Blog: Self Promotion without being a Douche
Is it possible to Self Promote without being a Douche?
God I hope so. As a journalist I'd say it was, but there seems to be a secret ingredient that some have and that others desperately lack. I know it's hard in a market like this and the flood of writers out there looking to make a name that you want to scream about your work from the top of the nearest twitter feed, MySpace page, Facebook Ad, but with a more and more ad savvy public, the things you do to promote your book often times are the very last things they want.
When a friend of mine asked me to guest blog on her great site, I really wanted to talk about self promotion and the different ways I’ve seen it done and ways I’d like to see it done. It was basically something along the line of “Don't be a Douche.” I was really excited about it, because I like to help people to not be a douche. I like it about as much as I like when people help me not be a douche.
But, then I found this blog of Maureen Johnson which pretty much tells you all you need to know.
The internet is made of people. People matter. This includes you. Stop trying to sell everything about yourself to everyone. Don’t just hammer away and repeat and talk at people-talk TO people. It’s organic... Don’t shove yourself into that tiny, airless box called a brand-tiny, airless boxes are for trinkets and dead people.
However, her thesis seems to tailor more to how to not be a douche by become a brand--a commodity. And while there are a lot of similar advice, I’d like to talk about douche-avoidance in a more general, more universal platform. One that you can, hopefully, take with you to the other parts of your life. Not only in writing is it a good idea not to be a douche. (Have you guessed yet that I like using that word? I do...a lot!)
So what her blog, and this thing here boil down to, forgive me Maureen for speaking for you, but what I think we’re trying to say is: be a person first.
Try to imagine that everyone you’re trying to sell yourself to is also trying to sell something too. Are you going to allow them to give their spiel? Then don’t expect them to want to hear yours. Networking isn’t a one way street, you have to generally care about other people.
Case in point, I was rather late to the Twitter game, just signing up last summer. I got my account, chose some writing, publishing and general shenanigan-type personalities to follow and within 6 hours, I had a lot of people following me and a fair number of them were Direct Messaging me with links to their vids, blogs and short stories. Why? Well, I suspect that because of the people I followed and the fact that my twitter name is @tjournalist, might have something to do with it.
I learned how to “unfollow” people pretty fast. I didn't join twitter to have stories, books, and music shoved at me, nor did I want to find authors/artists/bloggers to write about. I came to see what my friends were up to, what Nathan Fillion and the cast of Star Trek were up to and what interesting things are going on in the publishing world. Oh yeah, and I came to share pithy little thoughts with everyone and make some friends. That's it.
You can sell yourself without having to constantly be shoving your product down people’s throat. All you need to look to for proof of this is turn on the TV. What are your favorite commercials? Do they involve a talking lizard? A body slammed Betty White? Now, what do you remember about them? The slogan? The product? Or that they made you laugh, they made you think or they simple made you smile?
Another example for you: Remember that above link? I had never heard of Maureen Johnson before (just got a link to her blog on twitter in fact), had never heard of any of her books and she certainly didn’t take anytime to promote them on that post, however, what she did do was convince me that she has personality, a sense of humor and feels the same way I do on a lot of issues and has a writing style that I will probably appreciate. Plus she used my favorite made up word “craptastic”!
I bought her books.
In today’s world of social media and all the myriad ways to connect on a global level, the days of the recluse author are (sadly) over; word of mouth marketing is more important than ever. According to YA Author Tamara Girardi tweeting from Bookspace.org's conference, “Why social networking? 14% of people trust ads; 78% of people trust recommendations from friends-social networking is about making friends.”
Here's the thing about word of mouth though, it can’t all be coming out of your mouth. If your product is good, it will get into the hands of people who will tell others about it. Sure, you can help it along in all the ways you can, but at a certain point, you have to release it to the world and wait for the views and opinions of others to carry it along the rest of the way.
In the meantime, isn’t there a new book you should be writing?
As I like to have my toes in as many social waters as possible, this post can also be found on DreamWidth. You can comment here or there...or not at all if you want to make me cry.
God I hope so. As a journalist I'd say it was, but there seems to be a secret ingredient that some have and that others desperately lack. I know it's hard in a market like this and the flood of writers out there looking to make a name that you want to scream about your work from the top of the nearest twitter feed, MySpace page, Facebook Ad, but with a more and more ad savvy public, the things you do to promote your book often times are the very last things they want.
When a friend of mine asked me to guest blog on her great site, I really wanted to talk about self promotion and the different ways I’ve seen it done and ways I’d like to see it done. It was basically something along the line of “Don't be a Douche.” I was really excited about it, because I like to help people to not be a douche. I like it about as much as I like when people help me not be a douche.
But, then I found this blog of Maureen Johnson which pretty much tells you all you need to know.
The internet is made of people. People matter. This includes you. Stop trying to sell everything about yourself to everyone. Don’t just hammer away and repeat and talk at people-talk TO people. It’s organic... Don’t shove yourself into that tiny, airless box called a brand-tiny, airless boxes are for trinkets and dead people.
However, her thesis seems to tailor more to how to not be a douche by become a brand--a commodity. And while there are a lot of similar advice, I’d like to talk about douche-avoidance in a more general, more universal platform. One that you can, hopefully, take with you to the other parts of your life. Not only in writing is it a good idea not to be a douche. (Have you guessed yet that I like using that word? I do...a lot!)
So what her blog, and this thing here boil down to, forgive me Maureen for speaking for you, but what I think we’re trying to say is: be a person first.
Try to imagine that everyone you’re trying to sell yourself to is also trying to sell something too. Are you going to allow them to give their spiel? Then don’t expect them to want to hear yours. Networking isn’t a one way street, you have to generally care about other people.
Case in point, I was rather late to the Twitter game, just signing up last summer. I got my account, chose some writing, publishing and general shenanigan-type personalities to follow and within 6 hours, I had a lot of people following me and a fair number of them were Direct Messaging me with links to their vids, blogs and short stories. Why? Well, I suspect that because of the people I followed and the fact that my twitter name is @tjournalist, might have something to do with it.
I learned how to “unfollow” people pretty fast. I didn't join twitter to have stories, books, and music shoved at me, nor did I want to find authors/artists/bloggers to write about. I came to see what my friends were up to, what Nathan Fillion and the cast of Star Trek were up to and what interesting things are going on in the publishing world. Oh yeah, and I came to share pithy little thoughts with everyone and make some friends. That's it.
You can sell yourself without having to constantly be shoving your product down people’s throat. All you need to look to for proof of this is turn on the TV. What are your favorite commercials? Do they involve a talking lizard? A body slammed Betty White? Now, what do you remember about them? The slogan? The product? Or that they made you laugh, they made you think or they simple made you smile?
Another example for you: Remember that above link? I had never heard of Maureen Johnson before (just got a link to her blog on twitter in fact), had never heard of any of her books and she certainly didn’t take anytime to promote them on that post, however, what she did do was convince me that she has personality, a sense of humor and feels the same way I do on a lot of issues and has a writing style that I will probably appreciate. Plus she used my favorite made up word “craptastic”!
I bought her books.
In today’s world of social media and all the myriad ways to connect on a global level, the days of the recluse author are (sadly) over; word of mouth marketing is more important than ever. According to YA Author Tamara Girardi tweeting from Bookspace.org's conference, “Why social networking? 14% of people trust ads; 78% of people trust recommendations from friends-social networking is about making friends.”
Here's the thing about word of mouth though, it can’t all be coming out of your mouth. If your product is good, it will get into the hands of people who will tell others about it. Sure, you can help it along in all the ways you can, but at a certain point, you have to release it to the world and wait for the views and opinions of others to carry it along the rest of the way.
In the meantime, isn’t there a new book you should be writing?
As I like to have my toes in as many social waters as possible, this post can also be found on DreamWidth. You can comment here or there...or not at all if you want to make me cry.