There are only a few days left of the old year. You are already thinking ahead to new goals, new projects, and you are determined to accomplish them. Knowing writers, I can predict what your New Year's resolutions will be:
I will write 1000 words a day (after all, Hemingway did it, and he was a journalist)
I will finish my novel (it's been seven years … )
I will start my novel (it's been ten years … )
And so on.
This year, I am going to make the whole
breast-beating, self-flagellating, bound-to-fail experience of New
Year's resolutions a lot easier for you. Here's your resolution:
I will research my market.
(My computer has a Big Brother camera
on it. I can see the expression on your face.)
Writers don't like marketing and
promoting their work. But that's not because it is a venal,
distasteful, and ungentlemanly task. It's because we don't know how
to do it. Marketing belongs to the business world, not the artistic
world. As a writer, you prefer to wear only one hat. As a writer in
today's entertainment-driven world, you can't.
Rule #1: Know Your Market
Rule #1: Know Your Market
Knowing your market – who will buy
your book, how many people there are in this group, how you will
reach them – is the key to success. Even if you are lucky enough to
get an agent who will sell your work to a publishing house, the first
thing he or she will ask you is: What is your market? How many people
are in it? How will you reach them? What books compete with your own?
How is your book different? Why will people want to buy it? (A tip:
The answers to these questions should go in your query letter.)
In order to address these questions
(and you must be able to), you need to do some research. Go to Amazon
and type in keywords to locate books similar to yours. What is their
ranking? Go to a Barnes & Noble.
What's on their shelves? (Believe it or not, print publications still
matter.) Are you offering something new? Will
your book fill a gap?
Who will buy your book? That depends on
what you are writing, of course. Let's say you are writing a romance.
(Half of all fiction being published today is comprised of romance
novels.) Generally speaking, women buy romance novels – more
specifically, women who don't have a lot of time. Romance novels are
short, therefore your market consists of women who have small
children and/or time-consuming jobs and a curtailed sex life.
If you want to reach this market, you
have to know where these women go. What websites are they visiting,
what blogs do they read, what books do they buy? If you can't answer
those questions off the top of your head, go to: http://www.invesp.com/blog-rank/Romance_Novels
and take a look.
No matter what you write, there is a
market for your work. If you want people to read what you write,
spend an hour a day researching who those people are.
And last, but not least, read books
that are designed for entrepreneurs, because that is who you are!
Suggested reading:
One
Simple Idea: Turn Your Dreams Into a
Licensing Goldmine While Letting Others Do the Work
by Stephen Key. Key's book is about licensing ideas for
products, so you may not think what he has to say applies to you.
Keep in mind that when a publisher picks up your book, you have
essentially licensed an idea. Read what Key has to say about
marketing, and think about how to apply his methods to your own goals.
Go to worldcat.org and type in the
title of Key's book. Then, click on “preview this item.” You can
read the first 20% of Key's book right there.