Introverts and Book Promotion—3 Ways to Avoid Depleting Your Energy
How can someone who prefers solitude or small groups amplify their work into the world without burning out?
This was the question on my mind as I headed into a promotional season for my second book, WILD WORDS. Even though the publication push is fleeting, it’s still an essential period to embrace and prepare for. It’s also a time of strangeness, which I was reminded of not too long ago when I was reading a book of poetry before bed.
When the book closed, its spine caught my attention. I noticed the glue, how the pages were grouped together, and then thought of my own book at the printer, somewhere far off where I couldn’t touch it or change it. I could only wait.
These final weeks before a book comes out is a kind of liminal space, where as an author you’re no longer in the thick of writing, but not yet able to reveal your work completely. When publication day arrives, suddenly your story becomes known, you talk about yourself more frequently, and you’re maybe simultaneously thrilled and terrified. Sometimes I just want to disappear, and other times I’m ready to swipe on a coat of lipstick and meet my incredible readers. Most of the time, I land somewhere in between—there’s a quiet introspection pulling me inward, and also a tug toward openness.
Lessons From My First Book Launch
When EAT THIS POEM was published in 2017, I traveled to four different states, and did three local events in Southern California, where I lived at the time. This wasn’t an enormous book tour, but I certainly had a handful of things on the calendar. I was on podcasts and participated in a “digital book tour” where I guest posted on other people’s blogs or had them write a feature about my book.
In many ways, it was all the standard book promotion stuff happening, but I do remember feeling like the events were fairly close together. Both locally and farther away, the majority of my in-person appearances happened within the first three months of publication. It might not sound like too much to have two book events in one month, but when you have a full-time job and an infant, suddenly everything takes on a whole new level of coordination and sometimes it can feel like a lot.
The second time around, I decided to do things a bit differently…
Tip 1: Travel Less
When WILD WORDS was published in 2019, I traveled to fewer events. As fun as it is to hop on a plane and show up at bookstores in other cities, from a more strategic, return-on-investment perspective, it doesn’t always make sense. Sometimes you don’t sell all that many books during a bookstore event, or don’t have much of a turnout (yes, I once showed up to an event with zero attendees.) In addition to traveling less, I also prioritized events in my home state. Local events are closer to access, which means less time away from home, so they’re easier to add to the calendar. And speaking of calendars, after the experience with my first book, I’ve started planning in buffer days after events to prioritize rest and recovery.
Tip 2: Embrace Podcasts
Podcasting is a great way to promote books because you’re in front of a targeted audience for a particular topic relevant to your work. Plus, if you’re an introvert, you can wear sweatpants and still get your story into the world without having to go anywhere. Consider putting together a “podcast tour,” and maybe even starting your own show if that feels right.
Tip 3: Focus on Core Readers
I promoted WILD WORDS a few different ways to my core readers. The first was hosting a private Facebook group, which I started years before the book came out. Any writer will tell you, and I’ve said this many times, that books are written alone but they spread their wings because of others. Because of enthusiastic readers who tell their friends, who tell someone else, who create a chain of events that ultimately puts your book in the hands of more people. Six months before the book came out, I created the Wild Words Book Exchange. My publisher printed ARC copies (advance reader copies that go out to media/PR ahead of book publication) and I kept a few extras to use for this event. I had readers sign-up using a Google form, and the book traveled from reader to reader around the country. When someone finished reading, they emailed me, and I gave them the name and address of the next reader for them to send the book to. I asked readers to cover the mailing cost, as well as to submit early reviews for the book on Amazon and Goodreads.
There were several things I loved about this exchange. First of all, it allowed me to connect even more deeply with readers who have been around for a long time and have really championed my work over the years. As I mentioned, it helped get those early reviews in that are so essential to books doing well, especially in those first weeks of publication.
And I loved that it was a physical copy of the book. I’ve been on launch teams for other authors who have given a PDF copy, and I did that myself for EAT THIS POEM because it’s all I had available, but I think there’s something really special about being able to hold an early copy of a physical book that you were already planning to read and support anyway. So if you’re able, hosting a book exchange like this, could be a really great way to generate some early enthusiasm for your book before it comes out—it’s a real grassroots approach with your readers that can have some great results.
Tip 4: Conserve Your Energy
As an introvert, I only have so much energy in a day I can devote to Season of Visibility tasks—events, podcast interviews, even drafting guest posts—these can all fuel depletion. So the key, I think, is knowing this, and then being mindful about how you schedule your time during this period.
Naturally, the closer you get to book launch, and then those early publication weeks are going to be busier and more intense, that’s just the nature of these things. However, I do think there are things you can do to help keep yourself steady.
One example is podcasting (see above). Whether it’s recording my own solo show, doing an interview, or being interviewed myself for someone else’s show, I really try not to book things back-to-back. I can record maybe two solo shows in a day, but I never do more than one interview, and I often will schedule a recovery day in between to just give myself some extra space.
With in-person events, if you’re able to have some schedule flexibility, not booking them every weekend, or not hopping on a plane every other week. The boundaries will be different for everyone, sometimes things are a little bit out of our hands in terms of timing, but whenever I’m able to exercise any control over what I’m working on and when, I do that with the intention in mind to give myself a cushion to relax, recover, not drain all my energy at once, or give myself a day to replenish if it’s a busier week.
Something else to keep in mind that’s easy to forget is you don’t need everything to be done by launch day. It’s tempting to feel like every guest post, every podcast interview, every event needs to be on the calendar, and yes, from a publisher’s point of view, those first 4-6 weeks are pretty critical for books, so it’s important to have things happening during that time—however, you also wrote a book, which means it’s out there for months, years, decades even.
So when you start feeling overwhelmed about all you need to do to promote your book and especially prepare for the big publication day, don’t forget that it’s OK to write a guest post two months after launch, or go on another round of podcasts six months later, or continue to travel for events a year later. Play the long game.
Tip 5: Make a Spreadsheet
A spreadsheet is paramount. For each book, I have a master doc, and then I make sheets for each type of promotion, like podcasts, guest posts, and event locations. (This is also something that might be developed alongside your publication team and/or agent.) When you first create it, it’s really a chance to go wild with ideas. Put everything you can possibly think of in there, add links, add notes about pitching and people you might already know. And then you can organize it in a way that feels less overwhelming. You might want to highlight the top five podcasts you want to pitch and focus on those first. Or come up with a few guest post ideas that you want to start outlining. Don’t try to do everything at once. That’s basically just a recipe for overwhelm.
Here’s something I once believed to be true about launching a book. Before I went through it myself, I sort of thought the whole experience of publishing was an ending of some kind. Holding a real book in my hands seemed like it was an arrival, a finishing. I was now part of a club I’d longed to be in for years. I was somewhere sturdy and permanent, that no one could take away from me. And while it's true, in one sense, that publishing a book does signal an ending of a journey, I've come to realize that it's not actually an ending at all.
It’s an expansion, and an invitation, because our real work is to start again.
If you're waiting and hoping to publish a book one day, I hope you'll remember the truth, which is, the writing life is a journey. Books are certainly markers along the way, but once you write one, there will be more stories to tell, more writing caves to enter, and more emotional digging to be done. If it hasn’t already, the blank page will beckon once more.
