Alison Stevens invited me to guest post on her blog this morning for Marketing Monday! I'm so excited, because this is my first guest post ever! I feel so sought after :)
Please pop over to her blog here and read about what I have done in the wide, wide world of marketing (about which I knew absolutely nothing and had to figure out everything the hard way - by trial and lots of error.) You can also look back in her posts for marketing advice from other authors - very interesting and helpful.
I've also already thought of a couple things I left out when I was writing the post for her. One of them is Amazon. Amazon ratings and reviews are very helpful (as long as they're mostly good :)) but it's surprisingly hard to get them. If you aren't famous enough that everyone already knows about you - in which case you probably don't need the ratings and reviews so much - you're not likely to get too many.
So, if it should happen that someone tells me they like one of my books, I usually ask them, if they have a minute, if they would be so kind as to quickly write a sentence or two that sums up what they just said on Amazon. Sometimes they do, and sometimes they don't. I also seek out Top 10, 100, or 500 Reviewers and ask if they'd be willing to read and review my books. I can't afford to send out billions of copies, so I usually just ask two or three. So far I've been lucky - most have said they'd be willing to read the books, and they've given me nice reviews - but that is a risk you take. If they don't like the book, you could find you've gone out of your way to ask someone for what turns out to be a negative review with extra weight because it's from a Top Reviewer. I can't say whether the Top Reviewer reviews have actually helped sales or not, but I figure they're not hurting them...
If any of you have writer friends with books on Amazon though, you can help them by posting nice reviews with good ratings (if you honestly feel the book deserves it.)
The other thing I forgot to mention was bookmarks... which I am just in the process of making now, thanks to my daughter who is a lot more computer savvy than I am. When they're all done, I'll post a picture on the blog so you can see them :)
I think I also forgot to mention that I am on JacketFlap and GoodReads. I think it's helpful (hopefully) to be part of the reading community. I love to read and discuss books, I usually post giveaways when I have a new book coming out, and it's fun to see what friends and colleagues are reading and liking.
A lot of this blog's followers are writers - what do you do for marketing? Do you belong to JacketFlap? GoodReads? Other similar groups? Do you have marketing tips that you have found especially helpful? Please share! And don't forget to check out the rest of my experience in marketing, such as it is :), on Alison's blog!
Far too many of us find out too late that we should have been studying up on marketing before publication. Especially if you're published by a small house then marketing is somewhat of a requirement to being published. I don't know that I've done such a wonderful job, but like you I've learned by trial and error. One thing I do know is that word of mouth works wonders. Still learning as I go.
ReplyDeleteVery good stuff re: Amazon! Heading over to Alison's blog :)
ReplyDeleteI don't know that I've done a wonderful job... we're writers, not trained in marketing and publicity, so it's kind of a do-the-best-you-can and learn as you go situation :) but all we can do is try, right?
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