This post by Heidi Cullinan originally appeared on her blog on 2/11/14.
Getting Real About the Costs to Authors and Readers in the Current Marketing Environment
My name is Heidi Cullinan, and I’m here to write stories and publish books.
I’m not here to market. I’ll do a little of that because one must, because there is no cultural bulletin board right now my books can exist at, especially not mine as I’m a bit niche and still largely in my own pond. I strive to lift awareness of not just my work but works like mine, the whole LGBT romance pool, but even that is not the main purpose of why I’m here. I like to thank bloggers with ad purchases and guest posts and ARCs. I’ve made a forum for fans to chat, and if you link/@ reply me on social media and I’m able to see it, I’ll do my best to reply or at least like your post. I don’t buy reviews. I don’t ask people to buy books on a certain day at a certain hour at a certain place to game the system. I don’t send mass invites to “events” on Goodreads or Facebook. I don’t add people to newsletters who haven’t asked to be, and in fact I try to parcel out sub-newsletters for the truly die-hard to get ALL THE DEETS and those who just want release dates to not be spammed. I don’t cold-email other authors and ask them for pimpage or, even crazier, give them book recs. I don’t copy other people’s work because I can’t think of my own stories or hump sideways on someone else’s work because I’d sure like to scrape off some of their overflow. I don’t run around to ten million social media sites making sure I comment on every blog post, every review, every single mention of my work. I don’t join every new social media site and work up a huge presence there. I don’t stick my nose into reader conversations unless invited, and even if invited, sometimes I might decline. Because I’m a writer. I write books. I try to write a lot of books. That’s why I’m here. That’s what I do.
You would think, you really would, that such a declaration would be rather like stating the obvious. Except every goddamn day that passes, I feel more and more like the last unicorn, and even though I can’t find anyone actually turning the screws, I feel more and more pressure every day to market, promote, to be a flaming brand across the literary horizon. It’s killing me, and I think it’s eating a lot of our souls.
Click here to read the full post on Heidi Cullinan’s site.