Welcome back to another Creator’s Roulette feature, friends! I have Morgan Quaid with me today, sharing the ugly side of promotions of artistic pursuits! Morgan is an Australian-based writer of speculative fiction, fantasy, and horror, specializing in fast-paced page turners set against expansive fantasy backdrops. When he isn’t writing novels, comics, graphic novels, or short stories, he’s usually composing or producing music, or staring with longing and regret at a bar of chocolate.
His published works include: Whiplash Book 1 (Markosia), The Script Rebellion (Markosia), Shadow’s Daughter (Markosia), Idle Thuggery (Markosia). Upcoming works include: Rust Chronicles (Markosia 2022), The Blood Below (Markosia 2022), A Blade in the Dark (Black Caravan/Scout 2022).
I hope you enjoy this candid take on promotions and if you relate to his experiences, do tell us in the comments!
The Ugly Truth of Promotion: Getting Your Face Out There
A guest post by Morgan Quaid
You’ve written your latest novel, gone through three months of cruelling editing, reshaping, and re-editing, and now you’re finally ready to put it out there. After all that work, you’ve got something that you think readers will really enjoy, but now you’re faced with the problem of how to get your book into their hands.
For many of us creative types, marketing or promotion feel like thoroughly dirty enterprise. They take us away from the purity of creating art and the thrill of interacting with fans and readers.
The fact is though, in many cases the only mechanism to connect readers to our work is some form of marketing/promotion, whether leaning on social media, podcast appearances, or more traditional forms of advertising. Most of us don’t want to do it and, for most, the idea of spending time trying to promote our work is wasted effort—time we should be spending writing our next novel! The sad truth is, unless you’ve signed a contract with a huge publisher willing to put millions of dollars in advertising behind your work, you’re going to have to do the bulk of marketing and promo yourself. Even if you have signed with a large publisher, you’re likely going to be called upon to promote your own work regardless.
And here we come to the next hurdle; the problem of promotion when you don’t have a ready-made fan base. How do you build a following? How do you connect with readers and promote your work effectively? How much money should you sink into the enterprise before the cost of promotion outweighs what you’ll ever make from your book?
Well, the good news is that there are a bunch of youtube channels, blogs, and books which cover these questions in detail. Most tell a similar story, and most will tell you that you need to build a plan which works for you (e.g. your style of work, your desired fan base, budget, ultimate writing goals etc.).
What these sources can be a little light on is the reality of just how much time and effort the promotional side of things will take. The fact is that getting an audience takes time, patience, and effort. It’s not something that happens over night and it’s not something you can set and forget.
It takes a long, long time to build a group of readers and supporter who will eventually transition to die hard fans. You have to build support brick by brick and that takes time and effort.
One of the biggest obstacles to building this kind of audience, for most writers, can be selling yourself to readers. We’re happy to put our work out there, but most of us are shy when it comes to putting our own face next to our books, or promoting via podcasts, or recording video updates for our fans. It’s a fact of human nature that we want to see the creator behind the creation. We love behind the scenes footage from our favourite films and tv series’. We love to watch the blooper reel at the end of the movie, and why? Because it gives us a human point of connection with the creators of the film.
It’s the same with being a writer. Readers want to know the person behind the book, they want to understand your process, share in the creative journey and get to know you, to some extent, as a person. They want to feel a connection with you, not just via the written word, but with the person who stands behind those words.
For the most part, the old days where a writer can tap away at a typewriter in some dusty attic, shunning the world and living the life of a hermit, are over. We live in a thoroughly connected world, a world filled with talented writers all vying for a place within an incredibly challenging and crowded field. As much as we might hate the idea of putting ourselves out there, if you’re a writer, then chances are you’re going to have to put your face and your voice out there for the world to see.
That means having a dedicated web page, building a mailing list, running promotions, regularly contacting your readers, and providing updates. In short, it means building a community of readers, brick by brick. It means time and effort, trying and failing, being a little vulnerable, but ultimately gathering a group of people who can’t wait for your new book to launch; die hard fans that can help support your writing career, whatever that might look like.
Do you find it difficult to promote your work? What are some strategies you have used to grow your audience?
Tell us in the comments below!
Thank you so much for hanging out with us today! Connect with Morgan on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and his website.
Other articles in Creator’s Roulette that touch on this topic include Zarina Macha on Networking and Connections, Nicole Dake on Life as a Blogger, Author and Mom, and Nikki Minty on Being Self-Published amongst many others!
Photo by Pratik Gupta on Unsplash
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