The 4 Hour Work Week author Tim Ferriss tells the story of his ride to the bestseller list in an article on the Huffington Post. His plan is one that everyone wants to execute, but very few pull off.
“What were the 1-3 biggest wastes of time and money?”
This led me to create a “not-to-do” list. Number one was no book touring or bookstore signings whatsoever. Not a one. All of the best-selling authors warned against this author rite of passage. I instead focused on the most efficient word-of-mouth networks in the world at the time-blogs. The path to seeding the ideas of 4HWW was then straight-forward:
* Go where bloggers go
* Be there with a message and a story that will appeal to their interests, not yours
* Build and maintain those relationships through your own blog too
His success is a lesson in the power of social applications and is a must read for anyone involved in publishing – this is the new marketing and PR. It’s amazing how Tim was able to create community around his book – but more fascinating is the way readers created their own communities (via Ning) and extended his 4HWW “brand.”
(via David Rothman)
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