About Me
Thursday, August 24, 2017
It’s not that hard to be the sharpest knife in a drawer full of spoons.
There are times in life when everyone else thinks you’ve got it all figured out. You’re on the court, you’re in uniform and although you secretly feel like a fraud, you think you’re about to win until you pull the dumbest move in the history of team sports.
Here’s how it went down.
I grew up all over the midwest, the son of a preacher man, as the song says. I went to four different grade schools, in four different states. We landed here in Oklahoma, just after my thirteenth birthday. I’ve been here, 35 years.
When I was thirteen and in seventh grade, I went to a small private school, and because I’d reached the height of 5’11” a couple of years earlier, everybody assumed I’d be a basketball player. I wasn’t.
I mean, I could dribble with one hand, make a lay up and shoot a free throw, but I’d never really played, didn’t understand strategy, couldn’t even begin to grasp defense. I was basically useless unless my size just intimidated the opposing player.
Anyway, I made the B squad, and I was a starter.
Until it happened.
We were three games in to the biggest “B” team tournament in our league and playing against a school called “Christian Heritage Academy”, which was ironic, because although their junior high was twice the size of ours, they were cheating by starting their first string JV forward on their seventh grade “B” team roster.
Needless to say, we were getting our butts kicked.
To be fair, we sucked pretty hard and probably wouldn’t have done much better against their seventh graders, but it was the principle of the thing.
Finally, one of our parents was able to get the forward disqualified, they took his points off the board (not sure what rulebook that came out of) and we ended up one point down, with thirty seconds to play. We had a chance.
Our star forward, a kid named Frank Plumlee, who was also a pitcher who knocked me cold trying to prove I couldn’t catch his fastball ( a story for another time) took the ball down the court on a fast break and I made a beeline for the lane, “posting up” or that’s what I thought I was doing, I don’t know.
Frank sees me open, looks for anybody else, anyone at all, and finally, with a look of disgust, makes the pass. I receive it at chest high, back to the basket about a third of the way up the key.
Now, what I honestly meant to do next was pivot out, rock back, and put a short jumper in the net.
Wrong.
Without even looking at the basket, my hands dipped below my waist. and to my horror, as if in slow motion, I watched myself take the ball up, over my head, backwards, without looking, and lob it in the general direction of the backboard.
Even as a non athlete, I was horrified. Laughter swept the stands, with more than a few boos from our section. It was three weeks before Frank could look at me.
Did I mention I was not a basketball player?
This scrawny kid with curly hair -the guy who’d replaced the ringer- who was maybe 5’2” -with his sneakers on- swept past me, grabbed the rebound, pounded back up the court and sank the last basket of the game from the free throw line.
As a solopreneur, I’ve had to wear a lot of hats. I love hats. You may have noticed.
Over time, I’ve learned that there are some hats that don’t fit me well. Put me in a creative role, and I’ll nail every detail. But, in general, I’m a big picture guy. I can offer suggestions on other areas, and often spot problems because I’m a connections thinker, but when it comes to implementing solutions outside of my sandbox, it’s hard for me to do it hands on.
I need to delegate to others who are excited about it.
I just don’t care.
There, I said it. The big reason that I’ve been self employed and run my own small businesses for 25 years. So much of what passes for important in business, just escapes me.
- I don’t get why you need a strict dress policy in a world where people wear jeans to weddings and funerals
- I can’t feel you on the need to scold grownups for clocking in five minutes late from lunch.
- It blows my mind why you’d spend six months searching for the perfect candidate, then micromanage them into an early exit by insisting they forget all the great reasons you hired them in the first place.
My bliss is a good conversation, where you tell me a great story, and we find a way to make that make you money.
See, they wanted me on their team, because I looked like a knife in a drawer full of spoons.
Among a group of people who trend on the low side of 5’6”, I was a giant. They were impressed, but they shouldn’t have been.
This carries into my life as a writer and creative too. When you find yourself surrounded by people who don’t create for a living, it’s easy to impress them with simple suggestions. I can phone it in and still land the gig.
But the problem is, if you’re selling to spoons, and I’m thinking like a knife, there’s going to be a huge disconnect. If I’m playing to my own audience of one, instead of understanding your market, I feel great, you may be wowed, but the people who really matter? They’ll ignore us both.
Knives dig steak and chopping vegetables.
Spoons feel awkward at a barbecue until the condiments and baked beans show up.
It’s easy to think being a knife is somehow better, until the Maitre D delivers that hot bowl of delicious soup. Then you’ll wish you were a spoon.
That’s why, through years of acting and directing, I’ve had to train to step, temporarily, into the heads of other people. People who are not remotely like me. And, I’m told, portray them convincingly. As an acting coach, I can help you do the same.
I’m not saying that to brag. After all, for 25 years, that’s basically all I spent my time thinking about. I’m a knife in that way, and if you’re a spoon, that’s a foreign concept.
Now, you break out a spreadsheet and start talking ROI and profit margins and things get fuzzy.
I’m a pretty smart guy, I know the terminology, but you’ll probably lose me somewhere around the third column. It’s not that I don’t get it, I dig the measurement of success this represents, I’m just not the guy to explain it to.
No, I’m the guy who hears the end result, and goes back through the process to figure out where the disconnect is.
To me, it seems, it’s our job in life to figure out which role we play. In some scenarios, I’m the knife, in other places, I’m more like a spork. But, the idea is to feel it out and play to your strengths. This doesn’t mean we aren’t flexible and can’t learn new things, hell I’ve had to, just to survive. I’ve even got paid to learn new things from time to time.
What I’m talking about is being so in tune with yourself that you provide what’s needed from you in whatever environment you choose to plug into. You might not be the best at scooping soup, but a knife can dish out condiments too.
It’s that essential character, that “youness” that should flavor whatever role you put yourself into.
Notice, I did not say “get put into” because we’re all grownups and you chose your job. You put yourself there, and even if it’s traditionally a role for forks, but you feel more like a melon baller, your job is to just bring that baller attitude to bear and fill that fork’s role with a melony zest!
Or, better yet, find the opportunity that truly utilizes all that melon balling badassery to its fullest extent? Cool?
I may, or may not have mentioned yet that I’m a dad. Not just a dad, but one of “those” dads who has eight amazing kids, no twins, all with the same woman and never having been a Mormon or a Catholic. Yes, I know what causes it, and that my friends, is a story for another day.
But, as a dad to 8 human beings -half of whom now run their own lives quite successfully so far- and the oldest of seven children, I’m a mentor by default. So, here’s my take on this, from one dad’s point of view.
That thing, that makes you a melon baller, or a dessert fork, or a sorbet spoon. Your essence. It’s way more powerful than you think or imagine. It is. Not only that, but it is the key ingredient to your real success. When I say crap like, you can be yourself or a cheap imitation of someone else, I’m not just being a wiseass. (yes I am, no wait… okay, maybe a little)
I’m sharing something I believe deeply from the bottom of my heart.
We never pushed our kids. Ever.
Before you yell at me, the first one is in vet school, the second is a YouTuber who ranks about number three for VR gaming content (8BitNinja) the third is a junior working on her bachelor’s in photography, and already getting paid over a $100 an hour to shoot weddings, and the fourth just paid his first semester’s rent after covering his way to film school with his scholarships.
We set what we thought were reasonable expectations and we maintained them, but we didn’t push them. Instead, we encouraged them to find out who they are, and take that as far as they possibly can!
Why?
Because that’s what we’ve done with our own lives. And we’re happy.
I’ve spent my entire life telling stories from the age of eight when my third grade teacher handed me the assignment of writing a Halloween story on a single sheet of Big Chief paper that turned into three sheets, with accompanying illustrations.
I’ve done it:
- As a clown
- As an actor
- As a public speaker
- As a director
- As a theatrical designer
- As a playwright
- As a freelancer
- As a social media manager
- As an author
- And now as a ghostwriter
My wife followed me into the theater, which equipped her to do the work she does now, educating women on intimacy issues and managing a team of badass female entrepreneurs who will sell over a half million dollars in product this year.
Our successes haven’t always been measured by our bank account, but we’ve got lots of time and we’re getting there.
But, here’s what I want to say to you. If you don’t get anything else out of what I’m spitting here, get this. Are you ready?
Your unique story is the only intrinsic value that you personally bring to the marketplace.
I know for some of you, this feels like a slap in the face. You want to know if I think your MBA, PHD, or CPA is some kind of joke. No, I don’t. But listen to what I’m saying, your intrinsic value isn’t wrapped in a diploma, or a certification. It’s baked in. It’s in all the moments you’ve lived, and laughed and loved and cried, and died a little.
And for many of us, that’s sad, because we don’t use it. We put it on the shelf for special occasions, and only those people closest to us really see the “Real Me”.
I don’t care if you play a knife at work. If you’re a spoon, it’s going to show. And if it doesn’t, it’s going to dig at you from the inside out until you break.
It’s not that hard to be the sharpest knife in a drawer full of spoons.
But, if you’re a spoon, that’s your drawer. Own it!
Thanks for reading my article, if you agree that our perspectives are hugely undervalued, please take a moment to like this article, or share it with your own network. I'd also love to read your comments.
Thursday, February 23, 2017
Move over James Patterson, Stephen King, JK Rowling and EL James, there’s a new kid in town. Well, maybe not so new, but on the way up and I wanted you to be the first to get a chance to know. I am on my way to the top and I will not stop until I’ve become the world’s most famous author. Sounds crazy, right? Okay, maybe it is, but here’s a question, if you wanted to be known for your fiction writing, why would you stop before you were the world’s most famous author?
When you think of it like that, setting the top as your goal is the only thing that makes sense. Obviously, you'll become an NYT bestseller along the way, and make movie deals, and all the rest, but why settle for just half the enchilada? Even if you never quite reach everybody, why not invite one more person to buy your book, one more reader to find out if you have what it takes to win them over! So, that's why I decided, I'm going to be the World's Most Famous Author!
So, what would it actually take to become the world’s most famous author? I intend to find out. Stephen King and JK Rowling are tied at 673,000 Google searches for their names monthly, to give you some idea, that’s about 5x what famous author James Patterson got, and more than double what the inimitable Mark Twain collects monthly. EL James doesn’t even really register with just 90,000 searches, but they all pale in comparison to the master of the Attention Economy, the great orange one. Are you ready to be sickened? Donald Trump’s name is searched 16,000,000 times a month, over a dozen times more frequently than Rowling and King combined, while Jesus Christ is only searched just under 250,000 times each month.
I am sure there are a lot of factors involved in search volume, for instance, not too many who claim to follow him search “Jesus Christ” on Google with any frequency, since their source material likely doesn’t require a name search, and Mr. Trump’s recent victory is, no doubt, skewing the odds a bit. Meanwhile, the outgoing president, Obama, is still pulling a million and half searches a month. My campaign to become the world’s most famous author has a two step plan so far.
The first step, you are a part of right now, write a post called, “I’m Going to be the World’s Most Famous Author” step two also involves any of you that want to be involved. I’m daring you to find out if I’ve got what it takes. The first of my scifi series, “The Complete Beginner’s Guide to Saving the Multiverse” Is going on 99 cent countdown special starting tomorrow, and here’s where you come in! I dare you to prove me wrong. See if I’ve got what it takes! Get the book and read it, let me know what you think. I think you’ll love it, but some of you won’t and that’s okay.
Download the book here!
When you’ve finished reading the whole book, and please, not before, leave me a review. After all, I’m on my way to becoming the World’s most famous author and your opinion matters. I’d give you the book for free, but I know two thirds of you wouldn’t finish it, so for less than a McDonald’s coffee, you get in early on the trending literary conversation of the next decade, Mark R Morris Jr, World’s Most Famous Author. Some of you may want a piece of this fame in the making, and I’m prepared to share!
Here are a couple of ways you can get in on it. Get yourself an Amazon Associates account, share my books on your blog and earn commissions! Bam! Can’t beat that, you get to be part of the rise of the World’s Most Famous Author, and you make some money to boot! Some of you will see the benefit in connecting with me and for those, I’d love to do an interview for your blog, or podcast, just message on the form at the top of the page!
For those who think I’ve lost my mind, well, I’m out here trying to earn money as a writer, because my stage directing career took a dive, so thanks a lot Captain Obvious, now, either help me get ready for the big time, or stop bothering those of us who are working to make me the World’s Most Famous Author! Comments? I know you’ve got one! Leave it! I’ll love it! Find me on Facebook, with the button below, get your own Amazon Associates account here! And I’ll be looking for all of you on my many world tours as the World’s Most Famous Author!
When you think of it like that, setting the top as your goal is the only thing that makes sense. Obviously, you'll become an NYT bestseller along the way, and make movie deals, and all the rest, but why settle for just half the enchilada? Even if you never quite reach everybody, why not invite one more person to buy your book, one more reader to find out if you have what it takes to win them over! So, that's why I decided, I'm going to be the World's Most Famous Author!
So, what would it actually take to become the world’s most famous author? I intend to find out. Stephen King and JK Rowling are tied at 673,000 Google searches for their names monthly, to give you some idea, that’s about 5x what famous author James Patterson got, and more than double what the inimitable Mark Twain collects monthly. EL James doesn’t even really register with just 90,000 searches, but they all pale in comparison to the master of the Attention Economy, the great orange one. Are you ready to be sickened? Donald Trump’s name is searched 16,000,000 times a month, over a dozen times more frequently than Rowling and King combined, while Jesus Christ is only searched just under 250,000 times each month.
I am sure there are a lot of factors involved in search volume, for instance, not too many who claim to follow him search “Jesus Christ” on Google with any frequency, since their source material likely doesn’t require a name search, and Mr. Trump’s recent victory is, no doubt, skewing the odds a bit. Meanwhile, the outgoing president, Obama, is still pulling a million and half searches a month. My campaign to become the world’s most famous author has a two step plan so far.
The first step, you are a part of right now, write a post called, “I’m Going to be the World’s Most Famous Author” step two also involves any of you that want to be involved. I’m daring you to find out if I’ve got what it takes. The first of my scifi series, “The Complete Beginner’s Guide to Saving the Multiverse” Is going on 99 cent countdown special starting tomorrow, and here’s where you come in! I dare you to prove me wrong. See if I’ve got what it takes! Get the book and read it, let me know what you think. I think you’ll love it, but some of you won’t and that’s okay.
Download the book here!
When you’ve finished reading the whole book, and please, not before, leave me a review. After all, I’m on my way to becoming the World’s most famous author and your opinion matters. I’d give you the book for free, but I know two thirds of you wouldn’t finish it, so for less than a McDonald’s coffee, you get in early on the trending literary conversation of the next decade, Mark R Morris Jr, World’s Most Famous Author. Some of you may want a piece of this fame in the making, and I’m prepared to share!
Here are a couple of ways you can get in on it. Get yourself an Amazon Associates account, share my books on your blog and earn commissions! Bam! Can’t beat that, you get to be part of the rise of the World’s Most Famous Author, and you make some money to boot! Some of you will see the benefit in connecting with me and for those, I’d love to do an interview for your blog, or podcast, just message on the form at the top of the page!
For those who think I’ve lost my mind, well, I’m out here trying to earn money as a writer, because my stage directing career took a dive, so thanks a lot Captain Obvious, now, either help me get ready for the big time, or stop bothering those of us who are working to make me the World’s Most Famous Author! Comments? I know you’ve got one! Leave it! I’ll love it! Find me on Facebook, with the button below, get your own Amazon Associates account here! And I’ll be looking for all of you on my many world tours as the World’s Most Famous Author!
Wednesday, February 22, 2017
Good morning fair reader! Well, the promotion is going
slowly but surely. With no list and no leadup, I managed to generate 25
downloads on the first day, and I’m looking to triple that today. So, in the
interest of giving you some ideas of how to move your book from flatline toward
the first sale, here is the anatomy of my campaign.
I start with
Massplanner as my hub
I’ve mentioned it before but it’s the central pin of my
entire operation. It allows me to be promoting while I’m writing this. It gives
me the ability to create a network of “people” that share my posts and links.
It’s great.
Massplanner is an automation dashboard that works
differently than any other automation tool. It allows for the use of multiple
accounts to share content across a wide variety of social media outlets. I use
five Facebook surrogates, accounts I have logins for that allow me to post my promotional
information through them. (I didn’t tell you to make a second Facebook account,
just so we’re clear, wink wink)
These accounts are also linked into blogs, Google plus,
Pinterest and more. When I set up a campaign, one post might be shared by five
people across a half dozen platforms.
So, here were my
results from yesterday
First, you need to hack your Amazon traffic. You can’t KNOW
how many people visit your sales page, Amazon will not tell you. But, if you go
to Bitly.com you can create a custom, shortened (great for Twitter) trackable
link that will count not only the number of hits, but the sources of the traffic.
Use your Bitly link exclusively when promoting to allow you to calculate your
promotional CTR and conversion rate.
·
I shared my promotion in 130 places yesterday,
including about 100 Facebook groups for book promos, and readers.
·
From that, I got about 85 clicks on my link, so
2/3 of the groups (approximately, no way to know this for sure) earned me at
least one click, I’m sure some were more effective and some got 0.
·
Out of 85 clicks on my link, I earned 25
downloads, or about a 30% conversion rate, again, not bad for starting from
zero.
Promoting to lists of
locations will help you fine tune your strategy
I create promotional lists of groups, profiles and pages that
I want to post to, that way I can see which parts of my campaign are the most
effective, so that I can repeat them again and again. The lists that don’t bear
great results can be edited and tweaked to improve the conversion rate. I also
make sure I am serving the same content to all of the lists of locations to
make sure I am comparing apples to apples.
So, how long does all
of this take?
The set up is the most time consuming part. Gaining access
to profiles you can use, then inputting them, and adding them into your promotional
groups on Facebook, Google Plus, etc, is the most time consuming part. Once
that’s done, campaigns take very little time to set up and zero time to run.
·
Use images whenever possible and mix them up. I
use book covers, but I also create illustrations of various aspects of the
story. Any program you use to create ads or memes will work for this, I use
photoshop.
·
Make your text fun, funny and engaging. Lure the
reader in. Make them want to comment, or click on your link. One line that gets
some good response for me, is to guarantee double money back on free downloads.
It always gets comments and clicks.
·
Whatever tool you use to automate your campaign,
input your posts and choose the locations to send them to, then start it up and
get ready to respond.
Make sure you engage
with the audience.
If someone comments, or shares your promotion, like their
comment, or post. Comment in return. Ask questions, engage them in
conversation. Posts with conversation are more likely to catch attention and
will rise to the top of the group newsfeed.
·
Use your surrogate accounts to like and comment
on each other’s posts. You can start a conversation with yourself if you’re
creative, making it appear there is even more interest. This always draws a
crowd.
·
Be polite, even if someone is rude. The audience
is watching your response, if you manage to defuse a heckler, they will be on
yours side. If someone is harassing, simply delete their comments, rather than
responding in kind.
·
Commenting and liking also makes posts appear in
your notifications on Facebook, giving you even better tracking over the
conversation.
Don’t be afraid to
claim credit for rankings!
Amazon has split the rankings between free and paid
downloads. Don’t lie, but when you reach the top ten in ANY category, screen
capture it and promote it! People like success. They like things that are
perceived to be popular and the more you promote your success, the more others
will be willing to share and promote it too. They want to be associated with
winners. Be one!
One more tool that I
used on this campaign to date
Sign up for Copromote. It allows you to boost a Tweet or
post so that other users can retweet, or share your content. It expands your
audience and gains you new followers. I’ve only used the free version, but I
have a friend that swears by the premium version as well.
Tuesday, February 21, 2017
It was a long day, but I think I made a dent in some much
needed promotion. So, here’s what I’ve been up to. I finally came to the
conclusion that to move into a better paying platform ( Gum road, or Payhip) I
needed to leverage the audience building power of Amazon to sell enough books
to make the transition. For whatever reason, people will spend money on Amazon,
even at a slightly higher price, than on these other platforms. So, I’m moving
full bore Amazon.
At the moment, I’m promoting my Origin Dime Chronicles
series, a collection of three novellas that all add up to one novel sized
collection, The Complete Beginner’s Guide to Saving the Multiverse. Through the
magic of Kindle select, I have two types of promotion at my fingertips and I’m
using them both. I can only use one for each book, so here’s what I determined
to do. First: a 2 day give away of “Jacked” (part one of The Complete Beginner’s
Guide to Saving the Multiverse)
Then, a Kindle Countdown deal on the whole enchilada!
Starting Thursday, The Complete Beginner’s Guide to Saving the Multiverse,
formerly titled All Jacked Up until I realized there was too much competition
for that name and it also said nothing about my story, for 99 cents! The hope
is that the bite sized sample of the 80 page JACKED will lure readers into the
larger purchase of The Complete Guide, for a cash price.
Since Amazon stopped promoting free books, even when they
hit #1, getting a book to paid download status, is the key to getting ranked.
Also, the Kindle Countdown program has its web pages, where the countdown
volumes are listed separately for readers to find. So, what’s the benefit? Same
as the benefit of being sold in a small book store, less competition for
eyeballs!
So far, I’m up to #8 free in Time Travel scifi and hoping to
break #1! Then, when The Complete Guide moves to Kindle Countdown, I’ll shift
the second novella into free give away mode to keep the traffic coming. The
final piece of the puzzle, book three, will not go up for discount or free
giveaway, making the novel length “omnibus” containing all three novellas, the
best deal and hopefully a sure fire seller. So, while I may not make much off
the 99 cent sales, hopefully, I will move up in the rankings.
I’ll keep you posted! Thanks for tuning in. Be sure to share
my blog if it interests you and I love comments! Like to learn more about any
phase of self-publishing? Message me at MarkRMorris2@gmail.com
with your questions! Thanks!
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