Author Platform Redux: 10 Smartest Things I Ever Said About Author Platform

Author platform, writer platform, artist platform, or simply, platform. Regardless of what you call it, here are the top ten things that matter in an author platform.

These are also the top ten things to keep in mind when building your author platform:

1. Ownership. Who owns your platform? You do. Who can make the most of your hard work? That would be you.

2. Power. You have as much platform power as you do influence. Think that you have to influence the whole world to make an impact? Think again.

3. Energy. Your platform is not what you say. It’s not a message. It’s what you do. What you stand for. It’s who you are and the measure of your good intentions. If you are dynamic; your platform is dynamic. If your platform is not dynamic, it should be.

4. Integrity. If you are just trying to win the short-term profit game, you lose. If you don’t genuinely care about readers, this will be apparent. If you step on other peoples’ toes everywhere you go, they will not forget. Integrity means you can stand up in the face of opposition and calmly voice your honest opinion. It means you know what you know because you know it, not because you are part of an echo chamber.

5. Potential. Where is the greatest potential in your platform? Is it out there somewhere? Is it through social media? Nope? It’s a constantly renewable resource in you. But you have to share what you have to make it meaningful to others. Technology is neutral. People with something sincere to offer are contagious. The word will get around, even if the Internet goes black.

6. Transformation. If you don’t have anything that can create or inspire a genuine change in the reader, then maybe wait until you do before investing a lot to time, energy, and money in your platform.

7. Creativity. There is a natural, organic quality to creativity. Art and ideas are inherently creative. Your creativity expressed enhances your life and the lives of others. Self-expression only hurts when it is suppressed or repressed. You have to have an ego to be creative, but you can’t create well if you are ruled by ego. Have enough ego to think you deserve a platform.

8. Purity. If you have no qualms about leveraging other people’s assets as though they were your own, then maybe you are shameless. People with integrity don’t lean on other people’s work or call it their own. They base their ideas on their own work or extensive research and give credit where credit is due.

9. Authenticity. When you do good work with integrity, name it and claim it. If it’s authentic, it’s got your name all over it, so don’t worry about it. However, if you don’t appreciate and celebrate your own good work, then neither will anyone else. Start your platform by appreciating all that you have done. Then move on to the next most important thing you can do.

10. Freedom. Freedom means you answer to your heart. No other master. To name and claim your platform is to become a voice in the world. Expressing yourself in the world when you have something to say is freeing. Saying what you have to say because you dedicate your work to others is inherently empowering.

When you put your name at the center of your platform, you make a space for yourself in the world. When you showcase your best work in the world, you activate your platform. When you stand on top of the success you have built in the past and use it as way to be more visible for the future, you make waves in the world. When you serve the world, you start to make an impact.

But you can’t build an author platform by sitting back and watching. You can’t build an author platform by talking about what you are going to do or by critiquing others. If you want everyone to know your name, you need to know what it stands for first.

Content and keywords and other buzz words don’t inspire the greatest platforms humanity has ever seen. Passionate people with dedicated followings create the most of the meaningful change in the world. They always have and they always will. These are the people who will be remembered. These are the platforms that will be remembered. This is the kind of platform worth building. Why not begin yours today?

• • •

The Writer’s Workout, 366 Tips, Tasks & Techniques From Your Writing Career Coach is written by Christina Katz for Writer’s Digest Books. For sale everywhere quality books are sold, including: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Powell’s, IndieBound and Writer’s Digest. Listen to the introduction. Download an excerpt from Scribd. Get motivated by The Writer’s Workout Motivational Poster. Ready to get your career into shape? Let’s write the future…together.