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Virginia Writers Club Annual Symposium

I felt a real “trip around the sun” moment yesterday as I set out for Randolph-Macon College in Ashland: it felt like just yesterday that I first attended last year’s annual Virginia Writers Club symposium.

The event convenes scores of writers dedicated to their craft and features some twenty fellow members presenting hour-long seminars on a range topics.

These include overcoming writers block, writing credibly about lawyers and court cases, rethinking nonfiction through speculation, and at least half a dozen opportunities to learn about marketing and promotion.

It was these last that I felt drawn to most, and what I learned above all is that my fellow writers devote an incredible amount of time, energy, and resources to promoting their work.

The depressing conclusion for me was that these writers sacrifice significant time they might otherwise dedicate to narrative in the inevitable funnel of promotion. It’s a necessary evil: a writer commits to their stories, and writing gives them purpose. But if nobody reads, it’s just another tree down in the forest.

Cost-Effective Marketing

I can’t recommend highly enough the insights shared by Henry Rausch, who successfully reached 10,000 sales of his self-published debut nonfiction, Submerged: Life on a Fast Attack Submarine in the Last Days of the Cold War.

He shares at his website a protracted study of the market and provides tips and best practices for getting around the pitfalls of the self-publishing industry.

His presentation at the symposium included self-reflection on what he did right and wrong between his first book and his second, which didn’t sell as well by orders of magnitude.

Sleeping Policemen

I felt a twinge of nostalgia when Henry brought up “sleeping policemen,” a term he derived from what Egyptians call speed bumps; this is probably true elsewhere, and was certainly the case in Nicaragua where I lived in the early 2000s.

In this case the sleeping policemen are a net positive, a promotional activity authors can push into the world and, as with speed-bumps, will continue to be effective without requiring additional inputs.

Among the most effective cops on this beat, Henry noted, are podcasts. In his case, they drive sales in Australia and the UK where he’s done no other promotional activities.

As I conduct a refresh of publicity for Profiles in Service: Peace Corps Roots in American Diplomacy, one of the first resources I hope to leverage will be podcasts.

Henry’s material includes resources to research the question myself, but I’m eager to hear recommendations for podcasts enjoyed by readers here, whether about writing, international affairs, or adventurous lifestyles.

My first experience joining a podcast, Christopher Wurst’s excellent SoftPower/FulStories, resulted later that year in an award-winning essay titled Mr. Mediocrity’s Great American Novel.

Maybe give it a listen!

PS: I’m working on a short story called Podcats. Hope that sounds fun!

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