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The Steve Laube Agency

Helping to Change the World…Word by Word

The Steve Laube Agency

The Steve Laube Agency

Helping to Change the World Word by Word

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Home » Platform » Page 2

Platform

What if Platform Is the Goal?

By Dan Balowon September 16, 2021
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We’ve been here before on this blog, discussing author platforms and how to get one. It’s a never-ending process, and it has always been a requirement for authors. If you find yourself talking about author platforms and believe “Gone are the days when an author could just write,” you are not completely accurate.

Top authors from the “old days” were magazine or newspaper columnists with tens of thousands or millions of readers. Making up the author population were investigative journalists, professors at universities, think-tank scholars, experts, politicians, media celebrities, military, doctors, and business leaders.

Maybe a few came from nowhere to be a best-selling author; but compared to the total number of books published each year, it is so rare, it isn’t worth discussing. The publishing industry, a $250-billion, global industry, is built on qualified and connected authors, writing what they know.

These days, I think it is fair to say many authors do not embrace platform-building with the same level of commitment they apply to the craft involved with writing a book. For many, it is comparable to the unpleasant details one encounters when starting a business, like filling out forms, getting permits, and setting up processes

I’d like to turn the tables a bit on this issue and hope you find it challenging, coming in the form of questions to consider.

What if your platform is more important than your book?

What if the platform is your ministry, and a book is something to minister to those on it?

What if the most effective communication tool to accomplish your personal mission is your YouTube channel or podcast?

What if you reached more people each week through your platform than are reached by most books?

What if books were not an ultimate goal, but a step along the way to a much-greater goal?

Admittedly, books have a mystique about them. They are saved for years on shelves, reread, written in, dog-eared, cherished, given as gifts to friends, or recommended to others as expressions of deep and abiding friendship. They are powerful, impactful tools that can be used to change lives and start movements of God.

But what if you embraced building a platform instead of dreading it? For example:  

Authors of fiction using various media to paint a picture of the themes or settings of their novels, which might give greater appreciation and illumination to readers of their books.

Authors of nonfiction using different media to look at topics from various perspectives, in a timely manner, allowing them to explore things far beyond what one or two books might.

Authors of books for children and youth creating a perspective of their work for parents or teachers.

Books are hard to write, as are platforms to develop. Consider platform-building and its care and feeding as an opportunity to create an ongoing connection to an audience, speaking into their lives every week.

Platforms and books together are tools an author uses to love God and others. A blessing, rather than a chore.

Maybe viewing everything we do as a calling isn’t such a bad way to live after all, and maybe your platform is one part of the calling.

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Category: Platform

A Literary Agent’s Wish List

By Bob Hostetleron May 27, 2021
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People often ask me, “What are you looking for?” It’s a natural question to ask a literary agent, even when the questioner knows that the agent has offered a detailed answer on the agency website (here, for example). After all, something could’ve changed. I may, since updating my interests, have suddenly decided to get bold, branch out, and try to sell a systematic theology in iambic pentameter. …

Read moreA Literary Agent’s Wish List
Category: Agents, Book Proposals, Craft, Grammar, Pitching, Platform, The Publishing Life, The Writing Life

Platform Planning

By Dan Balowon May 26, 2021
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The never-ending struggle of an aspiring author to meet the requirement of publishers for a big enough “platform” can be frustrating at best, or worse, discourage someone from writing at all. Platforms are always built on content, not the container. Social media doesn’t give you a platform; it is the content that causes it to grow–or not. All medias are simply channels to people, and using …

Read morePlatform Planning
Category: Branding, Marketing, Platform

Every Book Doesn’t Need to Shake the Earth

By Dan Balowon March 11, 2021
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If you look at any list of best-selling books expecting every one of them to be a literary masterpiece, you are probably setting yourself up for disappointment. “Are you kidding me? A book about famous racehorses of the 20th century is a bestseller? People bought that instead of my 1,200-page book on linguistic anomalies in Hebrew and Greek biblical texts? For Pete’s sake, half of the horse book …

Read moreEvery Book Doesn’t Need to Shake the Earth
Category: Encouragement, Inspiration, Pitching, Platform

Free Webinar on Building Your Author Platform

By Steve Laubeon October 19, 2020
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Why write a book no one will read? I have a theory that a book has no impact unless the book is read. But a book won’t be read until it is purchased. Even if it was given to you, someone bought it. Thus the power of your words begin at the point of sale. In today’s world, that means the book has to be discovered. No matter how good your book is, if someone doesn’t know about it, …

Read moreFree Webinar on Building Your Author Platform
Category: PlatformTag: Author Platform, Platform, Webinar

Writing in Multiple Genres, Okay? Not Okay?

By Tamela Hancock Murrayon September 17, 2020
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The “Your Questions Answered” Series __________ In a recent Q & A, Steve Laube talked about how writers will pitch different projects to him in the same meeting:  a novel, a nonfiction, a devotional, etc.  He said that writers need to decide “what they want to be when they grow up.”  I’d like some clarity on why writing in different genres is discouraged.  As ideas come to …

Read moreWriting in Multiple Genres, Okay? Not Okay?
Category: Agents, Genre, Pitching, Platform, Your Questions Answered Series

How Big Should an Author’s Platform Be?

By Tamela Hancock Murrayon August 13, 2020
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The “Your Questions Answered” Series __________ PLATFORM. I read a lot of conflicting ideas about the importance of having a substantial platform: (1) It used to matter more but its importance is declining, but also that (2) a writer must have at least 5k followers on social media to even be considered for agent representation, and (3) some kinds of social media “count” more than …

Read moreHow Big Should an Author’s Platform Be?
Category: Platform, Your Questions Answered Series

12 Steps to Publication

By Steve Laubeon August 10, 2020
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It takes 12 strikes to achieve a perfect game in bowling. (See last Friday’s video.) It made me think there are 12 things that need to happen in the publication process. Each must knock down all the pins to achieve publishing success. With that simplistic idea in mind, I came up with the following: Idea – A book has to start somewhere Write chapter – if not the whole book …

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Category: Book Proposals, Common Questoins, Editing, Get Published, Marketing, Pitching, Platform

I Have Plans to Write That Book

By Tamela Hancock Murrayon November 7, 2019
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Last week, I talked about a few reasons why I don’t plan to write a nonfiction book on style, mainly because I have no desire to develop a presence or platform as an expert on style. But what if you want to write a nonfiction book about a topic you know and love? Let’s look at the list, revised from last week, to help you decide if you should: Are you well-known outside of your immediate circle of …

Read moreI Have Plans to Write That Book
Category: Book Proposals, Branding, Marketing, Pitching, Platform, The Writing Life

7 Reasons Why Christian Authors Need to Embrace Podcasting Now

By Steve Laubeon September 16, 2019
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Podcasting is here to stay. Here are seven reasons you should take it seriously as an author.  1. Podcasting Is a Tool of Bestselling Authors Here is a list of the 10 bestselling Christian authors for September 2019. (A Bible study of Lysa TerKeurst’s book is actually #9, so I edited the list to remove the repetition.)  Girl, Wash Your Face by Rachel Hollis   The 5 Love Languages by Gary Chapman …

Read more7 Reasons Why Christian Authors Need to Embrace Podcasting Now
Category: Audio, Book Business, Marketing, Platform, Podcast, The Writing Life
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