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publication date: Jan 26, 2009

author/source: Miles Galliford

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50 Easy Ways To Promote Your Book

With a little imagination you can discover dozens of creative ways to promote your book on the internet and massively increase sales.

Book publishing is under going a revolution. This is good news for authors who understand what is happening and bad news for book publishers who haven't a clue how precarious their situation is.

The internet is slowly but surely eliminating middlemen. Historically in the publishing world, agents, publishers, distibutors and wholesalers have all stood between an author and his reader.

The internet eliminates the need for these inefficient and costly layers. Authors can now directly reach their target audience. However to reap the rewards they need to invest time to understand what can be done and more importantly time to put these plans into action.

Here are 50 ideas for authors to help them to self promote their books:

Before You Start

Make Sure Your Book Will Be Relevant When It’s Finished

Sounds obvious but it’s not. One of my clients has just finished a book about investing in property. Not great timing!

Be Clear Why You are Writing a Book

There are lots of reasons for writing a book ranging from making as much money as you can to realising a childhood dream. Being clear about why you are doing it will influence how you market it. For example if it is to build personal credibility, you may not be as bothered about how much money it makes and be happy to give more copies away for free. If the book is your only income, free might not sound so great!

Is Your Audience Online?

Online marketing will be a fruitless exercise if your key target audience are not active internet users.

Six to Eight Months Before Launch

Create a Website Dedicated To The Book

A book should have a dedicated website preferably with the title being used as the domain name. If you can’t get the title try your/the author’s name. Three good book sites are:

Create a Blog Not Dedicated To The Book

Do you need a blog and a website? Yes, for several reasons. First your blog can be used to support multiple books. Second the blog will have a life after the book is off the shelves. Third you can use a blog to establish your credibility long before your book is launched. There are dozens of author blogs. Here are a few:

Seth Godin (probably the most populat author’s blog in the world!)
Paul Coelho
Naomi Dunford

Collect Email Addresses Online

Start collecting email addresses six to eight months before launch. Your email list will be the best and fastest way to get word out about your new book. To get addresses offer a free chapter, a unique bonus chapter, discounts, extracts, input…whatever it takes.

Collect Emails Offline

Whenever you go to an event, seminar or workshop collect business cards and email addresses. Remember to ask if you can add the names to your email newsletter list.

Create a Preview Book or Article

Chris Andersen wrote an article for Wired Magazine about his longtail theory six months before he released his book of the same name. By the time the book came out there was an educated audience desperate to know more.

Publish Interviews

If your book involves doing interviews, record them and publish the best ones as free podcasts on your site, iTunes and other podcast sites.

Ask For Feedback

Whilst writing your book continually ask your website visitors for feedback on the content. Promise to acknowledge all those who help in the book. All these people will feel they have been a part of the creative process and will be eager to spread the word when it launches.

Create a List of The Most Important Bloggers and Websites

Create a list of all the most important bloggers and websites in your niche. Try to think of a way of getting them involved with creating the content. For example ask for quotes, do interviews, use them as case studies, etc.

Create a List of All the Most Important Journalists

List all the journalists in the world who might be interested in your subject. Think how you can get them excited about its publication; get them to contribute, refer to their articles, interview them, etc

Create a List of Academics And Colleges

Are there any notable academics and colleges that teach about your niche? Make a list and send them free copies when the book is available

Distribute As You Write

As you complete chapters of your book, send extracts to people you quote or include for feedback. This will keep the project alive in their mind and hopefully looking forward to the completed version. James Caan provides some interesting and valuable business insights on his website.

Get Testimonials and Endorsement

Endorsements and testimonials from personalities within your niche is worth their weight in gold. Build relationships early so these people trust you when you ask for their support

Twitter Interesting Facts And Articles

As you do your research you will be finding interesting facts and articles. Twitter them to your followers so they can get an idea of what you are thinking. Proactively try to build your Twitter followers

Setup a Twitter Search

Search for terms relevant to your subject on Twitter. When interesting comments come up join the conversation. Remember not to overtly promote your book; this will quickly get you blocked.

Build A Community

I have mentioned a few ways of building a community (website, blog, Twitter), but there are dozens more. You should think about where your audience hang out and then use the best webservices to build your community. Think about MySpace, Facebook, Bebo, LinkedIn, etc. Start networking well before launch.

Don’t Waste Time On People Who Won’t Buy

I was recently asked to write an article for a real estate magazine about how real estate agents can use the internet for marketing. I was flattered by the editors kind words but halfway through the article I thought to myself real estate agents are not the target for anything I do, why am I wasting my valuable time talking to them?

Associations and Societies

Approach any associations and societies whose audience is relevant to your book. How can you work together. Run a workshops, do a book signing, agree a co-promotion deal, speak at one of their events, write for their website or magazine? Be creative.

Setup Google Alerts

Setup Google Alerts for your name, your book title, competitor’s names, competitive or complimentary book titles, etc. By following these alerts you can jump into the online conversation in a timely way and talk directly to people who should be interested in what you have to say.

Create a ‘By Invitation Only’ Community

Seth Godin launched his latest book, Tribes, by creating a private community for the people who placed a pre-order. Great idea (although most of us don’t have the profile of Seth Godin).

Review All Publicity Material

If you are publishing through a publisher make sure you review all the marketing and promotion material before it goes out. You need the key messages to be consistent online and offline, and through all channels

Design Matters

The cover design and internal page layouts matter …..a lot. Publishers have professional teams to do this, but make sure you have your say. Self publishers can find a book designer on eLance (www.elance.com). A good design is well worth the investment.

Join the Book Marketing Network

The Book Marketing Network is a online community for authors and small publishers to share their knowledge and support each other. Lots of great ideas.

Consider Publishing on WeBook.com

I haven’t used this site, but it has got quite good reviews. You can have your book reviewed, sold as download and if it becomes popular published. Go to www.webook.com .

One Month Before Launch

Four Weeks to Make an Impression

If you are publishing through a big publisher your book will have about four weeks to produce significant sales. If it doesn’t, it will receive little marketing support going forward. Therefore your promotion efforts leading up to the launch could make the difference between success and failure

Create a Competition

Create a competition on your website with ten or more copies of the book as prizes. Send an email to all the people who entered but did not win offering them a discount.

Offer the Book As a Prize

You should have a list of blogs and websites where you would like your book promoted. Offer the website owner one or more free copies as a competition prize.

Send Out Free Copies

Before the book is available send out free copies to all the journalists, bloggers and influencers on the lists you have put together. Warn them by email that you are sending it and then stick a signed copy in the post.

Create a Slide Presentation

Create a slide presentation and publish it on SlideShare. Take a look at the slides created for Dan Pink’s new career advice book

Use Meetup.com To Find Relevant Groups

There is nothing like face-to-face book signings to create buzz and trust, but how do you find groups of interested people. Meetup.com is becoming a great source of finding niche groups

Prepare For Launch Day

You should pick one specific day for your launch and ensure a lot of activity is planned for this single day (email your list, publish some YouTube videos, send out press releases, announce competition winners, launch a competition, do a webinar, etc). Hopefully a lot of activity will create momentum.

Create and Post Videos

Create and post videos on all the main video sites. Make sure the videos are under ten minutes long so they get published on YouTube. I use TubeMogul.com to hit a lot of sites all at once. The videos can be a book tour, interviews, book extracts, etc

Say Something Controversial

If your book takes a controversial stand point start an online debate before you launch. Blog, write guest articles for other sites, go on forums and Twitter. Get people involved.

Amazon Sales On The Same Day

This is hard to achieve, but if you can get a large number of buyers all to purchase from Amazon on the same day this will increase the book's ranking and get it higher up on the search results page. If you can do this blitz on a quiet trading day such as Thanksgiving or Christmas Day the impact will be all the greater

Book Cover Images

Get some images of your book cover and post them on Flickr, PhotoBucket and other photo gallery websites. Make sure you choose the tags carefully to reflect the subject

After Launch

Free Chapter

Give away the first chapter of your book for free as a downloadable pdf. At the beginning and end of the chapter add a summary of the rest of the book to encourage the reader to buy. Encourage people to share the free pdf.

Publish the Content Page

Publish the content page on your website with a brief overview of each chapter. Make sure the page is optimised for the search engines. It may also be worth having a printable version.

“What Questions Do You Have …Maybe I Have Answered Them?”

Create a post on your website which lists many of the questions that you have answered in your book. For example if your book is about professional blogging:

How much does a blogger earn?
What are the most important revenue streams for a blogger?
What blog subjects make the most money?

Online Virtual Book Tour

It is very expensive to do a nationwide or international book tour, but it is cheap to do one online. Do a series of free webinars that people can dial in to and listen to you talking about the book. Record them and publish them on your website or on specialist websites like Ask Database :

Online Questions And Answers

Once the early buyers have had a chance to read the book offer to run a series of free conference calls where people can ask you questions. To avoid a free for all ask for questions to be submitted via email before the call.

Encourage Amazon Reviews

When you send out free copies ask the recipients to publish their positive reviews in Amazon. On your website ask people who liked your book to do the same. And again with anyone who sends you a positive testimonial, ask them to repeat what they said on Amazon.

Arrange Interviews With Top Bloggers

By now you should have a list of all the top bloggers for your niche. Offer them the opportunity to do an interview with you. Its good content for their sites and great publicity for you.

Keep Copies With You All The Time

An author friend of mine sat next to a senior IBM executive on a short flight from London to Paris. They got chatting and he ended up giving him a copy of his newly published book. A week later he received an order for 100 copies! Always have a few books with you; you never know who you’re going to meet.

Deliver On Your Promises

Make sure you deliver on your promises. If you offered free copies to people send them. If you offered interviews, do them. If you said you would mention a contributor, mention them. You don’t want unhappy people in the blogosphere just after launch!

Copy Amazon Reviews

Create a section on your website called, “What People Are Saying On Amazon”. Copy the best reviews onto your page.

Speaking Events

If you get speaking opportunities at conferences, seminars, universities, etc always ask the organiser if you can set up a stand to sell your books at the event. Better still ask the event organiser if they will buy a copy to give to each attendee.

Get Some Cheeky Photos

Tim Ferriss (Four Hour Work Week) tells the story of how he took some of his books into a Borders shop, placed then prominently on a shelf and took some photos which he published on his website. A cheeky trick for self publishers!

Conclusion

This list is just scratching the surface. You won't be able to do everything so pick a few ideas and get creative to make your book stand out from the crowd.

Best of luck!

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