Musing about how to develop my marketing plan.
A frustrating and sometimes an infuriating topic, the critical effort of marketing and self avocation is where I am reluctantly turning my attention. Unfortunately, the side of my personality that enjoys sitting down and going through the creative process that involves developing characters, imagining new worlds, and putting together a kick-ass plot is not the same personality that enjoys getting the word out. Talking to complete strangers about something so personal is scary at best!
Yesterday, I had coffee with a good friend and fellow author, Annabelle Lewis. Check out her new website. One of our primary topics of conversation was around topics of interest in marketing our work. We’re a bit overwhelmed, and it seems that we have more questions than answers…
How do you identify your ideal audience and reach them effectively?
Should you use book promotion sites? Paid or Free? How do you judge the value proposition of each?
To audio or not? How does this factor into your publicity plan?
What’s the right balance on Social Media, and how do you measure success?
How do some of the pieces of the writing process, such as editing and cover design, factor into the marketing and promotion of your work?
What about critique sites? Is there any marketing or promotional value to those?
How do you get into bookstores as an independent author and publisher?
What about all these marketers that help you get onto blog sites?
How do you arrange or participate in “In Person” promotions and make them effective?
When to (and should you) go for the big publishers or an agent?
Annabelle and I decided to start meeting regularly to support each other in this endeavor. Two minds must be better than one, true? To those ends, we’ve posted a meetup and opened it up for others to join us. We’re hoping to find some like-minded authors willing to contribute and share information. Authors helping authors, if you will.
If you’re local to the Twin Cities, check out our next meeting HERE. Our next meeting will be at the Chanhassen Library on Saturday, January 12, 2019.
For now, I’m returning to Caetera and a charged scene between Gregor and Niccolai–they are simply thrumming with anger! I’m excited to see how they work this one out…
Happy reading and writing to all!