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Plug Your Book!
81
Author blog platforms up close
An author with a popular blog has a valuable platform, a way of
cutting through the noise and clutter. It’s a direct channel to your
audience, the same kind of asset that enables network TV news anchors
to write bestselling memoirs.
Blogs aren’t magic, though. They can’t make a losing book into a
winner. Plenty of blog-based books have flopped because the publishers
mistakenly believed a blog audience would automatically translate into
demand for a weak book.
Some publishers remain skeptical of blogs as a vehicle for book
promotion. Frequent questions are:
Who would buy a book when they can read it for free?
Will blogging distract the author from writing a good book?
Could the blog exhaust interest in the book before it’s available?
The reality is, online content makes it much easier for the audience
to discover a book and develop an appetite for it. Is it possible for a
single author to promote a single title using a simple blog? Many who
have done it well have had tremendous success:
Business
www.LongTail.com. The Long Tail, a bestselling 2006 business
book, originated with a Wired magazine article that grew into a blog. The
Long Tail idea is that niche products are becoming increasingly
important, and someday the niches might account for more aggregate
sales than the occasional blockbuster books, movies, and other products.
The magazine article drew a huge reaction, so author Chris
Anderson continued his research as an “open source” experiment in
book development. He shared his latest ideas with blog readers, who
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