Come Selahway With Me…

I mentioned yesterday that there’s a quirk of being published that I never thought about. I’ve talked about it on and off, but I mention it again because it really is something that you have to spend a lot of time thinking about.

Promotion.

I’ve gotten more comfortable pimping myself out, so to speak…I’ve even hired people to help me with it. Still the same, I do a lot of outreach, myself. You can’t put your eggs in one basket, and it takes time.

I know it’s tempting to just go back to writing…believe me, there’s a part of me that would rather be doing that. However, I try to find ways to focus on the positive with promoting. The obvious is that people need to know about me and my work to read it. I can’t grow as a writer if people aren’t paying attention. I’ve found, though, that I like talking to readers. I like finding out what they really think about not just my work, but different genres and things in general. These, after all, are intelligent, breathing people with their own experiences and preferences. I’m not going to run right over them in an attempt to get to the next thing.

However…this does mean I have to get better about scheduling. I will admit I do like to sleep in, and even when my hours are more flexible, I find myself choosing between promoting or writing. So I’m slowly trying to figure out the balance that works for me…even if I have to get up earlier, sigh.

The fact is, it’s a necessity. As a minor author, I’ve got to be smart about things. Even if I was a major writer, I’d still want to participate and make sure I knew what was going on and how I was being sold to the public…that’s just the way I am. Besides, it’s not like I don’t enjoy it…it’s just a different type of work and a different type of energy. I like dashing off the quick guest post, I like cons, I’ve even grown somewhat used to facebook, though I’m still acclimating to twitter.

So how about all you writers out there? What promotion tools to you find effective? Have you found a way to balance out the writing you have to do with the writing you want to do?