Tools & Tips ~ Building Your Platform

Build Your Platform

By Laura Howard

 

Building your Following Slow and Steady

You can't visit many writing blogs these days without running into the term “Platform”.

Build your platform before you publish.

The bigger your platform, the more people will know about your book.

First, let me say that this isn't necessarily untrue. I just think that maybe the perception of what a platform is has become a bit fuzzy.

When I imagine an “author's platform”, I think of the platform at a train station. On the platform is a person waving their book around at a crowd, shouting at them to buy their book.

Not an ideal situation, if you ask me.

So, instead of that image, I'd like to replace it with a new scenario. I recently read the free ebook The Secrets of Ebook Publishing Success offered from Mark Coker of Smashwords. Whether you publish through Smashwords or not, there are some great tips for self-publishing authors in there.

In it he referred to a platform as a fire. We all start with nothing. We add a small amount of kindling to get it started. We only add small logs in order to get the fire good and hot, because if we add a big one too early we will suffocate our flame. Once we reach a critical mass of heat, we can add larger logs, and then those logs start throwing off ever-greater heat, allowing the fire to burn hotter and brighter.

I love this visual. I love the idea of starting off small and building slowly. Each little piece of kindling represents a real connection- a real relationship.

Joanna Penn from The Creative Penn spends a lot of time talking about Relationship Marketing: Getting people to like, know, and trust you. I think this is made possible through making meaningful connections rather than gaining, say 20,000 Twitter followers who won't even remember your name.

Imagine how hot and bright your fire will burn when the small community you cultivate starts to grow enthusiastic about your book(s). Think about the many dozens of people each of your raving fans will want to share your work with. That's when the real magic starts to happen. But, it takes time to get there.

We all like to be part of something bigger than ourselves. When you have a group of people who are invested in what you're doing, you have also extended your success to become their success. They'll naturally want to spread the word about something that they have become such a big part of.

Once you've written the best book possible and you have a loyal troop of fans, there is only so far any amount of marketing will go. You must trust in good, old-fashioned word of mouth to fan the flames of your success.

So, as the tortoise showed the hare, slow and steady wins the race.

I'd love to know how you connect with readers, let me know in the comments!