Your Audience

We’ve talked about marketing and publicity before, but for the next few days I’d like to discuss how you reach YOUR audience.

1. Let’s talk about who your audience is.

2. Let’s talk about unique ways you reach them.

According to Alexa.com, here is info on who is visiting my website the most: “Based on internet averages, triciagoyer.com is visited more frequently by females who are in the age range 25-34, have children, are
college educated and browse this site from home.” Looking at other information Alexa told me, the websites they visit before and after my site is Facebook.

When I think of my reader, I often think of real women I know to help me picture “her” in my mind. One is Alana. She’s a friend from church who’s married to a great guy from Guatemala. They are involved in missions outreach in his home country. She’s college educated but put her career aside to raise her two kids. At church we chat about my new books and the research behind them. She’s invited me to her home to talk to other young moms about homeschooling. She posts adorable photos of her kids on Facebook and she works at a preschool part time, mostly because she likes the connection with other moms and kids. I have readers from other age groups/lifestyles, but I know that I have a nice following from this audience.

There are obvious ways I connect with them:
-By doing guest blogs on mommy and homeschooling sites
-By blogging about marriage and family on my blog (I throw books stuff in now and again 🙂
-By posting about my writing (which is following my dream), life and family on Facebook and Twitter
-By hosting Facebook contests

I also try to be aware of other places my core readers/followers are congregating. One of those places is www.Pinterest.com … what is Pineterest?

From their website: “Pinterest lets you organize and share all the beautiful things you find on the web. People use pinboards to plan their weddings, decorate their homes, and organize their favorite recipes. Best of all, you can browse pinboards created by other people. Browsing pinboards is a fun way to discover new things and get inspiration from people who share your interests.” You can see my page here: http://pinterest.com/triciagoyer/

I’ve discovered that you can “pin” anything to your “Bulletin boards” that has a photo. I “pin” my books under subject headings like “World War II” or “Amish.” I also started spending five-ten minutes each day finding old blog posts and “pinning” them. For example, recently I pinned a blog post from July 2010 on “How to Be a Better Lover” to my Marriage board. In the first few hours I pinned it over 250 people went and viewed that old blog post. It’s continued to get a few hundred views each week. If people like your pins they repin them on their boards. And then people look at their boards and repin them too. Sweet!

Recently, because of things like Pinterest and Facebook parties, the daily views on my blog/website have jumped from an average of 6,000 page views a month to over 11,000 in November. I’ve also seen my book sales numbers growing, too. Yeah! And the best part is it’s FUN for me! (Yes, I find Facebook and Twitter fun, too.) Because I like it I don’t feel like I’m marketing (so much) and readers don’t feel that I’m only concerned with trying to sell them something.

Even though the majority of books I write are fiction, I’m making a connection with my main readership who connect with me over family and real-life issues, and then run out to buy my novels. They also buy my books for their parents and grandparents, too. Which I love!

All that to say, instead of casting a wide net, and attempting to reach a variety of readers, I’ve been doing more to connect with those who respond most positively to ME and my books. For the next few days let’s talk about who YOUR audience is AND unique ways you’ve discovering to connect with them.