It’s easier to sell someone a book than to get them to read it.

While in the short term, selling books is helpful — you make some money, your Amazon ranking goes up — if nobody reads the book, it creates a long-term problem.

You can only market so much.

If you do everything on this website and in my paid programs to market your book, you will sell a lot of copies and get it out into the world… but it will only make it so far.

You don’t have the time or money to invest in continuing to push the book to hundreds of thousands or millions of people.

At some point, the readers have to take over.

My friends and business partner, Shawn Coyne, has been in the publishing industry for 30 years. He’s been involved with the publishing of many hundreds of books and even written a New York Times bestseller of his own.

Several years ago he wrote a post titled The 10,000 Reader Rule.

In it he says:

Exposing 10,000 people who care about the arena of your book gives you a chance that enough of them will actually read it and then recommend it to someone else. That word of mouth will keep the book alive from one year to the next.

Word of mouth is the only way a book eventually breaks out and keeps selling.

The Goal: Get 10,000 people to give your book a try.

It’s like a rocket ship.

If you give up on your book after it’s only been read by 5,000 people, your book never makes it out of the atmosphere. It’s going to crash every time.

But if you keep doing the work to get your book in front of 10,000 people, it makes it into orbit. From there you find out if it can fly on its own.

Should you give your book away?

I get this question a lot.

My answer is a question:

“Does it get you more readers?”

If you put book up perm-free on Amazon or download on your website will probably turn into Kindle-stuffing (people loading up their devices with free and cheap books that they never read).

Instead, if you can give your book away in a form that ensures they will actually read it… now that can be something!

Take a look at the promotion I am running for The Sand Sea.

We are getting two things in return for a free copy of the book:

1. An email address. Building an email list is the most important thing you can do as an author. This allows us to follow up with the reader.
2. Their agreement to read and review the book. This will greatly increase the likelihood that the person will both read the book and leave a review. I’ve tested it.

Should you give your book away?

Our goal as authors is to get 10,000 people to give our book a try. We want them to read the first page.

You never want to randomly give your book away to strangers.

However, if giving your book away is part of a bigger plan to get people to read the book, then I say YES, do it.

Normal life is suspended. Many people feel discombobulated and anxious. We don’t know what’s coming. (This is actually always true, we’re just not usually as aware of it.) 

Yes, it can be sad and frightening to watch this crisis unfold. 

But, given the dualistic nature of our existence, much good can come of our current situation. 

For example, many people will learn to properly wash their hands, Italians will teach us all the value of group sing-alongs from balconies, and you, dear writer, may be able to use the time to make serious progress on connecting with a wider audience.

This is not selfish! We need your stories more than ever—to make sense of our surroundings, expose injustice, or to just escape for a few hours.

And consider, writers have always been opportunistic AF. Whenever something bad happens, it only takes a few minutes for us to fantasize about turning it into fodder for our writing. 

The good news is; sharing our work as widely as possible has the power to benefit the world. This is our MOMENT. 

And to seize the moment, we need to get out there (figuratively, of course) and do some outreach.

Influencer outreach is where the marketing magic happens.

Tim defines outreach as moving people from not knowing you exist to knowing you exist. You’ve got to get in front of people who've never heard of you, but would probably enjoy your book. 

In this time where we need meaningful connection more than ever, it’s up to you to do  the reaching out. You can't wait around for your book to be found. (Well, you can, but you shouldn't expect to move many copies that way.) Without outreach, your audience will grow at a snail’s pace. Therefore, outreach is where authors should be putting 80-90% percent of their marketing energy. 

But outreach is a pretty big topic. To help break it down, I've created a 7-step outline for all the components you need to do outreach successfully.  

7 Steps to Outreach Success

Step 1: Get Your Mind Right.
Outreach is the scariest part of book marketing. It’s pretty certain that in the course of your outreach efforts, you’ll be ignored and rejected. But outreach also delivers a high return on your investment of time and energy. 

You've got to deal with your own fears before (and during) walking this path. Without tackling your mindset as your first step, you may inadvertently sabotage your own efforts either by giving up when things get scary, or coming from a needy, desperate place that will turn off potential readers. 

Keys to a good outreach mindset:

• Be willing to be uncomfortable at some points of the process.
• As Tim says, assume the best of people who ignore or reject you. You don’t know what’s behind their decision, so don’t attribute it to some dark motive.
• Remember that virtuous actions have virtuous results. Come from a place of wanting to add value to the world with your book.

For more on mindset, you can read my post on changing the story you tell yourself about marketing. 

Step 2: Set Clear Goals
Too many of us get sloppy about goal setting. We may be game to try some outreach, but we don’t want to quantify it, because we don’t want to set a number we don’t end up hitting and feel like a failure. By the result of not setting goals is not really getting anywhere.

I encourage my clients to set big, outlandish goals as well as smaller actionable goals that can help them get to the bigger goals. Your big goal might be hitting a NYT or WSJ bestseller list, but you aren’t going to hit them without setting smaller outreach goals.

Get clear on the amount of outreach you plan to do, and your timeline for doing it so you don't stall out. In my outreach intensive group coaching program, I ask my authors to create a list of 50+ influencers, and send 25+ pitches over the course of eight weeks. Then I recommend plugging time into a calendar to achieve specific goals. What I’ve seen with my clients is that it’s far more effective for them to add two hours to their calendar to “add 15 influencers to spreadsheet” or “write four pitches” than it is to classify that time as simply “outreach activities.” If you're too vague, your directionless brain will wander off to check Twitter.

Once you’ve set your goals, share them and invite people to keep you accountable. 

Step 3: Take Aim
You shouldn't be flailing around trying to tell EVERYONE about your book. You need to target your ideal readers, which means pausing to figure out your reader persona. 

I really can’t emphasize enough what a valuable exercise this is, and too many authors skip it and just create their outreach plan based on a vague set of demographics. A “college educated woman age 35-65” is not nearly specific enough. Knowing exactly the type of person who should read your book will help you focus your outreach efforts, find the right influencers and make decisions about what content to create for them. 

Step 4: Research
Now that you know the type of audience you're looking for, it's time to figure out how to find them. This means doing the unglamorous work of scouring the internet to figure out where your target readers congregate and who the right influencers are. An “influencer” is simply someone who has built trust with an audience and can impact their book buying decisions. 

When you first start your research, you’re likely to feel like you’re stumbling around a bit. That doesn’t mean you’re doing it wrong. It’s definitely jumping down a rabbit hole, but with a specific purpose. 

You are looking for influencers who've built a tribe of people who’d benefit from what you have to say. Start by googling keywords related to your book and coupling them with “podcast” or “blog.” (Obviously, for now we need to focus on digital outreach, not in-person events.) For example, let’s say you want to focus your outreach on podcasts and let's say your book is a memoir about raising goats off the grid. You’d want to google things like “off the grid podcasts” or “urban farming podcasts.” Then you’ll explore the search results and use a spreadsheet to keep track of possibilities that need further exploration. 

Make sure whomever you’re thinking of pitching is still actively creating content (when’s the last time they published an episode?) and that the audience size is worth your time. And there’s no “right” or “wrong” audience size. It’s totally up to you. Many authors prefer to start with influencers who have smaller audiences so they can get comfortable with outreach without the high stakes of being on Super Soul Sunday. Save Oprah for later.

Another approach to this research is to interview one of your actual readers who match your ideal reader persona and find out who they consider influencers, then add them to your list. 

Step 5: Cultivate
Once you know some influencers for your ideal reader, it's time to start cultivating a relationship with them. Ideally, when you reach out to an influencer for help promoting your book, it shouldn't be the first time they've ever heard from you.

Follow them on social media and start liking, commenting and sharing their content. Or send them an email thanking them for what they do or linking them something they may find interesting without making an ask. Use your empathy skills. Figure out what would be helpful to them and then do that thing. You’ll get on their radar as someone who’s helpful and friendly.

Step 6: Ask & Follow-up
To maximize your chances of success, it's important to create a win-win opportunity for both you and the influencer. Influencers need great content to keep their status as influencers. You can help with that. This means customizing each pitch to make sure it's easy for the influencer to say yes. 

Not only should your pitch be a win-win, it should be very specific and highlight the fact that you’re familiar with their work and have given your possible contribution some serious thought. 

It’s a mistake to offer something like “I’d love to come on your podcast and talk about my book.” Nobody cares about your book until you tell them WHY they should. It’s much better to offer specific entertainment, such as: “I’d love to come on the Urban Farming podcast to tell the story of how Gertie the nanny goat saved my life during a thunderstorm.” Or specific information, such as “I’d love to come on the Urban Farming podcast and share with your audience the top five mistake people new to raising goats make.” Of course, you’ll be mentioning your book in the course of all of this, but that’s not what will drive people to read or listen.

Your pitch, while customized for each influencer, can use the following template:

Hi [influencer],

My name is [your name] and I’m the author of [book title] which [social proof such as awards, positive reviews, number of copies sold*.]

I’m a fan of [name of their podcast, website, social account, etc] and particularly enjoyed [example of their work and a specific reason it appealed to you].

I noticed you sometimes have guests on your [ podcast, website, etc]. If you think it would be a good match for your audience, I’d love to [specific pitch, tell them exactly what you’d like to talk about or write about based on your research of what would benefit their audience.] [Explain why you’d be a great person to do this due to your background or the content of your book.]  

Thanks for your consideration. Let me know what you think.  (If you definitely want me on, you can use this link to book a time: [link to booking app].)

Best, 

[your name]

(* If you don’t have anything like this, you can simply say it’s a book that helps people do something or would appeal to a certain type of person because of a certain factor)

Once you send the pitch, if you don't hear back after a few weeks, go ahead and follow-up. It's quicker to follow-up on an ignored pitch than it is to research and write a new one. (But only follow-up once so you don't make a nuisance of yourself. You want a reputation for being awesome, not being a pest.)

Step 7: Deliver
Once you get a yes, (and you will if you consistently do your research and write killer pitches!) you need to deliver the goods. Whatever you've agreed to provide the influencer, be it a blog post, a podcast interview, a joint giveaway or whatever, you need to go in prepared, professional, ready to delight your influencer's audience and make an elevator pitch that invites them to your email list.

Rinse and repeat those seven steps for the rest of your career — or until you have the audience size you want.

In the process, you’ll not only sell more books, you’ll also build meaningful relationships that will help you feel connected and make a difference when the world seems upside down.

I’ve got all this time, what should I do with it?

Is it rude to try to market right now?

Am I going to annoy people if I do outreach?

In this article, I’m going to walk you through do’s and don’ts of how to put a book marketing silver lining around this world crisis.

You Know What Most People Are Doing… Nothing

Usually, when you’re trying to promote something, you’re competing with thousands of other little unknown distractions in people’s lives. However now, for the first time, you know what everybody is thinking about and what most people are doing.

While, yes, this outbreak is affecting people's lives and keeping them busy. The sick, health care providers and others are very busy, most people are social distancing and sitting at home with not a lot going on.

Knowing that is powerful.

So how can you make progress towards your book marketing goals during this time?

Follow these rules…

Rules for Book Marketing During COVID-19

Here are the rules I’ve come up with to grow your platform and sell more books while being respectful of the crisis going on in the world.

1. Do a lot of outreach

If you’ve ever wanted to connect with an influencer, now is the time to do it. If you’ve wanted to interview someone for your podcast or blog, they probably have time now. If they have ignored you in the past, try again now. If you want to be a guest on a podcast or write a guest post for a blog, reach out.

There are two hard things about outreach:

1. It’s time-consuming.
2. People are busy and unresponsive.

Well, during this pandemic:

1. You have time on your hands.
2. People are way less busy.

Use this opportunity to reach out to people you’ve always wanted to connect with.

2. Acknowledge But Don’t Apologize

On the 17th I got an email from my mortgage broker wishing me a happy St. Patrick’s Day. It had zero mention of the current pandemic.

It was weird.

I logically know this was an automated email setup months ago, but it was still weird. All it needed was one sentence at the beginning acknowledging what was going on but still wishing me a happy holiday and it would have been fine.

In everything you do — sending email promotions, outreach, etc — give simple acknowledgment at the beginning and then move on with what you are doing. Don’t apologize (you’re not doing anything wrong) but don’t try to ignore the elephant in our collective room.

3. Figure Out a Win-Win

I talk about this all the time. There is always a way to make your marketing a win-win.

Even when you are directly asking people to buy your book, it’s a win-win. They get this amazing story and knowledge for a few bucks. That’s a great deal for both of you!

In this case, how can you tie your marketing into what is going on? Here are a few ideas:

1. Start a social distancing book club with people (that includes your book). You can have daily/weekly meetings on Zoom or Skype to discuss. This will give isolated people a way to connect.
2. Run a “boredom promotion” where people can get your books at a discount.
3. Partner with other authors to promote a box set of all of your books.

People are feeling isolated, stir-crazy, and bored. How can you help them with one or more of those problems while selling some books?

4. Start Something New

Have you been putting off starting your blog or podcast? Have you been wanting to get ahead on your email newsletters?

Now is the time to start something new.

If you’ve wanted to start an interview-based podcast, now is a good time to get a bunch of guests (see point #1 above) and you can bank a lot of episodes so you can start off ahead.

Plus, if you’ve always been overwhelmed by how to start something new, now you have the time to dig in and figure it out!

—

A few days ago I was really freaking out about COVID-19.

While I’m not too concerned about the health aspects, I was spiraling about money and book sales and being cooped up in my house for weeks or, potentially, months.

So, as I do, I started journaling about it and realized I could look at this as an opportunity.

Yes, I’m cooped up inside, but that means I have time to do things I’ve been putting off.

Yes, everybody is dealing with COVID-19, but if I really believe my definition of marketing — creating long-lasting connections with people and being relentlessly helpful — then now, more than ever, I need to focus on marketing.

Your books are here to help people. You are here to help people.

We need that now more than ever.

Don’t be afraid to step out and work on your author platform and book marketing during COVID-19. You have the time to learn it and people will be open to it.

Where To Start

Here are two resources to get you started:

• Author Platform 101 Program – This is the start-to-finish walkthrough on setting up your author platform and beginning book marketing. It also includes monthly Q&As with me to get your questions answered.
• How to Build an Author Website in 1-hour – Still don't have your author website setup? In this free training I walk you through exactly how to do it.

Most writers I talk to haven’t created a reader persona for one of two reasons.

Either they don’t understand the benefits of creating one, or they’re experiencing Resistance (with a capital R) about marketing in general.

Allow me to persuade you that creating a reader persona is an activity that can unlock your marketing like almost no other.

But first, let’s back up a bit and explain what I mean when I talk about an ideal reader persona.

It’s basically a character sketch of a person who will be absolutely delighted with your work from the minute they read the jacket copy. 

Quite simply, it’s the imaginary version of a real person who was meant — dare I say, destined — to find your book.

Do you really need a reader persona?

As writers, we have a lot on our plate. Maybe we’re writing a new manuscript, revising an old one, working a day job and raising kids all at the same time. The thought of sitting down to dabble in what may seem like marketing busy work isn’t that appealing. 

Can you skip creating a reader persona? Yes. You’re a grown-up. You can pass on any tasks you don’t want to do, including paying your taxes and feeding your dog. 

But there are consequences for choosing not to do something. 

In the case of creating a reader persona, deciding to skip it can have the following consequences:

• Feeling stuck. You won’t know where to go next with your marketing and therefore won’t do much of anything.
• Wasting time. You’ll spend hours trying to reach people who aren’t interested in your book.
• Wasting money. You may dump money on ads or promotions that aren’t targeted correctly.
• Watered down marketing that doesn’t speak to anyone. If you’re trying to appeal to everyone instead of to your ideal reader, chances are your marketing isn’t going to be very interesting to anyone. 
• Frustration over lack of sales. Without a clear idea of your target audience, it’s likely that looking at your monthly numbers puts a knot in your stomach.

The magic of knowing who you’re looking for

Knowing exactly the type of person who should read your book will help you make key decisions and save you some serious time. 

Suddenly, you know where to look, what language to use and what content to deliver.  

Once you have a clear picture of your ideal reader, your marketing can almost magically coalesce around what that reader cares about, and therefore it’s much more likely to catch and hold their attention.

“But, my book is for EVERYONE!”

When we resist creating a reader persona, we often do it because our hope is that our book will appeal to everyone and we don’t want to limit ourselves. 

Your book isn’t for everyone. Truly. I don’t know the first thing about your book, but I do know that it’s not for everyone. 

How do I know that? Because one-quarter of U.S. adults surveyed last year hadn’t read even one book in the past twelve months.

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone has sold upwards of 107 million copies. I think we’d all be happy with that sales figure.

There are 327 million people in the US and 7.5 billion people in the world.

Harry Potter is not for everyone. Your book is not for everyone. Don’t try to market to everyone.

Creating an ideal reader isn’t about leaving people out. It’s creating an opportunity to saturate a core audience with a message that delights them so they will rave about your book and help it spread.

Minimum viable audience

The goal is to find what bestselling author and marketer Seth Godin calls your minimum viable audience—the bare minimum of people who will LOVE your book and help it succeed.

If you look at Harry Potter, that series went supernova before the internet had really even taken off. How? Booksellers liked it and they spread the word. That book was hand-sold to a certain kind of kid. Those kids went nuts over it and that led to phenomenal success.

Let’s look at another example. Steven Pressfield wrote a little book called The War of Art.   

That book has sold 500,000 copies. 

It was aimed at writers. Writers were the minimum viable audience. 

Writers ate it up and spread the word to other creative types and then to entrepreneurs and other groups. 

You can start with one minimum viable audience and then move to another and another. But few authors can try to hit multiple audiences at once and get any traction. 

Let’s talk about Resistance for a second

Since we just talked about Steven Pressfield, who coined the term Resistance (with a capital R) to explain the sort of dark inner force of self-sabotage writers and artists so face, now’s a good time to talk about how to deal with it in this marketing context.

There can be lots of reasons for Resistance to marketing. Sometimes we have a bad definition of marketing—we define it by its worst examples—so we decide we don’t want to sully ourselves.

But really, when it comes down to it, I see that many writers think that if they don’t try very hard to market their book, they have a ready excuse as to why it’s not selling. 

Many people feel like it’s better to not try than to try and fail. This is because we don’t want to feel the feelings that come along with failure, so we think we’ll avoid the feelings by not doing the thing.

BUT, if we’re willing to feel any feeling, there’s no limit to what we can do.

Resistance is completely disabled when we agree ahead of time to be willing to feel anything that comes up and act anyway.

Look at some of the most successful authors—they’re willing to feel rejection, they’re willing to tolerate haters, they’re willing to do interviews and put themselves out there. They still feel the discomfort and the resistance, but it doesn’t rule their actions. 

They’re willing to feel things in order to get where they want to go.

So, let’s keep that in mind as we look at how to create and use a reader persona. Let’s be willing to feel any feeling as we try to fulfill our potential as writers by finding our ideal readers. (For more help with author mindset, read this post.)

The research phase

Seth Godin tells us the #1 question we have to answer is in our marketing is: “Who’s it for?” 

This is the whole idea behind reader personas. But how do we figure that out?

Using comp titles

We can start by answering the following questions:

• What’s your genre?
• What are some comp titles?
• How is your book different?

Let’s answer those questions for the two books we’ve talked about so far. (And keep in mind this is a fairly subjective process, so you don’t need to email me to tell me all the ways you disagree with my assessments here. This is just to give you an idea of how to approach your own book.)

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone 

Genre: Fantasy and Action/Adventure

Comp titles: Lord of the Rings; Chronicles of Narnia; The Wizard of Earthsea

Who reads those books? Children who love to escape to magical worlds

How is HP different? Went from middle grade to YA in one series; revival of fantasy when fantasy was kind of dead…

The War of Art

Genre: Nonfiction Big Idea Book

Comp titles: Bird by Bird; the Elements of Style

Who reads those books? Writers who want to improve their craft, or people who want to be writers

How is WoA different? Focuses on battling Resistance, not improving writing skills

You can get a great sense of your ideal reader by investigating some of your comp titles. 

Head over to Amazon or Goodreads and read all of the five-star reviews. What sense do you get of people who loved this book? Can you glean their age, interests and worldview?

Now visit the author’s website and social media channels. Does this author have an engaged fan following? If so, poke around the profiles of some of those fans. What information can you glean about them? You should be able to tell their rough age and some of their other likes and dislikes based on their profile and what they’re sharing online.

Interviewing an actual reader

There’s really more than one way to do this, so let’s look at another method of doing research before you start building the persona.

In episode 31 of the Book Launch Show, Tim shared a story of how he created a persona for his book Your First 1000 Copies and his Booklaunch.com website. 

He based his ideal reader/customer on an actual client. He even went so far as to address every email he drafted to her, and then deleted her name just before sending.

If you have access to an actual reader, ideally someone you don’t know well who’s told you how much they love your book, ask for a brief call with that person so you can use them as a basis of your reader person. 

By asking about favorite books, you can discover comp titles. By asking about where they spend their time online, you can figure out the best social media channels to focus on. By asking what podcasts they listen to, you can start creating a list of podcasting influencers to target.

Best of all, by the end of the conversation, you’ll have a very clear idea of how your ideal reader talks and thinks and therefore how to talk to them.

Let’s build this thing

Now that you’ve done the research, you can start to build a reader persona. 

Tim's cohost on the Book Launch Show, Valerie Francis, gave us a killer example of how to build a reader persona in episode 34. (You can download her spreadsheet here.)

Now, before you start rolling your eyes at all this detail, I want you to remember what you already know as a writer: There is power in specificity.

(Tim says he even pictures what his ideal readers wear and what color hair they have.)

So start plugging in the details of your ideal reader. You can do this in a spreadsheet, or a document or a piece of paper, but actually do it. Don’t just think about it.

You want to include demographics and psychographics (another hat tip to Seth Godin here). You need to get inside this reader’s head and understand how they see the world. 

Example persona for The War of Art:

Name: Dylan Aarons

Demographics

Age: 43

Gender: Male

Ethnicity: White

Religion: Non-secular jewish

Location: California

Occupation: Business Analyst 

Relationship status: Divorced

Education: BA

Income level: $120,000

Children: 2

Leisure time per week: 8 hours

Psychographics

Biggest problem: Wants to write but gets stuck easily

Favorite book: On Writing

Favorite movie: Glengarry Glenross

Goals: Finish a novel

Political affiliation: Democrat

Favorite media outlets: NPR

Hobbies: Cycling

Values: Creativity

Habits: Goes for a long bike ride every Saturday and listens to podcasts during commute

Social media use: Instagram, Twitter & Reddit

You can also take all this information and write it up in narrative form, like a character sketch, and bring it to life even more.

Using the persona

Now, if you’re Steven Pressfield (I know, you wish) when you sit down to do your marketing, you can think about Dylan. 

You can design a reader magnet that will help him solve his biggest problem, like a free course on breaking through Resistance, for example. (Which happens to be exactly what Steven Pressfield offers new subscribers.)

If you’re writing a newsletter or crafting an article, you can speak directly to Dylan because you know what he cares about.

If you want to find Dylan online, you’re going to head to Twitter, Instagram and Reddit.

If you’re on a podcast, you’ll want to say the things that Dylan needs to hear.

And once you’ve got the Dylans of the world raving about your book, you can move on to the next almost-as-ideal reader. I recommend developing 2-4 personas and refining them over time. 

Again, the point of a reader persona is to help you find the people who will become raving fans of your work by being ultra specific. People different from your reader persona will find your book and love it, too. 

You’re just using your persona to get your foot in the door. Find your ideal readers. Delight them. And they will spread the word. 

Believe me when I say, I am NOT criticizing anyone here. All writers, including me, indulge in the occasional pity party. 

Here are the kinds of answers I get to the question: “What comes up for you when you think about marketing?”

Fear.

Overwhelm, loneliness, drudgery.

Anxiety (am I good enough? does anyone care?) and a desire to procrastinate.

Worry about being sleazy!

Can you relate? 

When I probe for the thoughts behind the feelings, here are some answers I hear:

“Somebody else—my publisher—should do be doing this for me.” 

“I don’t want to be pushy and salesy.” 

“I’m a nobody. I can’t get any traction when talking to influencers.” 

“I’ll be ignored and never know why.”

“I’m bad with technology, so I can’t build a mailing list.” 

“My work is dumb and not worth much.”

My only goal is to help people find success with their books—however they define it. I try to dig up these thoughts so I can do something about them. 

Because the plain truth is, you can’t possibly be successful in your marketing when you’re telling yourself this type of story about getting your book out into the world.

When you hate the thought of marketing, when you dread it, your marketing will suck. 

Therefore, your results suck. 

And you’ll conclude that you suck, or that you were right about marketing being a nightmare. 

It’s self-fulfilling prophecy. And it ends now. Today. With you reading this post.

One of the things that first drew me to Tim’s Connection System was his definition of marketing: The act of building long-lasting connections with people.

That definition is a big reason why the system works so well. Right out of the gate, it addresses the negative thoughts and fears most of us have about selling. 

But I still see authors get stuck on actually carrying out the system, even once they learn it and know it works.

They get stuck because they didn’t stop to consciously dismantle their old beliefs about marketing. As soon as they start taking action, their brain starts coughing up fears and doubts and they end up in a downward spiral of stinky thinking and stagnant sales.

Action is not the first step to solving the problem

Too many of us think taking action is the whole answer to almost any problem. If only I could take action, things would shift. But it just isn’t true.

Tim and I can tell you what to do to market your book all day long, but unless you’ve got the right mindset, you’re just not going to do it.

If you’re frozen in your marketing efforts right now, gritting your teeth and taking action is not the first step towards more books sales.

If you force yourself to do your marketing from a place of hating it, you’re going to fail, no matter what actions you take. Because people can smell a faker.

Shitty Thinking Sabotages Your Efforts

Here’s the kind of crap I hear when talking to authors about the different stages of the Connection System.

Objections to Permission: 

“But, I never sign up for newsletters so my readers won’t either.”

Objections to Content: 

“But, I don’t have time to create marketing content. I’m so busy and I need my spare time for writing my books.”

Objections to Outreach: 

“But, I’m a nobody, so I can’t get any traction when talking to influencers.”

Objections to Selling:

“But, I don’t want to sound like I’m selling used cars.” 

Notice how these objections begin with the word “but”?

“But” thoughts are an excellent signpost to identify the thinking that’s getting in your way. You say them as if they’re facts, as if you’re reading the news. “But” thoughts are not facts. They are self-sabotage. Every time. 

Hear me now: there is always a way around a “but,” if you want to find it.

Right action requires right thinking 

I’m going to help you solve the problem so many of us face in all facets of our lives: Knowing what we need to do but not being able to make ourselves do it. 

I’m building on the work of therapists, thinkers, and coaches like Tara Brach, Martha Beck, Byron Katie, and Brooke Castillo here, adapting and merging some of their concepts and exercises specifically for writers. Just like the Connection System, this is an underlying strategy. A foundation to guide you in developing thoughts that will better serve you in your writing and your marketing.

The key is to quiet the limbic system, or emotional center of the brain, and use our powerful prefrontal cortex instead. Some people refer to the limbic system as the “lizard brain.” It’s responsible for our fear responses and always wants us to skitter away from the unfamiliar, the challenging. The prefrontal cortex, on the other hand, wants to solve problems and find a way to reach our highest potential. Which part of your brain would you rather develop? 

Those negative thoughts we looked at earlier come from the lizard brain. We’re going to intentionally override them with our prefrontal cortex.

I’m going to give you a roadmap to clean up your thoughts so you can move forward with building the audience your books deserve.

Though it may feel a little woo-woo at first, I assure you, it’s actually incredibly practical. Once you start using it, you’ll be annoyed you never learned it in school.

Your Roadmap to a Better Mindset

To use this mindset roadmap, we need to understand how our circumstances, thoughts, feelings and actions all interact to create our marketing results. (Big hat tip here to life coach and effing genius Brooke Castillo here, this is based on her Self Coaching 101 model.)

Marketing is just a thing that exists in the world. A circumstance. 

It’s not good or bad—until you have a thought about it. 

Once you think something like “marketing is yucky,” that creates a feeling, often revulsion, that drives the actions you take—or don’t take—to market your book. 

Your action (or inaction) determines the result you get. In this case, lack of sales because your thoughts about marketing interfered with your ability to do any.

There’s only one way to change the result: Back the hell up and look at your thoughts.

Oh, wait. You don’t believe that there’s a direct line from your thoughts to your results? 

Consider Tim. Tim doesn't love marketing because he's good at marketing. He's terrific at marketing because he loves marketing. He loves it because he thinks it works. The way he thinks about it makes him feel excited about it, which drives the actions he takes, which create his stellar results. 

I’m going to walk you through the roadmap here and you’ll start to see your own thoughts about marketing and understand the connection to your results. 

This understanding, along with some practice, will allow you to better control your thoughts. When you control your thoughts, you can change the results you get in marketing—and in life.

Do you get that? Changing your thoughts about marketing can change your life!

So here’s how to leverage that prefrontal cortex and stuff a sock in the mouth of your lizard brain.

Step 1: Do a thought download. 

When you think about getting serious about your marketing, what comes up for you? 

Remember the answers my clients gave above?  

Now, it’s your turn. Write down every thought that comes into your mind when you think about marketing. 

If you’re currently unhappy with your sales figures, I’ll bet dollars to dark chocolate that most of what you put down is negative. 

Now read what you wrote down while imagining these are another writer’s thoughts, not yours. You think this other writer is brilliant and should be super famous and successful, but isn’t. Do these thoughts explain why their marketing isn’t working? You bet your ass they do. 

Thoughts like these don’t serve anyone but our inner lizards.

Step 2: Call out your own bullshit

Next, for each thought you wrote down, ask yourself, is this really true? The negative thoughts are simply stories you’re telling yourself. And because you’re a writer and you live and breathe stories, sometimes you can’t tell when you’re fooling yourself.

Let’s look at some shitty thoughts and investigate them.

Step 3: Restock your thoughts

Ok, that may have been a bit like having cold water thrown in your face, but never fear! We’re getting to the good part. 

Now that you’ve seen the mental manure inside your head, it’s time to muck the proverbial stall.

How much time and energy could you pour into finding an audience if you simply stopped believing all those thoughts?

However much I love eastern philosophies like Buddhism (and I do), it’s not enough to just notice our thoughts and try not to identify with them. We have to use our big fat prefrontal cortex to its highest potential and choose better, more helpful thoughts. Our new thoughts eventually become beliefs. And when we take action from beliefs that serve us, we get results we feel good about.

To take the kind of action that sells more books, we need to rewire our brains to focus on more positive thoughts about marketing.

Remember, our actions are driven by our feelings. In order to take massive action to build your career, what would you need to feel? Our thoughts create our feelings, in order to have a feeling that helps you take action, what would you need to think?

I’m not talking about chanting some silly affirmation until you automagically believe it. Start by finding some thoughts you already believe that will serve you better as you tackle book marketing.

You want your new thought to have the following qualities: It should feel possible and hopeful, it should be compassionate towards yourself (no shaming or blaming for what you thought before), and, most of all, it should be true. 

Your old thoughts were lies you told yourself. You new thoughts should be meticulously constructed to be both true and positive. 

Let’s look at some examples of old, shitty thoughts converted into shiny new, believable thoughts that can serve you better in your marketing: 

Try some of these new thoughts on for size and see how they feel. Pick one or two new thoughts and tape them up in your workspace. Each time you sit down to work on your marketing, read (or even speak aloud) your new thoughts. 

Can you already feel what actions might you be willing to take as a result of shifting your attention to these new thoughts instead of your habitual ones? 

Your thoughts are powerful. They are the stories you tell yourself. As a writer, you must tell yourself a book marketing story that serves you well, so you can serve the world with your story. Get to it!

I love it. 

The whole reason I do what I do is to help authors get their books into the hands of more readers. Any time I can help an author reach more people, it makes me happy.

However, many of the emails authors send me are written in a way that makes it hard for me to help them.

Reaching out—the right way

A big part of my success has been the ability to surround myself with people who are way smarter than I am. Input from other authors and business people—clients, colleagues, and mentors—has dramatically aided me in getting where I am today.

We all need each other. 

We need people who have walked similar roads to help show the way, to help us avoid the common pits and potholes.

I believe in that process.

But I see many people making fundamental mistakes when reaching out to their chosen mentors and advisors. Those mistakes keep them from making great connections with people who are in a position to help them.

Today, I’m going to walk you through how to reach out and connect with amazing people who will help you reach your goals.

I offer this advice based on three important perspectives:

• For most of my career, I lived in a small town in Virginia. I was at least three hours from anything that could be called a major city. I’ve had to do the vast majority of my relationship-building remotely.
• I know what it’s like to feel like a “nobody” reaching out to a bunch of somebodies.
• As I’ve become a quasi-, low-level “somebody,” I’ve begun to see what it’s like to have people who are just getting started reach out to you for help and advice.

Put these in your toolbox 

These tools will help you get connected in the right way, so you can start building those relationships that will help lead you to success:

1. Get the right mindset

You cannot, in any way, have unhealthy expectations regarding the person you are reaching out to.

If you’ve got a copy of my book Your First 1000 Copies, re-read the first six sections of the Outreach chapter (pages 80–87 in the print edition).

If you feel you are owed something—and that you’ll be angry if you don’t get the response you want—stop now and re-route your thinking, or don’t contact this person.

2. Take a risk

Now is an excellent time to exercise your experimental side. Of course, not everybody you reach out to will respond and be helpful, but some will.

Take a risk and put yourself out there. It’s no fun to be ignored or to get a “no,” but it’s much worse never even to try.

3. Start with the B-listers

There are only ever a handful of A-listers, and most people are trying to get help from them.

So many people forget that the B-listers are also having a lot of success, and are much more available to help unknown authors than the A-listers are.

Everyone is clamoring for help from Stephen King, John Grisham, and Malcolm Gladwell. Shoot for authors who are selling tens of thousands of copies of their books, not millions.

They still see a lot of success, and probably have more time on their hands—and a greater inclination to help you than the more prominent names would.

4. Keep it short

I honestly wish I could sit down and have a long afternoon coffee session with every single one of you. I love hearing author’s stories and giving advice that’s specific to their situation. However, as you can imagine, that doesn’t scale very well, given how crowded my work week is.

The same goes for email. When you send out a message, keep it short!

Don’t share your entire life story. Don’t share a lot of unnecessary details. Get right to the point.

If you show respect for this person and their time, they will be much more likely to respond in a timely and respectful way.

5. Do your research

Recently I received an email from someone who claimed to have read my book and all of the articles on this site. They then launched into a bunch of questions around the intricacies of building a following on social media. If you’ve read or listened to anything I’ve said about social media, then you’ll know this isn’t the right place to start with me.

I never responded.

Every answer this person needed is easily findable in my book or on this website.

Do your research first!

Read this person’s blog posts. Listen to their podcast interviews. Read their books.

If you’re not willing to invest time into your learning, why should they?

6. Ask a specific question

Please do not send a massive backstory of what’s gone wrong (see #1) and then ask a question like “What should I do now?”.

A big, ambiguous question like that would take a lot of back-and-forths emailing to sift through it all.

When you send an email to someone who is an established authority or success story in their field, ask just one or two specific questions that can be answered quickly and concisely. Here's a great article on how to ask useful questions.

7. Take their advice, then report back

Most people ask for advice, get advice, then promptly do the opposite, or never act on the advice at all.

Please, don’t be this person.

People love to help other people. Every author I’ve worked with loves to add positively to other people’s lives.

But after they’ve gotten burned, trying to help a lot of people who never act on their advice, it’s hard to keep trying.

However, if you’re respectful of them and their time, do your research, ask a specific question, then promptly implement the advice—you become someone they love to help and will keep on helping.

Case Study: Do it this way

A good friend of mine used this method to get a very prominent and successful author to become his mentor:

First, he read everything the author had published—in this case, two books.

Second, he listened to every podcast interview with that author that he could find.

Third, he took a specific problem he was having and sent the author an email asking for advice.

That quick, concise, thoughtfully worded email showed he had done his research.

And, most importantly, it was something the author could answer very quickly.

Fourth, the author almost immediately responded with a short email, answering his specific question, and giving a bit of advice.

Fifth, my friend immediately dropped everything and implemented that advice. 

He then fired back an email the following day, describing the results and asking a short follow-up question.

Sixth, the author sent my friend his phone number and told him to give him a call.

Now, tell me: 

What do you think would have happened if my friend had instead sent a 500-word email describing his entire background, then asked a vague, open-ended question that the author had already answered in one of his books?

Exactly.

Get in their corner, and they’ll get in yours

It’s no fun to feel alone on your journey.  It’s also incredibly frustrating to repeatedly make the same mistakes that so many others have made.

By connecting in the right way with people who have walked the same road and found success, you will reach your goals much faster.

You’ll also be inspired and encouraged by the company you meet along the way.

“That sounds great, but does it work for fiction authors?”

I get it.

Sometimes it’s hard to wrap your head around. How are you going to build an author platform when you can’t share tips on getting skinny, saving time, or starting a business?

In this article, I’m going to walk you through a very simple system that will take less than 3 hours a month to do.

Plus, you will start getting immediate results.

Let’s get started.

The Goal: What are we doing?

Of course, the goal is always to “sell more books,” but what else are we trying to accomplish?

According to the Connection System, we need to have:

1. Outreach: A way of moving people from not knowing we exist to knowing we exist.
2. Content: Putting content out in the world so potential fans will know we are a good fit for them.
3. Permission: A way to connect with fans that gets their attention and drives action.

All of these steps lead to building an author platform that allows you to sell more books.

So what is a simple way that you can do marketing for fiction authors?

Step 1: Write and publish a review of a book in your genre

This one is pretty straight forward. Grab a book you’ve read recently and write a 500-1000 word review and post it on your website as a blog post or stand alone page.

A few things about this:

• Pick a book in the genre that you write. I’ll explain why in a minute. If you write in multiple genres, review a book in the genre of the most recent book you released. If you don’t have a book out yet, write a review of a book in the genre of the first book you are going to release.
• Pick a book you enjoyed. Don’t write a negative review. Both because it won’t work with this system and because there are too many good books to waste time writing negative reviews of bad ones.
• Pick a book by a B or C list author. Avoid books by Stephen King, Gillian Flynn, J.K. Rowling, etc. It will make this system much more likely to work. Again, you’ll see why in a minute.

Step 2: Send the review to the author

One of the things I discuss when connecting with influencers is the idea of empathy. Put yourself in the shoes of the person with whom you’re trying to connect. See if you can come up with a way to help them get what they want out of the world.

What is one thing every author wants?

To sell more books!

By you publishing a positive review of an author’s book, you are helping them sell more books. (No, it doesn’t matter if barely anyone reads your website.)

This is a perfect way to connect with an author.

I suggest sending it to them through two different channels:

1. Email. Send a simple email to the author telling them you loved their book and that you have published a review. You can usually grab their email address off their website or, at very least, they’ll have a contact form there.Here’s a template for you:

Hi [AUTHOR FIRST NAME],

I recently read your book [TITLE OF THE BOOK] and love it!

In fact, I loved it so much I wrote a review and published it on my blog. You can see it here:

[HTTP://LINKTOTHE.COM/BLOGPOST]

I just wanted to let you know. Thanks for writing it!

[YOUR NAME]

2. Social media. Post a link to the review on the various social media platforms you are active on. Tag the author in your post so they will be notified.Here’s a template for you:

I published my review of [@AUTHORTAG]’s book [TITLE OF THE BOOK]. I loved it and you will too! [HTTP://LINKTOTHE.COM/BLOGPOST]

By the way, the reason why you picked a book by a B or C list is author is because they will be much more likely to reply to your email and share on social media.

If you review a book that has already been reviewed 100s of times by an author that probably has an assistant reading their emails and managing their social media, it’s going to be much harder to cut through the noise.

Step 3: Add a targeted email signup form

This is the reason you want to review a book in your genre.

It is going to attract people that are interested in reading books like yours.

Side Note: One of the biggest mistakes authors make is building an audience that is not interested in the genre that they write in. The most common theme here is writers that build a platform around writing. Sure, maybe you grow an email list and build a blog readership. But when it comes time to sell your epic fantasy novel, it’s not going to sell well. Always focus on attracting people that are interested in the books you are writing and publishing.

Now it is time to convert readers of the book you reviewed to be your readers.

Turn readers into subscribers.

Add an email signup form to one (or more) of these places:

• Sidebar of your blog.
• Top of the review.
• Bottom of the review.

Put this on the email signup form:

If you enjoy books like [THE TITLE OF THE BOOK YOU REVIEWED], then you will love my book [THE TITLE OF YOUR BOOK]. Sign up here and I will send you the first three chapters.

If you need help getting your email list and signup forms setup, I show you how to do that here.

Is your book not published yet? Use this template:

If you enjoy books like [THE TITLE OF THE BOOK YOU REVIEWED], then you will love my upcoming book [THE TITLE OF YOUR BOOK]. Sign up here and I’ll let you know when it’s ready.

Bonus * Step #4: Make a new friend

A lot of times when I discuss connecting with influencers it comes across as a very cold or swarmy kind of practice.

In reality, that couldn’t be further from the truth.

All outreach is simply connecting with other people that are nerdy in the exact same way YOU are nerdy.

When you are emailing the author of the book you just reviewed, you have a lot in common with that person. You both probably love the same books and movies. You both write and could discuss story structure and character development for hours.

The start of something long term.

Think of that first email you send to the author as a start of a long relationship with a peer. If they reply, send a follow up email asking for advice, offering to help them in another way, telling them about another book you think they’d love, etc.

A lot of my long standing friendships started with me reaching out to connect with influencers in my space.

This is another reason to start with B and C list authors.

When you connect with people that are still up-and-coming, you will create friendships that last a lifetime.

How it all works

When you write a review of a book in your genre, you’re creating Content that you can share with your current email subscribers and followers. It is also content that signals to people what you do and what you write.

By putting an email signup form on the review, you are getting Permission to stay in contact with readers long term. You’re also getting them to give your book a try by sending them an excerpt.

When you email the author and tag them on social media, you are doing Outreach by connecting with an influencer in your space. Also, many times the author will share your review on social media so you are bringing in people that have a) never heard of you before and b) read books in your genre.

Do this at least once a month.

It will take less than two hours to write the review. A half hour to publish it on your website. Another half hour to post it on social media and send an email to the author.

In three hours a month you will create twelve new pieces of content a year and potentially connect with twelve new influencers a year. Plus, you will slowly — drip, drip, drip — be building your email list with people that read books in your genre.

Book marketing is not complicated or time-consuming

The most common reasons people avoid making progress with their marketing is because a) they don’t know what to do and b) they are afraid it will take too long.

Follow this simple plan to get started and you’ll see it make a difference.

It was an amazing experience.

When we needed to recruit people to leave early Amazon reviews of the book, we easily had hundreds of people sign up. When he started reaching out to influencers to get their help promoting the book, he immediately had dozens of people excited to have him on their podcast, write guests posts, email their lists, etc.

When we started telling his audience about the book, they were thrilled to buy a copy.

I logged in to a live video conference for a few hundred of his early readers, and I have never felt so much excitement and love from a group of people for an author.

While most authors are languishing in obscurity, Hal has an army of people helping with his book launch.

An author platform isn’t what you think

I mean, it is what you think, but it’s so much more.

Yes, it means having an email list and readers and successful book launches.

But it also means having people in your corner when something big is happening for you.

Over the years I’ve worked with hundreds of different authors with audiences ranging from 10 people to 1,000,000 people.

At all levels, you see the same things happening when you’ve built a strong author platform.

Here are a few of my favorite unfair advantages you have with an author platform.

1. The Mighty 1%

Every author I’ve worked with that has a platform, has a small percentage of dedicated people that will do just about anything for you.

Take a look at this Twitter thread by a group of Taylor Swift fans.

In case you missed it, this is a self-organizing group of die hard “Swifties” trying to game the system to push Swift’s latest single to the top of the charts.

I found this in a New Yorker piece about writer Neil Gaiman:

“I have at this point a critic-proof career,” Gaiman said. “The fans already knew about [The Graveyard Book].”

I’ve seen this kind of phenomena even with audiences of just a few thousand. When the author needs help designing posts for Instagram, one of their 1% volunteers for free. When they are going to a city on a book tour, one of their fans organizes and plans the entire thing.

As your platform grows, you will build up this small, dedicated group of fans that will always be there to help you.

2. Success before writing

I often say there are three ways to launch a book:

1. Launch and hope. This is what most writers do. They launch a book and hope that it finds an audience and sells.
2. Launch and spend. This is what wealthy writers do. They launch their book and then spend huge amounts of money on advertising, co-op space in bookstores, airport placement, and, sometimes, even buying their way onto the bestseller lists.
3. Launch and know. This is what writers with author platforms do. Before they even start writing their next book, they are already connected to their audience and know that it’s going to sell well.

Sure, an author is always nervous about releasing a new title, but the fear of “will anyone even buy this book and give it a chance?” is gone for authors with platforms.

3. Lots of Focus Groups

Do you have an idea for a new series on your blog? What about a few book cover designs you want feedback on? Maybe you’re trying to get some early readers of a draft of a new novella.

If you have an author platform, it’s always easy to grab some people that would love to help you with this stuff.

You always have direct access to a group of people that are familiar with your work and will be excited to help you out.

4. Pivot Proof

Sure, some writers pick their niche and just mine that for their entire career. But most writers like to try out new things from time to time.

John Grisham built a huge following around his legal thrillers then writes Calico Joe and Bleachers.

Daniel Pink authors The Adventures of Johnny Bunko, a Japanese style business comic book, after the success of his first book Free Agent Nation.

When you have a platform, your fans will try out new things that you’re not known for. When they are connected to you instead of a particular book, they are more likely to follow along when you pivot to something new.

5. People to Launch With

And, of course, having an author platform gives you a group of people that you are already connected to when your new title is released.

They will buy your book, post about it on social media, tell their friends, leave Amazon reviews, introduce you to people in their network, and, overall, be excited to help you launch your new book.

It’s more than email lists and blogs and social media

My job is to help you figure out how to build an author platform. That’s what I do. So I talk a lot about your website and conversion rates and getting subscribers.

But the truth is, having an author platform is bigger than all of that.

It’s like saying your home is the wood, concrete, and metal that makes up the physical structure.

All of that is important and necessary, but a true home is when people living in it.

Having a group of people that are a part of your writing career will, yes, help you sell books. But it will also create a community around your work that is more rewarding and satisfying than you ever thought possible.

Just two days ago I spoke to an author that got picked up by the publishing house of her dreams, paid a $15,000 advance, and then… nothing.

Once the book was out, she was on her own.

The dream of getting a publishing deal and sitting back while your publisher takes care of making you a bestseller is dead.

If you want to be a successful author — no matter if you’re self-published or traditionally published — you have to make it happen yourself.

So how do you do that?

Where do you even begin?

What is an author platform?

If you ask six different writers to define “author platform,” you will probably get six different answers.

One might say that it is their website. Another might say it's their social media presence. It could be that they travel around and speak sixty times a year.

If you ever sit down with a publisher that is interested in acquiring your book, they are going to ask about your author platform.

Here's the thing… “author platform” is just code.

When you get asked about your author platform, here's what they are really asking:

“How are you going to sell your book when it comes out?”

Your author platform is however you plan to sell your books.

Whether it's speaking all over the world, a big email list of your fans, or standing in Times Square and New York City and hand-selling your books… your author platform is how you are going to sell books.

In fact, here’s my definition of an Author Platform:

“A direct connection to your audience that allows you to predictably and reliably sell books.”

In order to break-in and succeed in today’s book industry, you must have an author platform.

Let’s break it down a little bit:

“direct connection”

Do you own the connection to your fans?

Or are you relying on a publicist to help you?

Your publisher’s publicist is overworked and sending your book to the same list of bloggers, editors, and producers they send every book to.

If you hire your own publicist, they’re going to put you on an expensive monthly retainer so you pay them every month for their best try, whether they get you any coverage or not. And it’s getting harder and harder to get new coverage.

However, if you are directly connected to your audience, you don’t need anyone to help you find new people. You just talk directly to your fans.

“your audience”

The key here is to find and connect to people that are likely to be interested in your book.

If you write romance, your audience is people that read romance novels.

If you write spiritual self-help, your audience is people that are interested in their spiritual well being.

You want a direct connection to a group of people that are interested in the type of books you write.

“predictably and reliably sell books”

When you publish a new book, you have 3 options:

1. Publish and hope. Put your book out and hope that it some how, some way, finds an audience and sells.
2. Publish and pay. Spend a ton of money on advertising and publicists in hopes that it sells enough copies to make your money back.
3. Publish and know. Since you already have a direct connection to your audience, you know that your book is going to sell on the first day it’s published.

The Goal: Build an Author Platform

This is how authors are winning in today’s publishing marketplace. They have built up an author platform so they have a direct connection to their audience so when they publish a new book they know it will sell.

The next question: how?

How do you build an author platform?

Book marketing can be a huge, disastrously overwhelming topic that includes conversations about Twitter and Instagram and Facebook pages and blogs and podcasts and ads and a hundred other things. In this article, I will help you simplify and organize your plans by teaching you the basics of book marketing with the Connection System.

I’ve been working with authors for over a decade to help them build their platforms, connect with readers, and sell more books. I’ve worked one-on-one with hundreds of authors including New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestsellers like Hugh Howey, Daniel Pink, Barbara Corcoran, Sally Hogshead, Chip and Dan Heath, Robb Wolf, Charles Duhigg, Jean Chatzky, and many many more. I’ve worked across all genres — fiction and non-fiction —, publishers — traditional and indie —, and authors — big bestsellers to just-getting-started.

The advice I give is always based on real-world experience that I have tested across many different authors and platforms. My goal is only to give advice that I know will work for you because I’ve gone out and tried it for myself with my platform and my client’s.

The best way I've found to build an author platform is through the Connection System.

The Connection System: How to Build an Author Platform

As I worked with author after author and studied the authors that were finding success, I started to see a pattern.

I found an overarching system that every successful author was using to get predictable results of book sales. And it could all be boiled down to three simple principles.

So whether the author was active on social media or not, or had a blog or didn’t, or did a ton of speaking or not, or showed up on national media or not, or traditionally published or not… that didn’t matter.

What I saw over and over was they had something working in each of these three categories:

1. Outreach: The act of moving people from not knowing you exist to knowing you exist.
2. Content: Providing a way for people to get to know you and your writing.
3. Permission: A way to stay in contact with people long-term.

This is the Connection System.

What I saw was that if an author was able to solve these three problems, they were able to build a platform that predictably sold books.

Let’s look at each one in more detail:

1. Outreach

The act of moving people from not knowing you exist to knowing you exist.

Your first problem as an author is that enough people don’t know you or your books even exist. How are they supposed to buy something that they don’t know exists?

The first problem you have to solve when you are marketing is how to move people from not knowing you exist, to knowing you exist.

You can do this in literally thousands of ways. Here are a few:

• Be a guest on a nationally televised program.
• Speak at a conference.
• Get interviewed on a podcast.
• Get your book reviewed in the New York Times.
• Have a popular blogger write an extensive post about you.
• Speak at book clubs.
• Post a lot on Reddit.
• Stand on the street in Times Square, New York with a bunch of business cards introducing yourself to random people.

Literally, anything you do that moves people from not knowing you exist to knowing you exist is Outreach. Of course, there are ways to do this that are more effective than others, but right now that is not the point. Unless you have a plan for how you are going to accomplish Outreach, you will never build a successful author platform.

2. Content

Providing a way for people to get to know you and your writing.

Every time I’m looking for a new book to read, I download a sample of it to my Kindle. This gives me a chance to try out the author’s content to see if it’s a good fit for me.

When I listen to a podcast and an author is being interviewed, if I like what she has to say, I often go to her website or check out her new book.

Content is the second step in the Connection System and is how people get to know you and your books and see if you’re a good fit for them. Of course, not everyone — not even most people — will like your work, but that’s ok. Content is how you find your audience.

Your goal is to put out content widely and freely in different channels so people have an opportunity to connect with your work and decide if it’s right for them.

This can also take literally thousands of different forms. Here’s a few:

• Start a blog and post regularly.
• Start a podcast and release episodes regularly.
• Publish new research and studies in your field.
• Release a novella based in your novel’s world.
• Start a YouTube channel and release new episodes regularly.

The goal here is to put out content in as many different places as possible so your audience can find it and connect with you.

Note: Outreach and Content often work hand-in-hand in the Connection System. Getting interviewed on a podcast is both introducing you to people that have never heard of you before and providing content. Getting an author friend to send your free novella to their email list is moving his fans from not knowing you exist to knowing you exist while giving them Content to connect with. Same with YouTube or getting your work published in a professional journal.

3. Permission

A way to stay in contact with people long-term.

Remember that the first step in my definition of marketing is “create long-lasting connections with people.”

If you work really hard to get Outreach opportunities and people enjoy your Content, that’s great. But it does not create a long-lasting connection. Sure, maybe they buy a copy of your book after hearing you on that radio show, but then what? What about your next book?

The problem with relying on Outreach alone to launch a new book is that every time you release a new book you have to do all the same work again to find people to buy your book. You’re starting at zero every time.

That’s not marketing. That’s publicity. Publicity is constantly running around trying to drum up interest in something. Publicity is hard, getting harder, and has a quick rate of diminishing returns.

Marketing is creating long-lasting connections.

You move from Publicity to Marketing when you have Permission.

Permission is what you build when, once you have a connection to someone, you can continue to communicate with them long into the future.

Permission, the third step in the Connection System, is measured by how reliably and predictably you can

1. Get people’s attention, and
2. Drive action.

In Outreach and Content, I said there are thousands of ways to do those effectively.

In Permission, there is only one extremely effective action:

Build an email list.

Of all the tools out there that allow people to connect with you long-term — Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Podcasts, Blogs, YouTube channels, etc. — there is only one that has the greatest effect on 1) getting people’s attention and 2) driving action… Email.

I’ve talked extensively about myths of social media marketing for authors and why email marketing is so important.

If John randomly hears you on a podcast and buys a copy of your book, how reliably can you get John’s attention and get him to buy a copy of your next book two years from now? I’d say that number is close to zero.

However, if I get John to join my email list, I’ll be able to sell him a copy of my current book, and then the book I come out with two years from now, and then all my other titles in the future.

The Connection System

If you line up the three parts of the Connection System, you’ll see they work together very well.

Outreach moves people from not knowing you exist to knowing you exist. Now that people know who you are, they engage with your Content so they can see if you’re a good fit for them. Then, you create a long-term connection with them by getting Permission to stay in contact with them long-term by joining your email list.

Every. Single. Author. Has to solve all three of these problems in order to be successful.

Here are a couple of examples…

Hugh Howey, New York Times bestselling author of Wool, started by blogging on his website (Content) and self-publishing his books on Amazon. He was always quick to help anyone that reached out to him (Outreach) and started going to conferences and workshops in the writing world (Outreach). As more people started finding his books, his serialized novel Wool started gaining traction. People began following his blog (Permission), connecting with him on social media (Permission), and signing up for his email list (Permission).

Now, after doing this for years, he has a solid platform with thousands of connections to readers so when he comes out with a new book he can immediately connect with his audience and let them know that it’s available.

Stephen King is, well, Stephen King. He has written sixty books and sold hundreds of millions of copies of his books. He’s been publishing his writing for 50 years (Content), and the success of his writing has made him famous (Outreach). Now, when he comes out with a new book, he doesn’t have an email list, but every bookstore in every town and airport prominently displays his book on the front tables of their store (Permission).

Yes, even the most famous, prolific writers have to solve all three problems in the Connection System!

What’s next?

In this article I gave you a look at book marketing from a higher level. It’s not about figuring out the perfect time of day to post on Twitter or the right word count for your next blog post.

Your goal is to create long-lasting connections with people and then be relentlessly helpful. The way you do that is by creating a reliable system that helps you solve three problems: Outreach, Content, and Permission.

Everything you do should be trying to solve one of those three problems. If you find yourself debating in your mind about the icon to choose for you new Facebook Group, you’ve lost sight of the overarching picture.

Build your Connection System. Spend your time solving the three problems in the Connection System, and you will build a successful author platform that reliably and predictably sells books.

First, Everything is changing.

What used to work doesn’t any more. The traditional publishing industry keeps tightening its grip on the old way of doing things and insisting it still works.

Maybe you’ve sensed it. Maybe you haven’t.

But it’s happening. Quickly. And if you’re going to make it as an author, it’s time to pay attention.

What Used to Work

The old model was pretty straight forward.

1. Write, pitch, get rejected (by agents). Repeat.
2. Eventually persuade an agent to represent you.
3. Write, pitch, get rejected (by publishers). Repeat.
4. Eventually persuade a publisher to pick up your book.
5. From there, they publish the book, and get it stocked in book stores (the only place you could buy books).
6. If it sells, you get another deal. If it doesn’t, you’re out.

Unless you are already a household name and you’re automatically going to get stocked on the front table in every Barnes & Noble and airport bookstore, it’s almost impossible to break in to the marketplace the traditional way.

What Happened?

We could spend a lot of time talking about Amazon.com and how they revolutionized the book industry. But in a real sense, the same thing happened to the book industry that has happened to every industry.

The gatekeepers have lost power. There is no longer one small set of people that decides what gets published, what gets marketed, what gets reviewed, and what gets sold.

The shelf space is unlimited. You don’t have to get your book stocked at the big or indie book stores to be successful. You can publish your book in the same place that most of the copies of the latest Stephen King novel have sold (Amazon).

There is no central recommender. Getting a Kirkus starred review doesn’t sell a bunch of books. Just like winning a major writing award doesn’t translate to selling more books. Now people get recommendations from Amazon’s algorithm, GoodReads recommendations, YouTube channels, blog reviews, and of course the old stand by, word of mouth.

Everything has fractured. One of the upsides of the old model is, if you got in, you would be successful. Now, even if you get into the system, you still don’t have a better chance of success over the indie author who just self-published their novel.

I’ve seen several authors get their book profiled in the New York Times and see no bump in sales.

The power has shifted. Authors are no longer beholden to an agent or a publisher to get their work out into the world. BUT, that power now puts the responsibility on you. In the old model, once your manuscript was with the publisher, you were mostly done. Now, at that point, your job has just started.

This can be scary.

Now it feels like the wild west. You hear stories of authors getting published by their dream publisher, and then the whole thing becoming a disaster. Then you hear about some author that has used Instagram to make their book a best seller. Then you hear about how going on a blog tour works. But then it doesn’t work.

So…

What now? Current Book Industry Trends

Let’s assume for a moment that all of this is a good thing.

What does it mean for you.

Trend #1: Authors are trying new things. You can serialize your novel. You can come up with obscure, crazy genres and give it a try. You can write and publish a new book every month. You can join with other authors to launch a box set and go after a bestseller list. Now, anything you come up with you can just give it a try because you don’t need a big corporation to give permission.

Trend #2: Authors are owning the connection to their audience. With blogging, social media, email lists, etc, the author can now build the 1-on-1 connection with their readers. You don’t have to rely on distribution or advertising campaigns. You can build up your own audience so every time you come out with a new book, you already have a direct connection to your fan base to let them know it’s available.

Trend #3: It is not all or nothing. You don’t have to become a full-time writer to make it worth it. You can start small and build something over time. There are lots of self-published authors that use writing to supplement their income. They’re paying their light bills or taking their family on vacation using the money from book sales. Instead of going big, you can now start small and grow it slowly.

We already know there is a lot of money in the book industry, but with everything changing, how do you break in?

The next step: Author Platform

If you want to take advantage all three of these trends, the answer is to build an Author Platform. The definition of an author platform is:

“A direct connection to your audience that allows you to predictably and reliably sell books.”

This is how you take advantage of all three trends.

An author platform allows you to experiment with new ideas, build the direct connection with your audience, and build something slowly over time.

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