You may have noticed lately that I have been posting more here at RIU HQ. I’ve decided to begin a regular regimen of blog posting. Since these posts automatically link to my Facebook page, when I post at RIU HQ, it also goes up there. More bang for my buck.
Many authors think writing blog posts is a waste of time. But that is not the case for everyone.
For example, Joanna Penn writes regularly on her blog. Chuck Wendig is another. Hugh Howey writes semi-regularly on his blog as well. As a nonfiction writer, it’s a straightforward thing to write a blog, and it kinda dovetails together with your writing. But as a fiction author, why would you want to waste time writing a blog when you could be writing a novel and working on the next project? The reason is that this is another point of contact for people to get to know you. In a nutshell, it’s a long form way of marketing called content marketing.
Content marketing is different from other kinds of marketing in that it relies solely on writing long-form content on particular topics. For the fiction writer, it’s more about their personality. That can be a hard sell for a lot of writers who are introverts. Pouring out information which reveals themselves can be a scary endeavor. Normally, the first thing they convince himself of is that nobody cares who they are. However, if you dig deep enough, this is really an excuse why they don’t want to do something that’s uncomfortable.
Letting your readers know who you are in bits and pieces is normally what fans want. True fans, that is. Not the fly-by-night folks who come in and out of your mailing list faster than the Flash. True fans want to hear from and about the author. In the case of those of us who use a pseudonym (like myself), they want to know we’re an actual person. I purposely don’t put my face out there for multiple reasons. At least not under my pseudonym. Writing this kind of content lets everyone know I’m a genuine person. It’s one of the best ways to stay in touch with readers.
For the longest time, I went back and forth on whether I would blog regularly. When I thought I’d made a commitment, I always got caught up, going in this and that direction, trying every kind of marketing tactic I thought I should do because it was what everyone else was doing. Or so I thought. This year, something clicked with me. It is not that I don’t like marketing. I do. However, I enjoy certain kinds of marketing. I have to discover what kind of marketing works for me and my personality; which ones I can excel at for my brand and platform.
Recently, I mentioned that Amazon ads do not work for me. I must emphasize the “for me” part of that sentence. It works just fine for other authors. But because of how I’ve set up my publishing business, it doesn’t work as well. What does work better for me are Facebook ads. But I know many authors who say they can’t get any traction with Facebook ads.
So there you have it. It’s finding the kind of marketing which not only works, but I can enjoy, or get as close to enjoying it as possible. I certainly shouldn’t hate it. Even if I did, if I want to be successful at this thing, I have to bite the bullet and do it for the time being. So it’s best not to do the thing I hate the most. Better to do the thing I hate the least and make it work if possible.
Blogging Is for Me
That brings me back to blogging.
I truly enjoy blogging, primarily because it’s another way for me to connect with my readers. Also, because it’s easy for me. What I mean by that is, I don’t have problems coming up with topics to write about as a fiction author. This is one area many fiction authors have a problem with. They don’t know how to look at blogging as another point of contact with people who may be interested in their writing. The stories or novels are doorways to knowing a bit about them not only as a writer but as a person.
That’s why I like blogging. It’s the nonfiction side of the business that allows me to connect and build trust. I don’t have to be concerned about doing the hard sell all the time (which is annoying). I can concentrate on building relationships not only through the content that’s in the RIU, but a little about me personally.
In the past, I shot myself in the foot by announcing I would post on this and that day. Then something would come up and it didn’t happen. So, my goal is to post a couple times a week. If I post more than that, great. If I post less than that, it means I’ve been busy with something else. But as part of the new direction I’m going in 2021, expect to get at least one post a week. What day that will happen on is anyone’s guess.
I already see the signs that this is working. Just in the negligible time I’ve been posting (which has only been about a week) I’ve seen progress. More people are coming to RIU HQ (always a good thing), and I’m seeing an ever so slight of an uptick in reader engagement over at the Facebook page. For most people, these incremental steps are too small for them to take notice. But I’m watching everything, and I see it for what it is. Momentum. Forward momentum. There’s something exciting about that. Despise not small beginnings.
I think another reason fiction authors don’t blog is because they believe they will alienate their fans if they disagree with something outside of their fiction. I’m in no way shape or form afraid of that because if that’s the case, such is life. I won’t hide who I am just because someone disagrees with me. Don’t worry. That doesn’t mean I’m going to fill the blog with all kinds of controversial issues. However, just know some of my musings have the distinct possibility of rubbing someone the wrong way, because I’m not politically correct. C’est la vie.
Having said that, you’re probably nervous now, wondering what I’ll be talking about. Relax there, Tex. I’ll talk about all the little things that interest me — movies, books, projects I’m working on, writing, the publishing industry, my family, and whatever else tickles my fancy at the moment. You get the general gist.
The content here at RIU HQ is content you won’t find in my once a month RIU News Bulletin. I might mention some things there, but I normally have a format for my newsletters, and I like to keep the content there unique to it. So if you want in on that, sign up in the sidebar, or join here:
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Well, that went on a little longer than expected. Let me get off here and work in some other capacity.
All the best, and I’ll see you in the Tapestry.
