Joe – I hope everything came together for you!

~Kristen 🙂

Hi Valerie,

First of all, I love your name. It’s the name of the main character in a mystery series I hope to write someday. 🙂

Second, you’re absolutely right that marketing should start with friends and family. Start with what you know, then branch out from there. Where marketing tends to stop is when friends and family recommend a book to someone, and that person has no idea who the author is except that they’re a friend or family member (which is often seen as an instant bias). When they go check out the book, if all they see is a poor quality product many potential buyers will click off the screen onto something else.

That is the message I was trying to convey in this article – that yes, what’s written does matter, and I’d hope authors by now already realize that (though sadly I guess many don’t). And that how that writing is presented often matters even more, as it’s the first impression non friends and family will get for a new author.

You wouldn’t go on a first date dressed in PJs with bed hair and without brushing your teeth, yet many authors treat their book’s packaging this way.

Congrats on your success and may your book see many more sales!

~Kristen

Thank you, Randi!

Valerie, I did misunderstand so thanks for the clarification. I agree with you that we should applaud and support those who have the courage to get their words out there. But I still want them to think past friends and family. Make sure the people you can help/entertain/educate the most with your book know about it!

Sandy

I think my post was misunderstood. My own marketing has gone way beyond friends and family (and with pretty amazing results — the book as been in the top 100 in the Happiness category since its release).

I feel most self-published authors, however, are going to primarily friends and family, and even those who never go beyond that have still really achieved something great.

For me, marketing started with friends and family, then many of them began sharing it, posting it, tweeting about it, that it began building an audience for me. To agree with Sandra’s original post, that all speaks to the value they found in the book.

I just wouldn’t want someone who has done something as impressive and courageous as write a book (and tell those closest to them about it) to feel that is an unworthy venture merely because it didn’t sell, or to let that lack of sales discourage them from continuing to try and work harder next time.

I like the title of your book.

The people you want to read your work aren’t friends and family but members of your potential demo(s).

Valerie, I hope you — and all other authors — are marketing beyond friends and family! Don’t limit yourself. I’m glad the reviews are great — that’s very exciting. Congratulations!

Sandy

After I finished “Happiness as a Second Language,” I showed it to a handful of close friends and family members, who all said it was great, but that is hardly a reliable sample set. Now that it’s out, and the sales and reviews have been consistently high, I can breathe a sigh of relief. However, even the night before it went on sale, I had to ask myself, “Am I making a huge mistake?” It is very hard to know.

If anyone has the fortitude to write a book, and the courage to put in out there, and the confidence to market it to friends and family, we should celebrate that. If it doesn’t sell, then hopefully the author will use that as a learning tool and make the next one better. Fear of failure or embarrassment shouldn’t be anyone’s reason for not trying at all.

This shows how much worse life is when motivated by fear and not happiness:
http://speakhappiness.wordpress.com/2013/05/09/why-choose-fear-over-happiness/