Being a writer isn’t a path most of us choose consciously; it’s just who we are. We are storytellers, researchers, teachers, searchers, learners and so much more. To some, writing is a way to impart wisdom learned from years of living. To some writing is a way of finding out who we are and where we belong. To some writing is a way to heal a past or deal with the present; to purge emotional pain or align our thought processes. Writing is so many different things to so many people; but there is one thing all writers have in common – we want readers.
Readers are the foundation of a writer’s life. They are the sky we are reaching for; the most important ingredient in our author stews. So where do we find them? Where are they hiding? How do we attract them to our work; get them to read our novel, story, poem, or article? Some of us start with our friends and family; some of us search out an agent or publisher to find readers for us; some of us look online to our connections on social sites. None of these strategies is wrong, but none of them are enough either. So what is a writer to do? Where are the elusive readers of our dreams?
Finding readers has a lot to do with our purpose for writing. Why did we write our novel, story, article or poem? Was it for a sense of self? Perhaps it was to see our names on the best seller list? Was it for the thrill of seeing our book on the library or bookstore shelf? Whatever the reason, without readers our blood, sweat and tears lies stagnant on the shelf. We write for a reason; we have a target audience in mind when we write. If we write for young adults, then our target audience is teenagers; if we write fantasy or science fiction, then that is our target audience. If we figure out who we are writing for and our reason for writing this particular story, then we can figure out where to find our readers.
If we use social sites to reach readers, it is fairly easy to find our audience. Just look in the groups on Facebook alone and we can find people who have something in common with our story; someone who will enjoy what we have written and be interested in the information we want to impart. The hard part is making sure we don’t overstep the boundaries of friendship when we offer our work on these sites. The hard sell doesn’t work; pushing our work in readers’ faces is never a good idea. Our readers are our friends, or at least our future friends. We need to let them know we exist; we need to let them know our work exists; but after that it is in their hands. Readers make their own decisions as to what they want to read and which authors they want to offer their loyalty to. We have to respect that they have that choice.
Word of mouth is a very strong current. It can carry a novel on its tide and bring a wave of readers to our shores; but if we try to control the current, we may find that it is stronger than we think and can sweep our novel out into a vast sea of nothingness. With the advent of ePublishing, the sea is getting bigger and deeper and our novels are one of millions of novels floating around. We can take two paths here; we can trust that the reader will be the fisherman and our novel will happen to get caught on their hooks and hauled aboard to be devoured; or we can be the fishermen, dangling our bait for hungry readers. One path is passive, the other is more aggressive. Some might say that equating our readers to hungry fish is demeaning; but truth be told, aren’t most readers looking for something in our books that will hook them? The first line of a novel is called a hook; why not use it?
We are all vying for readers; to get the attention of someone who will love our work so much they will recommend us to other readers. Do we really want to be passive here? Dangle the bait; attract one reader and more will hopefully follow. We just need to make sure to use the right bait – good content. If the bait is hard to swallow, the fish won’t recommend it to other fish and our hooks will remain empty. If our bait is delicious and decadent, the fish will swim out to other fish and let them know where the best hook in the sea is.
Times have changed and it is no longer enough to just write a good story. The days of staying home and writing and letting others take care of the marketing are over. We need to go out into the sea of readers and find our school of fish; let them know where the best bait in town is and dangle the hook in front of them. Let them take the bait; then it’s up to them to decide if they want to share it or not. We can’t control the current, but we can tempt the fish.
Writers, where do you find readers and how do you hook them?
Readers, what hooks you?