Professional authors always have one thing in common: they seek an audience for their work, and almost always a bigger audience. Having a strong and growing readership helps turn writing into a sustainable, full-time career. But what leads to readership growth? And what can you do, especially without a publisher’s help (or a large bankroll), to encourage that growth?

This workshop offers hands-on guidance and discussion to help you better identify and grow a readership, regardless of how you’re published. Sometimes this is called “platform development.” Author platform is one of the most difficult concepts to explain in publishing, partly because everyone defines it a little differently. But by far the easiest explanation of platform is: visibility to your target audience—which translates into an ability to sell more books.

Platform building requires consistent, ongoing effort over the course of a career; the work is never really done, and your strategy and approach will evolve over time. It benefits from incremental improvements and pushing the boundaries of your own skill set. This workshop will help you sort through various strategies, tools, and opportunities available and what makes sense at this point in time for the next stage of your career.

Key elements of this workshop include:

· Knowing your readership. Learn how to better develop your understanding of readers and who they are.

· Improving your book’s description and your author branding. Learn how to “optimize” your books to appeal to your target audience, and offer a coherent marketing message online—plus how to find the language of readers to help your efforts.

· Developing your lead generation. Every author needs strategies and tools to reach new readers. We’ll explore various media and methods you might try.

· Solidifying your digital media foundation: Learn best practices for your author website, email, and social media, to better reach and engage readers.

· Building community and relationships. Identify opportunities to improve your reach through collaborations, partnerships, and influencers.

This workshop will help you start where you are, and grow in the year (and years) ahead. There will also be opportunities to discuss your own efforts, participate in impromptu critiques, and offer feedback and insight to your fellow authors.

 ABOUT THE INSTRUCTOR

 Jane Friedman spent 15 years working inside the traditional publishing industry and is the former publisher of Writer’s Digest. In addition to being a columnist with Publishers Weekly and an instructor with the Authors Guild, she is a professor with The Great Courses on the topic of how to get traditionally published.

Her most recent book is The Business of Being a Writer (The University of Chicago Press, 2018), a comprehensive guide on how to make a living as a writer. She has been a full-time freelancer and publishing consultant since 2014, and maintains an award-winning blog for writers at JaneFriedman.com.

Her speaking engagements have taken her around the world to BookExo America, Frankfurt Book Fair, the Dubai Knowledge Summit, SXSW, and hundreds of writing conferences and creative writing programs. Her expertise on the publishing industry and the future of authorship has been featured by NPR’s Morning Edition and All Things Considered, PBS, The Washington Post, and the National Press Club. She has also served on grant panels for the National Endowment for the Arts.