The Self-Published American

Internationally bestselling author M.J. Rose serves up some sage advice in the latest edition of Writer’s Digest. In her article Why Authors Must Be Marketers Too she rightly points out that writing the book isn’t the end of the road for writers. It is the beginning of the journey. You have to pimp your own book. You have to pimp yourself. There were over 400,000 books that made it to market last year in this country alone. You have to make your own space on the shelves (real and/or virtual). If you don’t want to market your book (and I’ve talked with authors who don’t), fine, but be prepared to not sell any books. It’s as simple as that. Or as M.J. Rose puts it:

Some authors are good at self-promotion and others shouldn’t bother. You have to figure out what you want to do, what you can do and what you can’t. You have to figure out if you want to promote your own book or if you want to hire someone else to do it for you. Or you can take your chances and do nothing.

I can tell you that it will take a miracle for you to find a spot in the market if you do nothing.