I'm not naive, I know poetry anthologies are a tough sell.

And poetry anthologies that open their pages to previously unpublished and/or not-well known poets are a tougher sell.

But most especially, I know that poetry anthologies published by a single person (as opposed to a publishing house) are the toughest sell.

Despite this knowledge, here I am.

Join me in answering the following questions with the goal of helping to get poetry in the hands of readers through grassroots marketing efforts.

The forthcoming Fantastic Ekphrastik Poetry Anthology will be my third anthology. With the first two anthologies, 10.10 Poetry Anthology and Two Truths and a FIB Poetry Anthology, I learned a lot about what it takes to put a poetry anthology together. 

I didn't really know how to market it, but I tried...

For the 10.10 Poetry Anthology I really didn't know what I was doing, so when it launched, I didn't have a clear marketing plan. But by the 1st year anniversary (October 2022) of its publication, I knew that I needed to get this collection of poetry into more reader's hands. That's when I launched a post-a-day Poetry Palooza celebration on my blog in order to highlight 31 individual poems and poets from the anthology. Poets who wanted to participate in the Palooza signed up for specific dates, then I created custom posts where I shared their poem from the 10.10 anthology and as many other poetry/book publication announcements that they wanted, plus all of their social media links and contact information. Here is a link to a post in the Poetry Palooza series.

For the Two Truths and a FIB Poetry Anthology I figured out that it would be best to promote the anthology at the launch. In order to do this I promoted the 29 individual poets from the book in a post-a-day Two Truths and a FIB-O-Rama celebration during the anthology's debut month, January 2023. Each post featured a custom short GIF-video of two truths and a fib about the individual poets. The idea was to have readers find out which fact presented in the GIF was a fib by checking the author's bio in the actual anthology. I also shared their social media links and contact information. Here is a link to a post in the FIB-O-Rama series.

Were these marketing campaigns a lot of work? Yep!

Was it worth it? You bet! It gave individual poets a lot of exposure.

Did it result in more sales? That's debatable, but I do know that the poets in my anthologies got to know each other a whole lot better.

Just think how much wider and farther we can spread the word about the Fantastic Ekphrastic Poetry Anthology if we (the collective of poets, readers, teachers, students, parents that we are) promoted it with a clear marketing strategy. Wowza!

On that note...

From everything I've read and experienced, short form videos are a highly effective marketing tool, at least to get the word out about poetry anthologies. (And picture books, and inspirational sayings, and...anything actually!)

One of my Two Truths and a FIB trailer videos has 1,000+ views on TikTok. And that was before I really knew what I was doing with making videos!

Wouldn't it be cool if there were multiple short videos made by multiple creators (not just me) about the Fantastic Ekphrastic Poetry Anthology floating around the internet? 

Right now, with the sole intention to put more light and love into the world, I've begun producing wee bee productions videos featuring my own artwork and some rockin' music. (And a heavy dose of puns...

you're welcome. :)

With each video I make, I've figured out that I really LOVE making short videos and I want to share that love (and hard won knowledge) with YOU.

Short videos appeal to the writer in me, each one is a tiny (15-30 second) story. 

Short videos appeal to the artist in me, I use my own artwork combined with Canvas' design elements. 

Short videos appeal to music lover in me, I always add a dash of toe-tapping goodness.

I am excited to share that soon I will be launching an affordable* step-by-step course on how to make short videos using Canva! 

You can use the videos you produce to make your poems come to life, to make book trailers, to make social media/website/blog posts, even to make love notes to the world...literally anything!

*And I'll be offering a 20% discount on the course if you make a short video about the Fantastic Ekphrastic Poetry Anthology and share it with the world. Details to come.