After the book launches on Friday, I plan to return to my “regularly scheduled program” here at wordwhisperer.net. In the meantime, what’s happening here is similar to what should be happening whenever you decide to roll out a campaign that’s designed to attract your target audience and convert browsers into buyers.
I’m focusing on reaching out (frugally) to my target audience–De’s fans/Star Trek TOS fans–to let them know there’s a book coming out that should be of more than passing interest to them. Notice that I’m informing De’s fans of the availability of the book and of the book launch, not demanding that they engage. This isn’t a “sales job.” It’s an affinity project.(For more on frugal book promotion, get Carolyn Howard-Johnson’s excellent primer, The Frugal Book Promoter here.)
For the presumably-numerous Kelley fans who are either reading-averse or blind, nothing that Amazon or I do will convince them to spend money on the book. This segment of De’s fans may, however, be wildly excited about the upcoming audio version which is scheduled for a mid-year release as of now, so I’m “nurturing” them to let them know I haven’t forgotten them…
If you’ve been following my campaign, you know I have a book launch page on Facebook where I’m publishing weekly #DeForestKelley Teaser Questions and brief excerpts from the book so visitors to the page can get a taste of my writing style and the anecdotes they’ll find inside the book to see if they want to hang with me by buying it when it becomes available.
After the launch, the campaign won’t end. There will be a full eight months to promote the heck out of the book’s availability before Star Trek’s 50th anniversary on September 8th, so my social media guru, Lisa Twining Taylor, will be creating linked memes and giving me direction on how, when and where to take the next steps to be sure I don’t shoot myself (or the book) in the foot by reaching out in inappropriate or off-putting ways. That’s key, because I see too many people turning ME off when they’re trying to turn me on because of the way they use the social media tools available to them.
I can’t stress enough how crucial it is to have a social media expert on your team… someone who can show you social media certifications and capstone projects from top universities like Northwestern … I’m sad to say that most self-proclaimed social media experts (like most self-proclaimed copywriters) don’t have the chops they claim to have, and if they don’t, you won’t get the ROI you deserve–and they may even derail your best-laid plans.
Yes, I know–that’s scary talk, and I hate “scare TV and radio”–but in this case, it’s absolutely true. You need to expect to pay premium prices for premium providers. The providers who are low-balling their prices aren’t capable of getting more, or they would be unless they’re like me, semi-retired but still hankering for a great project that I can really sink my teeth into. I will write ’til I die–and if there’s an afterlife, I’ll wanna write there, too!
Anyway, back to the subject. Nurture campaigns aren’t about selling. They’re about creating fond bonds and hanging onto the people who are interested in what you know, who you are, or what you’re offering but just may not be ready to buy. Early adopters jump in fast; they require very little convincing. But early adopters aren’t the whole enchilada; they’re just the tip of the iceberg (to mix metaphors horribly!) There are a lot more beneath the surface and a lot of them will rise up after the early adopters are already enjoying the fruits of their enthusiasm.
