Lately I’ve been working very hard on marketing. If people don’t know about my books I’m pretty sure they won’t buy them. And if they don’t buy them I might have to stop writing.
Sigh.
The problem is that I don’t know how to do marketing. How do I get my writing discovered by the people who will most enjoy it?
Especially since I have little or no money to spend on that oh-so-important marketing.
So I turned to Facebook. I’ve been a busy little bee, sharing and posting, doing everything in my power to increase the traffic to my Facebook Fan page.
After all, the more people who see my page, the more who will buy my books. Right?
Wrong! I’ve managed to get a ton of traffic to my Facebook page without any increase in book sales.
What I’ve gotten instead are requests for relationships.
I showed the requests to my best friend, who also happens to be my husband. He just shook his head and grimaced.
Then I deleted the requests since they give me an uneasy feeling.
Almost like I just looked down and discovered that I’m balanced on a tightrope that’s been strung across the ocean. Just below me, circling and watching with greedy little eyes, is a massive school of ravenous sharks.
Waiting for me to take one wrong step.
Have you tried joining Empire Avenue? It's a free website where you buy and sell stock in other people (fake stock with fake money) and then you can use your earnings to run what they call 'missions'. With these missions you can ask people to G+ your online stuff, follow you on Twitter, re-tweet your stuff, like or share your Facebook posts, follow you on Facebook, watch your YouTube videos, comment on your blog, and so so much more. I use it to good effect with my websites. My ticker is CBSB on there. If you ever get on there, then let me know and I'll buy up all your shares and give you a hand with some missions.
I haven't heard of Empire Avenue before. I'll have to check it out.
I find that it takes entirely too much time to do marketing. But since publishers no longer market their authors (unless the author is already a big name) what other choice do I have?
But I would so much rather be writing than marketing!
Hi Veronica. I learned a long time ago that Facebook users are not a market to be taken seriously… nor are the pathetic people who think it's a dating site. Stick to book forums and chat rooms, where the people you'll connect with are actually literate.
Sounds like great advice!