I have been a published author for two years roughly now. During this time I have mastered the art of savvy marketing and promoting, sussed out what works for me and my genre and what doesn’t work. I have made many great connections who have become great friends over time. A few of these great people I now work with and we help each other to cross promote.

It’s amazing how far one can come from their humble beginnings as a first time writer. Take me for instance, when I first started this self-publishing of my books I was so green that I made the grass look dull!!! Really, I’m not kidding you. I made every mistake possible and I have learned by each and every one of those mistakes. I have learned from others and paid attention as I have journeyed. I now consider myself an experienced writer and one that has learned a great deal from this business over the last two years as well as from my silly mistakes, which I don’t regret making by the way, as those mistakes made me a stronger and a much better writer.

I believe that no matter how good you are at something there will always be room for improvement, no one is that perfect that they can’t improve on their craft. However, there are many mean spirited and cruel people out there in the social sphere. People who are intent on bringing others down. Why, you may ask? Well, I can only assume these people are not satisfied with where they are at in their own career and don’t like to see others in the same business doing well. The people I notice complaining about authors on Facebook for instance are the ones that are not selling too many books, the ones that are not doing so well generally. By their Facebook posts they seem to believe they are above their fellow authors and trash them because the authors are selling books and they are not, although these people do not name names which is a small blessing and shows some sort of consideration.   There are many reasons we could consider, but I just think if there are people out there who are intent on using places like Facebook and Twitter on a daily basis to knock authors and constantly critisising them, well, they really are not in a good place themselves are they? I have deleted several people from my FB page for this reason, although these posts I refer to were not directed at me, I was tired of seeing their daily critical posts in my newsfeed. I cannot abide the constant bringing down of people, in my opinion that sort of negative energy is not what I want in my newsfeed or my life.

It amazes me what people will put up with, and how afraid of these people they become as they fear they may be targeted next by these truly mixed up individuals who clearly are not busy enough as they have so much time to live out their every thought on FB!!! I guess I am thankful that I mix with a fabulous group of authors who support and advise me and are so  like minded. Who just want to get on with their writing regardless and are a positive influence in each others lives.

There have been some really shocking things going on recently, authors hiding behind websites to trash other authors,deliberately writing bad reviews on their books and much more. This kind of behaviour from so called professionals makes me really mad. Why do they feel the need to have to do this? What can they possibly gain? This sort of thing says more about them as individuals than anything they could possibly say about fellow hard working authors. They probably know this and that’s why they hide behind websites and not giving away the details of who is behind such sites. I guess this sort of thing will always go on. Sadly there will always be people who are only happy when they are making other people unhappy. I have one thing to say about that, “KARMA” will always play its part in the end…

If there is one piece of advice I can offer anyone out there who is just starting out in the self-pub industry, don’t get too caught up in the whole social media side of things. Be strict with yourself and only allow yourself say 30 to 40 minutes per day on the social media sites to promote and catch up with your group or groups and so on. Avoid all the negative people and if you’re spending more time on social media than you are writing, well you are doing something wrong. After all, remember what you are supposed to be doing, what you love and what will bring you the rewards in the end, “WRITING.”  More books will lead to more sales, more groups and more chat won’t!! Stay focused on your dream and never, never, never let anyone say you can’t, because you can and if you’re determined enough you will succeed…