5 Reasons Why Building an Author Platform Is Awesome

At least once a week, entrepreneurial authors complain about having to build an author platform. 

I get it. Building an engaged, authentic audience can be a PITA — a pain in the ass. 

But it can also be awesome — and here’s five reasons why.

1. More visibility = more clients = more revenue.

Building an author platform and audience requires you to share your message and put yourself out there. Whether you send a weekly email, post on social media or write articles for websites like Medium — or do all of the above — that visibility will result in more eyes on your content, more ideal clients in your orbit and more money for yourself and your business. 

2. Sharing your content makes your book better.

I’ve been a professional collaborator and ghostwriter for nearly 10 years, and every entrepreneurial author I’ve worked with has struggled to know exactly what content to put in their book. Sharing your content with your audience and using objective data to figure out what resonates is key to creating a great book that not only sells to your audience, but helps to change their lives too.

3. The better you are at promoting and selling, the more successful your book will be.

The most successful authors I’ve worked with have been expert marketers who knew their audience inside and out. Launching, promoting and selling to your audience over and over again will help you get comfortable pitching your clients and asking for the sale. (As a bonus, you’ll also be much more chill and relaxed about the process, too.)

4. The bigger your audience is, the bigger sales you’ll see.

A lot of entrepreneurial authors assume every single person in their audience will buy their book, whereas established entrepreneurs know that’s not the case. In my experience, only 5 to 10 percent of your audience will buy the book prior to or immediately after its publication. So if you have a small audience — say 5,000 people — that’s only 250 to 500 people. Whereas if you have an audience of 50,000 ... your sales will be much higher. (And by the way, a following of ~50,000 is where you need to be in order to work with me on a proposal.)

5. Your confidence grows along with your audience.

I love seeing my Author Platform Builders take action based on what they learn in the program because I get to see a remarkable transformation. My clients go from feeling anxious and impatient about when their book will come out to feeling confident their book will succeed because there’s so much cool stuff developing outside of their book. And because confidence is totally contagious ... it spreads to your audience, your clients, your overall brand aesthetic and ultimately helps me and my team seal the book deal on your behalf.