It’s a fact that most people don’t like the idea of promoting themselves.
They don’t like the idea of telling the world how good they are at something. What’s more, if someone tells them that they are good at what they do, many people feel uncomfortable about accepting praise.
If you’re in business, you need to adopt a different approach to promoting yourself.
- If you don’t say you do a good job, why should anyone else?
- If you don’t say your work is excellent, why should anyone else?
- If you don’t write that press release to let the world know about your personal success and your vision and your passions . . . will anyone else?
Most writers don’t go in for self-promotion.
They are somehow embarrassed at the prospect of doing so. Many writers prefer to stay in the shadows and to let their works speak for them.
They don’t like to think about promoting themselves and they assume their publishers will promote their books.
Well, publishers have limited funds to promote books and authors. There are also lots of projects they could promote and lots of authors in their lists. If you leave promotion of your works to your publisher, you’ll only get a limited amount of support.
Therefore, it makes sense for you to take the lead in promoting yourself.
You know best what image you want to present to the world. You know how you wish to project yourself into your marketplace. You know why people should read your works and how they will benefit as a result of doing so – or if you don’t, it’s time you did.
Here are two questions to help you to be more confident that you are on the right track when you start promoting yourself.
- How do I add value to my readers’ lives through my work? (Yes, this question applies to fiction writers as well as to every one else.)
- If a journalist asked me to define my aims as a writer in a single sentence, what would I say?
Try these questions out for yourself now. Leave your answers in the comments box, if you’d like to share your responses.
About Margaret Adams
