Breaking Through a Marketing Plateau

You know when you start a new diet, and the first 5 or 10 pounds come off in a snap, and then a few more pounds come, and then, without you changing anything, it just stops? You've hit a wall or a plateau, where one pound feels like a life or death struggle.

Well, I think the same thing happens with marketing. You start a blog, write often, comment on others, use Twitter to bring in readers, everything you know you're supposed to do. And it really does work, you can get some pretty good growth that way. But then after a while it almost starts feeling like your little market is saturated. You're doing the same things as before, but numbers start flat-lining. Not nearly as many new followers, not as many comments. When this trend happens too often or too severely in something like book sales, it can be deadly.

So what can you do? I'll give you some suggestions of what I think might work, but mostly I want to hear your ideas. Those of you who have been in this game for a while, how do you keep things growing, keep the life blood flowing?

First of all, keep going. It's definitely not going to go anywhere if you stop moving. Keep writing, commenting, tweeting, touring, networking, everything. Sometimes, fingers crossed, all you need is time before your next spurt.

Find new places. If your main tributary starts drying, look for new ones. Find websites that you're not already using and give them a try. No need to stress about it either, just add one at a time and see if they give results. Maybe get business cards, or look for local opportunities doing readings, signings, panels, lectures, that kind of thing. Go to conferences and network. Of course those things are more time and money intensive, but they may be worth it.

Change something up. Add something to your blog design or change the time of your posts. Try writing about something a little out of the norm. Try tweeting more often or You might catch the attention of people you wouldn't have otherwise.

Then of course there is always the publicity stunt type stuff. Plan a book drive, organize an event at your kids school, do a blog contest, something like that, and get the news to come if possible. Again, intensive, with potentially little pay-off, but who knows.

So what are your guys' ideas? Even just using your online presence, how do you revitalize it when it seems like the normal methods are slowing down? How do you keep finding new people, and keep them coming back?

Sarah Allen

Where do you discover the books you buy?

Yesterday at The Kill Zone, Michelle Gagnon told us the best and worst writing advice she's ever gotten. There were some great tips here, some I've heard before and some I haven't. I definitely think keeping ones day-job is a good idea, for both financial and social reasons, and I've heard several people warn against spending too much on a publicist.

One thing that I'll admit surprised me was the statistic Michelle gave about social networks. She said that only 4% of book sales come from Facebook and Twitter, and probably even less from writer-centered sites like GoodReads and Shelfari. 4% is tiny, insignificant, minuscule, particularly compared to the percent of marketing effort most writers put into these sites.

Assuming that these statistics are correct, here's my question: what other/better options do we poor writers have? If Facebook, Twitter and GoodReads only give marginal results, where are more useful places to put our limited resources? Social networks take a lot of time, but cost nothing and therefore seem like a good choice. I still plan on using them as best as I can, but I want to put my money and time where it will really pay off, so I need some ideas.

I'll admit, I'm not the best at the discovering books from relatively obscure sources thing. This is absolutely something I hope to fix in the future (with the help of my new kindle...eeeeh :), but the majority of my reading picks come from classic lists (Dostoevsky, Austen, Brontes, Dickens, Hugo, etc.) best-seller and critically acclaimed lists (Steven King, Rowling, Kaye Gibbons, Tea Obreht) and recommended from friends and family (Connie Willis, Joan Bauer, Sharon Creech, Louis Sachar). There are many, many fantastic mid-list and indie authors with incredible books just waiting to be discovered. And you have to be discovered before you can become a classic, be put on lists, or be talked about around the dinner table. Since I'm just beginning to dip into this whole new pool of writers, and since for us beginning, un-listed, not-yet-classics, less-talked-about writers doing our own marketing is absolutely crucial, I'm coming to you guys: where do you discover the books you buy? If not Facebook and Twitter, then where?

My two ideas about this are that the most basic thing success in this field requires is great writing, and the second is that as far as marketing goes, blogs have big potential. I'm pretty sure the first idea is correct. I don't think you can really get that far on bad writing, though there are a few exceptions. But what about the second idea? Do blogs really do that much? It seems like Amanda Hocking used blogs and blog tours more than anything else to promote her books, and look where she is now. Of course I could be wrong, but I'm looking for ideas here. I bet a lot of people find books the same way I do, via lists and word of mouth, but what course of action does that leave for us writers, especially if social networking sites don't really help that much? What are the best places and ways to help us get to that listed and talked about point?

Thanks for your ideas, and happy writing!
Sarah Allen