How to Move When Feeling Overwhelmed

Whether we acknowledge it or not, it is easy to feel overwhelmed
as an author. The realities of the publishing world can be daunting. 



Every day
thousands of new books enter the market. In addition, authors and publishers are
promoting existing books to consumers. Every consumer has to hear about your
book seven or eight or more times before they reach into their wallet and
purchase your book. The average self-published book sells less than 100 copies
and the average traditional book sells about 1,000 copies.



Yet as an author you have a much bigger vision than selling 100
or 1000 books. When it comes to book marketing, there are dozens of books—and
each is filled with great ideas. Maybe you have read a few of these books and
are stuck in the “shiny object” syndrome where you are buying the latest and
greatest tool for marketing your book. While it may be good to purchase that
tool, are you using it and then measuring to see if it is working for
you?



If you are feeling overwhelmed (and everyone has these feelings
from time to time), here's several ideas for you:



1. Change gears to a different type of writing
project. If you have been writing a
novel, switch to a nonfiction magazine article or writing a blog post or an Ebook or some other type of
writing. The experience can get you moving again.



2. Plan a series of social media posts using Hootsuite or some other schedule
tool. When you put these posts into your tool, you are doing something active—building your platform and
presence in the marketplace.



3. Follow some new people on Twitter or
Facebook. Why? With the idea that some of those people will follow you
back and you will grow your social media following—a good thing to do if
overwhelmed.



4. Get more friends on Goodreads. There are 55
million registered readers on Goodreads. As an author, you need to be spending a
little time there on a regular basis. Use the friends section (see this link) to get
more friends. Many authors only have a few hundred friends. I used these tools
and built up to the maximum (which I learned when I hit it) of 5,000 friends.
Now everytime I write a review on Goodreads (for a book that I've read or
heard), it shows up on all these pages. You can have many friends if you
faithfully use the tools from Goodreads.



5. Look for someone to review your latest book.
Maybe it is someone you are corresponding with on email.Ask them if they are
interested or willing to write an honest review and get their commitment. Then mail
them your book. It's part of the publishing world to continually look for new
reviews and feedback about your book.



6. Write a query
letter to a magazine editor and pitch an article idea.



7. Read a marketing book like Online Marketing for
Busy Authors and take one idea from the book and put it
into practice.



My key point with this article is to take a small yet measured
step in the direction of action. The worst thing you can do when feeling
overwhelmed is nothing.





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Why writers need to do what they don't want to do.  (ClickToTweet)