Your Energy Budget Matters More Than Your Marketing Budget

Now that those of us who celebrate Traylor-related holidays have wound down from The Interview and absorbed the various sub-Reddit Swiftie theories1, I find myself thinking about one of her much-discussed pearls dropped during the interview more than any of the others. No, not one of the pearls about bread or otters or sparkles but this one:

You should think of your energy as if it's expensive, as if it's like a luxury item. Not everyone can afford it.

Of course, we’ve all experienced giving our energy to those not deserving of it, probably even in the last day. I’m not just talking about those people who live rent-free in ours brains because we’re convinced they did something terrible days or weeks or years ago but also the woman who doesn’t thank you when you let her in front of you in the security line or the TSA person who treats you like you’re a criminal because you haven’t gotten your Real ID yet.

When you’re writing and then publishing a book, the opportunities you have to give your energy away are endless. Here are just a few of the energy vampires I’ve fed that I’d urge you to avoid:

1. Other authors releasing books at the same time. This topic comes up at LLP whenever we’re discussing a client’s book launch release date. We’ll say something like, “We think January (or May or December or fill in the blank) is the best time to release your book.” They will come back with, “But I’ve heard that January (or May or December or fill in the blank) is the worst time to launch a book” or “I heard James Clear (or Tim Ferriss or fill in the blank) is releasing their book then.” I always go through the same spiel, explaining that the month you release doesn’t matter—that the reason traditional publishers are so focused on launch timing is that their entire business model is based on the success of a launch. In other words, if a book is successful the day it launches, they know that they should invest more of their energy or resources in it. If not (and most are not), they know not to think about it again. But Legacy Launch Pad’s model isn’t at all focused on the launch. To us, the launch is just another day in what will be the full life of your book. I released a book on writing in July of 2020—aka the worst time ever in that the world was coming to grips with being in the midst of a global pandemic and not remotely interested in learning about how to make their mess their memoir. And yet I got a five-minute segment on Good Morning America promoting the book. My point is: don’t worry about when your book is coming out, what other books will be competing against it and whether the attention given to those books will take away from the attention that may be given to yours. There’s enough pieces of pie for all of us.

2. Feedback from people who are not your ideal readers. This also comes up with clients; we will work with them on crafting the most exquisite book for their perfect reader. We will all agree we love it. Then they will give it to their friend from college who, despite not really being a reader, knows “what works”—and this doesn’t. You can’t imagine the number of people out there who, when presented with a book in progress, suddenly fancy themselves an editor. It is your job to ignore them, or not to share your book with them in the first place. When I was working on On Good Authority, I joined this group for aspiring writers who could all use a software the group leader had created to give feedback on each other’s books in progress. Now, this was not a good group for me since I wasn’t an aspiring writer—I was working on my eighth book and had been in publishing for decades—but I wanted to use the software and I figured (naively) that the people in this group would appreciate the work of a wizened elder. Oh my God you guys, their feedback was so mean. This one woman told me that my book was trite and her opinions only got worse from there. I was deeply discouraged and may have even cried. Then I looked at her profile on the aspiring author site and learned she was a British graphic designer who was convinced that she’d sell her book on graphic design to a top publisher who would then launch her career as a speaker, despite the fact that she didn’t have a following or compelling topic. The book I was writing was for successful entrepreneurs who were looking to forgo traditional publishing and choose themselves because traditional publishing wasn’t available to them and besides, would only break their heart. No wonder my book inspired vitriol—it was basically telling her that she was delusional. I vowed from that moment on to never go to the hardware store for milk again3. Now, if I get feedback while writing, I only get it from my ideal reader—or from other professionals.

3. Nasty Amazon and Goodreads reviewers. I’m not going to lie; nasty reviews hurt. While sometimes I’ve found the hostility amusing enough to compile a video of the meanest reviews, other times it’s felt like a punch in the gut. When I wrote a children’s book for my son, I thought it was the sweetest little love letter I could have come up with. An Amazon customer named Alisa Robin did not. Her review made clear that she would passionately “not recommend this book to anyone.” I’m not going to lie: Alisa Robin definitely made me cry. Whether that was new mom sensitivity or the fact that it practically felt like she attacking my son, I have no idea. But I now understand that Alisa was not a luxury worth splurging on.

4. Friends and family who don’t care. Releasing your first book is so exciting that it can be confusing when the people closest to you don’t care. While my family has always been fairly indifferent to what I do, I’m lucky enough to have a slew of friends that really showed up for me on my first book. You should have seen the crowd we gathered at events for Party Girl! Book number two—well, it was less exciting. Half the crowd. On books three, four and five, I felt lucky if I could even get a friend to acknowledge anything was happening in my life at all. My best advice is to keep your expectations in this area very low. Your family may not care. Your friends who say they’ll review your book on Amazon may not. The truth is they don’t get how important it is because they’re probably not creatives who understand what a difference their one Amazon review would make. That doesn’t mean they’re bad people or don’t love you the way you deserve to be loved. They just don’t get it. Rather than resenting them, shower the ones who do come through with gratitude.

5. The people who ask, “How is your book doing?” When your book is published traditionally, hearing this question is torturous since your publisher tells you nothing but gives you the distinct feeling all the time that It Is Not Going Well and It Is Somehow Your Fault. I remember after Party Girl came out, this guy I knew kept asking me “how it was doing.” I’d say, “Well,” and he’d ask me what that meant. And I didn’t know because my publisher had never even told me what “well” would look or smell or feel like. Now that I publish my own books and can focus on the things I can control (like doing the best book possible and getting it in front of my ideal reader), I can finally answer, “It’s doing everything it’s supposed to do and more” and mean it.