Know-How Exchange : Social Media

It depends on who your primary target audience is. Certainly among those under 35 your age might be something of a turn-off. Millennials generally believe they live in a different world than you do and may very well discount whatever point of view you are espousing as a result.

But perhaps the title and subject matter of the book will be of less interest to them anyway, and your REAL target is folks 55+. If that's the case, what you say and how you present yourself in the video will be more important, and your age (or apparent age) will be a non-issue.

One way to get at this is to ask a few people (more is better, but 12-15 seems like a good starting point) to watch the video and then answer a few questions.

Don't ask directly about the age thing. Instead ask about how likely they would be to purchase the book (and why/why-not); and whether the subject matter is of interest to them. If you ask people of a wide range of ages, you can get at the age discrimination issue with a fairly simple analysis.

If this approach is of interest you might want to pay a market research professional to help you think through the process, design the questionnaire and analyze results. Otherwise the technical and mechanical steps can easily lead to a wrong conclusion. That would be a shame, because you would have pursued the right approach but perhaps ended up with the wrong answer ... and you'd never know.

Hi Joel. Age be damned! I say go for it. Put your video up on YouTube, on Vimeo, on TubeMogul, and as many other places as possible. Is your goal sales? Are you giving your book away as a loss leader for something else? There are any number of things you could do, if you chose to, to make money off your book. I think you'll find that many more people struggle with this question. If your book helps someone assert their spiritual truth, tell their story, and complete their journey, your efforts will have been worth it.