Comments on: So you need to build a platform…

By: Maria Peagler

Maria Peagler — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 19:26:27 +0000

Laura – I agree wholeheartedly with your advice. Building a platform is hard work, and the tactics that really pay off often surprise you. I had the same experience you did: for my eighth book, media exposure gave a little bump in sales, but not nearly as much as other platform building activities.

Enjoy your perspective, as always!

By: Cloud

Cloud — Sat, 23 Feb 2013 04:51:00 +0000

I started my blog as a hobby to help keep me sane in the early days of motherhood when my old hobbies no longer seemed to fit in my life, and mostly it remains a hobby. But I’ve got a decent size readership now, and since I’ve got a couple of books coming out, I guess it qualifies as a platform! I have no idea how to build readership, though. I think I picked up most of my readers via comments I left on other people’s blogs. I occasionally think I should put some effort into increasing my readership, but I never get around to doing it.

By: Laura

Laura — Fri, 22 Feb 2013 14:20:01 +0000

In reply to ARC.

@ARC – exactly. All creative fields have a certain marketing component. And while traditional media can be part of that, it can’t be all of it. There’s a fascinating article in the WSJ today about how some business book writers used a company called ResultSource to buy their way onto the bestseller list. I guess that’s one approach — and I understand why they did it, in that having a “bestseller” to your name can vastly increase your speaking fees — but it was also heartening to see that just getting on the list did not necessarily have any impact on further sales. One book (Leapfrogging) highlighted in the story dropped to selling fewer than 100 copies a week immediately after the spike. You really do need a good following to keep sales going, and it’s worth the effort to do it the right way.

By: ARC

ARC — Fri, 22 Feb 2013 08:02:50 +0000

In reply to ARC. Oops, hit send too soon. I have also had the same experience re: media exposure. My work has been featured on lots of blogs, a few magazines, and most notably on Good Morning America, and you'd think I'd be set for life, but all of those yielded a spike in sales around the time of the feature, and then afterwards I still have to go back to the hustle ;)

By: ARC

ARC — Fri, 22 Feb 2013 08:00:59 +0000

This is not just true for writers – it’s also relevant advice for folks selling handcrafted or fine art items online (Etsy, etc.). Social media plays such a big part in attracting people to one’s work. There are lots of people selling things similar to what I make, so I need to find ways to get a “following” for my own work and the best way to do that is to form relationships. And you can only do that by spending time on it.

By: Laura

Laura — Fri, 22 Feb 2013 02:43:01 +0000

In reply to Leanne. Thanks Leanne! Yes, platform building is a long, long process. Fortunately it does get easier over time. Just keep celebrating small wins.

By: Leanne

Leanne — Fri, 22 Feb 2013 02:16:12 +0000

In reply to Leanne. By the way, I like that you used platform shoes for this pic!

By: Leanne

Leanne — Fri, 22 Feb 2013 01:44:29 +0000

Thank you so much for this post, Laura! I’m working on platform-building myself and having very limited success. I’ve been blogging steadily for over a year and a half, but until recently I only posted links on Facebook. A few weeks ago I started tweeting and stumbling my posts as well, and that has increased traffic, but I want even more. I’m on the fourth draft of my historical fiction novel and working on a set of children’s books, so I hope to have a need for a platform soon. I want to believe that if I put good work out there and continue to improve, I’ll receive attention. But it’s hard to start from scratch making contacts in the writing/publishing world when I’ve spent my college, grad school and last 9 years doing something completely different (music education).