The Luck Factor

As a publisher, author, and blogger I read study and look for new publishing news and information. What I try to do is planned and I am always testing things to see if I can do more to better our sales and our reach.

Sometimes this can be overwhelming and frustrating, as it is a never-ending process. As soon as I learn something new, it is buried under the next great thing. Like most things in the social media world, things are in a constant state of flux. How are we to keep up and bend? Can we ever master the art of meeting people and building a brand we can be proud of? Is skill even a factor? Can we learn or is it all just a mess of SEO and dumb luck?

The answer is both. I look at these authors that hit the top ten list and have no social media presence and when I hear hear them talk they have no clue to how they made it... it is this fluke, some sort of funny joke the gods have dropped on us just to mess with our minds. How is it that some do so well with little or no planning?

Everything I do is planned and tested, thought about and so on. But what about luck? It seems that every author that "Makes It" has this fun little luck thing going on. They try something and it just works, others follow and it does not seem to have the same results. I admit, I have this luck, some of it, but not all of it. I try something new in tweeting or promoting and it works most of the time.

This may sound great to you but to me it is a huge pain. I don't want to be a part of something that I can't duplicate or control. I want to be able to copy what works and spread it across to all our authors, but can it be done?

No, you can't teach luck, it just is...

Does that mean you have to have the Luck Factor? Nope, it just means that study, hard work, and doing the right mix of promotion and magic will still work. We can figure out what to do to be successful, but some will make it faster because of the LF.

I guess what I am saying is that if you have some luck, do not try to teach it to others as it will not work for them as it does you. But teach the things that will work even without the little dash of luck, because it is or is not... can we control it or force it to happen to us? I don't know, but I think no.

I believe everything can be done through hard work. But it does not hurt to have a little luck. If you have it, be glad but don't boast, if you don't, stop trying to get it or rub against someone who has it, work hard and we can all enjoy the fruits of our labor.

Author Aaron Patterson: Blog: The Worst Book Ever.