Author: Katie Ganshert

A month and a half until my debut novel hits the shelves and my mind has shifted into marketing mode.

Buzz is on the brain. 

In a post titled The Birds and the Bees of Marketing, popular blogger Jody Hedlund defined buzz as the chatter, the excitement, the hype that surrounds our book.

So how can I generate this buzz? 

It’s a question I’ve been asking myself a lot lately. 

Thankfully, I don’t have to carry the marketing load on my own. Not even close. I happen to have the best in-house marketer in the world. Plus, an amazing in-house publicist and an amazing sales team. These people are doing things I could never even begin to accomplish on my own. They are the epitome of awesome. 

But still, I want to do my part. I want to do everything I can to help.

So I’ve been doing a lot of brainstorming. And I’m pretty excited about what’s on the horizon.

Will these ideas work?

Will people respond well?

Will they generate buzz?

Honestly, I have no idea. 

But as I dive into the unknown, here’s the biggest, most important lesson I’m learning about marketing:

We can’t be afraid of failure.

Not every idea will work out. Some things will flop. And you know what? That’s okay. 

Sure, public failure is embarrassing. Anytime I get a poor response (whether that be to a blog post or a Youtube video or a Facebook update or a contest or whatever), I feel stupid. I find myself second guessing the effort. Maybe even wishing I could take it back.

But here’s the thing.

We’ll never know unless we try.  

I remember sitting in a workshop at last year’s ACFW conference, listening to Allen Arnold and Jim Rubart and Julie Gwinn. One of them, I can’t remember who, brought up the Single Ladies Devestation Youtube video posted by Carlos Whittaker. It had millions of hits.

And Allen or Jim or Julie said, “Do you know how many videos he posted before that?”

Moral of the story?

It wasn’t his first.

He’d posted plenty others that languished in obscurity. But he kept publishing videos until one of them went viral. He had no idea that one would become so popular.

All he could do was throw it out there and see.

This is what I’m learning.

We have to be willing to throw things out there. To take risks. To try. Some stuff won’t work out. Hey. No big deal. Shake it off and keep throwing until something sticks.

Let’s Talk: What lessons have you learned about buzz and marketing? What ideas have you tried?