Self-promotion. It's Not Gloating, It's Marketing!

If I was living my perfect world, it would consist of having an agent, a publisher, doing book signings on a regular basis, and maybe supplying a syndicated column on a weekly basis. However, I am just among the millions of other writers that are trying to get their message… their thoughts… their creative vision out to the masses. For alas, I am just another self-published, independent writer who is cutting a path through the jungle of pages written by others – in hopes to one day be accepted; for my written stories to be verified.

To date, over 500,000 new titles are entered into places such as Amazon, Barnes&Nobles, CreateSpace, Smashwords, Wavecloud, and Goodreads every month. And with numbers like that, you can imagine the difficulties one faces whenever self-publishing their work. Add into that – since most indie writers have fulltime jobs, families, and the like – that it becomes a daily challenge to not only do the entire marketing of their wares, but also to find the time to write even more. Personally, I have accumulated to date over six book ideas; all of which can’t find the time to write.

Each author in that predicament spends hours of their own time using social media as if it were their very own lifeblood. Posting non-stop on sites such as Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Goodreads, Instagram, and many others – all in the hopes that maybe, just maybe, someone will find interest in their title, their cover, their storyline, their genre and eventually check out that authors’ ‘masterpiece’. Dropping all pride aside – while not trying to make everyone tired of his or her self-promotion – they know that by doing this that it would be the ONLY way to share their latest endeavor.

Recently my wife, Lisa, made the remark that I am someone who HAS to have constant attention. When asking her why she indicated such – to me a hurtful statement - her response was something like ‘Well, you have so many fan pages. I always see your multitude of posts on Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook. You have an assortment of websites and NOW your blog!’

Needless to say, this hit a nerve. You see, as a child in middle school, since doing things like drawing pictures for teachers and/or playing the piano at events, fellow classmates were calling me ‘conceded’ and that I was full of myself – which was SO far from the truth since having the insecurities associated with artists.

I told her that all of those things she had seen posted from me WEREN’T to gloat, but to market. Market my books. Market my music. In fact, market anything that I could to help find interested folks who would enjoy those things. It was also during this conversation, I shared that since being an independent author that unfortunately no one was going spend the time or the effort to spread the word – which it was up to me, and only me. In conclusion, I then informed her of the old adage ‘It’s harder to market a book than it is to write one’. And man, how true is that!

Anyway, such is the life of an indie author/self-published writer. We write for the pure enjoyment of writing because we know that any funds will be hard to come by – at least for a while. We are all hoping for contracts from publishers and movie studios, and hope that our names become associated with the likes of Clancy, Sparks, Steele, and King. And though writings of that caliber are probably already available, due to the multitude of titles out there, the sad truth is that many of those words will never be read.

Oh, do you know that you can get ‘Just A Song Before I Go’ and ‘George’ in both paperback and for E-book? They are both garnering 4-5 star reviews, and both picking up speed. Get YOURS Today :)

Okay… so what did you expect? If ever faced with the opportunity, you have to self-promote.