Monday 31 March 2014
Marketing Your Self Published Book
Becoming a self-published writer seems easy enough in today's online world. We write, edit, find a printer or create an ebook...but then what? With access to the Internet, this task is openly available to anyone with the finances to self-publish, however, most authors are indeed just writers and are not prepared or don't know where to start when tackling the marketing side of self-publishing.
I want to offer up 5 simple strategies to marketing your book online. I had to do just this recently and am currently working on building my own online strategy, so it will be fun to grow and learn together. It is important to remember that social media is a very saturated place, so it is not as easy as you think to grow a huge following - it takes perseverance, great content, and regular posting to achieve a following. So hint number one when diving into your online strategy - work at it - everyday.
Twitter
Pinterest
I want to offer up 5 simple strategies to marketing your book online. I had to do just this recently and am currently working on building my own online strategy, so it will be fun to grow and learn together. It is important to remember that social media is a very saturated place, so it is not as easy as you think to grow a huge following - it takes perseverance, great content, and regular posting to achieve a following. So hint number one when diving into your online strategy - work at it - everyday.
This is a great way to find similar minded people. Twitter allows you to pick and choose people you want to target and have conversations with. I chose to follow women entrepreneurs and mothers of children who are in my target market - and they were so easy to find. Twitter auto-populates suggestions for you of similar people to follow, so make sure your description on Twitter describes your book and yourself so you are properly categorised and easy to find as well.
Boolean Searching
Finding and targeting your audience is easier than you think using the search engine within Twitter. If you want to find people who are looking for conversations around soothers or pacifiers - you could enter a search parameter like this: soother or pacifier which to the search engine means containing "soother" or "pacifier" (or both). It pulled up a ton of results, although dated conversations, I still found some interesting content that I was able to reuse for blogging and posting. Find additional search parameters for Twitter Searches here
Facebook Page
Facebook is an excellent resource for anyone marketing a self-published book. Here you can post regularly about content surrounding your book and related topics. Remember the golden rule to being successful on Facebook though is the 80/20 rule. Believe it of not, 80% of your content should be non-sales, but related content while the other 20% can be a reflection of your brand and pitching of your book. Your goal here is to build an audience that is interested in your content - then build trust - the sales will come from there.
Using a site like Pinterest can not only be useful for you to store new ideas for new books, but it can also become a way to find your target market. If you are seeking to find like minded people who would be intersted in your book you would start boards that others might be interested in and you would follow boards that your target market will follow as well. My Pinterest boards consist of children's room decor, children's art work and I follow alot of mom communities. My target market is immersed in the same content as this, so they can find me! This is also an outlet for me to post some of my custom graphics and showcase some of my blog content.
Blogging
Whether you are using Blogpsot or Wordpress, writing a blog can not only keep your creative juices flowing, it is also a way for you to draw attention to much more than your book. It allows you to open up a window into your business ethics or personal life, whichever sort of blog you intend to be. I like writing blogs about entrepreneurship and helping guide new entrepreneurs through this web of dead ends. Helping people and building relationships also helps my reputation. The more people know about me and my journey, the more confident they feel about passing along my information - which ultimately will end in sales. All self-published authors should consider blogging as an outlet and marketing medium.
Hopefully this was useful information. If you are still on the fence about whether or self-publishing is for you, I would recommend reading this post as well - 15 Signs you Should Invest in Self-Publishing
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