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Rule One | Rule Two | Rule Three
“Customers must recognize that you stand for something.”
— Howard Schultz, CEO, Starbucks
Entreauthors follow a simple formula for marketing:
- Make your mess your message.
- Make your message your mission.
- Make your mission your marketing.
Nobody likes self-promotion and especially. Most writers don’t like or don’t want to do marketing for themselves or their books. It seems so sales-ey (and sleazy). It seems to take away from the art, as though the art was a pure form of self-expression and the marketing took away that purity.
When you start with your mess, you can get to your marketing without feeling bad about it. It is the mess that got you here and inspired you to become a writer in the first place. That mess is who you are and something you should never be ashamed to share. In fact, it gives us a narrative through which we can connect to our audience.
Out of your mess, you can craft a message–the way in which others can get out of their mess two. Getting that message out there to the people who need it becomes your mission. It’s what you want most out of your work.
Out of that mission comes your marketing. You promote the mission, a message, and a mess that others can relate to. You are not promoting yourself and how great you are, instead you are helping others get out of that mess that you both share.
Your mission isn’t to do marketing. Marketing is an extension of your mission.
When your mission is your marketing, you don’t have to feel guilty as a writer. You share what you believe in and find others who share similar goals and values. You rally them around your ideas and form or lead a tribe.
How do you discover that mission? Focus on your mess (your challenges, failures, struggles, and desires for something different) and make it your mission to rise out of that mess a different person. Others who share the same struggles you have had will rally behind your call for a better world.
Without Rule Two
You have tried tactic after tactic and nothing seems to work. Your Amazon ranking barely makes a move. You can’t get any traffic to your website or when you do, no one seems to care about your email list. Facebook post after Facebook post and the only person who likes your stuff is your mom.
Despite the fact that results are meager, it’s taking away precious time from what you really love to do: your writing. How can you possibly do all the marketing you are supposed to do for you books and still find time to write them?
Marketing, especially today when everyone seems to have the top ten tactics to sell your book on Kindle, is an easy distraction. It can take you away from your art and disconnect you from your ideas. If, however, marketing is an extension of your writing and not a separate “sales” activity, you avoid losing time, losing touch, and becoming a salesperson.
The fact is, anyone can learn the tactics. The playing field is essentially leveled by the access to marketing information. Everyone can learn the tactics to increase conversions and sales and open rates, etc. Everyone can use the same free or nearly free tools. The challenge, then, is how do you stand out from the crowd?
With Rule Two
The answer is pretty simple: have something meaningful and memorable to say. Have a message and get it out into the world. Make it your mission to get that message in front of as many readers as you can.
A novelist who wants to find an audience, knows her genre and the readers who like it, but more importantly still she knows her theme, the message she communicates with her books. She finds an audience by talking about that theme in many different ways every day. Its the message that drives her. The message is her mission in life. She finds her readers by being speaking up and being herself. She unabashedly shares her failures and obstacles and makes that her message. In other words, she starts with her mess and there finds her mission. By talking about the mess, message, and mission she builds a small army of followers who buy her books, stay fans for life, and share her work for her.
Why It Works
It doesn’t feel self-promotion.
It’s okay, most authors do not like the idea of marketing. It seems so selfish and takes away from the real reason you are doing the work. When you focus on your mess, it is hard to feel like a sell out.
You focus on your audience’s needs (mess) not what you think they need (marketing).
Marketing doesn’t have to be stressful; it should be a natural result of a focus on solving people’s problems with a message that inspires. When your mess (and mission) are your marketing, you will connect with potential readers on a level much deeper than any other products.
People crave connection.
The only way to really connect with someone is through authenticity. When a person is honest about the challenges they have faced in their lives, it is much easier to trust them. Out of that trust, the door is open for a life-long relationship even if it is the relationship between author and reader.
People don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it.
This is the key phrase in Simon Sinek’s book Start with Why. In it he makes convincing argument that the best way to become a leader is to show people what you really believe. The more people understand your purpose (your WHY), the more they will be able to connect with you on a deeper level. We are authors so, thankfully, we have plenty to believe in and share with others.
Remember, as an author you are competing for a person’s attention from all sorts of distractions. Use those same marketing tips that everyone else is following and you get lost in the echo chamber. The only way to get someone’s attention is to really have something to say. If you can inspire the people who believe what you believe to join you on a journey, you will win over true fans for life.
How to Make it Happen
Entreauthors follow a simple formula for marketing:
1. Make your mess your message.
- Articulate your “origin story.”
- Know the struggles and challenges you want to overcome.
- Recognize where the Resistance is holding you back.
2. Make your message your mission.
- Share your story.
- Share your failures & successes.
- Share the stories and studies of others who fail & succeed too.
Writers write. They have something to say. Great writers write with a purpose. They have a greater mission and the world. Their message resonates with people who believe what the writer believes because the message is driving them forward to a world that could and should be different than the one they live in today.
3. Make your mission your marketing.
- Articulate a clear goal for yourself and your audience.
- Commit to pursuing that goal on a daily basis.
- Connect with others on a similar path.
- Share the lessons you learn along the way.
How do you get people to discover, like, trust, try, buy, read, review, and refer your books to others? Win over true fans. How do you win over true fans? Find a community of people who want to overcome a challenge and show them there is a way out of their pain.
From a tactical standpoint, get your message out into the world as frequently as possible using your books, an email list, a blog, and social networks where people can find, connect, and follow you. More specifically:
- Commit to rule #1: write daily.
- Share a piece of what you wrote or researched.
Books that Will Help You Make Your Mission Your Marketing
- Start with Why by Simon Sinek
- Tribes by Seth Godin
- Made to Stick by Chip and Dan Heath
- Show Your Work by Austin Kleon
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