Tags
Amazon, Faith Hope and Trickery, London Book Fair, marketing, Plank 6, The Selfies, WH Smith, writing
Ever since I entered “Faith, Hope and Trickery” for the Selfies Awards, I have been obsessed with book marketing. The awards were to be judged on several criteria including “an effective and creative marketing and publicity strategy”, and this brought marketing to the front of my mind. Whenever I had an hour to spare, I spent it not on writing but on marketing. To be honest, it is the easier option: when l was struggling with a knotty plot point or a scene that wouldn’t go right, I would abandon it and do a quick marketing task instead – design a poster for my WHSmith signing event, or work on my monthly Sam update (pure research – my number one favourite displacement activity!). Here’s the distraction poster in question:
As a result, I have fallen behind on my writing schedule for “Plank 6” – not disastrously and irretrievably behind, but uncomfortably so. And the irony is that all this marketing seems to make no discernible difference at all to book sales. None at all. Some effort is doomed: I spent a few hours answering questions about how my day job has influenced my writing and about financial crime in general for a promotions person ahead of the Selfies, and of course, because I did not win, no journalist was interested in my story. And some effort is (for me) bad for the state of mind: at the recent London Book Fair I attended a lecture on “creating your author brand”, and the amount of guilt it has engendered is huge. (No wonder the Sam books aren’t selling – I’m not a brand! And reading the numberless tweets generated by influencers in the publishing world is exhausting and time-consuming, let alone responding to them in a manner that will intrigue them and “drive them to you” – like Uber?). Much marketing effort simply goes into the ether and you hope that one day it will transmogrify into a sale. The only thing I have done recently that has had any impact on “sales” is my five-day giveaway of “Fatal Forgery” on Amazon – and I’m not sure it’s much of a marketing coup to say that hundreds of people rushed for my product when it was free!
As a result, I have been doing some authorly soul-searching. The key fact is that I work full-time. I have very limited time for my fiction-writing. And although I hope one day to be a full-time author, at which point I will immerse myself in the commercial side of it too (recognising completely that successful self-publishing is not an indulgence but rather a business), at the moment I simply cannot do both writing and marketing to an acceptable or effective level. And as it would be nonsense to concentrate on marketing if there is nothing to sell, the writing wins. I will continue with the bits I enjoy – this blog, and the monthly Sam updates – but I will be retreating from Twitter and other more ephemeral platforms, as I just can’t keep up.
Susan Grossey 
Dear Susan
Sorry to hear about the need for some authorly soul searching. I am always impressed by the way you juggle your day job and your “Planking”, especially in the way you put real thought and detail into things such as your blog, rather than trotting out platitudes or similar that could easily become repetitive in nature. As you say though, there are only so many hours in the day and I’m sure that we can all benefit from an occasional rebalancing to make sure that we are prioritising the important stuff.
I’m really pleased to hear that you’ll be continuing with the blog and the monthly updates as I certainly enjoy them, and I really appreciate the effort that goes into each and every one.
Best wishes as ever
Graham
p.s. the book signing poster looks great. I can see why it’s a distraction!
Dear Graham
I am so pleased to be reminded that you enjoy the blog and the monthly updates – they’re the bits I like best too! I think it’s partly the way my brain is made (and perhaps a function of age…): I much prefer to spend my time on carefully-crafted updates than on quick Tweets. I find the latter quite enervating – and it makes me panicky if I can’t keep up (which I can’t). So I will play to my strengths and spend my time in a way that pleases me, even if the marketing gurus tell me I’m missing a trick.
Best wishes from Susan
Susan I outsourced my social media marketing for three months recently with no discernible uptick in sales. That’s me done with marketing – I, too, am sticking to what I enjoy and save myself the stress.
Ah, I’m sorry that the paid-for marketing didn’t work either – although I am selfishly relieved to hear that professionals don’t have the magic touch that I lack! I think it’s a case of realigning my priorities: if I were relying on the book income for survival, I’d have to spend time on marketing, but as I’m doing the writing because I enjoy it, it’s crazy to spend writing time on marketing.
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