the inevitable necessity and learn to promote myself and my body of work.

Actually, I believe I've written some pretty impressive, if not entertaining stuff, but I also have a problem with judgment (which doesn't help either) so I hesitate putting myself out there for criticism. But, what the heck, at my age I should be able to take it on the chin and blow my own horn. (Some clichés are just too handy to pass up.)

I know there are many outlets available for promotion. Some are free, some cost a little, and some cost a lot. Being a 'starving artist', I'm all for the first option: "FREE"!

I run across so many writers' sites and Twitter accounts that offer such varied platforms, that I have become overwhelmed by them. Even my publishing outlets have resources available that I have not taken full advantage of.

I need to take some time to sort it all out, because as sure as "Publish or Perish" is true, so is "If you put your candle under a bushel basket, no one will see it." (or something like that)

Amazon and http://createspace.com/ seem to have some of the most comprehensive promotion ideas available, but a lot of them insist you be exclusive to Amazon and its outlets. I prefer to spread my wares around, but most of my royalties do seem to come from them, so I guess I do owe them some loyalty, if not exclusivity.

http://smashwords.com/ has promotion material available also and they are my co-favorite publishing site (along with the aforementioned Amazon and its http://createspace.com/)

There are also Twitter accounts for authors that offer free promotion in exchange for promoting other authors. I've run into several of those. I will be checking into them in the next few months.

 I know I said I would do some promoting during April, but you remember those taxes I also mentioned? Well, I put it all off until the last minute and filed my extension just prior to the deadline.

I have got to be the world's worst – or best – procrastinator, depending on how you look at it.

So now, here I am, the beginning of the fifth month of the year that's one-third over already. I still need to write, edit, publish AND promote.

Taking a deep breath, I'm plunging into the deep end. I'm going to do them all in May. If I'm breathing again by June 1^st, I'll tell you how it all went.

And I'm still thinking about throwing in at least one audiobook at www.audible.com project, so I'll have that to talk about, too. It's all very ambitious, I know, but stringing it out hasn't worked in the past and my far future is getting closer and closer to its final resolution.

In the meantime, over this month, if you have any ideas or thoughts about what has or hasn't worked for you, please let me know. I want to explore all the options I can.

It's wonderful, really, to have so many options available to us in this media driven age. I keep telling myself that over and over even as I am overwhelmed by my daily Twitter activities.

Okay, smiling now. I need to get back to my Tweeps and see how they are doing. Wish me luck this month, as I will need all I can get to not drown in the media sea I need to make better use of.

(Sorry about the preposition at the end, but…)

If you have any questions or comments on any promotion platforms or options, please leave a comment and I will get back to you. I love to hear from my readers.