Looking for advice on selling books.

We all have the dream; sitting on a dock or a mountainside writing novels for a living. But what is the reality? How much marketing and promotion will it take to go viral and suddenly sell thousands of books? What as authors can we do to get discovered? I've read all the Facebook, Twitter, Website, Forum, Utube; kinds of promotion, but what is the secret to acquiring that huge audience? Assume I've written books that would make Steven King proud, but all the marketing in the world wasn't selling them. What can be done? Please give all suggestions no matter how crazy they seem.