So, the best way to insure that you'll receive a slice of the publisher's promotion pie is to become an established author. Authors become established by writing a lot of books that are published. It's that simple. You're best promoting your career, your name, and your works by writing books. That's where you need to spend your time.

A little inexpensive self-promotion wouldn't hurt, either, especially to give you a break from all that writing. Self-promotion won't elevate you to the level of an established author--not really--but it may get your sell-through numbers up just enough to convince a publisher to buy another book from you. Here are the self-promotion techniques that I think work the best:

Tip #1:  Visit local bookstores, local writer's groups and writer's conferences, and offer to do book signings or workshops.

Tip #2:  Send a press release and press kit to local newspapers announcing the new book.

Tip #3:  Set up a web site advertising the new book.

Tip #4:  Visit on-line writer's groups and workshops with the possibility of participating in a book chat.

Tip #5:  Create an ARC and send it to on-line and magazine reviewers (if the publisher hasn't done so).

Expensive ads and costly bookstore and conference giveaways won't make that big of a difference in your sell-through numbers. A single individual just doesn't have enough money to create the kind of publicity that will influence the number of books sold.

The best way to build a relationship with your readers is to give them a lot of books to read. Again, it's that simple. Get writing! The inexpensive self-promotion techniques described above will also help you hook up with your readers. I've done all of the above self-promotion techniques at one point or another during my career, but I have discovered that the best way to promote myself as a writer is to write more books, so that's where I concentrate most of my efforts now.

Biographical Profile on Tracy Fobes

I've always loved reading romances. I started with Barbara Cartland when I was in middle school and kept a stack of her novels next to my bed. Barbara kept me up way past midnight on more than a few nights. It just so happens that I also loved ghost stories and mysteries, and savored the chill I felt over some creepy happening. When I wasn't reading Barbara Cartland, I had a Hardy Boys or Nancy Drew mystery next to my bed. Seems like a strange combination, I know. But it worked for me. So what the heck.

Eventually I turned my Barbara Cartland stories in for Kathleen Woodiwiss's, and my Hardy Boys mysteries gave way to Steven King's and William Peter Blatty's novels. In 6th grade I alternated between reading The Exorcist and The Flame and the Flower, much to my English teacher's disgust and consternation. He would rather have had me reading A Separate Peace by John Knowles. Personally, I would have preferred he put his tennis-racket bow tie in his dresser drawer for good. But I didn't change my reading habits, and from what I understand, he's still wearing weird clothes.

Throughout my teenage years I read voraciously, sometimes finishing a book a day. Romance and horror remained my two favorite genres and, though I branched out into thrillers, biographies, non fiction, and just about any other genre you can think of, I always came back to Stephen King and Nora Roberts. I finished high school, attended college, received a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science, worked as a systems analyst for a Fortune-500 pharmaceutical company, got married, had kids, and kept reading. I must have been close to the big 3-0 when I decided I should have a go at writing. Anyone who read as much as I did could surely write something fairly decent! So I quit my job so I could stay home with my kids and become a full-time writer.

What followed for me is fairly typical for a writer...I finished a few manuscripts that will remain forever hidden in my drawer, entered contests, joined a critique group, won some awards, and then finally sold my first book: Touch Not the Cat.

Overall, I've published six books with Simon & Schuster and signed on for a trilogy with Dorchester Publishing for another three books. I was the Waldenbooks bestselling debut author in Romance and a RITA finalist in the year 2000. Two of my books were selections of the Random House Book Club and another two have been published in two foreign languages. I'm hard at work on the third book in my trilogy and already starting to think about a proposal for a new series. My books are all paranormal romances...stories about love complicated by grimalkins, witches, druids, mermaids, unicorns, and even mad scientists.

I also work full-time at a local advertising company (if you're a writer, don't quit your day job...unless your name is Nora Roberts!) and I'm a student of Tae Kwon Do and Haidong Gumdo, two Korean martial arts. I live in Pennsylvania, in beautiful Bucks County, with my family and a pug, 2 cats, and a variety of fish.