On chocolate bars and self-publishing.
Girl writes a book. Girl’s too scared to get rejected by agent so skips that part. Girl self-publishes book. Girl panics. Girl calms down and realises all she has to do to sell books is eat chocolate bars. Kinda.
Marketing lessons from Mars
When I was a child, I knew more about branding and marketing than I do now.
When I was a child, I knew exactly what to expect from a Mars bar, clothed in its black wrapper and emblazoned with a mighty red and gold logo, an almost superhero-like uniform. I knew how it would taste, or specifically, how good it would taste.
How I first discovered its sweet caramel and soft nougat centre is probably more to do with my father than anything — it was his chocolate treat of choice — but I would no doubt have stumbled upon its charms on the shelf of my local newsagents, which was, of course, positioned at a perfect child’s-eye height.
So, to summarise, when I was a child, I already knew the following about branding and marketing: a product needs to be in the right place, look a certain and consistent way and it must deliver on its promises, i.e. taste as good as I expected.
While no doubt television advertisements and marketing campaigns also played their part, it’s also important to highlight again that my father may have recommended the chocolate bar to me, because in the context that I want to discuss marketing and branding, word of mouth is of the utmost importance. For in self-publishing, word of mouth is the most valuable and yet most out of reach weapon in our armoury. We cannot insert ourselves into the conversations of others, we cannot force people to share the pleasure they took in reading our books and we cannot record or measure each time a word of mouth recommendation results in a sale. Nor can we buy, bottle or recreate this magic weapon, no matter how many Goodreads giveaways we do or how many tweets and Facebook posts we manufacture.
The nightmare of fulfilling a lifelong dream…
I won’t bore you with the long-winded background to where I currently find myself; a self-published author with one book, a furrowed brow and a very chewed bottom lip. But in the six weeks since I pressed “publish” on Shy Feet: Short Stories Inspired by Travel, I feel like I have been running in a hamster wheel, exhausting myself with marketing efforts I don’t fully understand or enjoy. I’ve listed the book on countless ebook websites; I’ve guest-posted my way around the blogosphere; I even secured some international media coverage (albeit not in the language my book is written in — d’oh!) and I’ve tweeted, Facebooked, pinned, tumbled and Instagram-ed until I’ve looked for the unfollow button myself.
Honestly speaking, I’m struggling to see if or how the hours of “marketing” and “publicity” will pay off and it’s getting to the point where it’s making me a little unhappy.
Which is ridiculous. Completely ridiculous.
Six weeks ago, I fulfilled a lifelong dream. I wrote a book.
And I worked hard to get there; I poured my heart and soul onto the pages of my fictional short stories and it was far from a dizzy and romantic whirlwind experience. For I spent over a year researching the realities of self-publishing extensively before deciding to go it alone and I used the platform of my blog to grow and engage with potential readers and I am deeply proud of the end result. Proud and very happy, because it was an absolute riot; my laptop and I have never had so much fun since Hot or Not first came out. I can’t wait to do it all again.
But what is a book if it is not read? And what if it takes twice as long to write the next one because I have to work more hours in the “day job” to recoup the costs I spent (and will again spend) on editing, proofreading, formatting and the cover design? In short, how do I sell this book, especially when I can’t conjure up the most powerful marketing tool there is, word of mouth?
Well, I can do all the things I’m supposed to do; work my way through the “self-publishing-must-do-lists” and experiment with my own marketing ideas (free Mars bar with every purchase, anyone?). I can risk losing much valued followers as my social networks by keeping my streams saturated with self-promotion and I can dither between boring or bribing friends and family to spread the word. But recent experience of all the above has already taught me the impact of this will be minimal.
Time to care…
As often happens when I fall flat on my face in the hamster wheel, I was forced to take a step back.
And because I’m British and have a sweet tooth, this meant sitting down with a cup of tea and a Mars bar to have a good, long think about things. And because I’m ever so good at wallowing in a little self-doom, the first question I asked myself was, “Why me?”. Why isn’t my book selling? Why do I feel the majority of my marketing attempts are in vain?
“Because they sort of are,” the voice of reason replied.
“But why?!?” my self-doom persisted.
Because people have better things to do. My baby is not their baby and you can’t make them care with a tweet or a beg. You can only make them care by giving them something they want or need, when they are in a position to want and need it. There’s no denying when it comes to books there are always going to be readers. That’s the beauty of books; no matter the genre, the story or the style there are millions and millions of potential readers out there, readers who have the potential and inner make-up to care, when the time and place are right.
So when it comes to marketing at its most basic level, what I simply must do is put the book in the right place (where they can find it), make it look a certain way (so that it promises something special) and ensure that it delivers so that when they do eventually bite, they will associate my product with tasting good.
But brands were not born overnight. The Mars bar I saved up pocket money for as a child had already been around on shelves at child’s eyes since 1932, that’s over fifty years of delivering, over fifty years of tasting good. In many ways, this reveals a much more powerful secret weapon in the marketing game; time. Unlike the “word of mouth-instigator-magic-wand”, this is one weapon I do have.
I can wait. God-willing, I have time. And time isn’t such a bad thing. Time means I can write another book and if I do it properly, I can make it something special, something that tastes good, something that compliments Shy Feet and builds my brand. Because maybe, without Snickers sitting next to it on those shelves, Mars would never have looked so good.
