I would like to play out a little moment in
time that happened to me recently surrounding a Q & A event for my newly
published, and first ever book, Enemy.
Scene 1
(Location: Bookshop)
Event
Organiser: So how many people do you know are
definitely coming tonight?
Me: Umm… I’m not exactly sure anyone is coming. I kind of used up my
friends for my book launch
Event
Organiser: (Panic stricken look on face) Have you
told people about it on social media?
Me: Yeah
Event
Organiser: I’m sure people will come. It’ll be
great
Fade on my face showing that I am100% sure
she is wrong.
Scene
2
(Home)
Me tweeting and facebooking the event
again, trying to outrun the growing feeling of shame that comes when planning a
party nobody wants to attend. Three responses ping back to me. All friends. All
saying something along the lines of, “I was planning on coming, but something
has come up.”
Holy
Crap.
Scene
3
(Home)
Me: (text to publicist) I just
wanted to let you know that it seems highly unlikely that anyone will be coming
to this talk tonight. Sorry for being such a no-friends loser.
Scene
4
(Home)
Publicist: (on phone) I’ve spoken to the bookshop and Cate [my publisher who
was doing the Q & A with me]. They both know it may be a no-show. If it is,
you can just have a glass of wine and chat with them. You won’t be the first
author this has happened to. It’ll be fine. Try not to worry.
Great.
So now my publisher knows they should never have produced my book and this bookshop
now wishes they had not sacrificed their precious shelf space to stock it. Kill
me now.
Scene
5
(Home)
Another message chimes, this time from
someone I went to high school with who follows my page on facebook but who I
haven’t seen for twenty years.
Friend:
I’m still coming tonight, but don’t know how long I
can stay.
Me: However long you can stay is more than fine. Look forward to seeing
you then.
Brilliant.
Now I have a lone witness to my absolute failure as an author and human being.
Scene
6
Just before event
(Location: Bookshop)
Me: Sorry about this. The only people I knew were coming are now not
coming, except one guy who probably can’t stay very long. It’s all a bit
embarrassing, isn’t it?
Event
organiser: I’m sure it’ll be fine.
Woman
1: Are you Ruth Clare?
Me: Yes… are you… here for the event?
Woman
1: Yes. I found out about it on twitter.
Me: (nearly sobbing with relief) I’m so glad you’re here, I thought no
one would come!
Man
1: Hi. We met on twitter.
Me: We did! I wasn’t sure if you would come!
Man
1: I’m looking forward to it.
Scene
7
(Location: Bookshop.)
A crowd of eight people gather, looking
attentive and friendly.
Cate:
Let me welcome you to this event…
END
***
Now firstly, let me say, I am extremely
grateful to be in the lucky position of having a bookshop host an event for me
at all. May I also say that this particular bookshop did a fantastic job of
promoting my Q & A event in their newsletter, in-store and on social media.
My publisher also got in on the act,
promoting the event to the large number of followers on social media. I have
less than zero complaints that everyone did their absolute best to spread the
word about the event.
Let me also say, that in the few weeks
since my book, Enemy, has been out in
the world it has had some pretty amazing media coverage. I have talked about it
on Conversations with Richard Fidler
(an hour-long radio interview that broadcasts Australia-wide and has a huge podcast
following both here and internationally). It has had a multi-pages excerpt in
one of Australia’s largest circulation newspaper publications, The Good Weekend Magazine, which
subsequently rolled out to regional centres. It has had an amazing review in The Australian, as well as a few more
community radio interviews. It pretty much could not have had a more amazing
amount of exposure.
But let’s look at the reality of the
situation. This is my first book. People don’t really know me. To ask someone
to come to an event like this means asking them to arrange babysitters to put
the kids to bed, or leave the excitement of their after-work drinks, or interrupt
the very lovely eating of takeaway while watching Netflix.
To attend an author talk takes effort and
energy. If people are going to do it, they need to have a good reason why. So
what was that reason? For my event, the reason boiled down to the effort I had
made at connection on social media.
Apart from one person who attended after
reading the excerpt in The Good Weekend,
every single person who came to my event was someone who I either met
exclusively via twitter or facebook, or who was aware of my event because they
followed my posts.
I really had no idea if anyone would come.
I was beyond delighted that they did, but I know that unless I had put myself
out there, the attendance at my event would have been one person. So if you
have been umming and ahhing about whether you want to get involved in social
media, may I suggest that you picture yourself in the position I was in.
Your first book is published. You have the
opportunity of doing more than one event to promote it. Who are you going to
invite? How are they going to know about it? Even if you are with a big
publishing house, you are still one person trying to compete with the lure of binge
watching House of Cards or Nashville.
People are people. When you are starting
out in your career as an author it may be the personal connections you make on-line
and in the real world that save your event from complete disaster.
Let the shame of the no-show override your
shame of being a blowhard. Start making connections now!
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