Promotion for Books Today, Part I

Question? "What is the publisher going to do for my book?"

Answer: Publish it and all that entails. Formatting, Cover, ISBN number, Getting it on All the Internet Book Sites, Have it On Their Website, Perhaps some Promotion

Question? What do I need to do to promote my book?

#1 You need to let people know you have a book.

How do you do that?

Through everything that is available to you.

A personal website. Easy to do today--it can be set up on your blog. I choose to have a separate website. http://fictionforyou.com/  The first chapters of all my books are on my website.

It is not enough to just have the website, you have to keep it up-to-date. It should have information about you and your books.

A blog. This is my blog, of course. It's important that content change on your blog often. Once a week at the least. The more followers on your blog the better.

Make comments on other people's blogs. Follow blogs you like. Be a regular guest on other blogs.

I'm a regular blogger the first and 3rd Tuesday on the following blogs:



Be on Facebook. For this to really help you need to have a lot of friends. Then you should post several times a day. It doesn't have to be about your book all the time. It's like having short chats with your friends. Tell them what you're doing--but don't badmouth anyone and personally, I think you should stay away from politics. You can find me under my name Marilyn Meredith.

There are groups on Facebook for readers. Join these and let them know about your books. You don't have to bombard them, but when you have a new book or a bargain with one of your books, let them know.

Twitter. I'm not as good about tweeting as I should--but I try to tweet at least once a day.

Goodreads. Every author should have a page on Goodreads. I'm not nearly as active as I should be on there.

And of course there are listserves, I belong to several: Sisters in Crime, LA Sisters in Crime, Central Coast Sisters in Crime, DorothyL, both my publishers' lists--important to any writer who has a publisher. If your publisher has a blog, participate on it, leave comments on other people's blogs.

When your book comes out do a blog tour. I'm doing another the month of November for River Spirits.



If you rely on your publisher to promote your book you aren't going to have many sales--and you'll have no one to blame but yourself. Readers need to hear about you--and your book.

There's lots more you can do, that's just some of what has worked for me.

I'll have a Part II soon.

Add your ideas if you'd like.

Marilyn

Comments

Thonie Hevron said…
Well said, Marilyn. These are publishing basics that some 'new' authors just don't understand or aren't willing to invest the time or energy. I'll be watching for part two!
Thanks, Thonie. Too many people blame poor sales on the publisher when they haven't done a thing to alert people about their book.

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