5 Reasons Your Self-Promotion Isn’t Working
Self-promotion is an absolute requirement if you want to build a brand or a business. If you’re not talking about what you do, no one else will know or care.
You’re trying to find clients, get a sponsored ad, make an affiliate sale, or sell something you made. Every day you’re hustling and grinding, but the results are limited. You tell yourself that maybe you’re just not cut out for this sex blogging, erotic writing, adult industry thing.
There are a lot of reasons why self promotion isn’t working. I can’t give you every possibility, but in my experience, these are the most common reasons.
You’re Spamming Everyone
If I go to your social media account and every other post is self-promotion, that’s a problem. Yes, you have books to sell or products to pimp. We all do. But if that’s all you ever share or post, you’ve just spammed everyone. Not only are people muting, blocking, or unfollowing you, they’re definitely not buying.
Talk about what you’re doing. Share your own resources and people you love. Interact with your followers. And for the love of all that’s sexy and kinky, do less self-promotion. Yes, repetition is important, but that’s over several days, weeks, and months, not multiple times in a day.
You’re Not Showing Us What You Can Do
Yes, you have to let the world (at large) know that you’re for hire, that you accept sponsored posts, that you’ve got products to sell. Of course, you do. But take a little writing advice on this one…show, don’t tell. When every thing you do is really just your hand out asking for something, no one knows that you’re capable of doing it, only that you want to.
Share the writing you’ve done for other sites (paid or not). Talk about the process of making your product. Talk about what you do as part of who you are, your brand, or just your life. This helps people associate the thing you want to get paid to do with who you are as a person and professional.
You Seem One-Dimensional
This goes hand-in-hand with spamming. If all we ever see is the hustler and the seller, but not the creative sex writer/creator person, you never give us a reason to care about you. You’re easy to forget and easier to ignore.
You get to have boundaries and protect your privacy — of course you do. But give us a glimpse of the person beneath the sales pitch. Your brand is you, so who the hell are you? That’s what we want to know. Not everyone will like you, but not everyone needs to.
You’re Still Too New
I applaud new sex writers and creators who come out of the gate promoting themselves as a professional for hire. You’re better than I was about that. It took a long time for me to do any self-promotion, and only after I was kind of sure someone would hire me.
Being new has it’s perks, just in enthusiasm level alone. But there’s a definite downside. You don’t have enough followers, name recognition, or trust built up yet to push through the crowd and get attention. Keep doing what you’re doing (and please don’t spam us), and you’ll get there. Sometimes all you need is time.
You’re Selling the Wrong Thing
You’re trying to sell your services or a product, but most companies want to buy more than that. They buy expertise, a voice, a work ethic, things of value that can’t always be quantified. So if you’re promoting yourself as a writer, what kind of writer are you? Do you always hit deadlines, provide feedback, help a publication or brand find it’s voice?
Sell what you do that’s better, different, special, and of value. A lot of people create the thing you do, but brands want to know how you do it better or different. What are you adding that they can’t find anywhere else? We get so focused on selling the article, the product, or the service that we forget we’re selling who we are, too.
Self-promotion isn’t inherently bad, it’s just that so many people do it badly. We do it too much and it doesn’t work or too little and it still doesn’t work. This isn’t a “build it, and they will come” kind of thing. You’ve got to let the world know you’re out here, ready to sell, looking to work with them, and willing to add value. But if it’s not working, take a look at your methods first.
Got thoughts on self-promotion that works or doesn’t work? Share in the comments below or talk to me on Twitter!
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