I’m wearing my big girl pants today. That’s what I say when I have to tackle something I’d rather not—something that makes me a little (or a lot) uncomfortable—something that confuses me, that I don’t understand all that well or that I just despise doing. Today, I have to deal with the State Franchise Board with regard to filing a form for SPAWN (Small Publishers, Artists and Writers Network). I keep filing it and they keep writing to say I haven’t filed it. Sigh! Government and other types of filings and forms are outside my comfort zone. Neither do I like discussing finances, investments or taxes. These things complicate my world and I’d rather avoid them.
When you are an author, however, you’re in business and forms, contracts and finances are part of the equation. This is also true if you run a nonprofit organization for authors.
Some authors don’t consider authorship a business and they miss the opportunity to create a successful book project because of it. There are still authors who work hard to write and produce a book and then walk away. They don’t understand that, if they want a successful product, they still have work to do—a lot of work. In order to sell copies of their books, they must get heavily involved in the promotion.
Many authors know at an intellectual level that it is up to the author to promote his or her books. But they don’t understand what goes into successful book marketing. Or they have an inkling, but they prefer not to go out of their way to promote their books. They find it so distasteful that they choose to toss their books to the wind and hope for the best.
We’d all like to stay within our self-imposed comfort zones. But there always comes a time when you have to—simply must—are forced to—take a big step into the unknown, frightening, intimidating, overwhelming world you work hard to avoid. And when you do, it is never as bad as you thought it might be. At least that’s what I’m hoping as I approach my challenge today.
Before I sign off for the day, I’d like to present you with a challenge. What have you done to promote your book so far this month? Have you done any speaking gigs or planned any? Have you promoted to your mailing list? Have you contacted book reviewers? Have you established or added to a blog? Have you actively promoted your book through your social media accounts? Have you designed promotional material and started sending/handing it out? Have you signed up to sell your book at a local book festival or one in another state where you will be visiting?
You can sign up today to sell your book at the LA Times Festival of Books April 12/13, 2014 for only $203 per day, as opposed to $1,000 for a booth of your own. Here’s the link where you can get more information. http://www.spawn.org/latfb.htm. If you’re not a SPAWN member, join here: http://www.spawn.org. Click on join/renew. It’s $65/year.