Self-Marketing
A deep plunge into insanity
Backtrack to about three months before publication. That’s when I actually started. I did what any ignorant, red-blooded debut author would do: I went to webinars, searching for magic bullets. What did I actually want? My goals were nebulous. At first, I thought I wanted A Reluctant Spy to become an overnight sensation, at the very least a best seller. Put it down to dementia.
It was fun learning about marketing. A strange new world. All those webinars came with a dash of joie de vivre, spending time among my people, my fellow writers, all of us with souls full of hope.
I clutched at many topics: Marketing for Dummies, Setting Up an email Newsletter, How to Land a Podcast, Pros and Cons of Facebook Ads, Mastering Amazon in Less than a Day, Setting Up Ads on Amazon, Mastering Amazon in 13 Easy One-Hour Lessons, Bestselling Authors Tell Their Secrets (the one I remember was Include your dog in the story. Done.), How to Become a NY Times Bestseller (presumably irrespective of the quality of the Book), Social Media for Writers Who Hate Social Media. ETC.
I didn’t immediately become a basket case. In my former life, I had been a high school computer science teacher, and I possessed certain organizational skills. The problems started when I actually tried to do some of the stuff in those webinars. For example, I’d always been a social media hater, who found a lot of the discourse insipid. Reluctantly, I crawled back to Instagram with my updated email address, but perversely, it wouldn’t let me in. It seemed to assume I was an imposter, muscling in on that other Roselyn Teukolsky’s account from years ago. So Instagram was a bust.
I had more luck with Amazon ads for my novel, where everything worked like a charm. Trouble was, my book sunk into oblivion, with zero evidence of ever popping up anywhere on Amazon.
Okay, back to those webinars. Despite the wading-through-the-bulrushes numbness of too much information, there were some golden blossoms among the weeds. In those early days, two presenters influenced me dramatically enough that I went back for more.
Jane Friedman, a paragon of publishing and marketing, was a fount of useful tips and must-dos; but most of all, she was eloquent and a joy to listen to. She made me feel, if just for one shining hour, that I could do it all.
Her webinar on email newsletters changed my life.
Set up your email newsletter, ideally a few months before publication, Jane advised. This means, gather together in one list the emails of all your contacts—family, friends, enemies, colleagues, acquaintances, and supporters. Get ready to send emails to your list, announcing any big events, like your launch date, or the completion of your sequel. (I know, this assumes you’ll find time to write that sequel.)
But of course there was so much more to email newsletters than setting up the mailing list. Plain old emails were SO 20th century. For effective newsletters, you had to use Substack, or Mailchimp, or Squarespace….
Whatever you decide to do, treat yourself to at least one webinar by Jane.
Getting newsletter sign-ups became my new, lifelong enterprise. I surprised myself by morphing into a total predator in my second life. The word “family” became a fungible word that extended, for example, to second and third cousins and offsprings’ in-laws. Without providing details, I will share that my rheumatologist, hip surgeon, gastroenterologist, hairdresser (and all members of the salon), dentist, hygienist, receptionists, grandsons’ teachers, and many of my ex-students are on my newsletter mailing list. I carry copies of my paperback wherever I go, and happily hijack unsuspecting people as they go about their daily lives.
Talking of which, if anyone reading this blog would like to—oh! But wait, I digress.
My other star webinar presenter was Rob Eagar, a marketing guru extraordinaire, passionate and articulate in promoting his ideas on how to sell my book. I became a Rob-groupie, watching him on panels and sponging up his marvelous advice on everything marketing.
Here’s just one little gem from his treasure chest. Line up your family and best friends to write an Amazon review within the first two days of your book’s publication. Aim for 20 to 30 reviews in the first week. Because, here’s a simple fact: if people click on your book and see two Amazon reviews, they won’t buy it.
My extensions of Rob’s Rule. Beg, borrow or steal to make this happen. Autographed copies, bribery, gift cards, … be imaginative.
(Reality check to self: Even if I self-market like a genius, people probably won’t go to my book on Amazon because no one has heard of me.)
My greatest marketing decision concerning Rob, was to purchase a 90-minute, one-on-one consulting Zoom meeting. I won’t give away Rob’s trade secrets, but the advice he gave me on that day, led to spikes in my sales that continue to this day. The cost was $350, the best money I’ve spent on marketing so far. Rob was fun to talk to, with a deep knowledge and fervor that was very appealing. Do yourself a favor and sign up for his newsletter and three free books. Get on the Rob train—you won’t regret it.
After publication, my marketing life revved up and became a sight to behold, because my type-A personality went into overdrive. Simultaneously, I was juggling these balls: writing my blog, composing my email newsletter, keeping my website updated, crafting bookmarks on Canva, working on my sequel to my novel, creating my Media Kit, setting up a Kirkus Pro Connect page, mailing autographed copies of my book, and replying to every email from readers telling me A) they loved the book or B) they found an error on P.?, or C) inviting me to join their book club (which of course I said yes to).
At some point I realized I needed help—not psychological help, mind you—but actual help with all this stuff.
So I started looking into getting a publicist.
Another black hole of Insanity.
I had to ask myself certain existential questions: Was I really going to surrender control to a stranger? And was I really willing to blow my daughters’ inheritance on my novel? Publicists don’t come cheap. Especially the ones who don’t approach you unsolicited, but wait for you to line up and beg for their services.
Going back, here’s what tipped me into utter madness. I signed up for Canva, an ap for creating book covers, postcards, bookmarks, logos, banners, and Instagram posts (ha ha). I couldn’t make head or tail of which end was up on Canva, which has one of the worst interfaces I’ve ever encountered on an ap. So I went to a webinar on How to Use Canva, because I was really motivated. I confess that I never mastered that darn ap, but eventually I broke the code on enough things to make it worthwhile. It is so much fun to create your own bookmarks and banners, etc. on Canva.
Meanwhile, my blood pressure was surging into the stratosphere, threatening to give me a stroke before I became famous.
There were two incredible people who brought me back into the world of moderately sane people: Jenn dePaula and Phil Adams.
Jenn dePaula advertised a webinar Marketing for Self-Published Authors.
By this time, I was fed-up with all those time-sucking webinars, but I realized that I had time to squeeze in just one more….
So I signed up and found myself listening to a personal savior. Jenn looked me in the eyeballs and said:
You don’t have to do it all.
It seems so obvious now, but at the time, it was a revelation. Jenn gave me permission to regain my sanity. If you hate Social Media, Jenn said, just pick one or two and stick with them. Pick just one long-form marketing device, either blogs OR podcasts OR articles. Do what you enjoy. Have fun with your published novel. Be clear about your goals and check your progress. Focus on your website and email newsletters. Interact with your readers, and always have a call to action—come to my launch, or help me pick the best cover.
It sounds overwrought and melodramatic as I write this, but I took Jenn’s advice and eased my life. I decided to drop the goal of “best seller NOW” and adopt the idea of “slow burn to fame.”
Recently, I gave up a precious afternoon working session to meet with Phil Adams, my daughter’s father-in-law, who is in the advertising and marketing world. Phil is a sage with a soothing voice and gentle demeanor, who assessed my situation immediately. (His daughter-in-law is just like her mother.) He quoted the stoics, who came up with a philosophy of coping. They distinguished between Practical Goals that could be accomplished now and Aspirational Goals which were on your wish list, dependent on others for their achievement. For example, an aspirational goal for me was to bring my novel to the attention of the Computer Science Department at Cornell, where my novel is set. A practical goal, which I accomplished last month, was to send an autographed paperback copy to the department chair with a nice note and one of my attractive Canva bookmarks. I did not receive a response. But that aspirational goal lives on. I plan to visit Ithaca in September, and perhaps I will drop in to the department in person, a real author handing out free autographed copies of her spy novel!
Phil gave me this advice: Each morning, write down two or three practical goals for the day, and put everything else to the side, while you work on just those items. Liberate your mind and body. Think only of the task at hand. My practical goal yesterday was to write this marketing blog. Today’s is to finish it.
As with writing a novel and self-publishing it, self-marketing is HARD. What we do is impossible in its demands. For now, I’m clawing my way out of the abyss, back into the world of sane people who are trying to market their books. (Yoo hoo! Are there any out there?)
Okay, that’s enough! It’s time to Zoom with my newly hired publicist, who thinks my website is cluttered, an unprofessional mess that will turn away potential readers. He’s suggesting—insisting, actually—that the site needs a makeover by his company. He’s wrong of course. All it requires is some strategic rearrangement and a bit of new code here and there. I don’t need him for that.
Title of my next blog: Adventures with a Publicist. Or perhaps, Taming your Publicist. Or Rise of the Killer Zombie Publicist….