In this day and age, all writers, as well as published and self-published authors need to be more enterprising. The internet offers the kind of opportunities that simply weren’t there a decade ago, and every writer should know how to properly use those opportunities. That’s what, in essence, it means to be enterprising – to see opportunities where other people don’t, to be bold and take initiatives that sometimes feel daring and dangerous. But in the end, if those initiatives and risks bear fruit, then you, as a writer, might find yourself on the NYT Bestseller List in just a few years. Read on to learn 5 ways in which you can be more enterprising.
1. Research
Before you put yourself “out there,” or, before you publish your book, you need to research the market for your target audience very thoroughly and carefully. You’ve written a book, and that is a great accomplishment, even if you haven’t sold a single one yet. However, before you send it out into the world, think about the market. More importantly, you need to decide whether the genre you’re writing in is overflowing. If it is, don’t despair, because this doesn’t necessarily have to be a bad thing. But you should add a little spin to it by thinking out of the box.
2. Think out of the box
And combine two or more unusual elements for the genre you’re writing in into your book. This way, you’ll create something new that hasn’t been seen before, and it will help distinguish your work from the others within your genre. It might seem scary at first – what if the readers aren’t ready for what you have? Questions, and doubts like that might come to you, but then again, you’re a writer, and creative by nature. If something doesn’t work, then think creatively and find a way to make it work, or create something else that does.
3. Observance
To ensure that what you’ve created generates success, be observant towards the needs, and wants of your target audience. For example, you can read two star reviews of novels in your genre and find out what other writers did wrong – and be objective towards yourself in the process and decide whether you are prone to making the same mistakes. If you find that you are, don’t be cruel to yourself about it, after all, the reviews weren’t targeted towards your own book, but to someone else. Feeling bad will only block you from progressing, both in your writing and it might affect you personally. Instead, use that as a guide, and create something that you will be certain will please the readers who had given those bad reviews, because they are your potential fans.
4. Building an audience
You can start slowly, by publishing a book, or self-publishing on Amazon, and do every other marketing thing in the process: create Facebook and Twitter accounts that will hopefully gather followers, and use other social platforms and ways to promote and market your book. But, it would go a lot faster if you try to gather an audience before you publish your book. You can blog, you can answer questions, you can be highly active on Facebook and Twitter, and be “out there” before you actually have a book published. You will have an audience, no matter how big, that already reads what you write. You will have a presence, and after you publish your book, and promote it everywhere, with the loyalty of your audience, their numbers will only grow.
5. Generosity
Once you have your audience, make sure that you care about your readers. And this is shown through being genuinely generous towards them. Try giving out signed free books, or make your e-book free for a day, or a week, or simply post an excerpt from your new book that you’re working on. Maybe create contests where they can participate in, or simply talk about how you write, your methods and your habits. Many of your readers are writers themselves, and they would love if you blogged or simply posted about writing on your website. You need to think about pleasing your readers, and making them happy. This will ensure they follow you all the time and the proof of that will be when you will see how many pre-orders you have on your new book.
Image credit: Phil Whitehouse on flickr and reproduced under Creative Commons 2.0[author] [author_image timthumb=’on’]https://writingtipsoasis.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/photo.jpg[/author_image] [author_info]Georgina Roy wants to live in a world filled with magic.
As an art student, she’s moonlighting as a writer and is content to fill notebooks and sketchbooks with magical creatures and amazing new worlds. When she is not at school, or scribbling away in a notebook, you can usually find her curled up, reading a good urban fantasy novel, or writing on her laptop, trying to create her own.
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