#254: Book Marketing Case Study (Marketing Minute)

Welcome to Kingdom Writers, where we help equip and empower Christian writers of all genres to share your unique gifts with the world. We're your hosts, C.J. and Shelley Hitz.

This podcast is filled with spiritual encouragement as well as prayers to help you overcome the resistance you face as a writer. Your story matters.

Welcome back to the Kingdom Writers Podcast. My name is Shelly Hitz, and I'm here with my husband, C.J.

Hey, guys.

So in today's episode, I just wanted to remind all of you that marketing is a marathon, not a sprint. And I'm going to share a case study with you today. But you know, cj, as a runner and a competitive runner for years yourself, there's a huge difference between a marathon and a sprint, right?

Oh, yeah. You know, marathons require endurance. You're in it for the long haul. Sprint, you know, is over practically in the blink of an eye. So you can. You have to really prepare differently for a marathon, for sure.

Yeah. And so we're going to be talking about that today, and I really believe that so many times we, as authors give up too soon. So you're in it for the sprint, maybe your book launch or a special promotion, and maybe it doesn't go like you think it should, and you just get discouraged and give up. Have you seen the popular meme that has circulated on Facebook that shows the miner and has his pickaxe, and he's trying to, you know, find the gold or the diamonds or whatever, and it shows him turning around and giving up just before discovering gold? Well, that's what I think often happens to authors as well. We just simply give up too soon, or we just keep trying this same thing instead of trying something different and really asking God for wisdom. But I read a really encouraging case study by an author, Hal Elrod, in his book the Miracle Equation, and I thought it might encourage some of you with your marketing. Now, I just want to let you know I'm not necessarily endorsing the book, but I wanted to share this case study with you. So this is a direct quote from his book. He says, when the Miracle Morning was published, I had very few resources beyond what the average person would have to promote the book. I didn't have a platform or a big email list, and I didn't know anyone else who did. So I asked myself what the best way to promote my new book would be. Now, I'm going to pause here for a minute, and I'm going to say, this is not a blueprint to say, go do exactly what Hal did But, but this is an opportunity to even say, okay, what is the best way to market your book? And he really thought about this and this was strategic. Alright, so I'm going to continue on with this quote. After speaking to a lot of authors and doing online research, I decided that the fundamental strategy I was going to implement was being interviewed on podcasts. I surmised that the type of person who listens to podcast interviews is the same type of person who invests in personal development. It's also a very cost effective strategy since being interviewed on podcasts costs nothing other than your time. I have since done more than 300 podcast interviews, plus produced more than 200 of my own Achieve youe Goals podcast episodes. It took me 18 months of interviews just to sell again what I had sold in the first month after the book was released. And he gives this graph and it shows that, that he just had little, little, little sales. And then at the end it started to take off. And he says, the graph shows the value of remaining committed to your process for an extended period of time, regardless of your short term results. That was 18 months in which I saw very few sales in proportion to the amount of time and effort I was investing in securing and conducting podcast interviews, as you can see by looking at the graph. And again, like I said, the graph is just, it shows like for many, many months it was just a small amount of sales and then at the end it starts to take off. But he says, as you can see, I didn't sell many books from December 2012 through June 2014, which means my effort wasn't paying dividends in the short term. Had I been emotionally attached to my short term results, I never would have made it. And this is where I'm taking a break again. This is where I see so many authors getting so emotionally touched. Because you know what, our books are like our babies, right? We have our book babies and then we get so discouraged when we don't see those immediate results. But let me continue on just a couple more paragraphs. He says, but I believed in the book and we talked about that last week. He says, I believed in the book and knew that it would change people's lives. So I stuck to my process and remained focused on the big picture. Ultimately, my commitment to my process paid off. As of today, the Miracle Morning has surpassed over 1 million copies sold. Half of them in the United States and the other half spread across more than 100 countries around the world. Further evidence that although achieving significant goals often takes longer than we might want or expect fact. When we maintain unwavering faith and continue to put forth extraordinary effort over an extended period of time, we can create miracles. And what I want to say is God can create miracles, right? We believe he is the One. He is the author of those miracles. And so I just want to close with a couple action steps. Number one, have you ever felt discouraged with your marketing efforts? If so, journal about it and and what you think worked well and what you think didn't. Number two, marketing is a marathon and not a sprint. Are you willing to invest the time needed to market your book? If so, commit to weekly business meetings with God to receive strategy and direction from Him. And we have a previous podcast episode all about this plus a free download that can help you do this. But commit to meeting with him and receiving from Him. Strategy of what to do with what will work for your book. One of my favorite verses for business is Galatians 6:19. So let's not get tired of doing what is good at just the right time. We will reap a harvest of blessing if we don't give up. So I just want CJ to go ahead and close us in prayer.

Oh Father, I just thank you so much for each and every one of these authors, these aspiring radio writers. We ask, Lord, that you would give us the patience and endurance to last for the long haul. And I pray that our blood, sweat and tears that we've poured into these books would be rewarded with not just sales, but fruit from the content of the books and how it impacts people. We ask, Lord, that every single listener that's hearing this would be given wisdom and understanding and creativity in their marketing efforts. I pray that you give them those aha moments that perhaps they've never thought of, but an idea just hits them out of the blue one day. I just ask that you would give each person specific ideas for their books that would really yield results in terms of sales and also their books getting into the right hands at the right time. So we thank you for what you're going to bring about through our seeking you and remaining patient and enduring for the long haul. We ask this in Jesus name. Amen.

Amen. And we just thank you all for being here and for being a listener of this podcast and you. You know, it would really mean the world to us for you just to take a minute and leave a review of this podcast. If you do, just go ahead and take a screenshot and email us@supportrainingauthors.com and we'd love to send you a free access to my course procrastination and Publication. So definitely just take a moment, do that and email us. We love you guys and we will talk to you soon. Bye Bye Bye bye.

Thank you for listening to this episode of Kingdom Writers. We believe that you, as a Christian writer, have a specific role to play in the Kingdom of Heaven to impact lives for eternity.

And because of this, we choose to pour out our lives into encouraging writers like you to not only tell your stories, but to take the courageous step of self publishing your stories in books that will outlive you and leave behind a power powerful legacy. This podcast is sponsored by Christian Book Academy where we help you give birth to your books. We invite you to join our community of Kingdom Writers.