When I started writing thrillers five years ago, I admit that I was probably naive about book marketing and promotion. Let's scrub that: I was naive, no probably about it. I was a social media novice, hankering after the old school method of getting noticed and published - i.e. find myself a literary agent, hopefully attract a publisher and, with luck, it would all be book signings and author speaking sessions as book sales grew exponentially. Yes, well, as I say: naive!Early on, I did find a literary agent. She allowed me to begin the journey I'd been hoping to embark on. Following an Amazon promotion, my second book, The Dossier, reached #1 on Amazon UK's thriller rankings for 6 weeks. I was quietly optimistic. Then my third book, The Gambit, launched, this time Amazon didn't promote me and it was a setback. Meanwhile, I was being encouraged by my agent to Tweet my books incessantly to get them noticed. Whilst I hated this "Buy my book" mentality that pervades tweets by authors on Twitter, I joined the crowd.By the time I got to my fourth book, The Reluctant Trader, I decided to part company with my agent and go it alone. Same old process - "buy my book" tweets on Twitter and paid advertising on Facebook - but this time I was on my own. The book again did well but, to be frank, not as well as I believed it capable of - and yes, Amazon again didn't promote me. On the plus side, I received a large number of very positive reviews: on the minus side, I was now totally convinced that the Twitter route to market was flawed and no longer appropriate. It was time (temporarily) to put down my pen and take a long hard look at both what I wrote and how I should go about promoting my writing in future.Between then and now, I had my 'light bulb moment'. It dawned on me, perhaps all too late, that I needed to do so much more - in order to target the people who really like the kind of books that I write - than I'd been doing. I needed to encourage interested readers to sample my writing - and, assuming they liked it, to come back for more. I needed to interact with people more effectively on-line, to communicate with them in a more appropriate manner and allow faithful supporters to feel loved and appreciated. This sounds a bit like a confessional - and to the extent that I have failed to do this up until now, I apologise for my naivety. I’ve had my lightbulb moment – and I promise from now on to try to do this so much better!So, starting this summer 2018, a LOT is about to change. The good news is that I am launching TWO new thrillers: a short story, Powder Day, on 22 June; and a full-length thriller, The Markov Encryption, on August 22. Both are Ben Lewis thrillers (back by popular demand!). Powder Day is set before The Dossier and helps to provide more backstory to Ben Lewis's character. I have invested in professionalising both my manuscripts (thanks to Carrie O'Grady, by new-found professional copy-editor) and my book covers (thanks to Peter at BespokeBookCovers for the Markov Encryption's cover and a soon-to be-released, newly redesigned, cover for The Reluctant Trader). I have also completely overhauled my website and the story it is trying to tell. I am hoping that it will become a much more effective portal for displaying my writing, allowing interested readers to access giveaways and promotions and learn about my new books and read sample chapters before anyone else. The site continues to evolve. Please take a look over the coming weeks and let me know what you think!Above all, these last two years I have expanded my store of knowledge about how successful authors run websites, marketing databases, promotions and giveaways. I have tried to emulate many of these in my new, ‘post-lightbulb’ moment website! My aim is to make it look high quality - so that the book promotion side in future can operate as professionally and smoothly as possible. I hope you find these positive developments. I look forward to your feedback!