#337: Marketing Minute: What to Do When You Struggle with Feeling Self-Promotional

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 Shelli 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.

Have you ever struggled with the feeling of self promotion in regards to your books? Hi, my name is Shelly Hitz and welcome to the Marketing Minute episode on the Kingdom Writers Podcast. And Terri from our Facebook group. We have a free Facebook group called Kingdom Writers Community at this time. You can join go by going to trainingauthors.com group and she shared with us this struggle. She says I struggle with feeling self promotion in regard to my self published children's book and I'd like help and encouragement as I seek to get my second children's story out. And so, Terri, you are not alone. We often have these struggles as writers and I've heard this over and over again. I've even talked about this before on the podcast, but I just feel like it's such an important topic that, that I wanted to cover it again. So if you are at the process that you have a published book and you are looking for ideas to market it, we have a resource for you. You can go to trainingauthors.com ideas and there you can download our PDF with 27 book marketing ideas and that will just give you some great places to get started and to, you know, just reach more people and inspire, inspire more lives. But today we're going to be talking about when you're struggling with that feeling of self promotion. There is a very real thing that we face that yes, marketing can be sleazy, slimy, self promotional. It really depends on how you approach it. So let's talk about three things that I really think make a difference. The first is just knowing that marketing equals relationships. So marketing does not equal a sale. So we're not talking about the sleazy, like slick car salesman or Internet marketer. You know, like a lot of times we have these thoughts in our minds, like, oh, I'm going to be. People are going to think I'm that person. No, marketing is simply building a relationship. So how have you defined marketing in the past? You know, you might have a distorted view of marketing and it just may be that you need to change that up. And so one of the things that I really encourage you to do is think about it as just like a friend or someone that you are getting to know. And that's where we move into step number two. Permission based marketing is really the foundation. And so what do I mean by permission based marketing? Well, I mean that you are getting someone's permission to send them more information. So you're not just bombarding people with buy my book, buy my, buy my book. They're choosing, they're saying, they're raising their hand. They're like, yes, I want that. I am interested, please send it to me. I mean, when you are solving someone's problem, when you're helping them, when you're entertaining them or whatever it is that your book does and they really want that or they really need that, they'll be like, yes, please, I want that. Send it to me. And so I like to describe it as inviting someone to your home for coffee versus being that person that's standing on the corner of the street with a bullhorn trying to get people's attention. What's going to make a bigger impact? Sure, the person with the bullhorn may get a little bit of results, but it's not going to be that great. Let's just be honest. But if you specifically meet someone, let's say you meet them at church and you find that you have some things in common and you want to get to know them and you say, hey, I'd love to have you come over to my home for coffee or tea or whatever you're into. And they're like, sure, that would be fun. I would love that. So you see the difference. You've found someone that has something in common with you, they're interested in moving that relationship further, and then you've invited them and then they said yes. Whereas the bullhorn, you're interrupting that person's day. You are an interruption and many times an annoyance. And people are just like, what are you even doing? Can you please stop?

Do you feel the difference? It is night and day difference and kingdom writers. When you use permission based marketing, it's going to feel different. It's not going to feel so self promotional. It's going to just feel like you're building relationships, you're building your tribe, you're building people that you can pour into, that you can influence, you can even potentially disciple or whatever it is that you're doing with your books. It's going to feel different. You're making like a lot of times legitimate friends. Now may just be Internet friends or email friends or whatever it is, but I have made legitimate friends through marketing this way. And what I recommend is if you have not gotten our many marketing Messages workshop yet I teach in depth on permission marketing and how to use it for social media, especially specifically. And so I highly recommend that you get that workshop. It's just $37, it comes with tons of templates and I really go into depth on how to word things, how to do things, but specifically for social media because that can be the trickiest one, I think. You know, if you're inviting someone to join your email list for, you know, for a free gift, kind of like I did at the beginning of this episode with our 27 book Marketing Ideas download, I invited you. And if you choose, if you're like, yes, I need that, then you'll sign up. That's permission marketing, right? With social media it gets a little trickier. So go to go to many marketing messages.com and you can check out the workshop there. I highly recommend it. If you're struggling with this feeling of being self promotional. I really think that this workshop, even if you're not as into social media, you can use the concepts in other ways, but you'll really learn the the foundation of Permission Based Marketing so the first thing is just to realize marketing equals relationships. The second is to use permission based marketing as the foundation of what you do. And the third is inviting God into the process. You know, around here we are all about having you invite God into the process of every part of the, you know, writing, publishing and marketing your book. So much advice out there on the Internet or online or at conferences, you know, it's just all about like, okay, this technique and this thing and learn this thing and go try this. And we teach all of those things too. I mean we teach those at our conferences as well. But we also have specific sessions and specific things where we are saying, come on, let's come back and let's realize we need to invite God into this process and allow him to lead and guide and direct us. And you know what? God, God has the best ideas. We can have a lot of good ideas, we can get a lot of good ideas from other people, but ultimately God can then guide and direct you as you have that 27 book marketing ideas PDF, have a business meeting with God and say, okay Lord, what is it that, you know, you want me to start with or focus on? Or maybe there's something that sticks out to you. If you're not even sure where to start with a business meeting with God or this is a new concept to you, you can get our free training@training authors.com businessmeeting and it's just some simple steps you can take to implement what I recommend being a weekly business meeting with God. And I truly believe it's one of the most important actions you can take as a Christian writer. Because I have seen firsthand, like when I involve God in the process, he gives me the best marketing ideas and they actually.

Or maybe I don't even know it's a it, you know, what, what's going to happen. But I just get this prompting, I get this idea and I follow through with it and then it takes off in ways I never even imagined. So number one, really see marketing as a relationship. And when you have a relationship, like when you are truly friends with somebody, it's different than when you're like just trying to sell someone something, you're trying to help them, you know, and sales is all about helping. But marketing, think of it as a relationship. And then number two, use permission based marketing. Make that the foundation of what you do. And when you do, that person is always giving you permission to go the next step. So it doesn't feel sleazy, it doesn't feel slimy because they're like, yes, please, I want that or yes, I'm interested. Number three, consider inviting God into the process through having regular business meetings with God. I really believe it will transform your marketing when you do. But this is just the tip of the iceberg and I just invite you again. If you haven't yet, sign up for our workshop minimarketingmessages.com you'll learn a lot more in that of even, you know, just the kingdom mindset around marketing, but also that foundation of permission based marketing. It is, it will really change the way you do things moving forward. So let me pray for you. So God, thank you so much for this opportunity that we have in, in, in this day and age to market our books online or in person and all of the different ways that you can use the words that we've written. And yes, it can feel difficult to put ourselves out there, but we're not putting ourselves out there, we're putting you out there. This is not to glorify us, it's to glorif. And no matter what anyone else thinks, this is between you and us. This is what you are inviting us to do. And we are just being obedient, Lord. We are, we are choosing to be courageous writers. We are choosing to take the next courageous step and to step out so that the message of our books can impact more lives. And we thank you for this. In Jesus name, amen. All right. Amen. Friends I hope that this encouraged you. There's a lot more I could go into regarding this topic, but I just wanted to share these three simple things just to kind of get you thinking, moving forward and not being stuck in that whole mindset of I don't want to market my book because I'm self promotional. Instead, I get to market my book and I get to meet a lot of really great people, get to have relationships with them and potentially impact their lives for eternity. Because God has trusted me with this. This is a stewardship thing. He's entrusted us with these books, with these words, and he will use it in the ways that he wants. It's all about him and him receiving the glory. Amen, Amen and Amen. All right, I will talk to you soon, friends. 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 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.