5 Brilliant Things Writers Can Do to Overcome a Small Platform

As editorial director for a major trade publisher, I regularly receive questions like the following:

  • How big a platform is big enough?
  • Am I out of luck if I don’t have much of a platform?
  • What should I do if my platform is still smallish?
  • Do I really have to be a superstar to get published? (This last one is usually asked with just a hint, or more, of exasperation.)
photo credit: Missus Martian via photopin cc

photo credit: Missus Martian via photopin cc

It is true that the number 1 reason we turn books down is lack of platform, and I suspect that’s true for most trade houses. But I have some good news: Platform is not the only thing publishers care about, and determination and hustle can take you a long way.

In this vein I want to offer 5 things to do that will undoubtedly help you build your platform and increase your chances of landing a book contract.

1. Measure hustle, not traffic

I can’t take credit for this little gem. It comes from my friend Jon Acuff. He should know. Jon went from stockpiling useless business cards and URLs to becoming gainfully self-employed and hitting the New York Times bestsellers list. (By the way, Jon just announced his next book. Super excited about it.)

Especially in the beginning it’s important to measure your hustle, not your traffic stats or your Twitter followers. Are you posting a blog post every week or every day or whatever it is you want to do? Are you getting to bed early enough to get up early and write? Measure that stuff, forget the rest.

2. Focus on your email list

I know this sounds like a contradiction of the first step above, but hang with me. The most important thing you can do is measure your hustle, but if you’re going to zero in on any one stat, make it your email list. Actually, I don’t recommend obsessing over the number. I recommend going to school on how to increase that number steadily over time.

Number of email subscriptions is by far the most important platform metric. (Tweet that!)

It easily trumps the importance of Facebook fans and Twitter followers because you own your email list. You can decide how or how not to use it. You have far less control over your interaction with your Facebook and Twitter tribes because you don’t own those services.

3. Emphasize growth

When you’re interacting with a potential agent or publisher, in a book proposal or over coffee, don’t talk about the size of your platform now. Talk about how much it’s grown over a period of time and about the strategy you have in place to keep it moving up and to the right.

4. Don’t neglect concept and writing

Platform is at most a third of the publishing success formula. The other two main components are your book concept and the quality of your writing. We regularly approve books for publication that are attached to relatively small platforms but deliver in spades when it comes to concept and writing. A compelling concept and amazing writing can take you a long ways. By the way, if you’d like a great infographic how to come up with a compelling book concept, click here.

5. Answer this: What can I do today?

It’s easy to get overwhelmed. As a platform builder myself, sometimes I get so discouraged that things aren’t happening faster. But I need to keep coming back to this question: What can I do today? If I keep asking that question and then do whatever is within my power to do, I’m confident that one day I’ll look up and see significant results.

Question: Which of these ideas resonates the most with you right now? You can leave a comment by clicking here.

Bonus Content: The best way to start a nonfiction book project is by writing a book proposal. I’d love to give you a free copy of my Book Proposal Guidelines, used by countless authors to write their book proposals. 

Download

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Categories: Blogging, Book Proposal, Goals, Life, Platform, Publishing, Uncategorized, Work Habits, Writing

Please note: I reserve the right to delete comments that are offensive or off-topic.

29 thoughts on “5 Brilliant Things Writers Can Do to Overcome a Small Platform”

  1. I just added improving my email list to my 2018 goals. Another super helpful post, Chad. Thanks!

  2. What can I do today? Create a schedule of blog posts and put it on my Google calendar so I can’t ignore what I should be doing.

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  6. Thank you for your encouraging article. I am doing my best to get my book published, I am actually going the self publishing way.

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  9. I love what can you do today. It’s much easier to be gracious to yourself when you take it in small pieces.

    Also, every time I write something, it has a way of touching someone who needs it at just that moment. I have feeling that is true for all who write from the heart. I try to remind myself that one person is just as important as thousands.

  12. Hi Chad!

    I thought I would share something that has made a huge difference in the last few months for my platform and I think it might help someone. I have steadily grown my blog over the last 3 years but never really saw a giant growth spurt at any one time. It was just a nice, consistent climb. Then, in December, I wrote a post that went somewhat viral (shared 3600 times). What one viral post did for me that month and in the months since then has outweighed hundreds of other posts. That post was simply a list I put together of the 65 most important apologetics questions Christian parents need to learn to answer. I never expected it to get the attention it did, but it struck a chord because people realized they couldn’t answer many of them. I quickly added to the post that I would be blogging the answers to those questions over the next year, “so if you’d like to learn how to answer these, sign up for my email list!” Since December, that single post has (directly or indirectly) led to over 1,600 new email subscribers. I learned a few things from that experience:

    1) A viral post is worth hundreds and hundreds of non-viral posts, in terms of platform building. I’ve always believed in quality over quantity blog posts, but this really solidified it in my head.

    2) All viral posts are not created equal. I somehow got lucky enough to have another one go even more viral in February – this one was shared over 12,000 times. At first, I was jumping up and down because I thought that automatically meant tons more fans and subscribers. But then I noticed the post was getting shared a ton, but I wasn’t capturing subscribers and fans at a comparable rate. Lesson I learned: just because a post goes viral, doesn’t mean the visitors will be motivated to want to hear more from you. About half way through that day, I added a link to my December post that gave a reason for people to sign up (to get answers to the 65 questions). It was relevant to the post that was going viral that day. I immediately saw the email subscriptions pour in. I still kick myself for not capturing what would have been hundreds of more people before I added the link. I learned so much though – traffic alone isn’t going to build your platform. People HAVE to have a reason to stick around. My original post in December gave them that reason, so pointing people back to it solved the “problem.”

    3) None of this means that all the average posts written to that point were meaningless. On the contrary, I wouldn’t have had the base of readers to spur my December post into viral action if I hadn’t written for months and months. It paved the way for this to happen. And if I hadn’t taken the time to make my site look nice and function well before that, people wouldn’t have signed up.

    4) If you can write a post that outlines the topics you’ll be writing on over the next few months (like my 65 questions), it gives people a reason to sign up. Might be worth a try. 🙂

    5) I started posting more links to relevant news stories on Facebook and noted a couple that were shared thousands of times. I decided to take one as a test and write a post about it, seeing it was a story of high interest. That blog post got shared 2,600 times! So, depending on the nature of your blog, put links to stories on your FB page and see what gets a lot of interest. Then try writing on it.

    Just thought someone might find this helpful!

  13. Thank you for this post! I’m almost crying with relief at your message.
    We finally had the money to take my site off wp.com so I could increase my email list conversion, but things are still tiny compared to what my ideal publisher could expect, but I’m stubborn enough to have continued plugging away even without home internet access this Summer.
    Your assurance that great writing, content, and upward growth are the keys is a breath of fresh air!

  14. I’m finding that great writing is still the key element. Two years agi I wrote an award-winning blog post, “Things I wish I’d told my husband,” that was re-posted a few times on my tiny (63 followers) blog. Someone else must have re-posted because last week I got a bunch of new followers and several comments. One was asking me how long it takes to “get an established blog like yours…” I have been blogging three years and doing little promotion but the best written post still resonate. All the rest is important, but make the writing the best thing you’ve ever read.

    • Love this, Francine! I once heard a speaker say something like “Do such a great job serving people that you can’t help being paid for what you do.” That resonates… You’re pointing to a similar idea: Make your content so good that people just HAVE to share it. Easier said than done, no doubt, but still worth pursuing.

  15. Thanks, Chad! I needed to hear this today, as for the past few days I’ve been suffering the Small Platform Blues. (Although “small” might be generous.) Great reminders to focus on habit and keep moving forward one day at a time.

    • Rome wasn’t built in a day. A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. Take it one step at a time. They’re cliche, but these maxims stick because they’re true. Sometimes it’s hard to be content with one little step after another, but I’m convinced there are no shortcuts. That’s the only way to success.

  17. Thank you, Chad, for being encouraging about this! It is a topic that can easily incite despair.

    The one that I’m working hard on is #2, the email list. It is hard work, but I’m convinced both that it is worth it and that there are solid strategies out there to make it happen. Copyblogger has great stuff on this, both in their example and their content.

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