You’ve probably heard it a million times: “you must have a platform.” But what exactly is a platform? Well, many times it’s the difference between making a book sale and sending a potential customer to buy someone else’s book instead. If you envision a platform as something you stand on, then the components that elevate you can be any one (or all of) the following:

Your business
Your expertise in a field.
Your speaking career
Any products you’ve developed related to your topic/book
Any articles you’ve published on your particular topic

Whether fiction or non-fiction, having a platform can be crucial to furthering your career as a writer and if your ultimate goal is to ink a deal with a corporate publisher, then a platform isn’t just crucial, it’s mandatory. If you haven’t spent a lot of time creating your platform then maybe you should.