Challenge to Discover Your Writing Market

Knowing your writing market can be key in determining what words you write and what you do with those words when you have written them. I heard an idea recently that made me rethink the path for discovering my market. It is not about whom you want to sell your books to, or even about whom you want to read your books. Discovering your market can be as simple as finding a picture.

Take the Challenge to Define your Market Reader

1. Find an image that depicts the person you are speaking to when you write.

2. Tell what problem you are trying to address with the words you are creating and how it relates to that “core reader.”

3. Describe the lifestyle, attitudes and relationships of the person you chose to depict your “core reader.”

“You decide who is your target market.” I heard these words recently and a light bulb went off. If I am the one that makes that decision – and all other businesses make that decision so why should I be different in that regards – then I need to quit messing around and make that decision already.

My definition of a core reader is the one I imagine I am talking to when I write. It is the first circle of readers. But the ripples move out from there and begin to include others in their rings. I am not limiting myself by picturing that core reader – I am freeing myself of to connect with that reader in a new, and closer, way.

Once you define your “core reader,” go find that reader. Connect with that reader in social media, in real life and in your writing. By building relationships with your “core reader” you will begin to build that writing success that you desire.

My Take on the Challenge

1. I am my core reader. When I first heard the idea about picturing the person I was writing to, I wrote this statement. “I am writing to people like me – scary thought, huh?” The more I thought about it, the more I realized how much truth that statement held. When I write something, I am speaking to my own heart. I only hope that in speaking openly to my heart, the words will speak to others as well.

2. The problem I am addressing in all of my writings is the hunger for hope. In my fiction, I tell a story that provides an uplifting message entrenched in hope. In my non-fiction and columns, I offer words that will point to hope. In my talks, I tell stories that inspire hope. Helping others discover their path to hope is my focus.

3. I write to a woman that is trying to walk the tightrope of family, work and God – and keep them all in the right balance. She has a sense of humor, enjoys a little snark now and then, and references movies and songs in her every day speech. She plays with words and enjoys being around others that can keep up. She has a solid relationship with God, but hungers to go in deeper. She is not afraid of faith in her own life or in the lives of those she encounters. She lives a life reaching for the rainbow.