Confessions of a Reluctant Brand

 

Writers do more than writing, as we know. Which bit of the publishing-business side of this caper would you ditch if you could? Or, which bit of the business side would you happily do for yourself if you had to?

 

If I wanted to be in Marketing, I’d have gone to business school and started saying things like synergy with a straight face. Instead, I became a writer — which is like shouting into the Void and hoping someone out there is fluent in your brand of echo.

But no. Turns out, being a writer in this economy (said in a dramatic noir voice, lighting a metaphorical cigarette) means becoming a full-time content creator, part-time social media strategist, and occasional tap-dancing bear.

Writing — the part with the words and the coffee and the sweatpants — is only 40% of the job. The other 60%? That’s business, baby.

And if I could, I’d ditch exactly one thing: self-promotion.

I know, I know. “But, you have to be your biggest advocate.” And I am. I advocate for myself every morning by making coffee and not quitting. I’m also my own case manager for mental health. Standing on the proverbial street corner on the Net with a megaphone yelling “READ MY BOOK!” feels about as natural as selling vacuum cleaners door-to-door in a bikini. (Bold. Uncomfortable. Likely to backfire and includes wedgies — the variants vary from Atomic to Melvin. IYKYK.)

It’s not that I don’t want you to read my book. I do! I worked hard on it. Bled for it. Gave up the free time called Life and sacrificed the few milligrams of sanity I have… and yet telling people to buy it feels like I’m hawking a timeshare. “Just five minutes of your time, and I’ll change your life — with a 300-page emotionally devastating narrative arc!”

My inner introvert wants to whisper modestly from the shadows, “If it’s not too much trouble, and only if you want to, you could maybe… sort of… read it?”

Meanwhile, my inner Don Draper is chain-smoking and screaming, “NO ONE BUYS A SECRET! GOTTA BE SEEN AND HEARD IN THIS BUSINESS. A DRINK?”

So, yes. If I could burn one business task to the ground and walk away in slow motion, it would be self-promotion. Not because I don’t think it’s important, but because it feels like performing heart surgery on myself — necessary, but deeply awkward and I have no anesthesia.

Now, if I had to pick a business-related task I’d happily do? Editing. Not the glamorous kind where you cut unnecessary chapters like a literary samurai, but the nerdy kind — tightening character arcs, oiling transitions, corralling rogue commas. Give me that and I see the electricity.

IT’S ALIVE! IT’S ALIVE.

But building a Brand? Creating Content? Convincing strangers that my book is not only worthy of their time but also better than sleep, Netflix, and every other book ever written?

I say everything I can about my books. Niente. Post a funny picture of my tuxedo cat Munchkin, and the world knows I exist for a nanosecond.

Still, I do it.
I pitch.
I post.
I persist.

Because at the end of the day, the books don’t find readers by osmosis. They find them because we believe — awkwardly, earnestly, ridiculously — that our stories matter.

Funny how life is just a grown-up version of the childhood playground or high school. Except there’s no Mr. Rogers to be your friend, the girl you asked out thinks you’re a garden gnome, and your inner Don Draper just lights another cigarette, pours himself a drink, and shakes his head.