How Am I Supposed to do THAT?

CAUTION: Before you read this post beware: I am a very peppy person and I like my exclamation points! J

You’ve written your New York Times best seller, you’ve found a publisher, gone through round after round of edits, and think the worst is over………. then you hear the dreaded words “Now you need to market your book” EEWWWW!

Marketing is not as big, bad, and scary as it sounds. In fact, you market something every day – YOURSELF! Marketing is behind a lot of things we do, whether we realize it or not. As a child you do everything in your power to convince your parents as to why you need a new toy. When you are dating you specialize in marketing yourself. You get dressed up in order to market yourself physically, and you filter what you do and say in order to market your personality.  When you enter the job market, you highlight your education and experience in interviews. And when you finally land that job, you are constantly promoting yourself and your company. All of this is marketing.

But I’m an author, how does that apply to me? As an author, one of the best things you can do is something you are already used to doing – Marketing YOURSELF! Open Facebook and Twitter accounts, begin blogging, join writing societies and critique groups. All of those things go a long way to create a name for yourself in this business. This should be fun, and is a great way to meet new friends and create contacts. However, when using social media and any other online application be careful what you post:  Once on the internet, always on the internet.

What about my book? You’ve worked hard, and have gone through many a painful edit in order to get your book published. You now have bragging rights, and in a sense that’s exactly what marketing your book is; and once again it should be fun! Use the various internet outlets and connections you have previously setup and gained to tell the world about your book and why they should read it!

The aforementioned tactics are not by any means the only ways to market yourself or your book, and that’s where I come in. We at Astraea believe in giving our authors the best. And in this case, that means helping our authors to succeed. By taking an active interest, and by working with our authors to create integrative marketing plans, we are doing our best to give you every chance to succeed.

So keep on writing, and when marketing is mentioned remember – don’t FREAK have FUN!

- Alice