My Experience with Marketing

Lessons can be painful, and those are normally the best ones. You come away from them stronger and more aware. What follows is my own experience. If you're just starting out like I am, hopefully this will give you something to think about.

I work an average of 50 hours a week and at least 6 days a week. I am not big on social media as I like to keep to myself. I'd rather spend my time writing, reading, watching movies, etc. Realistically, to be successful as an indie author, you can't do that. But when you're wiped out from your job (especially if you no longer like it), the last thing you want to do is something you're not comfortable with when you finally get home.

As a result, I paid a lot of money to a marketing company for a variety of services that I felt would put me in the best position for success. I was thrilled. I could have a professional team do all the things I didn't feel like doing and didn't know how to do, and I could spend my free time doing what I loved: writing stories!

Even though this is a fairly big company, they had reviews that made me think twice before signing. Ultimately, I chose to as they had an overall rating around 4.5 out of 5. Yes, I researched them beforehand. They had done the cover for my first book, and it was beautiful! So, I already had a relationship with them that had gone well. All I'll say about what has happened since is that it would be impossible to be more disappointed in how things played out. I threw that money away and am now spending more to try and retrieve most of it through legal means.

This was a painful lesson. I trusted my dream to someone else, and that was a mistake. I had worked so hard to save up the money that I did. I work in retail and the pay isn't good. After three years of saving, I chose to put almost all of it toward my dream. Truth be told, I probably won't be good enough to make my living as a writer. But I was (and still am) going to find out. Failing, while not at all what I want to happen, is OK as long as I try. If I didn't try, I'd never forgive myself. I had the money and thought I had a partnership that would put me in the best place for success. If I failed under these conditions, so be it. And then my dream never even got a chance.

But, like the phoenix, we can be reborn from the ashes. I had to wait for the contract to expire before I could create my own website. I also had to wait on publishing my third book. Luckily, I was already in the process of preparing my fourth book. So, I was covered there. Now, what to do about a website once I could do so on my own?

I have no experience with this stuff. Piecing together trailers, websites, ads. How can I get all this done? About two weeks ago, I found two sites: Canva and Envato. Envato is for free videos, audio, sound effects, and other things for making content. For unlimited downloads, it was maybe around $250 for a year. Good enough for me. Done. Canva has a wonderful free version that allows you to piece together things for presentations. In other words, TRAILERS!! I started putting trailers together on my own. I've done two full trailers and three or four teasers for...$250. SO MUCH LESS THAN WHAT THE COMPANY WAS CHARGING. And remember, I can keep doing trailers and the cost for one year is...$250, no matter how many I make. AND it's all incredibly easy to use. I still haven't watched a "how to" video. It's that easy!

Then, about a week ago, I sat my ass in the chair at my computer and said, "This is my one night off this week, I'm free of the contract's expiration date and can now create the website, so let's do this." After a couple of searches and reviews, I chose Wix. For around $375, I had my website. Again, incredibly easy to build and navigate through without even looking at a "how to." If you like the look of my website or even think it's "OK," then I did "OK" even though I had no idea what I was doing. Guess what? That means YOU could do the same, if not better. A little over $600 spent for a year's worth of usage and I can create as many trailers, teasers, picture ads, video ads, or anything else my dumbass self wants to do. I won't have to spend a penny more if all I do is post them on my social media accounts that I created for free.

I paid sooooo much more to the company, which I hope to get back. Either way, I should have never trusted my dream to someone else. Instead, I should have looked into doing it all myself from the beginning. Now, running ads is all I have left to do on the marketing piece that cost me so dearly. And if you've looked at the cost of that on IG or FB, you know it's not expensive at all.

I give you my story to hopefully spare at least one person who is dreaming of publishing a story of their own from going through what I have. You don't need to pay for most things. Editing and covers are really all. If you are artistic, then you can do your own covers through Canva. I know for many, $600 is a lot. But paying someone else would cost more. Much more. And you don't even have to have a website or marketing in the beginning if you already are active on social media and have a following. You can chase your dream. You should chase your dream. Just remember, it's YOUR dream, no one else's. No one will be as committed to your dream as you will. After my experience with this company, I will never put my dreams in the hands of another.

Now, I just need to learn how to build a following and find my readers. Well, I need to keep working on my writing as well. But I'm just glad I've balanced my free time to where I can do all this promo work AND still write. Now that the website is done, I only have to update it whenever I want. I only have to make videos when I want. It doesn't take much time at all, especially now that I know how to do it all. I wish I'd known it was this easy to do on my own.

Now, back to the world of horror! Good luck to all indie authors. If you have a company or a marketing person that does a great job for you, I couldn't be happier. You are lucky! To all you newbies, you got this! Just know to be careful if you want to use someone else. Also know you don't have to. It's so simple to do yourself. I wish you the best in your own journey.