Don't you just love mothers? They can tell you your outfit looks like crap one minute, then tell you you're the most amazing thing since sliced bread the next. Cherie Burbach learned a thing or two on the latter side from her moms about promoting her book:

I quickly realized that my mom was not shy about talking to people about my book, whereas I would feel like I was "bragging" if I brought it up. Ironically, as a marketing person I was not at all shy about promoting the companies I’ve worked for or the products we produced. My zeal as a marketing person made me extremely good at my job, because I could convey genuine fondness about the thing I was promoting. When I talked about my own work, however, I would stammer and become quiet, giving people the impression that my work wasn't very good.

My mother was just the opposite. She would easily describe my poems to people, talk about mentions I’d had in the local media, and proudly talk about my sales ranking on Amazon. She would talk about my books with neighbors, co-workers, friends, and, as I'll mention a little later, complete strangers.

She's not only sold my book but created excitement about it. I received my first fan letter from someone she sold the book to. With my mom's help, a woman she works with bought my book and then she and her daughter looked on the Internet to view recent articles about it.

When my mom got done talking to people they wanted to read what all the fuss was about. And isn't that why companies spend millions of dollars in advertising? To get us to at least try their product?

Tell me about it. My mom actually sold some copies of my book to a local store. Maybe more importantly, we should all hire our moms to be our publicists so they can just do this stuff for us.