In my recent article, Hurry Up and Fail (currently posted at http://www.matilijapress.com/articles/publish_hurryfail.htm, I urge self-publishing authors to make sure their book is ready for publication before they send it to the printer or to the fee-based POD publishing service. Unfortunately, it’s all too obvious that many authors neglect this important step. There’s another consideration that too many authors don’t take into account when they are in a hurry to produce a book. And that is Platform
We are so eager to get our wonderful, useful, delightful, entertaining, educational, informational, life-changing book out there that we sometimes rush the process when we really should be putting on the brakes. Why would you stop the forward motion of a book that’s ready to go? To make sure the author is also ready.
Your book has a dynamite cover, the text is perfect, the design is magnificent, but what about you? Are you ready to promote it? What will entice people to buy this book? Why will they buy a book that you wrote?
Sure you can figure out ways to get the word out. If you’ve been hanging around this publishing blog for any length of time and if you’ve been reading my books and articles on book promotion, you know some of the publishing ropes. You know about press releases, making news, getting out and speaking, showing up at bookstores to hand deliver books, writing articles for appropriate magazines and sites, getting book reviews. But again I ask, why will the consumer buy YOUR book?
With competition so extreme, it is even more vital that you have a platform before you produce a book for publication to a large segment of the population. Think about it, when you are shopping for a nonfiction book, you want to know that the author is credible. You wouldn’t buy a book on how to fly a plane by an author who had never flown. You might purchase the book if you’d heard this author speak at an amateur aviators convention, for example, or if you’d read about him heading up a flight academy for kids.
Novel readers typically purchase books by their favorite authors. They might even buy your novel, but you’re going to have to provide compelling reasons why they should. People who have enjoyed reading your stories in magazines, would surely be interested in your book. Maybe you happen to be the mayor of the town where your mystery story takes place or you have been teaching character development workshops at writers’ conferences for years or you have a high profile Web site where visitors can win prizes by solving mysteries.
Your platform is your following. It’s your way of attracting readers. My platform for my writing/publishing related books includes the fact that I have 8 books on these topics and I travel about half dozen or more times each year to various cities and present workshops and give keynote speeches at writers/marketing conferences. I have been writing for publication for 34 years and my publishing company is 24 years old. If I’m pitching a book related to article-writing, my background as a freelance article writer would be useful and impressive. Readers would want to know that I earned my living writing for magazines for many years—having contributed hundreds of articles to about 260 different magazines including Writer’s Digest, The World and I Magazine, Pages, Woman’s Own, Cat Fancy, Entrepreneur and many others.
If the book I was marketing had to do with authorship, my history as an author would become my platform; including the fact that I have 25 published books, that I am president of SPAWN (Small Publishers, Artists and Writers Network, write the monthly SPAWN Market Update and frequently speak and give workshops on publishing and authorship topics.
Of course, these facts would have no or little interest to someone who is contemplating purchasing my book on youth mentoring. I present a totally different set of qualifications and credibility factors when I am promoting or pitching my book, Youth Mentoring, Sharing Your Gifts With the Future.
Many authors enter into the world of publishing with a solid platform. You write the book because you have the qualifications to do so. When you have qualifications, you generally also have a following. But what if you don’t? I meet a lot of authors and hopeful authors who write books because—well, because technologically, they can. They have a theory, a measure of expertise or a story to tell. What they don’t consider is that their story might not be of interest to the general public. And, as indicated above, if they aren’t widely known—if they have no following—they will struggle to sell this book.
What’s the answer? If you don’t have a solid platform, establish one. I often recommend to my clients and other hopeful authors to hold off producing their books until they have established a platform.
One of my clients came to me with a book proposal for a unique and really marvelous book idea. I was convinced that she could land a major publisher. She had produced an excellent book proposal. I particularly liked the marketing section where she described the seminars she would set up in large cities throughout the world. She named specific celebrities who would be working the seminars with her and said that they would draw around 3,000 people each and sell probably 1,000 books. Wow, was I impressed! And I suggested to my client that she provide information in her book proposal about the success of seminars she has conducted in the past.
This is when she told me that she had not conducted any seminars—not yet.
I was disappointed, but I said, “Well, let’s get some quotes from some of the women you have coached related to the process in your book.†She said, “I haven’t taught this to anyone.†I asked if she had ever spoken before an audience or taught classes of any kind—she had not. As a last ditch effort, I begged her to tell me that she had a connection to some of the celebrities she mentions in her book proposal. Unfortunately, her response was, “No.â€
After heaving a big sigh, I said to my client, “I suggest that you stop forward motion on your book and spend the next several months establishing your platform. I want you to set up a seminar in the largest city near you.†I told her that a successful seminar would go a long way toward establishing a following and building credibility in her field. I did my best to convince my client that she wasn’t quite ready to start pitching her book to publishers or, for that matter, to promote it to the public.
She fired me.
I strongly urge anyone reading this today to seriously consider his or her platform before ever writing a book and definitely before sending the book to the printer or submitting it to a publisher.
Let’s say that you have a historical fiction. How can you establish a platform for this book? If you’ve been doing research and writing the book, you’ve probably already become somewhat of an expert on the period, the events occurring in this time-frame and the place where the story takes place. To add to your perceived expertise:
• Join the historical society in that place.
• Make contacts with people there who can help you get speaking gigs.
• Join Toastmasters and do some public speaking.
• Produce a few booklets in house on the topic, place, costumes and/or people from that period. Circulate them.
• Submit stories to magazines and Web sites to help create credibility as a writer of fiction and to establish a following.
Some people have an impressive platform in place, but don’t realize it. Let’s say that you wrote a book on dog care, yet you’re not a veterinarian, breeder or groomer. You’re simply a dog lover. What is your platform? Here are some ideas:
• Point up the fact that you have fostered dogs for a local humane organization all of your adult life.
• Explain that you volunteer at the humane society.
• Tell the publisher/public that you teach dog care to the children at the local recreation department, Boys and Girls Club, 4-H, for example.
• And reveal that you arrange for pet care classes at a large pet store chain in your county.
• Point out that you also travel to other cities and present seminars at pet shops and humane societies.
• Show some of the informational and educational leaflets or booklets on dog care that you distribute free through your Web site.
• Play up your strong connection with breeders, groomers and veterinarians related to specific dog rescue or protection projects.
(Note: Most people take for granted their own skills, talents and accomplishments. But if you are producing a book, this is no time to be modest. Of course, state only what is absolutely true—but there are definitely ways to embellish those truths for the sake of your platform. You may consider yourself just a regular mom who has written a book to help other mom’s deal with their autistic children. Dig deep into your pool of qualifications, however, and you may come up with some strong supports for your platform. You have two autistic teenagers, for example. You foster autistic toddlers. You are the president of a regional group for parents of autistic children. You organized a local program for educating autistic children. You were selected mother of the year last May in a community-wide competition.)
How can you establish a platform for a children’s book? This is a little tougher. Why? One reason is because of the competition. Every former teacher, retired policeman, mother and Sunday school teacher is writing a children’s book these days. Many of them do not have a background in writing and/or children’s literature. If you are a children’s book author without a platform, here are some ideas that might help you build one:
• Connect with public and private preschools and grammar schools and offer to read your books and other books to children.
• Start a library reading program for kids.
• Take a prestigious course for children’s writers.
• Submit stories to children’s magazines—a lot of them!
• Establish a Web site for children who like to read and their parents.
• Enter your stories in contests. Prizes help to establish credibility and notoriety.
• Launch a newsletter or magazine related to children’s reading material and circulate it far and wide.
• Set up a mother/daughter and/or father/son book club in your area and offer a template for others to do the same.
As you can see, all is not lost if you happen to read this blog after you’ve produced your book. Hopefully, it will help you to recognize elements of the platform you already have and it will give you some ideas for establishing a solid platform that will carry you through to riches.
Once you have that all important platform, don’t just keep things status quo. Use it, flaunt it, build on it and incorporate it into your promotional plan.
For more on how to establish your platform and for oodles of book promotion ideas, be sure to order your copy of The Right Way to Write, Publish and Sell Your Book. http://www.matilijapress.com/rightway.html And be sure to sign up for my online self-publishing workshop starting February 6, 2007. Sign up at my site. click on Appearances and then Courses.