Going it Mostly Alone: the Publishing Path of A Perfect Blindness

In writing as in life, most of what you do depends on what you know and when you know it. There are luck, circumstance, and people that can help of course. But what you know and when you know it allows you to better take advantage of luck, your circumstance and anyone who can help. At the very least, it can prevent much frustration and head pounding by evading journeys down fruitless trails.

Such as trying to implement tools and advice for Social Media power users before you understand what Social Media is actually useful for. And the first thing it’s not useful for is directly selling books.

I hear all the howls of derision pouring at the screens upon which those words were just read, the same as I blurted when I first read them. This time I know to hold up a mirror to that scorn, and ask its makers “How many times have you seen an ad on social media, clicked on it, and then actually paid for something?” 

I’m not talking about ads that made me aware of something that I later went off to buy, but seeing a link, clicking right then, immediately feeding my credit card number or PayPal information in, and pressing “buy now.”

The difference between these might seem trivial, but it makes all the difference between success and failure of using social media to reach readers.

I only asked myself this question after having read Tim Grahl’s Your First 1000 Copies. < https://outthinkgroup.com/first-1000-copies/ >

Once asked, that question made me realize I’d only actually purchased two things directly through an ad on social media in the past 10 or so years, and one was for a coat that my wife shared the website for on my FB timeline.

It also means that almost all the money, time and effort spent by all the myriad people who have tried to entice me to buy things directly through links in social media has been wasted. As was all my time trying to get my “buy my book” posts in front of people’s eyes. They probably won’t buy, and instead, pass right by yet another sales pitch, if they even see it in the first place: More on that later.

First of all, people want to get stuff. Free stuff. Further, they, like I and probably you, have become inured to the vast majority of advertisements. Especially if the adverts are for yet another book to join the 30 or 40, I already have to read right now.

So then, what use is social media for an author if not selling books?

Know someone who might like this? Post it or Forward this email to let them in on it.

To ask a question or follow along with the self-publishing adventure, join the “Publishing Path of A Perfect Blindness” here.