Every professional writer knows there are readers out there who are ready to gobble up their book if only those readers knew it existed.

Those readers are your target audience. They’re searching for you and the kind of book you’re writing. Your book scratches their intellectual or emotional itch. You must thrill and connect with them if you want your book to succeed. Your mission as an author is to find them and help them find you.

How do I connect with my target readers?

The process of building connections with your readers before your book comes out is called building a platform.

Authors who want to work with big traditional publishers must build their platform first. Nonfiction authors, novelists, and even successful indie authors must build their platforms before releasing their books.

It’s no secret you need a platform. You’ve probably heard it dozens of times on this podcast, at conferences, and in books.

But how do you build a rejection-proof platform?

Last week, I hosted a webinar titled How to Get Started Building an Author Platform. This article is the first part of that webinar. If you want to view the slides or hear the 40-minute Q & A session at the end, you can find that here.

Let’s start with a story.

Once upon a time, three little pigs were sent out by their mother to find their fortune in the world. The first little pig came across a man selling straw. The man said, “If you buy my straw, you can have a house today.”

And wouldn’t you know it, the first little pig built a house that very day.

The second little pig came upon a man selling sticks. The man said, “These sticks are better than straw, but they are more work. If you’re willing to buy my sticks, you can have a house in just a few days.”

And sure enough, the second little pig built his house within a couple of days.  

When he was finished, he and the first little pig laughed and played in the sun. They made fun of the third little pig who was hard at work, building his house with bricks. But the third little pig knew something that the first little pigs did not.

The third little pig knew The Big Bad Wolf was on the prowl. When The Big Bad Wolf came across the first little pig’s house of straw, he huffed and puffed, and he blew the house down and ate the first little pig. (Some of you grew up with the censored version of the story, but let me assure you, Grimm’s original fairy tale is a bit grimmer. The wolf ate the first little pig.)

A few days later, when The Big Bad Wolf was hungry, he came to the second little pig’s stick house. He huffed and puffed, but he could not blow the house down. So, he set fire to the house, burned it down, and The Big Bad Wolf had a feast of roasted pork.

When The Big Bad Wolf came upon the third little pig’s house of bricks, he huffed and puffed, but he could not blow the house down. He set fire to it, but it wouldn’t burn. And the third little pig lived happily ever after.

What in the world does this have to do with building a rejection-proof platform?

Ancient wisdom resides in these old stories. The sad reality is that most authors have poorly-built platforms because they used the wrong materials. They believe platform myths that hijack their writing productivity and their marketing efforts.