Don’t you hate this feeling? I swear, I’ve listened to podcasts and webinars until I’m ready to scream, read blog post after blog post, followed self-publishing threads at Absolute Write, and I’m still not sure how to market my books. I’m coming to the conclusion that perhaps marketing isn’t what I’m doing at all. What I really want is just to be visible to people who might like my stories. Are there any readers out there who miss fantasy in the tradition of Tolkien and Lewis? Or has everything gone grimdark?
Sure, I can compile a list of all the choices out there. There isn’t enough time to do it all. And all the promotion ideas have strong adherents. Many of them will be happy to sell you their marketing plan.
So this is merely an admission of confusion in the struggle. If you’re flailing around out there, trying to figure things out, you’re not alone. I’m right there with you. 🙂
Keep writing anyway. Something’s got to work.
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Avid writer and reader of Faerie tales and noblebright fantasy.
Cathleen Townsend 
I assure you, you aren’t alone! Keep plugging along, you’ll get there. Best of luck to you!
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Thanks–and to you as well. It was meant to reach out to anyone who’s as frustrated as I am–I figure there has to be quite a few. Sometimes it helps. 🙂
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It’s interesting the names you mention there. I’m of the opinion that people don’t necessarily buy books, they buy people.
A modern example is JK Rowling, if she published a book, people would buy it. They wouldn’t wait for reviews. I don’t know if this helps, but perhaps you need to sell yourself to readers not your books.
Sorry if this is unhelpful, just my thoughts. 🙂
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Thanks for your thoughts. I really do appreciate them.
I believe people would buy Rowling because of the kind of story she writes–for some reason, it resonates. Although she’s one who gives me hope, (along with Suzanne Collins) because they’re modern writers who wrote no-kidding heroes, and their books did very well. So maybe there’s a market for the sort of things I write.
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There is a market, you need to tempt the reader to pick up your book and read it. Sounds easy eh?
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Yeah, I’m in the same boat. I spent the last couple days actually registering my small business (a detail I hadn’t quite realized I needed to do) and getting all the forms straightened out. Between that and working on my book covers, trying to get Book 2 edited (and this isn’t even the final edit, just the second-final), keep up with my blog, do real life junk, and figure out when to do a cover reveal, I’ve been driving myself up the wall. There’s so much conflicting information out there, people saying “Do this do that.” I need to reveal my cover because I want to start a Goodreads giveaway, but at the same time is it my final cover? How can I be sure? I don’t have an Ingram account yet because my small business wasn’t registered…
…And on and on and on.
I’ve sort of been making myself sit down and breathe. I have a plan. Maybe my plan will work, maybe it won’t, but panicking won’t help. Of course, neither will avoiding my work by playing pokemon, so I’ve been trying to keep on task. But it’s amazing how quickly it all gets overwhelming, isn’t it?
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Extremely overwhelming. And there’s always someone ready to take hundreds of dollars who will promise that if you just follow their plan, you’ll have hundreds of reviews in your opening week, you’ll go Amazon number one bestseller, people won’t be able to get enough of your books–just act now before the price goes up.
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Not alone in the marketing quandary… But, we’ll just keep writing! 🙂
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