DuVernay, Bigalow, Coppola... Bond...

Maybe this is the 'They'.

They say you need six months for marketing once your book is finished. Who 'they' might be, is less clear. Self-publishing experts, bloggers, writing groups that have a decent online presence? All of the above. What's also less clear, is how that marketing actually manifests itself.

Some people are hell bent on trying to get their book into bricks and mortar book shops. I can understand this. It would be quite the thrill to be tracing my finger over the spines of an Atwood, Billingham, and Blume, before chancing upon a Bond. Quite the thrill indeed. 

This is how my attempts at cultivating a
 relationship would go. But it would be the
booksellers that needed the Kleenex
due to my awkwardness.

But not thrilling enough for me to take on this gargantuan task. Not at this point, anyway. It's virtually impossible to get an indie-published work into a brick and mortar bookshop, unless you've spent the previous years cultivating relationships with the owners. And as I tend to avoid small talk in all retail transactions I encounter, I've never quite made it beyond handing over my bank card and saying 'thank you', in whatever book shop I happen to be in. So, I have to market elsewhere.

The internet is the obvious place. I've got all the social medias (except the ones I really can't be faffed with) and I use them regularly. Twitter, Facebook, Insta, this blog - it's all happening in my online life. So I bang on about my book/s and hope people are moved enough to click the links or look them up.

It seems this isn't enough, though. More and more suggestions are out there. How to make people move from mild indifference to an actual sale. How to reach out to as many people as possible, widening the scope of people who might feel the urge to buy. So here we are. It's come to this. The future of marketing is video.

*chuckles to self* This is soooo me.

Yes, I realise that even the word video sounds like an 80s throwback these days, but this is where we are. Movies, clips, gifs... the moving image is what social media is about. It seems scrolling past an image is way easier than scrolling past a clip. People tend to linger, longer if something is moving. That's what I've gathered, anyway, from observing the way I use social media, and the way things are marketed to me. It was also something my sister-in-law mentioned when she started a new job. Videos are the future, according to her Comms team. 

Armed with this knowledge, I did a thing last year. I experimented with iMovie. This is a free programme that's been on my Mac since I bought it, yet has remained unsullied by my inner Spielberg. Not any longer. I dusted off that programme and had a play about. The first results - which long-time fans may have already seen on Facebook and Twitter - took the form of this....

It's basic, I know. But considering I had no clue what I was doing, or what buttons did what, I'm happy enough with it. And it was just for starters.

Fast-forward to the present day (about three months later, last week) and I had another go. This time I wanted to add some audio. I worked out a shortish way of explaining what Leeza McAuliffe Has Something To Say is all about, whilst sitting in my kitchen, and hopefully looking as natural as possible. Imagine I'm being interviewed by Melvyn Bragg or Mariella Frostrup. No, go on. Imagine it. And now imagine that instead of seasoned interviewers, the questions are being asked by titles inserted between clips. Now add some irritating sound effects and you've pretty much got the gist. 

A sneak previous of my seminal work - a screen shot of
an ad. Coming to a social media platform near you, soon.

I'm going to 'drop' these videos in a couple of weeks, once I've got my other adverts in place and ready to go. I'm also going to ask everyone to retweet and share the hell out of them, and possibly give away a free book to a lucky retweeter/sharer - it's all part of spreading the word.

But for now, I'll carry on filling this marketing period with as many constructive ways as I can to reach out to readers everywhere. Just call me <INSERT FAMOUS ADVERTISING AGENCY HERE>. Yeah, I'l be honest, I don't know any famous advertising agencies. It's not an area of the world with which I am familiar. This is all uncharted territory, and I'm winging it every step of the way. So, if you feel sorry for my pitiful attempts at playing with the big girls (Ogilvy and Mather, Dentsu, WPP group - I googled it!) then feel free to share this blog, retweet any links I put up, or use the power of speech to spread the word. It's all much appreciated. And it'll make the remaining two months of marketing time absolutely fly by.

Have a lovely week, folks.