To market, to market

The Washington Post featured a great article several weeks ago about what it takes to be a successful author today. In a nutshell, it is so important that authors—particularly first-time authors—be proactive when it comes to promoting their books and themselves:

"Being an author has become much more of an ongoing relationship with your audience through the Web, rather than just writing a book and disappearing while you write the next one," says Liate Stehlik, publisher of William Morrow and Avon Books. "You have to be out there in the online world, talking and participating."

Authors are expected to behave like mini-entrepreneurs, says Kamy Wicoff, founder and CEO of She Writes, a Web site devoted to helping women writers promote their books. She started the site in June. More than 4,000 writers have joined.

"The landscape has altered so fundamentally and irrevocably that almost no one is immune from finding ways to participate in the promotion of their books," Wicoff says. "Writers with small advances and limited resources are expected to treat their book as a new company, with marketing and promotion and PR."

This trend is driven by the availability and ease of Internet marketing, the expense (and diminishing use) of author tours and the need to keep up with the competition. More than 560,000 books were published in the United States last year, a $25 billion pie of which everyone wants a slice.

Too many good books go unnoticed, not because they are poorly written or uninteresting, but because no one (including the authors) made the effort to let people know about them. Even if you have a traditional publisher behind your title, that doesn’t mean your book will receive a fancy publicity campaign. In fact, the majority of a publisher’s marketing budget goes to its top, proven authors. Strange, we know. But that just means that as the author, you must work hard to make your book a success, no matter what your publisher is doing.