Tuesday, November 13, 2018

Why Authors Shouldn't Let A Strength Undermine Their Success




Don’t be blinded by your strengths when marketing your book.

Sometimes your skills get in the way of promoting your book in the best possible way.

Say what?

Yes, you heard me. Your biggest asset could turn into a liability if you depend on it to the point of tuning out the other things that need to be done.

Case in point. Let’s say you’re a social media whiz and have 100,000 connections.  No, make it 250,000. That’s sizeable.  However, it’s not enough to sell your book the way your book deserves to be sold.  If you ignore public speaking and traditional media and other means to promote and market, you do yourself a disservice.

Another case in point.  You are a strong presenter and enjoy speaking at events before large groups.  Great, you’ll no doubt sell books, but to not pursue digital or traditional media or to ignore social media would be foolish.

Just because you’re good at one thing, even exceptionally good, never dismiss or ignore the other areas that offer potential growth.

I guess a similar comparison would be found in dating.  Just because you are good looking, don’t ignore improving your mind, manners, or your communications kills. Be well-rounded and develop each area of your life.  Same goes for your book marketing.

All too often authors choose to believe they can rely on a single strength, skill, resource or connection.  That’s a bad approach to take.  You leave book sales on the table and miss a golden opportunity to grow your brand when you fail to take a comprehensive, holistic approach to book publicity.

It’s ego, ignorance, thriftiness and other characteristics that play a role here.  Be aware not to fall in this trap, no matter how good you are at any one thing.

The book world is an interesting playground.  Authors can view their books and assets in a certain, perhaps limited way, that interferes with their ability to initiate and execute all that must be done to successfully market a book.

Now you may disagree and believe that you can just exploit your strength and ignore all other things, but why would you?  Go and exploit your strength and pursue other areas that can add to your success.  It’s not about choosing one over another – diversify your approach and put in time and resources into multiple areas.

To become more than who you are, do what it takes to become who you need to be.


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Brian Feinblum’s insightful views, provocative opinions, and interesting ideas expressed in this terrific blog are his alone and not that of his employer or anyone else. You can – and should -- follow him on Twitter @theprexpert and email him at brianfeinblum@gmail.com. He feels much more important when discussed in the third-person. This is copyrighted by BookMarketingBuzzBlog © 2018. Born and raised in Brooklyn, he now resides in Westchester. His writings are often featured in The Writer and IBPA’s Independent.  This was named one of the best book marketing blogs by Book Baby http://blog.bookbaby.com/2013/09/the-best-book-marketing-blogs and recognized by Feedspot in 2018 as one of the top book marketing blogs. Also named by WinningWriters.com as a "best resource.” He recently hosted a panel on book publicity for Book Expo America and participated in a PR panel at the Sarah Lawrence College Writers Institute Conference.

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