The hottest of guys are the ones who wear ties. That’s my motto. Okay, no it isn’t. But shouldn’t it be?

I’ve heard a lot about the benefits of paying to have your book/eBook promoted and featured on various advertising websites. I myself haven’t tried it yet. I’ve also been spending these past few weeks researching and looking into the best types of marketing by following a couple of blogs with some helpful advice.

While researching, I haven’t done much writing, or working on my book cover. I still have the copy of a finished novel ready to launch that I haven’t launched because my cover is still only half-finished. The reason why it’s still waiting in the locked-down pens of self-publishing is because I feel like I need to boost my following and promote the work somehow before releasing it. I need people that are “into my stuff” (namely gay romance) before releasing new stuff.

I’m already beginning to notice how this will only damage me, rather than help me.

How soon should I be worrying about marketing?

What I’ve neglected to say so far here, is that the book I’m waiting to release is my second novel ever. Yes, I have only published one book so far. Some have said that getting into marketing early is advantageous, but I’m starting to see how it’s holding me back. With all of this research and paperwork I’m diving into, how the hell am I supposed to write my books?

Since I haven’t published more than one yet, I can’t state from my own experience what works for me. What I can say is that while I’ve been losing myself in knowledge on how to get my work out there, I’m not getting my work out there. I personally believe there is a good time… and bad time to put all of your focus on marketing.

How many books should be released before marketing becomes your primary concern?

Well, if “more than one” isn’t a good enough answer, I’d be willing to bet that marketing won’t do you much good if you don’t have more than a couple of them out. There’s something that publishers refer to as “phoenix sales,” which means that if people buy your newer book, and enjoy it, they tend to buy your older material, thus boosting the sales of older books at the same time. It makes sense, doesn’t it? After reading one book by an author and liking it, chances are you might enjoy their other stuff.

What about social media?

As of right now, social media is not helping me at all. Granted, I spend very little time on it, but that’s because when I do spend time on it, it doesn’t seem to benefit me. All it seems to do is give me spam that I don’t look at.

I write almost entirely gay romance, and maybe some other genres with gay romance sub-genres in them. When I discovered that this was my label, this was my brand, this was who I was… I sort of got lost in wondering how I’d snag people who were into it. I’ve heard it can be very popular, especially in eBook form, but I have yet to find out how to take advantage of that. I’ve accepted that it’s what I enjoy writing, but I’m not sure how to go about picking an audience for it. All I know is that you can’t wait for them to come to you. I don’t know how to get them to come to me.

Obviously, publishing more books and establishing a brand should be the first step. People should recognize your name when seeing all of the books you wrote. “Hey, they wrote such-and-such, and as I recall I think I kinda liked it.” Well, that’s one thing you’ve got.

My advice, to myself and to others, is to give yourself a bit more breathing room before focusing all of your attention on hooking an audience. The right time will come to show yourself off. Your first book is an introduction to (hopefully) how awesome you are, and to show that this is your brand. I don’t really count my earlier eBooks in this because they were short and pointless and I was still testing the waters. I’m totally serious about publishing now, and it’s all about my best effort.

Remember: establishing yourself as an author will take a while.

Don’t be in too much of a rush. You might get ahead of yourself… and stumble on the way. Like me. And I fall pretty hard.