PART EIGHT ON BOOK PROMOTION
This is
going to be a lot of information and a very long post, so you may want to get comfy and also save
it on your computer for future reference…
I’ve
been doing this self-publishing thing for over six years and I have read a ton
of marketing books, and I’ve also researched and studied author promotion
extensively, so I think a lot of it is “trial and error” with marketing. Some
things worked for me and others haven’t. You need to find your own niche and go
from there.
But a
few universal truths to success is to publish new books within a 4 month
time-frame, and get lots of reviews posted on Amazon and goodreads, and have a
professional-looking book cover (also branding), and lastly an engaging “hook”
in your book blurb. All those things are easy to do to help your book beat out
the competition.
From my
own personal experience, those tips listed below will help any author to start
making money and have some success with your book promotion.
Doing
the following things listed below helped many of my books become Amazon
bestsellers.
TIP 1
A
"hooky" blurb is the most important thing a writer needs besides an
awesome cover. I've continually tweaked my Product Descriptions. I suggest that
you study the books in the Top 100 lists on Amazon. Tips
on blurb writing: http://www.thebookdesigner.com/2014/06/karl-bunker
(I can help you rework one
of your blurbs and give you a html code to upload so it stands out, and offer
some more keywords to add, please click HERE for
more info.)
TIP 2
The
right book cover is critical and having a striking image at thumbnail
size is important. A sub-title with keywords can help drive sales, too. This is
just my opinion, but maybe updating your book covers, revising your blurbs with
more of a “hook,” and adding more keywords in KDP might really help boost
sales.
The
other authors that I have helped do these simple things said they doubled their
sales within 6 weeks. I want to help you, so I can offer you one free cover
design if you really want to test out a new cover. Please click HERE to browse
my selection of premade covers.
TIP 3
On your
author Facebook page, marketing studies have proven that posting an image or
photo along with EVERY post will get you more “likes” and interest. Make sure
your FB page is linked to your Twitter account, too so you can cross-promote on
both of these sites.
TIP 4
Join
kboards, like right now. Go hang out in the “Writer’s Café” and search through
the marketing posts until your eyes bleed. (Well, maybe stop before that.) http://www.kboards.com/index.php?board=60.0
There is a wealth of awesome book promotion advice on what works and what
doesn’t. Plus, quite a few very generous, bestselling indie authors offer tons
of great suggestions on a wide range of marketing topics.
TIP 5
Sign up
for BUCK BOOKS: http://buckbooks.net/buck-books-promotions
it is free and reaches a large email readership. In order to run a promotion
with them, you don't have to pay anything, but you do have to agree to tell
others about their service by either sending out a tweet or FB post and signing
up for their affiliate account.
TIP 6
TIP 7
Book
bloggers should become your best friends. Start creating a list of bloggers
that will host a guest post or review your book(s). But it helps if a writer
already has a few reviews posted on places like Amazon and goodreads, which
will really help to persuade them to take a chance on an indie author.
You will
need a professional letter to request reviews. When you finish writing an email
“review request letter,” please send it to me and I’ll double-check it before
you send it out. I know for a fact that my books have been bumped up a number
of times on a reviewer's TBR pile, because reviewers assumed that my book would
be as professional as my review request. They'll start reading with the right
impression.
You can
search for book bloggers on Google by typing in “book blogger” and your
genre. Example: book blogger review science fiction
To find
bloggers in your genre you can go to sites:
Each
site has its own review policy. Use a spreadsheet to keep track of each
blogger’s name, email, and website URL. And I would make sure to carefully
follow the blogger’s instructions.
You must
send your request in individual emails and use their names. You might consider
collecting all the emails and sending out a giant blast, but this is considered
spam. The only way to comply with the federal CAN-SPAM Act is to send your
request one email at a time.
TIP 8
Authors
usually need more reviews posted on Amazon and goodreads to gain exposure. At
least ten reviews on Amazon will help because “two digits” seem to be a
magic number and anything less might hurt potential sales.
When I
chat with other authors about obtaining reviews, it seems as though most
writers struggle to get over twenty and have no idea how to get more posted.
Okay, I
know some authors will want to burn me at the stake for this suggestion, but
please hear me out…
To
start, I suggest using Fiverr to get a
few reviews posted straightaway, because you do get honest reviews and they
will post them within a week. I know other authors who have done it and they’ve
had great results. I’m not against paid book reviews nor do I consider
it unethical. The paid reviews are honest and they will eventually be lost
among the real ones that get posted with all those new sales you'll get.
Many
authors are willing to pay hundreds of dollars for a Kirkus Review, but cringe at $5 for a
regular one, which makes no sense.
Kirkus Reviews charges $425.00 for their basic
review package.
BlueInk Reviews charges: $396.00
Publishers Weekly PW Select charges: $149.00
Personally, I'd rather pay $50.00 for ten honest reviews. You
can either give Fiverr sellers a link to download the book, or ask them for a
“custom gig” to include the cost of your book to get an Amazon “verified
purchase.”
However,
here is my advice:
Only buy
10 reviews at a time for any book. Don’t ask for a positive review or tell them
what to write. Make it clear to the person you hire that you want a
normal, honest review. Don’t buy hundreds of them, but promoting a book (even
to promotional sites like Bookbub that require a certain number of reviews be
posted before they’ll accept your work) is much harder if you start with zero
reviews on Amazon or goodreads.
Plus,
a lot of advertising sites will not promote your book if you don't have any
reviews up. Get a couple of them up there right away; it will make it much
easier to get more. After you have 50+ regular reviews, then those first 10
reviews won’t matter anymore. (Once I bought 7 Fiverr reviews for one of my
books that only had two reviews posted at the time, but I asked the sellers not
to leave five stars reviews and to be honest. Once the reviews were posted, my
sales increased a few weeks later and it helped my ranking.)
TIP 9
Doing little blasts about your promos or free books can boost sales.
TIP 10
You
could post a few chapters on wattpad to entice readers to try your books with a
request at the end of each chapter or placed at the end of the free sample to
read the rest of the book. Wattpad is a community of more than 35 million users
who are writing, reading, and sharing stories — all for free. Want to share a
short story that’s tangential to your novel? Or tempt readers with an excerpt
from your upcoming book? This might be the platform for you.
Wattpad
marketing (http://wattpad.com is a popular
website where people can read free books uploaded chapter by chapter by the
authors using apps available on their computers or various mobile devices.
Wattpad readers typically like their content in nuggets, and they may follow a
book’s posting live, reading a chapter or two per week as it’s slowly uploaded.
You can upload your book to sites like this to expand your reach, then include
a link at the end of the chapters (or at the end of the larger work) to get the
rest of the series.)
TIP 11
You
should become an Amazon affiliate and make extra money by using their links for
your book(s) on your blog/website, and other social media. You can sign up to
be an Amazon Affiliate here: http://affiliate-program.amazon.com
TIP 12
Put links to your books EVERYWHERE on your blog and/or website to make it easy for readers
to buy your novel(s).
And all images should be labeled with something that drives traffic to
your blog. Every image / photo
on your blog or website or posted on any social media, including book covers
should be renamed/labeled with keywords that search engines will pick up on and
send traffic to your sites. For example, almost all of my images include: sherry
soule - author - young adult paranormal – romance or sherry soule - adult romantic suspense - new adult - college romance
TIP 13
Again,
book bloggers can be helpful in promoting your work because they genuinely love
reading and think of authors as rockstars. Having a guest post to offer can
often boost sales or create interest in your books.
The
problem is that bloggers are flooded with requests, and since there are about
4,000 books published daily, the system is overloaded. And readers generally
don’t always review the books that they read.
So
what’s an author to do?
Easy! Put together at least five guest posts on topics
related to the book that you’re promoting and offer those in place of a review
if the blogger is unavailable to review your work. Include your cover, the
blurb, and links to buy the book at the end of each post, along with your Bio
and social media links.
TIP 14
If you
have more than one book, then I suggest that you make one a “loss-leader” by
making it either $0.99 or perma free. This will give new readers a chance to
read your work and you’ll gain some new fans.
List one
of your books with these sites whenever it’s free. Though some of them have
minimum review requirements, meaning you have to a minimum number of 4+ star
reviews.
TIP 15
These Facebook groups can be helpful in a book
promotion or if you're giving away a free book.
TIP 16
When
you’re Tweeting about your books, be sure to use these hashtags.
#Amazon
#eBook
#BookBuzzr
#BookGiveaway
#BookMarketing
#Kindle
#KindleBargain
#KPD
(Kindle Publishing Direct)
#WLCFreeToday
#FreeKindleReads
TIP 17
Use and choose your keywords carefully. Writers can also stuff additional keywords into your product description that
Amazon’s search engine will pick up on through Author Central.
Your book product page is not the place to ramble
about nonsense, or talk about how cute your dog is, or whine about your book
sales. This is a business. Impressions count. Use Author Central to promote
your work through positive, strong keywords. Just like your book, words matter.
Study
the product pages of bestselling authors.
Tip 18
Some
newer authors don’t understand the importance of keywords. These can help you
reach a much wider audience. You can stuff over fifty keywords into KDP and
other online retailers to get your book into more genre categories.
Keyword stuffing: http://www.kboards.com/index.php?topic=205816.0
And
lastly, I wanted to share this great article on book marketing. I
recommend taking a few minutes to read this insightful blog post, "Why Your Cover & Blurb Suck" by Rebekah Haskell
