BE NOT AFRAID

Catchy title huh? Wink wink to my stalker.

Last week I blogged about my current events and the fact that my writing friend, Deborah Lynne (I stole the title of this blog topic from her latest book series) and myself were going to team up and hit the pavement to market ourselves. So I’m sure you all want to know what results we got.

From our marketing efforts we got:  1) Learning Express a local toy store is hosting a book signing for me on June 9^th and if that goes well, she will buy copies of my book to put on her shelves; 2) a Bible and Bookstore that carries Deb’s books  is now carry my books and host inga book signing for us both on June 23rd; 3) We got books a million paperwork to send in so they can warehouse our books and then we can do a book signing; 4) a great contact at barnes and noble. I walked in the main branch in B. Rouge who turned me down once before, however they have a new marketing rep who happened to be someone I worked with at my regular job and she got laid off the same time I did! She has promised to get us a book signing in the near future; 5) a weekly TV show called “Around Town” that advertises events going on in the area to feature our book signing May 19^th; 6) at least two more promising book signing events that we are waiting to hear back from. We only had one place turn us down.

So as you can see, going in person and having a flyer introducing yourself and your book can really pay off (Great idea, Deb). I know, I know… most of us writers don’t like marketing ourselves but the bottom line is, WE MUST DO IT!! And guess what, after the first book store we approached, it really was easy after that. And well worth all the effort, zits from worry, and sweating from stress.

So if you’ve been putting off marketing yourself or if you aren’t published yet because you keep putting off submitting things, just stop it. Get out there! If I can do it, anyone can do it. Be positive and try to enjoy the adventure. You might be surprised, as we were, at what great reaction and responses you’ll get. After all, most good things that happen in our lives come from hard work and those are also the most rewarding and will make you feel most satisfied. So this is me kicking and cheering us all on to stop being afraid!