The Most ImportantWriting Lesson I Learned the Hard Way

I've made plenty of mistakes in my life when it comes to almost all aspects of it at one point or another and writing is not the exception. 

There are things I should have started doing sooner, things I wish someone could have told me, and things that I was told, but didn't listen to - until it was too late. 

Being a full-time writer for the past few years has taught me many lessons on its own, but there is one today that I'd like to share with you before it ends up costing you in one way or another. 

Start Building Your Platform 

One of the classes required for my bachelor's Degree in Creative Writing solely focused on the business side of being an author. It taught us the importance of marketing, how to brand ourselves and behave as not only an artist but a seller of goods, and most importantly it taught us about building our author platform. 

I did the work, passed the class, and earned top marks on my final assignment which was to build a sharable author's website linking it to at least one social media on which we would be marketing ourselves or our work. 

Soon after receiving my grade, I paused the site and never went back to it. 

Even though I was a year or so away from graduating, the professor stressed to us the importance of building our author platforms long before we had a physical product to market. We needed to begin to build our presence in the minds of other writers or possibly readers as soon as possible. 

The reason for this is that it takes years to build some platforms up to have a decent online presence. 

If you wait to do this until after you've finished writing you're not going to have a platform to share your work with. In my teacher's words, "You would have better luck posting about it on Facebook for all the good it will do you without a platform of readers." 

I can post about my books all I want on my Facebook, and while this post may receive a like or a dancing cat GIF from my aunt - it's not going to help me in building an author presence or turn into sales. 

"You can't market a book to an empty room. Build the room, fill it with supporters, readers, and writers alike, and the book will have a way to market itself." 

Whatever stage you are in your writing journey, if you don't have an author platform, before you write another word - take a few hours and start building one. 

I didn't become serious about building my platform until this past year and every day I wish I had listened to my professor and started sooner. 

Your platform can be on whichever social media site you are most familiar with and comfortable using. If you don't have a website then now is the time to put one together using either a free or paid service and give yourself a room where people can go to find out more about you and your writing. 

Don't wait until you've finished writing. 

Go start now. 

With love, 

B.K. xo xo

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