Platform: A Jumping Off Point

If you're like me, you're a writer who's earned their chops on the page and shamelessly promoted yourself a time or two. You're also trying to get published and doing whatever it takes to stand out from the crowd. Unfortunately, if you're anything like me, the one area that you fall short is your platform.
Are you familiar with this term?
A platform is an editor-invented word for "a way that the author can pick up the publicity slack." Fewer people are being signed to book deals nowadays, due in large part to the slumping economy. Agents and editors can only spread their funds so thin. If an author has a strong platform--there's that word again--it gives him or her a leg up on other hopeful authors. Possessing a strong public presence can make agents and editors salivate when you approach them.
It also tells them that you are: A) A serious writer
                                       and B) You know what you're talking about
Until recently, a solid "platform" was more of a concern for non-fiction writers. Along with a winning book proposal, an agent would ask the author about their platform. In other words "What are you planning to do to take some of the advertising heat off of us?" This practice has spread to all genres. It is now an vital part of any authors life.
So how do you develop a platform?
Here's where it gets interesting. We live in the internet age. Throwing yourself out there just got that much easier. Start by setting up your own website. That's what I'm working on now. I went with weebly.com. It's a free hosting website and there are lots of free sites to choose from.
On your new website, link the crap out of yourself. I'm not kidding! This is your chance to shine. Don't worry about how conceited you look. Slather the self-promotion all over your website. It's yours after all. It's all about you. Get a Facebook page just for your writing and link it. Get on Twitter, start a blog. Enter all the writing contests you can handle. Get yourself out there any way that you can.
Ta-da! You're off to a good platform start.
Then check out any number of books on the subject. For instance, an author friend of mine and Facebook buddy Christina Katz wrote a book called Get Known Before the Book Deal (See below.)
 

• Learn the definition and meaning of an author platform
• Find out why most books fail
• Answer the three key questions about platform to increase your chances of success

Excerpted from Get Known Before the Book Deal by Christina Katz



Having your own platform is something of a mystery to aspiring writers like me. I'm a nobody. I come from Small Town Nowhere. Who's going to remember me? There are ways and I intend to find them. You're officially caught up to my level of expertise. Can any of you supply me with a marketing idea that I haven't thought of yet? I'd love to hear about it. In the meantime, good luck to you and good luck to me. I'm sending my friend Christina a knowing wink ;-)
TTYS