Timing is Everything
I love this phrase.
It has served me so well in nearly every one of my professional endeavors.
As a rookie public relations pro I learned when was the best time to promote an event to the media (and this was pre-internet days, mind you, when dinosaurs roamed the earth, computer disks were the size of LPs and you had to send PRINT PRESS RELEASES!) It still mattered...the timing thing.
My next best example of how much this phrase really means was in my career as real estate agent. Nearly a decade spent in the service of humans stressed to the max as they bought or sold what, for most of them, would be their biggest investment ever, taught me that to be in the right place at the correct moment was crucial. And it was no accident. You had to know where the buyers would be (i.e. at a fresh open house in a desired neighborhood). Or the sellers (same, or online, poking around in sites that are woefully out of date). And then, get your ass there, in front of them, armed with your knowledge about the market that they were seeking.
When I walked away from that and into the beer business, becoming part owner of a craft microbrewery and taking over marketing and sales for it, I learned yet more lessons about retail timing--that is to say, finding current and potential craft beer drinkers meant finding where they gather, and putting the beer in front of them (for free at first, at various fund raising events and other such places) until they got it and would then come to the beer bar you opened.
In writing/publishing it still holds true. You may have submitted the next Lord of the Flies or Valley of the Dolls to your target list of agents and publishers but unless that right person is sitting at the right desk, looking at their email at the right time, you can just call it "rejection day" yet again.
One of my heroes in the publishing world is Hugh Howey. He's the dude who wrote a serialized SF/spec fic novel called "Wool", put it on his blog at first, then self pubbed it and the Big Dogs came running at him in a huge, yowelling pack from the Big Apple. He smiled, signed up with one of them, I forget which, but said, "Oh and by the way I'm keeping my e-book rights, thanks." They blinked and he won.
Because honestly in the best of all possible worlds, that is how it works for an indie author. All the work spent seeking your readers, trying to position yourself in the right place, right time for the right set of reader/reviewer/influencers (which is a full time job in and of itself I assure you) and BAM, you are a "New York Author," hardback covers, deep pocketed ad campaigns and all BUT....those early iterations, those babies you wrote and nurtured and promoted are still yours--no sharing of revenue. Thanks.
He has always been the guy who knew the meaning of that timing phrase, in my opinion. But rest assured, it is no accident, or simple matter of star alignment. It's been said publishing a book (much less 20 or so, as I have done) is a marathon, not a sprint. I get that. And so I keep turning to guys like Mr. Howey for street-level advice. How to best use the tools at my (not deep pocketed) disposal to capture that right time right place moment for myself? His main point: reader engagement--and not just by yammering ABOUT your books 24/7. Engage them as a human being, while letting them know you are a human being who would like to make a living from your books, write a great book, then write another and another NEVER LOSING SIGHT of your reader base.
Because timing may be everything, but more you understand that you control the clock, the better off you are.
Click here to check out his words. I do a lot of these things but some I don't and plan to, including that dreaded agent search. And for the record, I heard the "focus on the next book" advice before, from many a struggling author. It's the best advice out there. Keep writing. Keep getting better at your writing. That is, as they say, Job 1. Don't get distracted by the rest of all the nonsense.
Click here for his killer blog. (Get ready--this is one of those GOD I HATE HIM...no, I love him and what he does moments, trust me)
Carry on, don't give up and remember, you are ONLY as good an author as your next hard edit proves.
cheers
Liz
SHUT OUT, book 3 of the Black Jack Gentlemen released this week!
Buy it here and here.
And follow me around if you like, I love to talk craft beer, sports and books!
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It has served me so well in nearly every one of my professional endeavors.
As a rookie public relations pro I learned when was the best time to promote an event to the media (and this was pre-internet days, mind you, when dinosaurs roamed the earth, computer disks were the size of LPs and you had to send PRINT PRESS RELEASES!) It still mattered...the timing thing.
My next best example of how much this phrase really means was in my career as real estate agent. Nearly a decade spent in the service of humans stressed to the max as they bought or sold what, for most of them, would be their biggest investment ever, taught me that to be in the right place at the correct moment was crucial. And it was no accident. You had to know where the buyers would be (i.e. at a fresh open house in a desired neighborhood). Or the sellers (same, or online, poking around in sites that are woefully out of date). And then, get your ass there, in front of them, armed with your knowledge about the market that they were seeking.
When I walked away from that and into the beer business, becoming part owner of a craft microbrewery and taking over marketing and sales for it, I learned yet more lessons about retail timing--that is to say, finding current and potential craft beer drinkers meant finding where they gather, and putting the beer in front of them (for free at first, at various fund raising events and other such places) until they got it and would then come to the beer bar you opened.
In writing/publishing it still holds true. You may have submitted the next Lord of the Flies or Valley of the Dolls to your target list of agents and publishers but unless that right person is sitting at the right desk, looking at their email at the right time, you can just call it "rejection day" yet again.
One of my heroes in the publishing world is Hugh Howey. He's the dude who wrote a serialized SF/spec fic novel called "Wool", put it on his blog at first, then self pubbed it and the Big Dogs came running at him in a huge, yowelling pack from the Big Apple. He smiled, signed up with one of them, I forget which, but said, "Oh and by the way I'm keeping my e-book rights, thanks." They blinked and he won.
Because honestly in the best of all possible worlds, that is how it works for an indie author. All the work spent seeking your readers, trying to position yourself in the right place, right time for the right set of reader/reviewer/influencers (which is a full time job in and of itself I assure you) and BAM, you are a "New York Author," hardback covers, deep pocketed ad campaigns and all BUT....those early iterations, those babies you wrote and nurtured and promoted are still yours--no sharing of revenue. Thanks.
He has always been the guy who knew the meaning of that timing phrase, in my opinion. But rest assured, it is no accident, or simple matter of star alignment. It's been said publishing a book (much less 20 or so, as I have done) is a marathon, not a sprint. I get that. And so I keep turning to guys like Mr. Howey for street-level advice. How to best use the tools at my (not deep pocketed) disposal to capture that right time right place moment for myself? His main point: reader engagement--and not just by yammering ABOUT your books 24/7. Engage them as a human being, while letting them know you are a human being who would like to make a living from your books, write a great book, then write another and another NEVER LOSING SIGHT of your reader base.
Because timing may be everything, but more you understand that you control the clock, the better off you are.
Click here to check out his words. I do a lot of these things but some I don't and plan to, including that dreaded agent search. And for the record, I heard the "focus on the next book" advice before, from many a struggling author. It's the best advice out there. Keep writing. Keep getting better at your writing. That is, as they say, Job 1. Don't get distracted by the rest of all the nonsense.
Click here for his killer blog. (Get ready--this is one of those GOD I HATE HIM...no, I love him and what he does moments, trust me)
Carry on, don't give up and remember, you are ONLY as good an author as your next hard edit proves.
cheers
Liz
SHUT OUT, book 3 of the Black Jack Gentlemen released this week!
Buy it here and here.
And follow me around if you like, I love to talk craft beer, sports and books!
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