Blowing Your Own Trumpet

One of the challenges of being a newly-published author is the issue of publicity and marketing.  No doubt those who have been fortunate enough to be signed up by the big publishing houses will have more support in this area than people like myself who have been signed to small independent publishers.  But whatever the case, an author cannot simply sit back and relax once the book is out.  Indeed, an author has to put a good deal of time and energy into pushing his or her published work, and that leaves very little left over for writing the next one!

I can’t speak for anyone else, of course, but I suspect that most authors would rather be writing than selling.  I, for one, am not a salesman, and yet I’m having to behave like a salesman to help my book reach its audience.  It wouldn’t be so bad, of course, if the only thing I was selling was my book, Delivered Unto Lions.  But it isn’t.  An author has to sell himself (or herself).  This is especially the case when the book is so closely associated with the author’s own experience, as mine is.  But even if that isn’t the case, the fact is that the editors of newspapers, websites, etc., want stories about people, not inanimate objects like books.  So, you have to make yourself sound interesting, and you have to be prepared to ‘blow your own trumpet’ – and, to be perfectly honest, the trumpet lessons I had as a child did not produce very convincing results! 

But at least there are some good sources of information out there to advise the reluctant author-come-publicist.  For anyone else in a similar position – or anyone who is likely to be in the near future – I recommend three books which are packed full of good marketing ideas:

•  The Frugal Book Promoter by Carolyn Howard-Johnson (Star Publish, 2004)
•  Aiming at Amazon by Aaron Shepard (Shepard Publications, 2009)
•  Plug Your Book! by Steve Weber (Weber Books, 2007)

These books are addressed primarily to authors in the US, but a lot of the advice can be adapted for non-US authors – and in any case, even if the US is not your main market, it isn’t a market you would want to ignore. 

Anyway, I need to get back to work now – no, not on my next book; there are media releases I’ve got to send out!

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Delivered Unto Lions by David Austin is published by CheckPoint Press.
For more information visit www.davidaustin.eu