Tag Archives: author success

Posted on

4 Things I’ve Learned After 11 Years of Working in Marketing

I’ve worked in Marketing for Eleven Years now. I’ve made mistakes- I’ve Fixed others Mistakes- And I’ve learned from Mistakes. However, one secret I know is this-

Marketing is not that hard.

It really isn’t. I think we have a tendency to make it harder than it really is. But the truth is: all you need are a few basic things-

One: A good product

Two: A passion for your product

Three: An ability to overcome the fear and share.

When most people ask me how much they should spend on marketing their books, products, etc. I tell them unless you have the money- You should only spend your time.

Sounds strange. But so many get ahead of themselves. Put your money in the production of the product FIRST. A well-edited book with a great cover will do more for you. If you have money left over, invest what you can in marketing.

Here are four things I’ve learned by being in upper management that anyone can do on any budget.

  1. Find what works for you and stick with it consistently.

Our company specializes in Direct Mail. It’s what most of you would call junk mail. But we have mastered it. Everything from creative design to programming mailing lists, to the production of envelopes, applications, brochures, etc is done in house. We even fold, insert, and sort all our mail down to a specific postal carrier route. We have mastered it by bringing everything in-house. We send out 3.5 Million pieces of mail each week. (YES- You read that right.) We know what works for us and we have a concept:

“How do we get you to open up the envelope without tricking you?”

  1. Your Fans / Clients / and Existing Customers- when satisfied will be your Number 1 point of future sales. (Click to Tweet This)

Here’s something. We market to our existing customers. We spend a lot of time and product development in marketing to the family members of existing customers who have been loyal for years. These products are some of our biggest sales. That’s not just us. Any large successful business does the same thing. Word of mouth is the biggest friend you can have. Find your fans- Build that email list- And hold on tight to them.

  1. Frequency- Frequency- Frequency:

Listen- Only Impulse Buyers buy the first time- 85% of the rest of the market need to see it more than once. Now please understand something. We don’t mail each customer every week. Sometimes it’s simply once a month. However, we hit them more than once. If you are a writer or entrepreneur don’t make every facebook, Tweet, or Instagram post about your book or product. After a while I’m going to be like: “Yeah, I get it.” But don’t ever go silent. Push it and don’t be afraid to push it.

  1. Test your control strategy against a test strategy:

We test everything. We have packages that have worked for years- But that doesn’t mean we stop brainstorming new ideas and concepts. Try one thing one day. The next week at the same time- Try something else. Test your results. Test your reach. Don’t shy away from data- It may not always tell the right story, but it can be eye-opening when it tells the same story consistently.  

Posted on

START BY BEING YOU!!!

I by no means claim to be a Marketing Expert. However, I have worked in the field for over ten years. And if those ten year of experience have taught me anything it’s this:

Comparisons Marketing is an alienation of the Brand You Should be building…

Tweet: Comparisons Marketing is an alienation of the Brand You Should be building. @jjjohnsonwriter #AuthorMarketing #Engagement

What do I mean by Comparison Marketing…? Well it’s quite simple really. It’s marketing yourself in a way that compares you to a product within the audience you are targeting.

Now don’t get me wrong. Comparison Marketing works so long as you aren’t the one marketing it that way. An endorsement from someone comparing you or your product to a similar individual or product is something entirely different. In fact that’s what you hope to achieve in some aspects of Endorsement Marketing.

But when someone seeks out to create an ad, tweet, FB Post personally Comparing their work to someone else- I want to shake my fist and scream at them!!!!

 Recently I came across several different ads on Social Media by authors where the title was:

“As Good as Ted Dekker…?”

“As Good as the Wheel of Time…?”

“As Magical as Brandon Sanderson…?”

Every time I see these I have to resit the urge to message the person and say: “Stop!!! You’re doing it all wrong!!!”

In Marketing you want to find ways to be Remarkable, Unique, Different… Basically You want to be remembered. Not Compared.  

I work in a Direct Marketing Firm. Every year we send out over 170 Million Pieces of Mail marketing our various forms of Life Insurance. Some will say:

“Now wait J.J. Direct Mail is like Junk mail. It’s almost like spam. You’re against the ‘Buy my book Spam post.” 

You’re right. I don’t like the Buy my book tweets and Facebook post. I like engagement tweets and Facebook post. But what we do in our company is simple. Most Spam tweets, emails, post etc. along with junk mail have one purpose and one purpose only. Flood the masses.

But does flooding the masses work? Maybe at one time it did. But my philosophy is that it doesn’t anymore.

What we try to do in our company is go beyond the idea of hitting the mail box with an envelope. Our goal is to engage you enough, without deception or trickery, into opening the envelope.

My advice. In your marketing. Go beyond comparing yourself. Go beyond just creating a simple tweet. Be creative. Be you. Be engaging.

Then you’ll be remembered.

What about you? As a reader. What makes you want to stop and look at a tweet, Facebook Post, or Ad online…? What makes you want to engage with the writer? And possibly- Buy their book…? 

 

Posted on

FIRST LINES!!!! – I Love Them

first line banner

Every book starts someplace, right?

I have a ADD. Not the type where I’m bouncing off walls all hours of the night, but I struggle with sitting down to concentrate. So when most people say that if you can’t engage your reader after twenty pages, then you’ve failed- I want to laugh. Why? Because with me, it’s much less.

Is that fair? No. But it’s reality. I have two kids under the age of two and a busy life outside of the home. My time is very valuable and I don’t have a lot of extra minutes to wait and see if a book will draw me in.

That’s why I always look at the first line.

I notice right away if a book is going to hold me long enough to get to the end. Basically, I want to be pulled into a story right away.

I love this Quote by Stephen King-

“A book won’t stand or fall on the very first line of prose — the story has got to be there, and that’s the real work. And yet a really good first line can do so much to establish that crucial sense of voice — it’s the first thing that acquaints you, that makes you eager, that starts to enlist you for the long haul. So there’s incredible power in it, when you say, come in here. You want to know about this. And someone begins to listen.” – Stephen King

Below are some of my favorites that I’ve collected. For some strange reason that first sentence in these stories pulled me into the pages and captivated me. They may not work the same for you. And that’s fine. But for me, they did what they should have done.

“It Was A Pleasure to Burn.” – Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451

“You’ve Been here before.” – Stephen King, Needful Things

“On the second day of December, in a year when a Georgia Peanut Farmer was doing business in the White House, one of Colorado’s great resort hotels burned to the ground.” – Stephen King, Dr. Sleep

“There was once a time when only God knew the day you’d die.” – Nadine Brandes, A Time to Die

“Tonight we’re going to show you eight silent ways to kill a man.” – Joe Haldeman, The Forever War

“I did two things on my seventy- fifth birthday. I visited my wife’s grave. Then I joined the army.” – John Scalzi, Old Man’s War

“Szeth-son-son-Vallano, Truthless of Shinover, wore white on the day he was to kill a king.” – Brandon Sanderson, The Way of Kings

‘”I’ve watched through his eyes, I’ve listened through his ears, and I tell you he’s the one.'” – Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card.

“It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking 13.” 1984, George Orwell.

“It was raining the night he found me.” Tosca Lee, Demon

Now these aren’t a full list of all my favorites- But they are ones that pulled me in and kept me longing for an answer to the questions they posed in my mind…

What are some of your favorites…?

Posted on

Why I Almost Quit Writing

4 Reason I Almost Quit

Being a writer is difficult. Heck- Being in any sort of creative work is tough. Most days we walk around with so many ideas fighting to get out of our heads we can’t hardly find the time or energy to sit down and get them on the page.

Not long ago I listened as someone in one of my Facebook groups said they were ready to give up. They had just gotten their sixth rejection on their fourth book. As of this date none of their works had been picked up by a small press or large publisher. Frustrated, tired, burned out, they were ready to throw in the towel. Heck, not even a relaxing cup of coffee could bring them to their senses and relax their mind…

 espresso-1426265-m

I felt for them- I really did. I’ve been there. I know what it feels like to fail- In fact- I still fail. The truth is I have even quit before. I’ve quit a lot of things. And afterwards, I feel more substandard then I did before.

Now don’t get me wrong- Quitting sometimes is healthy and good. I stopped drinking soda. Some stop smoking, and yes- Maybe quitting for a time will renew your passion. But that isn’t what we are talking about here. Where talking about quitting because you feel inferior.

The truth is- Quitting doesn’t bring closure or satisfaction, or even less stress. It doesn’t make you forget the pain of rejection- it only brings insult to your soul.

There was a time I just about quit writing. I sit on my patio and made list of four primary reasons I needed to give up. I’m sure there are a hundred other excuses as well, you may even have some yourself. But I have found that quite often the four below are pretty common…

Number One- Time:

Let’s face it. I have a busy life. I work full time, I’m active in my church, my wife and I have two children (Miles who is 2 ½ years old and Bennett who is 9 months) Finding time to write is very challenging. Luckily for me I have a very supportive wife who understands my need to get words on the page. There are nights where she tells me to just go, get out, and write. But let’s face it- I can’t do that every night. I mean I would be a massive jerk to leave her at home alone with those two. So what that means is cutting out the distractions (Netflix) and powering through from 9:30 to 11:00 until I get my words on the page.

If I can have a family, work full time, work out every day, eat healthy, spend time in God’s word, and still find time to write- So can you. So Don’t quit!!!

Number Two- Perfection:

The thing I wished someone would have told me when I first started is that it didn’t need to be perfect the first time. I have written some horrible first drafts before- Some that felt so bad I walked away from them. Don’t quit because of a bad first draft. Structure and grammar can all be fixed during re-writes. Let’s face it- Editing is a separate process for a reason.

Number Three- No Money to Invest:

I find a lot of people who think they have to go traditional because the publisher will pay an advance, take care of editing, and take care of cover design. It seems that most when faced with rejection from a publisher use money as the number one excuse for not going indie. As of right now I have a full length novel, two short stories completed, and a novella I’m currently working on. Now it’s true I can’t afford to send them to my editor all at once. But I don’t intend to start publishing these until next year (2016) anyway. My goal is to have four books in the queue ready to go up in Jan, April July, and October of 2016. Releasing those 90 days apart and putting out good content.

Why you ask- Because I can’t afford to edit them all right now, nor can I afford to pay for cover design for four books all at the same time. This is my approach to getting around the money issue, write, prepare over time, and publish throughout the course of next year. Technically I could even wait up to a month before to get the cover design ready. The point is find a strategy and go with what works best for you. Writing isn’t cheap, and sometimes if the finances aren’t there it may take some time to get them out. Don’t rush- And don’t quit.

Number Four- Lack of Forward Progress:

This is one I understand all too well. It’s also something I think people use as the number one excuse for giving up. Because this is a universal excuse. Why do most people give up on diets or healthy lifestyle changes? Simple- The scale never moves. Why do people stop blogging? No one visits their site. Michael Hyatt made a great quote on his podcast not too long ago. He said “Most people quite right before the inflection point.”

I’m glad I didn’t give up and quit, and so is my wife who would otherwise have to listen to all my crazy insane ideas. Now don’t get me wrong- I love seeing people quit for the right reasons. Stress, poor lifestyles, there are a number of reasons to let go of something and move on. But don’t let a list of reasons (like above) stop you when you feel like nothing is happening.

What about you? Have you ever felt like quitting at the beginning…? If so what did you do to overcome that feeling of inferiority?