Often attracting an audience (aka building a platform) feels difficult because we misunderstand its purpose.

We think it’s about:

• Sending an email or writing a blog post every week
• Coming up with something brilliant to say on a consistent basis
• Sharing about our writing journey regularly

These are all things we may end up doing when we’re building a platform, but if your focus is on these things, you’re more likely to burn out and give up.

What Tim Grahl Said

Tim Grahl, author of Your First 1,000 Copies, said something really smart about this a little while ago, and it stuck with me.

He said, “Building a platform is about gathering a community of people who like to geek out about the same things you like to geek out about.”

That’s a smart thing to say for at least two reasons.

First, it’s true. If your goal is merely to write a blog post every week or be consistently brilliant or share about your writing life, not only will you be more likely to burn out. You’re also more likely to attract readers who will not be interested in your book.

Building an audience is hard enough. Imagine spending a lot of time and energy to attract a large group of people who are not interested in your book. My stomach turns just thinking about it!

But if you build an audience of people who are interested in the same things that interest you, now we’re onto something!

If you build an audience of folks who care about the same stories and messages you like to share in your writing, now you have an audience who will run, not walk, to buy your books!

Here’s the other reason what Tim said was smart. If you approach building an audience as gathering a community of people who are fascinated by the same things that fascinate you, building an audience just became a whole lot more fun.

How to “Geek Out”

In other words, this isn’t about sending an email or publishing a blog post every week. This is about telling people what you’re excited about every week.

This isn’t about being consistently brilliant. It’s about pointing to something both you and your readers will find helpful.

This isn’t about sharing about your writing life, though, sure, sometimes you’ll want to do that. This is about gathering a group of folks who are interested in the same kind of content you like to write.

If you’re writing self-help or business books, for example, don’t feel like you have to come up with some brilliant idea every week. Rather, point out what’s already out there that you find brilliant. And share why you think it’s brilliant.

If you’re writing memoir, don’t tell me how the writing process is going every week. Instead, share helpful resources that relate to the themes of your memoir.

If you’re writing science fiction, stop telling me about your query rejections. Tell me what your favorite sci-fi movies are and why they’re your favorites.

If you begin to “geek out, out loud,” as it were, you’ll start attracting the right audience for your book. And you’ll have a more fun in the process.

Question: How can you ‘geek out, out loud’ for your audience? You can leave a comment by clicking here.