A new look is on the horizon

For those of you who visit often you'll notice that we're doing a little remodeling of the blog/site.  There are many exciting changes coming. Stay tuned.

Magic Beans, Willpower and a Smidge of Motivation

Welcome back! Yesterday I discussed blogs and today I'm going to discuss Magic Beans and Motivation... Yes. I can be a little crazy, but for the most part, I've been blessed through the years and given a certain knack for dreaming up wild ideas and actually implementing them.

What better subject for an author who got her start years ago when she launched a Balloon Business just two weeks after her high-school graduation?  Magic Beans.  What are they and where can an author get them? Did you even know you need them?

Well, this blog post is about the unseen initiative that drives us toward any goal and whether or not you have what it takes to persevere and be the success that you were meant to be. 

Many of my fellow authors will be appalled by what I'm about to say, but the reality is that whether or not we like it or not. It's true.  Some call the phenomena "dumb luck."   Maybe, it is, to a degree.
You don't have to be the most talented author on the planet to become a successful author.  In fact, many of the most successful falls surprisingly short when it comes to the opinions of their peers. 

I'll shock you again when I say, "so what"! I'll try to explain.  When it comes to measuring another author's ability, we all would do well to recognize that the way we look at another author's work, and the way readers do is completely different.  It's subjective.  It's like a person's decorating choices and whether they adorn their lawn with pink flamingos or a work of modern art.  People are different, and they like different things. 

Do we as creatives do the world an injustice when we protest the writing ability of others and become bitter when people we deem unworthy achieve success?  I think we do because regardless of our opinion of our own ability, someone isn't going to like us or our work, and they are bound to let us know using the review system.

So, that being said it's important to identify these "Magic Beans" that every author needs to grab the spotlight of success for themselves.  There are two things that precede any person's success.

-Either they believed in themselves or someone else did! 

With just a smidge of self-motivation and determination any number of shortfalls can be overcome.  We can change how our covers look. We can edit a bad manuscript into a better one, but what we cannot do is succeed without the motivation to do so.

I would ask you now. Do you have what it takes?  Are you playing at the business of being an author? Or, do you truly believe in what you are doing and your ability to do it better every single time you put your fingers to the keyboard? 

I'm not famous, but I'm proud of the accomplishments I've made so far because I know that I do everything I can each and every day to assure success. 

Recognize today the success you already are and set those goals for the success you want to achieve.  Today's the day to wake up your will power and motivate yourself to create your own Magic Beans!!!  YOU are the secret ingredient because no one else can write the way you do!

I'd love to hear from you. Please comment and share this blog post any, and everywhere you can.

Tammie

To BLOG or Not to BLOG that is the Question!

Like you, I belong to a few writers groups online and one of the most asked questions lately has been "Should I have a blog?" 

For those of you who have read my book you already know the answer, but for those who haven't I'll try to explain the why behind the resounding "yes you should."

My background is in offline marketing and advertising and any person in that line of work worth their salt will tell you that it's hard to get anything for FREE, but if you can, you should use it.  For now, blog platforms are FREE. This may not be the case forever, but for now why not take advantage of the medium to further your marketing reach and help get both, you and your books out there? 

The biggest problem I see with authors and blogs is the fact that they don't plan how they will use the platform and instead judge the results by an arbitrary set of values.

I use my blog as a billboard. It's there to catch the occasional passerby, and I try to make sure that there is enough information on myself and my books to be informative when someone drops by.  I also use my blog as a means to an end. If you don't have a blog, you are virtually eliminating several additional methods of marketing yourself without even realizing you have done it.

What? Because I have a blog, I can participate in several things that I cannot if I only have a website. 

Book Tours: It's hard to participate in book tours, and blog hops without a blog. While there are paid versions you can easily set up tours and hops on your own working with fellow authors to cross-promote each other's books.

Articles: Using a blog you can easily draw attention to your blog and therefore, a static advertisement for you as an author by sharing the posts via Twitter and Facebook.  This is wonderful when your articles become viral with many authors sharing them across the various platforms.

If you're creative, you can come up with lots of ways to use a blog, but be careful not to miss the point of a blog.  A blog is a form of communication, and communication can also be static.  When you create a blog, it creates one more place that readers MIGHT find you. Don't be overly concerned if you blog isn't getting thousands of hits a month. It doesn't have to.  It's a tool and right now you can use it for FREE. 

If you have thoughts on blogging you'd like to share I'd love to hear your viewpoint. Please feel free to share.

The Books Debut: Behind the Book: 8 Hours to Jump Start Your Career...

The Books Debut: Behind the Book: 8 Hours to Jump Start Your Career...: BEHIND THE BOOK With a million things to do why in the world would an author spend valuable time out of their own writing to try to in...

Book Marketing Requires Doing Something...

It's often been said that you cannot continue doing the
same things and expect a different result.

Authors are no different than most people.  They want the "overnight" success story, but they fail to realize that most of those overnight successes took a lot longer to make it to where they are.  This article is about being realistic.  I know. We are authors and most of us in some form or fashion tinkers in the world of fantasy.

When it comes to marketing our books, it's time we made the distinction between fantasy and reality. It's ok dry your eyes. It doesn't have to be that bad. In fact, it could be even better than your fantasy. 

What? Have I lost my mind?  No. The reality is that while we all fantasize about becoming a million dollar seller, nothing compares to the first time you realize as an author that someone is buying your books and that you might actually be a real author afterall. What about the first five-star review you received, didn't it give you chills?

Reality is knowing that unless we do something, we'll never get where we want to be and it all starts with having a plan.  It doesn't matter what form your plan comes in, but sooner, or later you have to devote yourself enough to your success that you are willing to give "reality" it's due.  Reality is like an "entity."  I know you've probably heard sayings that refer to "the school of hard knocks," "paying your dues and any number of variations.  For our purposes, "reality" demands a bit of attention.

The truth is whether you are traditionally or non-traditionally published you still have to be willing to "pay your dues" and this case that requires acknowledging that you need to devote a few hours to planning.

Indie and self-published authors tend to be "seat of the pantsers" and that's exactly why you need to do this now. Don't wait, don't put it off. Sit down with a pad and paper and:
Set a Goal for the rest of the year.  This means set a goal for how many books you want to have out and how many over-all  books you'd like to be selling on average.
Set a Goal for next month. Since it's impossible to know when you'll be reading this you might as well set your goal for the next full month. Monthly goals are different and much more active. They are also the goals that will help you reach your end of year goals.
           Some suggestions for monthly goals:
             -A set number of review requests you will send out.
             -A set number of blog interviews you will schedule to do.
             -A set number of blog posts you'll write for your PR/Bank.
            -A set number of info and fresh promo tweets you'll write for your rotation.
            -A set number of new places to promote your books for free that you will find.

Set a Weekly Goal.  Weekly goals should consist of the above suggestions worked out into manageable tasks. 

Lifestyle goals are another area that you should allocate some time for planning.  Lifestyle goals are those big goals like "sell enough books to buy a car" or "sell enough books to write full time".  My suggestion is to use visual goals setting with this type goal.  If you have an office or writing room decorate it with visual images that you will associate with reaching your particular goal.  Surround yourself with motivational posters that make you feel good. 

The first step that you can take to assure a successful marketing campaign has more to do with you personally than it does with where to advertise or what group to join.  If your attitude is not right, you could be sabotaging all of your efforts.  You can market without being a pest and reach your goals, but nothing is going to happen until you decide to do something and then do it...

If you haven't already got a copy of the first book in the 8 Hour Series I hope you will give it consideration.

Afraid to take the plunge? Marketing to the Masses

Are you afraid to take the plunge?

We all have our comfort zones.  We have our writers groups and our Facebook friends and a few folks following us on Twitter, but how do we expect to ever sell to the masses if we're afraid or even just not motivated enough to put our wares out where the unseen public can make a determination about them.

Here's my disclaimer:
These articles are designed to inspire you and help you identify opportunities you may be missing in your marketing plan, but that assumes that you have a marketing plan, and many don't. These suggestions will be more productive if you use them as a layer to an already existing foundation. I know I sound like a broken record... I just know that it's true. Having an egg hunt with uncooked eggs is risky business. We should make sure our "eggs" are fully cooked and ready to meet the world before we expose them to the masses.

Now, what do I mean by the masses? I consider the masses as the general public that probably doesn't live and breathe Facebook author groups and reader groups. The general readership seldom leaves reviews, though they may read them on your page if they know about your book.  The masses are what have driven Shades of Grey and The Hunger Games to sales that make every traditionally and non-traditionally published author want to weep, pull their hair out and gnash their teeth while contemplating the reasons those mega hits shouldn't be successful.


So what's the magic?  The masses.  The masses, for the most part, could not care less about trolls or author politics. If faced with either they are usually either unaffected or appalled. The masses are what make the difference between a break-out book and a mildly successful one.  Contrary to popular belief, you don't have to be selling a million copies to be a successful author you only have to be exceeding your own goals and expectations because if you're not in your mind, it doesn't matter how successful others think you are you'll always be dissatisfied.

So, how do we tap into the masses?  Word of mouth is a great generator, but how do you possibly create word of mouth on a book to reach the masses? The key is to go where other authors don't think to go and do it in a way that the masses won't be offended by. This is not an endorsement of spam. It's actually a suggestion that you "mingle" socially in some places that you don't normally go. 


All of us have hobbies and interests outside of writing. As self-published or indie authors we often surround ourselves in the writing world cocoon and wonder why we aren't getting sales. Get a life and follow some of your interests for a bit. Help others and they will become interested in you, and if they like what you do they will help you spread the word.


The masses still believe that authors hold a certain degree of magic. They read and are still a bit glamour-struck when they "chat" with authors because their exposure to authors is limited. 

As authors we tend to believe that the "world" is what it is because it's what we see, but if I judge the world based purely on what I see I am putting limitations on my existence because I'm only exposed to my sphere of influence, and that would be either the real estate world or the online publishing world. 

So how big is this "Mass-World"... well for the purposes of this article let's just say the world is a mighty big place and believe it or not there are still quite a few people that aren't on Facebook and have never left a review on a book. They don't all run from site to site getting recommendations for books, and they rarely visit author websites.

So, why do we do those things? What's the point?  We do those things, in other words, we market to our base "world" because they can help us penetrate the masses.

I believe in actionable tasks. If you've already read my first book in the 8 HOURS SERIES, you know that I believe in action.  You will never get anywhere if you sit around and do nothing.  I'd like to challenge you to reach out into the world and  prepare to take your message to the masses.

Grab a pen and paper. Perhaps you'll even want to get a notebook for these exercises because I believe in homework.  

Jot down five things you enjoy doing or have an interest in.
Pull up Google or your favorite search engine and look for online ways to interact with that focus group.  Believe it or not but if you look hard enough you can find readers in most groups. Will everyone be interested? No...but within this demographic if you can connect with just one or two readers the benefit could be substantial.  These are the folks that will go and talk about your book and convince all their friends to buy your book. ( Especially, if they feel they know you personally)
The key is to share an interest with these readers.
Try it...you have nothing to lose and everything to gain.  You never know you just may have a little fun in the process.

Tammie

Need a marketing plan? Don't know where to start? 
Tired of marketing your book and feel like you're a spectator in your own life?
Know your book is good but still not selling what you'd like?
8 Hours Jump Start Your Career: A Step-by-Step Guide for Self-Published Authors can help you.  Grab your copy today.  Amazon  Barnes and Noble

Looking for Sales in all the Wrong Places...

I woke up this morning with the "Looking for love in all the wrong places" probably a sign I went to sleep with the TV on again. Within just a few minutes my mind connected  the tune to what I feel is a prevalent problem with authors.  The new indie revolution has forced creatives to try their hand in the marketing pool and often with disastrous results.   

As authors we are often like a "man overboard" floating on the internet sea, but there are life preservers being offered that we often overlook. The most important is time.  We have time to adjust what we do.  The wonderful thing about being non-traditionally published is the fact that we have a certain amount of control that no authors that've come via the traditional trail can say they've had.

We can monitor our sales, and we can adjust our marketing accordingly. This can be good or it can be bad. Why? Because, often we end up making changes that we shouldn't have just because we lack the patience to allow things to work.  We live in a world where everyone wants instant gratification, and we are no less adamant about the results, we want our books to have, but...that same impatience can often sabotage us and actually set our efforts back by weeks and sometimes months.

Weekly sometimes daily on virtually each group I belong to the same question is asked, "What's been your most successful promotion so far?"  What the poster usually means is "how can I sell more books today."  I have an answer to that. Expose yourself. No, I don't mean run around naked, but I do mean that visibility is the key to any marketing campaign, and you may just have your cart before your horse. Think of it like this. If you were building a house would you set up the studs before, or after you lay the foundation? Well, I suppose you can build on a foundation of dirt, but when it rains you're going to get water inside your dwelling. It's not the best foundation that you could have chosen.

Now, think about your book marketing and author branding in the same way. Slow down and examine your foundation. Is it solid or did you put your book out, then start running around and chasing every rabbit down every rabbit hole another author mentioned?  If you have don't worry you are not alone. It's one of the reasons everyone's book isn't at the top of the charts.  The wonderful thing is that you can give your book a firm foundation in just one day.

When I wrote '8 Hours to Jump Start Your Career: A Step-by-Step Guide for Self-Published Authors' even I didn't realize that what I'd done is give authors that've yet to create a marketing plan for themselves an easy to follow one.  I'm working on part two now.

Promotions are wonderful but if you don't have your house in order, then inviting the whole town to visit isn't such a great idea. Do the housecleaning first and then have your party your results will be better.

If you have specific questions feel free to ask, and I hope that this post will encourage you in the right direction, I can't wait to see you and your book at the top of the Amazon Bestseller's list.

Tammie

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