How often have we, as authors, tried some new-fangled promotional tool and not seen the results we want, but we continue to use it in the hope it'll suddenly net us the sales. Well, if you're anything like me, or some of my author friends, probably more times than you'd like to admit. Perhaps, its the sense of entitlement we have come to believe in, or maybe its complacency, or simply a desperate hope we cling to like a shipwrecked victim clinging to the dingy. Or perhaps, its none of those things but rather a simple lack of awareness of what we're trying to do.
Are we trying to get recognized?
Looking to boost our ranking on Amazon?
Perhaps, we are trying to attract sales?
Are we trying to compete with other authors?
Whatever the answer, it drives us forward, beating our fists against a brick wall without truly understanding what the end result is meant to be.
I've talked with a lot of people, including professional coaches about using the tools at our disposal in the pursuit of success and sales. During those conversations, the very idea of having an expectation of instant return on investment was talked over.
I had one conversation where the person I was speaking to asked me at one point a question. Instantly it had me rearing back with a gasp. How dare she ask me such a question. How dare anyone assume I wasn't looking at the big picture.
What is this question which caused such a monumental moment of shock and horror? It was a simple question, and instantly had my defences going up.
When was I going to stop blaming everyone and everything else for my lack of sales?
After sitting for a few moments doing an Emmy award worthy impression of a goldfish, I blinked, and sat back in the chair and stared at her. Her question was a difficult one, but one I needed to answer for a couple of reasons. One, I didn't necessarily want to accept I wasn't carrying my share of the burden of promotion. I wasn't, by the way. And two, to see the results I want to see, I needed to have the blinders taken off.
I could sit around and complain about how my sales suck, or I'm not getting anywhere, I want to make more money.
In truth, I discovered the reality of there is an endless supply of "I'm spending money on ads on social media, I hired a PA to do my scheduling for promotion etc.
Excuses are plentiful, I found, like juicy apples on a tree.
Full disclosure: I've offered my fair share of excuses, of paying the blame forward. Its not my fault the books are selling it must be someone elses. In truth, I've spoken of them numerous times, until I got the wakeup call.
Sitting at my desk, bemoaning the lack of sales, and search engine placement, I drafted an email. I could almost feel the ulcers forming as I hit send on my message and wondered if it was the right thing to do.
That email was the first smart action I took. The answer I got was a wake-up call, and one I'd tried very hard to pretend wasn't what I needed. My correspondence was met with a hard truth, one which lifted the wool from my eyes. If I wanted to succeed I had to take a cold, hard look at what I was doing...and cut away the dead weight of repetitive action I was hampering myself with. I had to acknowledge being accountable for my own mistakes meant I needed to push aside the excuses, the laziness, the sheer lethargy I had managed to convince myself was working.
I failed to see how my actions of epeatedly, trying to gain ground by doing the same thing over and over again was in its own way insanity. Believe me, I tried the basics until it was nearly muscle memory. But, I wasn't gaining, by all accounts I was holding steady with a decline in sales as my books were superseded by new releases by other authors.
I had to do some thinking, what did I want to do? Get a head or spend my time spinning my wheels in quicksand. With every post, every missed chance, I was making the choice to walk along the path of denial.
Now, I'm sure you're wondering, what does this have to do with the title of this blog?
Well, its a prime example of my experience with the insanity of inaction. I was determined to unmine myself, to make my own projects second, while I wallowed in the woe is me of lack of sales.
Taking the advice and critism from others was hard. It was shocking and bold, and what was needed. For me to succeed - for any of us to succeed, I believe we need to take a solid look at what have and what we don't have. What we know and what we don't want to know.
If I want to be sure I'm making sales, I have to accept my part in the process and step up to the plate. I need to step off the revolving door of complacency and jump into the deep end of promoting and marketing my brand, my books, and engage with my readers.
Is this going to be easy? Probably not, but then the things we want aren't always easy to obtain. When we have to work for what we desire, we appreciate it much more than if its handed to us. So, it begs the question, my fellow authors, where do you fit in the cogs of this wonderfully crazy world of publishing?
