If you hadn’t noticed already, this is a post by Levi Jacobs. And, as I’m sure you can tell by this website’s URL, Levi Jacobs is not my name. We’re doing a guest post!
Levi is a fantasy and science fiction author I’ve known for a long time. He’s a hardworking, innovative writer and he’s neck deep in independent author marketing tactics. Without further ado, I’d like to hand it over to him. Levi, the floor is yours.
It’s an old adage in writing that you need to turn off your Internal Critic if you’re going to get anything done. Maybe that’s why the same adage-dispensers advise us to write drunk and edit sober, because booze turns off the critic (or makes him or her more entertaining, at least). And for the most part, it’s good advice. You don’t know how good something is until it’s written (which yes, means you really should finish that novel)—but that’s not what we’re here for today.
Today we’re talking about turning off the Internal Salesperson.
Salesperson? you ask. I don’t have a salesy bone in my body.
Ah—but do you want readers? Do you want somewhere in your heart of hearts to give the finger to your middle manager and boldly earn your living writing stories in your PJs?
If so, you will eventually meet your Internal Salesperson. She is the one who wakes up wondering if anyone downloaded your book, if anyone read pages (this extra torture reserved for those of us with books in Kindle Unlimited, meaning we can see daily how many pages of each book the world has read). And she is the one who will say, tugging at her checkered and elbow-patched jacket, that there is really no point in writing today, since no one’s reading your stuff.
Now if you happen to be selling gangbusters, perhaps you can ignore this advice. Maybe you want, in fact, to turn on your Internal Salesperson (you’ll have to find out what he’s into). But likely even for you, oh Gangbusters-Selling Author, there will come a day when you load up your sales dashboard to find a much lower number than you or your Internal Salesperson hoped for. Maybe even a zero.
And for many of us, that zero has a pernicious way of translating into our word count for the day. Of unlocking the closet in which we have stuck our Editor for those few precious hours that we get to tell stories, and we all three stare at a blank page, saying, “Well no one’s going to read it anyway—they haven’t even read book one,” and, “This is obviously garbage—remember how much we revised Book One? And still no one’s reading it,” and maybe even, “Do you think our middle manager took that middle finger the wrong way? Maybe we could send him a nice email, see if he’s got any work around.”
No, friends, the Internal Salesperson is not your friend. She’s either inflating your ego to the point the Internal Editor can’t get a word in edgewise, or they’re piggybacking on each other to make sure you feel too dismal about your hopes as an author to actually do the work of authors, which is writing, of course.
So what to do? Turn the Salesperson off of course.
Easier said than done, because sales are the best estimation we have for how many people are reading our books, and most of us authorly types are very interested in people reading our books, and smartphones make it oh-so easy to check how many people have purchased said books, and the tab is right there on your computer as you sit down to write. And the minute you click that tab, the Salesperson wakes up, and he is sure to have an opinion. And you haven’t even had your coffee yet.
So, some strategies:
One: Set your expectations low. Set them at zero, in fact. Then, if you’ve had five pages read today, why, that’s five pages more than you were expecting! If someone’s bought your book, the Salesperson is sure to be pleased! Meditate on that fact deeply: you are getting read. You’re doing it. Then go happily about your words for the day.
Two: Don’t look at your sales every day. A watched pot never boils. If you’re the one in charge of running your advertisements, etc., then set a day once a week to evaluate the last seven days and make changes. But this refreshing the KDP Dashboard every 15 minutes? You’ve got to quit it.
Three: Don’t look at your sales until you’re done with words for the day. This is my approach: I get my words in, I sometimes get a little rush of joy when I see good numbers, and when the numbers aren’t stellar, my Internal Salesperson often has something useful to say.
This is his territory, you see: he has as little place in the word document as a used car salesman has at the Tesla factory. But out on the lot? The Salesperson is your man. Even if he’s not a particularly wise or informed fellow, his negativity may spur you to action (yes, you will have to tell people about your book to sell copies at first), and often he’ll have some insight about a slogan, or key word, or ad image, or salesy what-have-you that will get a few more people to read your words.
And that’s the whole point. So maybe you do need to learn how to turn on your Internal Salesperson, as well as turn her off. She has her place, as your Internal Critic does.
It’s just that most of the time, that place is locked in the closet. You run this show, not the Salesperson. Run it how you like.
Hope that helps.
Levi Jacobs is the author of the fantastical Resonant Saga, as well as the near-future science-fiction novel ACHE and the forthcoming Water of Night series. He has received the Colorado Gold award in Speculative Fiction, taken first place in The Zebulon Fiction Contest for Science Fiction, and had shorter work published in Spark: A Creative Anthology, Jungle Crows, and Perihelion SF. Hailing from North Dakota, with much of his formative years spent in Japan and Uganda, Levi has an MA in Cultural Anthropology and sells fruit in the oil fields to make a living. Learn more at www.levijacobs.com.
