What Do You Mean I Need a Platform?
Posted By Wendy Delaney on May 13, 2009
Wendy Delaney, Author
By Wendy Delaney
Copyright © 2009 Wendy Delaney
Promotion is for published authors. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard the advice that unpublished fiction writers should just focus on writing a great book. It’s a tough market, a shrinking midlist, blah, blah, blah.
Enough! I get it.
I need to tell a great story, and if it’s going to have a snowball’s chance of selling, it had better be a fabulously marketable, entertaining page-turner. So, it’s important that I understand my market, focus on craft, focus on character, and focus on pacing.
I get it. Really I do. Focus on the writing.
Then, while I was intently focusing on my writing like a good unpublished author, a writing buddy asked me about my platform. Uh…my what?
She told me about a book, Get Known Before the Book Deal. I made a mental note to order the book and add it to my collection of Writers Digest books. I’d try to find some time to read it—later. Maybe after I work on that website I’ve been putting off, or come up with a tag line for those business cards I need to order. Right now, I’m busy writing. I am unpublished after all. Don’t want to lose focus and put the cart before the horse.
Little did I know that a week later, I’d be at my local library, attending a workshop presented by Christina Katz, author of Get Known Before the Book Deal. I figured if nothing else, this would be an expedient way for me to acquire a copy of her book. As a bonus, I’d absorb some salient details about this platform stuff, especially since I’m busy writing and already have my summer reading planned out. (It’s the left-brainer in me. I have a to-be-read list.)
Katz started the session by reinforcing the message that in this economy and very tight market, craft has never been more important. Okay, that provided an all too familiar jumping off point for where we were heading in the next fifty minutes—how I need to start planning my professional development. Why? Because I’m responsible for my writing career.
Of course, I am. Who else would be responsible?
However, that statement came as a minor revelation. I’m responsible for my writing career. As in one hundred percent responsible. I need to start thinking of this not only as a business, but as a relationship with my would-be readers that I can influence. How? With a platform—starting with baby steps to increase my visibility and build potential readership. Now, not later.
Christina Arbini was one of the few writers at the workshop who was already actively developing her platform, preparing to hit the ground running with her first sale. As she put it, “When that first book contract comes through, you want to already be established and have a built-in networking system, or ready-made list of readers to market your books to.”
Christina Arbini gets it. I’m no dummy. I get it too.
The Christina Katz workshop came as an unexpected turning point in my writing career. I highly recommend both her book and her workshop, especially if you’re like me and you’ve had plans for a website simmering on the back-burner for the last year or three, but establishing a Web presence has never been a priority. Hey, you and I have been busy writing, and a website is something we’ve had penciled in for later. Guess what? If you’re serious about your writing career, it is later!
Author Note: Wendy Delaney currently does not have a website, but she’s working on it!
My web-genius son-in-law is helping me build one, so I’m taking my baby steps now. It’s a little scary, but I can definitely see the usefulness of it. I heard someone say that if an agent has to chose between two manuscripts - one author with a web presence and the other without - it’s more likely the one with the website will be chosen. The agent or editor can see what kind of person you are beyond your query and your story. It makes sense. I’m just trying to figure out what all I’ll ‘talk’ about aside from the books that aren’t yet published. It’ll be an interesting journey.
Are you building your own website? I’ve got a blog, and I want a website of my very own, but I’m really not sure how to go about building it.
Wendy, I’d love to hear more about your attempts to build a website and the resources you might recommend to others!
Hey Kate, Jacquie and I built 1st Turning Point in Wordpress, which allows you to have static pages like a website AND a blog-like page (such as this Articles page). I didn’t know a thing about Wordpress until this February, when I dug in and learned it and then created this site. It wasn’t easy, but it wasn’t mind-melting (well, only on a couple of days–ha ha). If you know HTML, Wordpress can be frustrating–just ask Jacquie.
But if you don’t know HTML, Wordpress is kind of fun, relatively easy to learn, and has a lot of options in the form of Plug-ins and Widgets.
Monica, I wish I had a web-genius son, husband, sister–anybody!–to do this for me. I could hire it done, but since I have some HTML training in my other life, I’m sucking it up and am taking a bit of time each day to work on this next phase of my writer’s education. It’s just like you say–baby steps towards a goal. You’re absolutely right about agents and editors checking out the author’s website. If you’re serious about publication, a website reinforces the fact that you’re approaching this like a professional. So, good for you for getting going on this phase of your “journey”. Be sure to let us know when your website is up so we can come visit!
Kate, right now, I’m learning Wordpress. Like Ann mentioned, it’s considered to be fairly easy to learn, and I’m really trying to believe her when she says it’s fun.
Later in the year, I hope to share my “journey” to help other writers (those of us who used to think that Facebook was just for kids!) develop a web presence, so stay tuned. We’ll have more info on this subject down the 1stTurningPoint road.