Staying Motivated ...When Your Book IS Not!

Huh? I can see the question marks lit over your heads.

Well let me enlighten you. My book "Hypnotic" has been on the market for a year now. To the average publishing company this will give them an idea on how marketable your book and writing style will be. But to me it is a learning process that helped me grow. The sales on my book are not outstanding which can be discouraging at times. But somewhere I read that 1/3 of writers don't sale over a hundred books. If this is true, I at least have surpassed that.

With the publisher I am with, most of the marketing falls upon myself. At first, like many of you this pushed my panic button to a new level, but gratually I became parcial to the idea. What I did learn is even though there's a lot of competition on the shelves, this is a product that I knew more about then anyone else, so I needed to run with it. As I wrote in another article of mine, ("Bad Sex.. are you.. Having it or Giving it?") www.xcentrixmagazine.com I was congratulated by another author for the release of my book and wished many sales. Then the other author implied, "Of course it will sell, it's about sex." To which I answered..."Have you ever had bad sex?" If you are a person that isn't a good sex partner how can you sell it, or write about it?" I know it really is too early in the morning to talk about that subject, (6.am my time.) I think you got my point so I'll move on. After a year the idea of going to another booksigning for my book.. started getting ho..hum to me. I found each time I had to find something to get me excited again and when I presented it to my readers, they would be too. So with that I started rereading chapters pulling pieces from it to use.

For instance, since my book is steamy (smile) I decided to give away a travel size box of Kleenex, it is wrapped in prints of my bookcover with a little ribbon on it...and a one liner sentence from my book. Also candy suckers with small pictures of my bookcover as a novelty item. I found that book buyers love free gifts. But of course the best reward is when you unexpectedly hear how much they enjoyed it. I also reinvented new ways to represent my characters. I realized that each time a prospective buyer walked up to me, I would tell them all about my protagonist but hardly ever mentioned the antagonist. People love the evil person more sometime then the victim, so play off on them both! I was sick of saying the same spill each time so for different signing I would switch it up.

Another lesson I must also remember is that though I maybe bored with marketing this book, it is what has got me started. How can I dismiss it even after my third, fourth or nineteenth book? I am still getting booksigning so I better stick with a more positive attitude and put on my cheerleading smile. If not others will notice. Tell me, why a reader would believe in your product when the novelist does not? Until next time...