Lauren Hunter, author, novelist and poet from Canada. A writer of paranormal romance and Regency paranormal novels, with plans to write in a variety of other genres, including time travel, angel, ghost, and contemporary romance. Besides novels, she also writes poetry and short stories, with her poems appearing in anthologies from England, Holland, and the US. In this brief interview Lauren Hunter shares her personal experiences and insights about promoting her books. Lauren is the author of The Promise and The Coffee Shop.
What is your talent?
Under the pseudonym, Lauren Hunter, I write romance novels in a variety of genres ranging from paranormal to regency paranormal, and have plans to write angel, ghost, and time travel romance novels as well.
What were the difficulties you faced in promoting your talent?
The same difficulties I would say most writers experience, and that is time and money. Promoting is a huge part of writing, without it no one will even know we exist. So we have to find any way, technique, or method we can come up with to get the word out to our target audience. The problem is it is so time consuming it stops me from doing any writing. It would be nice if I could find a nice balance, and I am hoping that after a year of promoting I can now write some more novels. I am not saying I will stop, or relax, on the promotion front, but having more new books to present is also all part of it.
So you start out trying anything and everything and see what works. What works for one may not work for another, I am hearing this time and again, and it's true. For one doing guest blogs may be the best way to get noticed, for another maybe paying for a targeted ad. Someone else may use mediums like Facebook, or Twitter, or any of a variety of others, and again I am hearing different people say this one or that one works better for them. Perhaps a combination of all. All we can do is try different places and approaches and see what works for us personally.
What are the main methods and approaches you follow to spread the word about your works?
As I mentioned above, I tried many different approaches, guest blogging on sites that feature books and authors, holding or participating in author features on blogs, or multi author giveaways, blog hops. I joined many groups on fb, and I try to spread the word as new books come out, I tried ads and giving away bookmarks. I lined up many reviewers and at times did giveaways as part of the blog post to drive more people to the blog and my book. I set up author pages on Manic Readers, Goodreads, Author Central, Shelfari, I submit my ISBN to the library of congress and into overdrive to reach libraries. I have a blog, and a web site that I update as new info comes available, I set up Google Alerts, I get my book into Goodreads lists, I go to places like Humanmade, Bargain ebooks, Indie Spotlight. I printed up some postcards and am hoping to distribute them. I have been approached to do a radio interview on the net. I have a Twitter account. On Facebook you network with other authors and promote each other on your pages to help each other spread the word. As I say, I am trying anything and everything, and seeing what does and doesn't work. The only thing I haven't done is set up an interview with my local paper or radio, and done a local book reading/signing. I prefer to do that with hard copies instead of digital. I am hoping more and more people will be open to the digital though as time goes on.
Oh, and my publisher does an amazing job of posting my works to many sites all over the world, in four formats, so it is accessible to everyone. My paranormal romance, The Coffee Shop, is available at sixteen digital retailers world wide, and The Promise came out a week ago and is already available at nine outlets.
Do you have a certain routine you follow in regards to writing and promoting?
With writing first thing I do is check my emails to see if I need to get back to anyone immediately, regarding publishing or promoting. When I am writing that is all I do all day, every day. When I am promoting, which consists of many different things, that is primarily all I do. Although, I may slip in writing some short stories in there, as I can do them in one day.
To what extent you feel you were successful?
With writing I already have contracts on four books and nine short stories, with more ready to submit, so I am feeling that has been successful. As far as promoting, with everything I am doing, the word is getting out and it can only spread from here as I continue to do so.
What are your recommendations for people who share the same talent with you?
It's a lot of hard work and takes a lot of time, so be prepared to put in a lot of hours to get the word out. I recommend trying everything and anything you can think of, like all the things I have so far, you never know which one will work for you until you try. As I say, what works best for one may not work at all for another. I am not sure why that is, there could be any number of factors playing into it, timing, presentation, etc.
Any final words regarding promotion for talents?
You have probably heard this many times before, but it is something I can't say enough. NEVER GIVE UP! If you have a dream don't stop, no matter how many rejections. How many times have we heard stories of famous writers that were rejected many times before they got their start?
humanmade.net would like to thank Lauren Hunter for taking the time to share with us these valuable information and insights and experience in promoting her writings.
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