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.

Must Publish!

April 2017 Blog

This is the fourth month in a row I'm posting my blog on time. I'm on a roll!

Must Publish!

I was able to write outside today. My session started out cold and windy, but about halfway through, the sun came out and I finished in relative warmth.

Must Publish! A Haiku

I'd share my thoughts with

The world, to the pleasure of

Some, bane of others.

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 Publish!"

Publish or Perish! It's ever been the rage in academia and is a great admonition for all authors. It goes along with "Don't hide your light under a bushel basket!"

Truth is, authors must publish to be widely remembered, and who among us does not wish to be remembered or at least have our words live beyond us?

"Traditional" publishing, where you submit your work to an agent or a publishing house directly, has been joined (and some may say even surpassed) by self-publishing through one or more of the capable publishing platforms on the internet.

I would have stuck to submitting the traditional way, were I a whole lot younger and had not nearly died from heart failure a couple of years back. There's a certain amount of validation having someone else believe in your work and actually paying you for the privilege of being able to publish it. However, it's not necessarily the way to instant riches or a "Steven King-dom".

Also, self-publishing or "Indie-Publishing" does not carry the stigma it used to – since your work lines up equally well on sales platforms such as Amazon – and a lot of readers now don't seem to care who the publisher is or isn't when they pop a book into their Kindles.

Personally, I have used http://createspace.com/ (the publishing arm of Amazon) and http://smashwords.com/ (a multi-platform e-book publishing site) to a certain degree of success. Their tutorials are relatively easily followed, and they have been around for a while. I'm sure they'll be around a while longer, so I believe my own catalog is safe.

Once you make it through their step-by-step processes and hit that "Publish" button, you will feel a euphoria unknown to the non-writer, non-publisher. Once you come down from that high, however, you need to concentrate on promoting and marketing your offerings. Few self-published books are instant successes without a push to let the buying public and your future loyal-readership know what you have to offer and how easily they can purchase it.

But I digress and marketing is the subject of my next blog. (Wouldn't want to get ahead of myself.)

Once your manuscript is written and edited (and re-edited to everyone's satisfaction), you need to carefully research your publishing choices.

Even if you go traditional, you need to make sure your publisher or your agent are reasonably honest and trustworthy. A search online should reveal any problems they may have in the industry.

Also, you need to be aware and perhaps wary of the vast array of subsidy publishers out there who may not have the best of reputations among authors and aspiring authors. Some may promote a good game, but after a large investment and sweat equity on your part, you may find yourself with cartons of unsold and/or unsalable books and the huge headache of selling them yourself. (Maybe not too much of a problem for our extroverts out there – but many of us fall on the introvert side of the author coin.)

I will not name names. Since I have avoided these companies, I have no tales of woe to tell, but again – "google" them. Find out what others are saying about those in which you are interested.

If you decide on my favorites (http://createspace.com/, and http://smashwords.com/), follow their instructions carefully. Check and recheck every step. If you have insurmountable problems, they offer excellent professional services, but you can publish absolutely free with them.) And you will end up with a product of which you can be extremely proud. A book you can put next to anybody's on the shelf and smile and say "Hey! I wrote that! Would you like me to autograph it for you?

By the way, that first autograph is going to put you on cloud nine. There is no better feeling for an author than to autograph a book and hand it back to a satisfied reader. (I know. I've been there. I've done that.)

Sorry, another tangent there. Back to publishing. You need to consider all the options available to offer your work to the widest possible audience. Besides print-on-demand books suitable for every conceivable outlet, you need to consider e-books in all their varied forms and requirements. It is essential to make your work available on Kindle type platforms.

Sounds confusing, I know, but remember Createspace, Amazon and Smashwords. They've got it all figured out for you. Just follow their instructions.

Beyond all the print and visual media out there, you also need to offer an audio option. I know I need to, and I'll be exploring www.audible.com for my audio publishing needs and will report my experiences in a future blog.

Remember, next month's blog should be on Marketing and promotion unless something else pops up that cannot be ignored. Hopefully, I will be reporting on my own successful efforts this month. However, I have procrastinated on taxes again this year, so don't know how much I will accomplish.

If you have any questions on any of these platforms or options, please leave a comment and I will answer. That's a new thing I'm doing – trying to be more responsive. I do have this problem – I am distracted by shiny objects – there goes one now – ooooh, so shiny…