Writer Fears: Self-Promotion

If there is one thing you get out of all those random writing articles, online writing tips, and even tips from writing friends, it is that – these days – you are supposed to establish an online writer’s presence before you even get published. Apparently your agent is going to look online for you to make sure you will be able to market yourself or some such nonsense. Really, I think it is stupid consider most writers are introverts and hate pouring their souls out to people. You, my readers, don’t count, because I don’t know you, and therefore have no fear of judgement from you. Don’t be offended. Be complimented. You know things about me my family doesn’t even know. 🙂

But in any case, I can’t get around the fact that, as a serious writer, I am supposed to get myself “out there” via twitter, blogging, and Facebook. Ugh. I absolutely refuse to make a Facebook page featuring myself as a writer until I am actually getting published. Otherwise it will just be too humiliating to be touting myself as a writer when it is years and years before I actually get anything published.

Twitter- well – I try every now and then. I tweet something random and then forget about the service for a long time before remembering I am supposed to be tweeting every day. I’ll work on it. Probably.

The blog thing? Well – I don’t really want to advertise this blog because – it is my sanctuary. Once everyone I know knows about it, it becomes another fear instead of my forest retreat. I’d really prefer to just keep this blog between us. Therefore, I have come to the conclusion I need another blog. I know – I’ve said this before – but I made the mistake of forcing myself to publish excerpts of my writing before I was ready. So, my thought NOW is that I can revamp that blog to be one I don’t mind actually sharing with people. The trick will be to do that and still enjoy writing the posts so that it doesn’t go the way of twitter where I write one post and forget about it for three months. So – here is the thought I am currently having: I have to do research for my books, right? Well, the best way to reinforce research results is to write about it yourself. So what if I take various subjects I am researching and turn them into blog articles? Like fashion in the 1890s, or the Oregon trail route – things like that. Then, I not only have something to write about, but I reinforce the results in my own mind, and I help other writers with their books in case they are looking for the same information. So, I think I will give that a try and see if it works. We’ll see how long that lasts.