Winging it

There is something ever so disconcerting when you realise it's already been two weeks since your last post but only feels like a handful of days. It's been a busy few weeks. The first week was taken up mostly with work on other projects that needed to get done but I still managed to do bits and bobs with regards to book marketing and definitely didn't waste any time. Amongst other things, I worked on and finished some promotional pictures which I'm going to use on social media that have some catchy/memorable quotes from my books. Here are some examples:

It wasn't until the morning of Monday 20th February however when the planets finally aligned and I was ready to get my books out there and by the afternoon, I'd done so much research and sorting that I even tweeted:

Are you more shocked by the statement above or the fact that I tweeted something? Yes, I have been tweeting this week and it feels good. Even though I wanted to use Twitter again for marketing purposes, to be perfectly honest, I've enjoyed using it again for me and for now, I'm going to do it just for me and see what happens, because sometimes these things need to grow in their own time.

Apart from that, I bought the Writers' & Artists' Yearbook 2017 which I plan on reading after I've finished #Girlboss and I have been doing LOTS of research on book marketing. On Monday I binge watched The Creative Penn's YouTube videos *here* (which I've already discussed before and am a fan) and also found interviews with top self-published authors on how they sold so many books. It's funny, but after a while, the more videos I watched, the more I realised that their methods, which worked wonderfully for them, just aren't right for me. For a start, most of the people I watched started marketing years and years ago when there was MUCH less competition and the likelihood of being seen was easier. One of the authors said 'Something had to be done when I was only selling six books a day' and all I was thinking was Girl, you sold six books a day without marketing?!!

Midway through the week I did some thinking and feel that if I want to really succeed in this already oversaturated market, I've got to come up with a different way of going about things - a new angle. The other reason for wanting to do things a little differently is that every author I watched treated their books like a business and not as a passion. I know that sounds dreadfully simple of me and I know I've talked about this before but it really does bother me that I've got to do all this stuff completely unrelated to writing and books, like build up a mailing list etc, to be successful as a self-published writer. I JUST WANT TO WRITE! I want to write when I want to write and not feel under pressure that I've got to produce X amount of books per year to keep readers happy and buying. I hasten to add I am not having a go at these authors - I like them and their books very much and totally respect what they are doing but I just want to be me. I want to write because I love it and sell books because people like them. I don't want it to be this clinical business where I start to resent writing.

As the title suggests, I'm going to wing it somewhat - try stuff out to see what sticks and probably fail along the way - but most importantly, keep a firm grip on three important, but easily forgotten, words: DON'T. GIVE. UP. I believe in my little book series and think they have an audience out there, I just need to find them. Easy...

Until next time.