Stay Creative

 By Maria Vassilopoulos- Organic Books

When you are writing your book(s), it is with the creative brain.  Even with non-fiction there is a creative process involving having the vision to see the end result and manipulate the content to be easy on the eye as well as informative and educational if needed.  When it’s all printed and bound and ready to go, don’t stop the creativity.

You have to play a bit of a game here – imagine you had all the money in the world, a totally receptive audience and all the time a person could need to think and really get behind your product (yes, your book once printed is a physical product that people don’t know they want until you find a way of communicating to them) and write down what you would do to promote your work.  Some ideas:

– A UK book tour

– A display at a prominent bookstore

– A TV talk show slot

– A competition prize that links to the content of your book

– A huge social media campaign

It’s a bit like making a list of what you would buy if you won the lottery – except slightly more useful. You will probably sit back, look at what you have written and feel your confidence drop – will people want to read your work?  Why would a bookstore want to display your book? Who would want to hear you give a talk?

These seemingly negative questions  are actually not as they first seem and are part two of this process. Write them out also, underneath the point that triggered them like this:

– A UK book tour

Who wants to listen to me?

For the above my answer could be “Family and Friends”  What has happened here is that you have taken the big idea and found a beginning for it.  The UK book tour is now a goal and the answer is where you should start in order to reach it.  So if you think 5 big thoughts, you can have 5 small thoughts and end up with 5 places to start to reach your big thought GOALS.

This can now become a basic promotions plan for your book and should also help you defeat confidence issues by building up to the big ideas – you are one author in a big industry and it’s important to be realistic and measure your success by completing the smaller milestones and building your fanbase organically, rather than rushing in like a dictator and getting upset with people or being too laid back and doing nothing.

About Maria – I have worked with books for 10 years, selling, stacking, event hosting, marketing and even making posters of them!  I have double-stacked shelves at home and want to offer advice to authors that may need some clarity on the book trade from time to time – you are not alone!

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Read more at http://organicbooksblog.com/

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by

Laura

I'm Laura. I started Novel Kicks back in 2009 as I wanted a place to discuss books and writing - two loves of my life. As someone who has anxiety, these two things give me, and I am sure countless others, a much needed escape.
There is a monthly book club, writing exercises, prompts, reviews, author interviews, competitions and guest posts. I cover many genres and I hope there is something for everyone.
I grew up by the sea in Dorset and currently live in Poole with my husband, Chris and three cats. I love writing and have a BA (Hons) in Creative Writing from Falmouth University. I am writing my first book. If only I could stop pressing delete. Chris has threatened to stop it from working. Haha.
I have always loved creative writing since I was in first school and would very much like to meet my teacher, Miss Sayers, to say thank you for all the encouragement she gave me then.
When not writing, I love reading, cats, Disney, singing (I can't sing but this doesn't stop me,) and falling into a good TV show or film. If I could step into any fictional world, it would be amongst the characters in ABC's Once Upon a Time.
I love reading many genres and discovering new authors.