Tag Archives: book marketing

13 Easy Ways to Start Selling More Copies of Your Books

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By Books Author Denise Turney

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You’re going to have to free yourself of magical thinking if you want to start selling more copies of your books. Why? Wishing that you’d sell more books won’t get you book sales. It’s not enough just to want to sell your books. You have to take smart actions. This might help. Think of selling books as another artform, of sorts, a measurable artform.

Furthermore, selling books is a mix of online and offline marketing and promotion. That is, unless you plan to only focus on selling books through a single retailer like Kobo, Apple Books or Amazon. If you want to go wide, you’ll want to list your books with a wide range of online and offline bookstores and retailers.

Work with Book Distributors to Start Selling More Copies of Your Books

Another action that you’ll want to take is to list your books with a broad range of book distributors. Ingram, Baker and Taylor, Bella Distribution, Heritage Group Distribution, CBL Distribution, Casemate and Publishers Group West are among dozens of book distributors. If you’re new to the book world, distributors get your books to online and offline bookstores and other retailers.

Because of the role that they fill, book distributors are as close to a must as you may get if you want to go wide and start selling more copies of your books. Therefore, entering into a contract with legitimate book distributors is an early step in the book sales process. Want to keep yourself honest? Create a spreadsheet and track which book distributors you contact, including the date and form of outreach (email, telephone, snail mail, etc.) that you use to introduce your books to distributors. Follow-up with distributors you haven’t heard from.

Before you reach out to book distributors, create a marketing strategy. For example, your marketing strategy might highlight social media marketing efforts, including the number of social media followers your literary accounts have. Other items you could include are scheduled book signings, public speaking events, scheduled book club discussions and the numbers of books you’ve already sold.

Although these aren’t part of the 13 easy ways to be start selling more copies of your books, they are keys to early and ongoing book success. For starters, write a great story. If you’re writing nonfiction, do sufficient research and lay discoveries out in an easy-to-understand way.

Due Your Due Diligence

After all, it’s what’s inside the front and back flaps of your book that readers most want. So, nail the book writing part. To ensure that you pull this off, make sure that an experienced and talented book editor reads your manuscript before you publish it. Another tip is to run a spell and grammar check on your manuscript, even before you send it off to a skilled book editor. Working with an editor who is familiar with the type of book you wrote (mystery/suspense, romance, science fiction, etc.) can yields great results.

Next, create an engaging synopsis, book title and book cover. Don’t skimp on these actions. They will play a direct role in your book marketing efforts and your book sales. Here’s another tip that I want to share with you.

Years of book marketing has taught me the importance of researching book editors, book publicity specialists and book marketing services before a deal is inked. The last experience that you want to have is discovering that you just paid two or three times more than you needed to for editing, cover design or book marketing services. You also don’t want to ink a deal with a specialist who does shoddy work.

Hence, do your due diligence. You’ll thank yourself later.

Easy Ways to Start Selling More Copies of Your Books

And, now for those 13 easy ways to start selling more copies of your books. Steps shared in this article deal with promoting a book that you want to market and sell online and offline.

  1. Create a website that you’re committed to updating at least weekly – Years ago, you could have simply designed an author website to sell books on and walked away, letting the website pull in book buyers. Those days may be over. To keep your author website relevant, update it no less than once a week. Ways that you could do this are to add a daily writing tip or fact about a character from one of your novels to the author website. Or, you could add a quote from one of your characters to your author website. Just commit to updating a data point at your website once a week or more. And, add strong meta data like targeted keywords to your website.
  2. Start a book blog – At this blog, you could write about book conferences, book festivals and book signings that you’ve recently attended or that you’re planning to attend. You could also share insights that are related to your latest book. Another step that you could take is to post feature interviews with other writers at your blog. As with your author website, the point is to keep the blog updated. In fact, you could link your blog to your author website and keep both updated with this one easy step. That’s what I do at chistell.com. This single, easy step pulls in thousands of potential book buyers a week at chistell.com.

Additional Ways to Start Selling More Copies of Your Books

  1. Send postcards and direct mail to bookstore buyers – Even further, build relationships with bookstore buyers. These relationships can make it easier for you to get your new books into bookstores months from now. To keep these relationships healthy, consider sending book buyers (including library book buyers) holiday greetings.
  2. Reach out to military exchanges through organizations like RangeMe to see if you can sell your books at military stores.
  3. Teach a course at a local college. Ask if you can sell and sign your books at the end of the course.
  4. Schedule and conduct podcast and radio interviews – Yet don’t just conduct interviews. Make sure that you interview on podcasts and radio stations that pull in your book’s target audience.
  5. Design a literary newsletter – Building a newsletter can help you to develop your own mailing list. Consider adding a free newsletter subscription form to your author website. Items to include in your literary newsletter are diverse, ranging from feature author interviews to book reviews to upcoming book events to discounts to holiday messages. Sign up for The Book Lover’s Haven to get a feel for more of what you could do with a literary newsletter.
  6. Attend book events – It’s true. You could sell thousands of copies of your books online, without leaving home. However, it’s also true that getting outside and attending book events is a great way to introduce your books to new readers. In fact, you could sell dozens of books at book conferences, book fairs and festivals.

Even More Ways to Gain Book Sales

  1. Use Sign-Up Sheets – When you attend book events, bring sign-up sheets with you. Let people know what you’re using the sheets for. As an example, you could use a sign-up sheet to grow your literary newsletter subscriber list. You could also use a sign-up sheet to email in-person event attendees information about your books, including how to order copies of your e-books.
  2. Feature your books on book promotion websites. Again, do your due diligence before you pay for services at book promotion websites.
  3. Do newsletter cross-promotions with other authors whose books are in the same genre as your books.
  4. Newsletter book market services – Pay for newsletter book marketing services. Make sure that you work with newsletters that have a high open-rate. It may not do you much good to pay for an ad in a newsletter that boast 10,000 subscribers but only has a 3% open rate. Also, work with services that have tapped into your book’s target audience.
  5. Zone in on Social Media – Just 10 to 15 minutes a day on social media can increase your book sales. Test different social media sites to discover which sites generate the best return for your books. Also, pay attention to what days of the week and times of the day are best to post book marketing material. Examples of this material are book covers, book reviews and book quotes.

Amazon Ads and Selling Books

Other actions that you could take to start selling books are to add your book cover, book title and author website URL to your email signature line. Definitely ask family and friends to tell people they know about your books. Reaching out to school book buyers is another way that you could generate book sales.

If you’re promoting a book that sells on Amazon, consider taking out Amazon ads, namely sponsored product ads. You could also build an Amazon store to introduce your entire line of books to readers. But don’t just start Amazon ads. Budget for the ads. Study relevant keywords. Be patient during this process, as this isn’t a quick process. Take your time and find dozens of relevant keywords. You also might find success with relevant Amazon ad categories.

Stay Motivated

It could take one to three weeks to start seeing results from your ads. So, keep your daily spend low or no more than $5 a day when you start working with ads. Download and review monthly reports until you start to notice which keywords, categories and similar products are working to bring in book sales.

Above all, don’t be dreamy about this. In fact, don’t be dreamy about any part of the book marketing process. It’s work. There’s nothing magical about it. Before long, you’ll witness the link between your efforts and the results that you’re seeing. Should a step not yield good results, consider altering a part of the action or replacing the action (in-store book signings, discussion board link shares, etc.) with another action.

Keep at it. There are readers waiting to read great books!

How You Can Promote Books Without Spending Money

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By Books Author Denise Turney

lights hanging inside bookstore with rows of books
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Forget relying totally on paid book ads. Explore these ways to promote books without spending money.

First, let’s acknowledge what you have done. After all, book marketing is tireless work. It starts with writing a riveting novel or a hard hitting, informative non-fiction book. Kudos to you if you have knocked out this part of the book marketing process. Take time to celebrate. Then, roll up your sleeves and prepare to work, announcing your books to readers.

Taking the Book Publicist Route – This One Will Cost You

If you want to punt book marketing efforts to someone else, you could pay a marketing agency or publicist to do to that work for you. But taking that route will cost you. In fact, Writer’s Digest shares that the average book publicist rate is $100 an hour. Also, to get traction from a book publicist’s work, you may need to hire the publicist for three to four months prior to book publication and another three months post publication.

On average, you can expect to spend $5,000 to $10,000 for a book publicist. Take this path, and you’ll definitely want to vet a publicist or a marketing agency thoroughly. After all, you want to get your money’s worth from every book marketing effort that you invest in.

And, if you do pay for book marketing, check to see that the book publicist or marketing agency has deep experience marketing (and selling) books. For instance, check their references. Even more, check that they have influential media and book industry contacts. This helps them land you newspaper, magazine, radio and television interviews.

Free Ways to Promote Books Without Spending Money

Ensure they have gained 5,000 or more sales for other books that they’ve marketed. At the minimum, an effective marketer should have generated 1,000 book sales in a year. If not, they might not have the best skills. Before you sign a book marketing contract, speak with authors who have worked with the book publicist or book marketing agency you’re interested in inking a deal with. Do your homework.

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That’s a good first step if you choose to pay someone to promote your books. Just don’t miss out on free promotion tools. Are you ready? I’m going to share several ways to promote your books, marketing techniques that won’t cost you a cent.

Fortunately, you could knock out a few of the below steps over a few weekends. I didn’t add this one to the list because it’s not free. But you definitely want to have a sharp official author website. Media contacts will visit your website to learn more about you.

In fact, add your website URL to postcards, magnetic automobile stickers, your email signature and all printed material related to your books. Other steps include:

Marketing Tools to Promote Books Without Spending Money

  • Add a book blog to your official author website – You could use a CMS like WordPress to do this. However, if you do add a blog to your official author website, write and publish a new post to your blog weekly, if not more. Include SEO phrases in blog posts in a natural, easy-to-read way.
  • Schedule podcast interviews – Check directories like Interview Guest Directory (interviewguestsdirectory.com) to find podcast that interview authors for free. Schedule interviews with these podcasts. iTunes, Google Podcasts and Blog Talk Radio are other places that you can look for podcasts to interview on, letting listeners know that you have new books for sale.
  • Get on the radio – Similar to podcasts, reach out to radio stations that interview authors. As a tip, contact DJs who cover topics similar to the topic your book focuses on.
  • Use television – Share content from your nonfiction books with viewers at your local public broadcasting station. Also, reach out to local, regional and national television stations if your book has a holiday theme, relates to current events, etc.

More Tools You Can Use Without Spending Money

Take advantage of author newsletter book ad swaps – Exchange book ads with other authors. For example, you could advertise an author’s book in your newsletter and, in exchange, have that author advertise your book in her or his newsletter. Also:

  • Share book designs on social media – Use free book design services at places like BookBrush (bookbrush.com) and Canva to create designs to share on social media. Post about your books on social media to build your audience of potential book buyers.
  • Work with book directories – Add your book literary directories. This directory has free and paid listings (https://www.selfpublishingreview.com/2014/07/author-directory-sites-the-complete-list)
  • Start a literary video channel – Launch your own author video channel on platforms like YouTube, Vimeo, etc. Akin to operating a book blog, update your video channel weekly.
  • Launch a literary newsletter – Tools like Constant Contact, MailChimp, Emma and Benchmark make it easy to create and distribute literary newsletters. While these tools aren’t free, they do cut down on the time it takes to create and distribute newsletters. Yet, you can also create a literary newsletter using Word or PowerPoint and distribute manually to your email list for free, but this takes work and more time.
  • HARO (helpareporter.com) – Help a Reporter Out (HARO) list websites and media outlets that are looking for people to interview for articles, etc. Some HARO contacts include books in their catalogs.
  • Search paid book marketing sites – Some paid book marketing sites offer free marketing services. You might have to look for them. For example, BookDoggy (bookdoggy.com) will feature your book in their newsletter and on their website for free. All you have to do is include a BookDoggy ad in your literary newsletter that has 3,000+ subscribers.

Stay Encouraged

Whether you’re marketing books to land on the New York Times bestseller list, Essence top selling books or Amazon bestsellers, you’ll have to invest time. The same applies if you only want to sell a few thousand copies of your book.

The point is to keep introducing your books to new readers. That’s not all. To increase your book sales, you’ll need to keep your book in front of readers who are already familiar with your work. This is when blogging, starting a podcast and creating a literary newsletter can really pay off.

Another way to grow your book sales without spending money is to write new books. In fact, authors with 12 or more books in their catalog tend to sell more books than authors with less than 8 published books. Stay encouraged. Keep advancing. Keep writing!

How New Authors Gain Book Sales

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By Book Author Denise Turney

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Yes. New York Times bestselling books are often written by household name authors. Readers know what to expect from these authors. To readers, there may be less monetary and time risks involved with these titles. But that doesn’t mean that new authors can’t gain book sales. In fact, following are techniques that help new authors gain book sales.

Launching New Books

That’s good news. Unfortunately, simply writing a book, even a beautifully crafted story, isn’t always enough to gain book sales. Furthermore, publishing a book on a major platform like Amazon, Kobo or Barnes and Noble also is no guarantee that new authors will gain book sales, let alone enter the ranks of bestselling books.

Despite the genre, new authors could gain book sales if they publish books in January. To get more sales, the book genre is another factor to consider. For example, romance and self-help books may perform better when they launch in January. Children’s books and cookbooks may do well when published in December, and science fiction does well when published May thru August.

Getting to Top Selling Books

Yet, here’s the thing. During the end-of-year holiday season, authors of bestselling books are marketing and promoting their titles. That puts new authors in competition with household name authors which is why January launches yield results. In addition to launching new books at the start of the year, to move books for sale, new authors can:

  • Design catchy book covers using tools like Canva, Book Brush, Pic Monkey, 99Designs. Consider posting two to three book cover options on social media and asking people to vote on their favorite book cover. Another option is to share three book covers with family and friends and ask them to tell you which image they like best.
  • Also, write an attention-grabbing book description. It’s this overview that may determine whether readers simply flip a book over and put it back down or pick a book up and buy it.
  • In today’s digital book world, it’s important to add the right keywords to book overviews. Why? Keywords are what will help attract readers to new, classic and older books. In fact, keywords will impact search engines, Apple Books, Google Books, audio books and Amazon bestselling books.
  • And here’s another tip. If new authors aren’t gaining book sales, they can update their book description, trying different keywords within the description.

More Ways for New Authors to Achieve Top Selling Books Status

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Here are more ways for new authors to gain book sales. The first choice sounds easy. Yet, there are still authors who don’t have an official website.

  • Therefore, it’s important that new authors have an official website. When developing a website, consider using the author name as part of the website URL. It may not be a good idea to use a book title as part of a website URL if a new author plans to write more books.
  • To polish the story, let an experienced book editor look at the book. New authors and established authors are so close to their stories, it can be hard to spot mistakes in the writing. Even more, authors may overlook parts of a story that should be carved out. Another thing authors can miss that can hurt sales is an area of a story that could be stronger with dialogue or scene change.
  • Back to the official author website. Don’t just create a book author website. To get traction, add a blog to the author website. Add a new blog article that has relevant key phrases at least once a week. Here’s another tip. Website content management systems like WordPress allow authors to add a link to their book’s Amazon sales page.
  • Depending on the budget, new authors should consider trying paid ads. But watch the budget to avoid getting dreamy and overspending with minimal results.

Even More Ways for New Authors to Gain Book Sales

Places to test books for sale ads include Book Bub, Bargain Booksy, Cush City, AALBC, Facebook and Amazon sponsored ads. Here’s another tip as it regards ads. Run two ads to test which images and ad copy pull in more book sales.

  • Also, review book marketing analytics. This could keep new authors from entering states of magical thinking. After all, magical thinking can cause new authors to think that their new title will soon be among the Amazon bestselling books and New York Times bestselling books just because they wrote the book.
  • Create, publish and market book trailers.
  • New authors can also create their own Vimeo or YouTube Channel, offering writing and marketing tips.
  • Notwithstanding, the fact is selling enough books to see a title among the top selling books takes work. Which is why book marketing analytics aren’t always fun to review. But they offer insight into the types of book marketing techniques that are working and the techniques and strategies that need to be changed or stopped.

Pathway to Book Sales Online and Offline

Even more, podcast interviews, offline radio interviews and television interviews are effective ways for new authors to gain book sales. Other ways for new authors to gain book sales are to design and mail post cards using tools like Canva or VistaPrint. Thanks to the Internet, these postcards can be in print or digital.

Other options to announce books for sale include posting flyers on college and university bulletin boards. As a safeguard, authors should ensure they get approval from school administrators to post the flyers. And creating book newsletters is another way for new authors to gain book sales.

Definitely encourage family and friends to spread the word about the new books. This is not the time for authors to be shy. This raises another point. If new authors are assertive, there are a myriad of actions they can take to promote and market their books.

Keep the Momentum Going

For example, new authors can attend book festivals and cultural events that attract their book’s audience. Teaching college writing courses is another way to pull in more book sales. Additionally, there are book tours, book reviews and book swag to share with attendees at major events.

In closing, as the Internet and the world continue to change, new authors can develop innovative book marketing strategies. They can also take advantage of marketing apps and social media book marketing tools. To continue growing book sales, authors have to keep releasing new books. And, they have to keep introducing their new books and their backlist to book buyers and book readers.

These 3 Keys Lead to Book Marketing Sales Success

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By Novelist and Books Writer Denise Turney

man standing inside library with rows of books holding and reading book
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Congratulations on your new book! Considering the work that goes into writing a good book, your achievement is worth celebrating! A meal at your favorite restaurant, a visit to your favorite jazz club, an afternoon at the beach or an evening enjoying a live stage play — wonderful ways to celebrate writing a new novel. And celebrate you should, because soon focus on book marketing sales success goes into full swing!

Book Marketing Sales Success Resources

If you’re an experienced novelist, you already know that selling books is not magic. In fact, as part of your book marketing efforts, you may have already started contacting book clubs, bookstore book buyers, librarians and book bloggers, sharing details about your new book.

Good digital marketing companies that focus on books you could use as a marketing resource include sites like Book Bub, AALBC.com, Reedsy, Goodreads and Bargain Booksy. Pinterest, Facebook and TikTok are other resources you could use to introduce your books to more readers and book buyers.

Book marketing software resources range from Storiad, Bublish, Publish Wide, Book Buzzr, Book Baby to Publish Drive. To save yourself time, use social media schedulers.

Book Marketing Schedulers

Among the social media schedulers there’s Loomly, Buffer, Hootsuite, VistaPrint Digital Marketing, SproutSocial and CoSchedule. Strengthen social media marketing by using Net Galley and other resources to get book reviews, going so far as to email family, friends and beta book readers, asking them to write a review for your new book.

Give reviewers an Advanced Reader Copy (ARC) of your new copyrighted manuscript. If they love your new book, they may be great first-person book marketers, sharing details about your book with their colleagues, neighbors and friends.

Admittedly, even with schedulers and other resources, consistently selling lots of books is work. This is where the three keys that can lead to book sales success are important. Simply put, even if you get book reviews, engage in direct book marketing strategies by mailing postcards, print newsletters and book catalogs to book buyers, it may not be enough.

Road To More Book Marketing Sales Success

You still might not generate enough sales for your book to hit a bestseller list. Put in 10 or more hours a week marketing your book only to yield low sales and, after six months, you could wonder if it’s worth it. You might even wonder if you should keep writing and selling books at all.

This is the time to exercise the 3 keys that lead to book sales success. It’s now that you need to call on creativity, tenacity and perseverance. You need to create new book marketing strategies. And, you need to tweak existing book marketing actions. Examples of this include analyzing Amazon book sale reports, social media posts engagement and connections between book reviews and book sale spikes.

Additionally, it means that you try different direct marketing strategies. For instance, you might start your own literary podcast. Or you might design and use a car magnet on an older vehicle. Sending book buyers holiday greetings, blogging and paying for ads on influential book blogger websites are other choices that you could take.

Examining 3 Keys That Lead to Book Marketing Sales Success

In fact, creativity goes beyond writing books. Creativity is a huge part of the book marketing process. Throughout your writing career, you’re going to have to shift, pivot and make creative changes.

Tenacity is another must in order to experience a rewarding book writing career. This applies whether you write fiction or nonfiction books. If you’re tenacious and confident, you won’t abandon creative marketing ideas too soon. You’ll know when to hang in there and when to step away.

Even more, you’ll be persistent. But you’ll be persistent with your book marketing strategies in smart ways. In other words, you won’t hammer book buyers with one book ad after another. While using social media schedulers and good digital marketing companies, you’ll take time to actually engage with book readers and book buyers, and you will consistently measure the results of your book marketing efforts.

Engaging Book Buyers

For example, to introduce your books to more readers, you might post motivational quotes, questions and polls in literary newsletters or on social media. Other actions you might take include responding to visitors’ comments and thanking followers for Likes. To generate interest in your new book, you might run giveaways. This doesn’t just work with Amazon book sale efforts.

In fact, you can run book giveaways at your author website. And you can run book giveaways as part of online radio interviews. Book conferences and book festivals are other places where you can run book giveaways, particularly as part of contests.

Another key that leads to book sales success is perseverance. If you’re aim is to write books full-time, perseverance is a must. Book writing and book marketing are not for the feeble of mind. As a book writer, you’re entering a field that calls for toughness.

There’s a lot of competition. More than 1 million books are published each year, according to BK Connection. Then, there are the more than 12 million books already in print (or in audio book or e-book form). Even with the numbers of avid book buyers, that’s a lot of books to sale.

Keep Advancing Smartly

If you don’t persevere, you could throw in the towel just before your big break arrives. You could also start to believe the way your book sales are currently going is the way they will always go. And that doesn’t have to be the case, especially if you keep monitoring your results, pivoting and making smart changes. So, believe in your creative abilities, research book marketing tools and book marketing strategies.

Also, attend free marketing webinars offered by companies like Constant Contact, Amazon Marketplace, LinkedIn and Social Butterfly. Attending these free webinars is a great way to get up to speed on online marketing for beginners. Local chamber of commerce’s also hosts free online marketing webinars.

As you persevere, you can grow your book catalog. This alone can attract new book buyers, netting you more book sales. Readers will start to become familiar with your writing style and your personal brand. Don’t be surprised if your reader base grows, especially if you continue to sharpen your craft.

Then, you may start to generate book sales from your backlist. As your catalog grows, keep marketing your backlist. There’s a market of readers who look for used books for sale and old books for sale. Marketing your backlist is also an effective way to maintain interest in you, as a writer, allowing you to create traction for each new book that you release.

3 Ways Authors Land Book Marketing Radio Interviews to Discuss Their Books

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By Books Writer Denise Turney

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Performing book marketing radio interviews is an effective way for authors to introduce their rare books, print on demand books and contemporary fiction to more book buyers. Yet, success with radio interviews for writers isn’t always a slam dunk. Of course, the larger a radio station’s listening audience, the better. But, even then, authors may have to conduct five or more interviews on the same radio station before they see their book sales increase.

Highlighting Benefits of Book Marketing Radio Interviews

This brings up the first way that authors can land radio interviews to get more book sales. First, writers can listen to their favorite radio stations. Get to know which radio stations and radio DJs appreciate the types of books they write. It’s these radio stations authors should seek interviews on, as these radio stations attract the demographic that buys the types of books the authors write.

Then, authors can reach out to those DJs. But they shouldn’t just request a radio interview. Instead, they should outline specific ways that their books benefit readers. For instance, does the book teach readers about financial investments, how to save for college or save thousands when buying a house? Or perhaps, the book inspires or features strong women who demonstrate the worth embedded in breaking longstanding societal rules?

If the book is fictional, does the story focus on a real-life event or does the novel share a story that parallels a popular real-life romance? It’s these elements that offer history, education and entertainment, all which could interest radio listeners and book buyers.

Authors Serious About Landing Book Marketing Radio Interviews

Authors shouldn’t go light on highlighting benefits their books offer readers. In fact, they should make these benefits the centerpiece of their requests for book marketing radio interviews.

Next, create a request template for book marketing radio interviews. This is a time saver, especially for authors serious about landing a dozen or more radio interviews a month.

A plus about developing a radio interview request template is that the most authors should have to do before they email out interview requests, is to change the radio station call numbers and the DJ’s or radio station owner’s name. Use a spreadsheet to track radio stations that are contacted, including DJ and station owner names, radio station website URLs, telephone numbers and the dates that stations are contacted.

In addition to tracking progress, this spreadsheet creates a contact list. It’s this list that authors can return to after they finish writing and publishing more books, reaching out to radio stations to schedule new radio interviews. To continually grow book sales, authors should keep reaching out to more radio stations, landing even more radio interviews.

Working With Radio Directories

Here are two more ways authors land book marketing radio interviews. Both ways require tenacity and persistence. Follow radio station influencers on social media. After developing relationships with these influencers, authors can send a private message to radio station DJs, again sharing benefits that their books offer readers.

A third way that authors land radio interviews is to subscribe to directories like RadioGuestList.com. Directories like iTunes Radio, Tune In, Filter Music and Radio Tower also list radio stations, with contact details, that authors can contact to land more interviews.

During actual interviews, authors should prepare to respond to questions with more than yes and no answers. They are encouraged to share an intriguing bio with DJs after they land interviews.

Include tidbits in author bios that could evolve into engaging questions about children’s books, motivational books, rare books and coffee table books that radio listeners may want to buy and read. Another tip for writers, is simply – do not hold back. Once on the radio, authors benefit from being open and candid.

Getting More from Author Book Marketing Radio Interviews

Here are a few more tips for authors who are ready for radio:

  • Focus on offline and online radio stations
  • Seek out nonpaying radio interviews to introduce book buyers to your titles (there are lots of online radio stations that interview authors for free)
  • Post links from the interviews at social media accounts

Keep at it. After all, the more authors talk about their books, the more book buyers will learn about the books, a necessary step toward increasing book sales.

How To Land Book Marketing Radio Interviews

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By Books Author Denise Turney

bookstore building facade in city seeking book sales and retail sales
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Book marketing radio interviews are a path forward for authors. Conducting radio interviews, especially on the right stations, can differentiate new and seasoned books from the pack. See an increase in book sales and the effects extend beyond book rankings. For starters, it can take a lot of the struggle out of marketing books. It can also keep you encouraged.

After all, if you think writing a great book is tough, wait until you start the book marketing process. Part of the challenge has to do with the number of books published each year. It’s sobering. Each year, between 600,000 and 1,000,000 books are published. And this is in the United States alone.

Book Marketing Plan Ideas

Yet, as tough as it is, there are ways to distinguish your books from the crowd. To start, develop an effective book marketing plan. Here are items you could include in your book marketing plan:

  • Author biography – Include a professional photo with your biography. Also, add key public speaking events that you headlined, published articles and feature interviews.
  • Professional Website – Partner with an experienced website designer to design and build out your author website. Keep it simple, adding book excerpts and ways for visitors to easily purchase your books. Avoid adding too many links that lead away from your books and your book order pages.
  • Book catalog – Brief summaries or overviews of your books as well as ways to order your books are must-haves to add to your book catalog.
  • Book Blog – This may sound surprising. But a book blog is an effective way to attract readers. As a tip, add a new article or interview to your book blog at least once a week.
  • Social Media Book Marketing Strategies – Also, create a social media presence. This includes adding social media links at your author website and book blog.

Book Marketing Radio Interviews

But don’t just set up social media accounts as part of your book marketing plan. Post comments, questions, polls and upcoming book events at your social media accounts. Also, post information about a radio interview, including a live radio interview, that you’re scheduled to discuss your book on.

That’s right, radio interviews should be part of your book marketing strategy. If you’ve never done a live radio interview, the idea of doing a radio interview might seem intimidating. Fortunately, it’s not. In fact, you might end up loving doing radio interviews. But first you need to land a radio interview.

Here’s how you can do that. Save yourself time with a radio directory. There are online and print radio directories. Some of these directories include newspaper, magazine and television media contacts. If you’re book marketing locally, consider focusing on setting up radio interviews with local radio stations.

Track Live Book Marketing Radio Interviews Results

To track your results, set up a spreadsheet. On the spreadsheet, add the radio station call name, DJ at the radio station you want to interview with, website URL, telephone number and email address. Also, add three to four columns to track the dates that you reach out to a DJ to schedule a live radio interview.

Other steps you can take to land radio interviews are:

  • Email 5 to 10 radio stations a week – add the link to your website in your email signature
  • Send your author biography with the radio interview requests
  • Highlight specific benefits the radio station listeners will gain during your interview. It’s important that you let the DJ know how your book can improve the lives of the radio station’s listeners.
  • Follow up on radio interview requests within 5 to 7 days
  • Track each outreach and follow-up on the spreadsheet
  • Extend your radio interview book marketing plan to online and offline radio stations

Book Marketing Requires Ongoing Action

After you land your first radio interview, schedule another interview. To keep interviews engaging, expand your answers. Make radio interviews a lively conversation with the DJ. Yet, keep listeners in mind, continually offering tips, insight and entertainment as you respond to questions DJs ask you.

Another step you can take is to list radio interviews you’ve already done at your book blog and author website. Also, list upcoming radio interviews at your book blog and author website.

To continue to market and sell more copies of your books, consider reading manuals on eBook marketing, attending free book marketing webinars and taking advantage of guidance in content marketing books. Also, remember that book marketing, including landing radio interviews, is ongoing work. I’m rooting for you!

Achieve Book Marketing Success from Home

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By African American Books Author Denise Turney

woman in brown shirt holding buy books quote board
Photo by cottonbro on Pexels.com

Book marketing is work. In fact, marketing books is so much work that authors can easily spend 90% or more time solely on marketing after they publish new books. Fortunately, there are no-cost to low-cost ways to get the word out about your books without leaving home.

Book Marketing Festivals

For example, The Everywhere Book Fest, the Miami Book, FLIP, Hay Festival of Literature and Arts, Brooklyn Book Festival, Edinburgh International Book Festival and the Harlem Book Fair pull in hundreds, some of the events attract thousands, of book lovers and book buyers. For instance, in 2018 more than 250,000 people attended the Miami Book Fair.

Clearly, book festivals are great places to implement author marketing strategies like distributing postcards, handing out brochures, flyers and free book excepts. Also, large book festivals are great places for authors to talk with book lovers and book buyers face to face.

Authors who ask visitors who stop by their festival booth to sign up for their digital newsletter, could send festival visitors holiday greetings, birthday greetings and other book marketing messages post festival. After all, a key benefit of marketing books is relationship building. As an author, if you want to expand your readership and increase book sales, make developing and deepening relationships with readers a priority.

Ways to Market Your Books from Home

But what if you’re an author who’s unable to attend book festivals to market your books? There are ways to connect with readers online and start developing new, rewarding reader relationships. These are genuine relationships, not communication pathways to saturate readers with “buy my book” messages.

Below are ebook marketing, Kindle marketing and other novel marketing actions that you could complete to introduce new readers to your books from home:

  • Social media marketing books – Schedule social media posts using automated systems like HootSuite, Buffer, etc. But don’t just post book excerpts, answer questions, respond to book polls and like and comment on other authors’ and readers’ social media posts.
  • Amazon Ads – With the right keywords, authors could increase book sales by running Amazon automatic and sponsored ads. Consider taking free Amazon ad webinars to learn how to market your book on Amazon. Before running campaigns to market your books. Also, review ad reports, looking for effective keywords, twice a month. Be open to making campaign changes until book sales increase and your ad spend costs drops. The goal is to turn a profit, so watch your ad reports and make adjustments as needed.
  • Virtual readings – To market your books, you can host virtual book readings on platforms like YouTube and Facebook Live.
  • Digital newsletters – Create and distribute digital newsletters. Add newsletter sign-up forms to your official author website. There are email marketing systems like MailChimp and Constant Contact that you could use to manage digital newsletters.
  • Press releases – Write and send press releases to media.
  • Postcards – Design electronic postcards and send to book club presidents and book lovers.
  • Private group discussions – Hold discussions about your books at private social media groups.
  • Virtual book festivals – Attend virtual book festivals.
  • Blog – Start a book blog and link it to your website. Use Google Keyword Planner to find effective keywords to add to your blog articles.

Building Reader Relationships

EBook marketing isn’t the only book marketing strategy that’s a good fit for authors who market their books from home. Tools like social media, electronic postcards, brochures and digital flyers have made it easier to market print books from home.

However, authors who truly gain from book marketing, focus on developing reader relationships. They may send readers a birthday card, holiday greetings or attend book club events, places where they might not sell a single book. Yet, as readers start to feel that authors sincerely value reader-author connections and strive to create the best stories for them to enjoy, those readers may turn into an author’s regular book buyers.

And it’s that reader and author connection that’s often the biggest reward. Little surpasses the reward of hearing a book buyer share how much she enjoyed reading your novel.  Even better is hearing a reader share how deeply your book touched him, perhaps inspiring him to make a good life change. The good news is that authors can make these reader connections from home or abroad.

Why You Should Use Book Marketing Analytics

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By African American Books Writer Denise Turney

cool trendy african american man with dreadlocks reading book about book marketing on street
Photo by Andrea Piacquadio on Pexels.com

Book marketing analytics are a writer’s best friend. Why? Book marketing can be a challenge for authors. This is due, in part, to the fact that authors, particularly novelists, rely on imagination and creativity, not hard facts, to develop their works. While writing, creativity, imagination and relying on the muse are blessings. They aren’t necessarily blessings during the book marketing process.

Book Marketing Options

In fact, novelists can sink into magical thinking after their books are published. Fortunately, there are doors that lead from fiction writing to book marketing to book sales. The first door sees fiction writers handing the job of marketing books to publicists, marketing specialists and content marketing writers. But those options cost money.

As a fiction writer, you could go through the second door and use marketing analytics to steer your book marketing efforts. Time may be your greatest investment. It takes time, consistent time, to market books. For example, if you use Barnes and Noble, social media, Kobo, Google or Amazon sponsored ads to market your books, download marketing analytics twice a month. But don’t just download the reports.

Content Marketing Analytics

Review the reports. Pay attention to which keywords are getting clicks that turn into book sales. Lower bids on keywords that receive clicks but, no sales. Also, attend free social media and book retailer ad webinars. Keep learning. Book marketing tools and platforms change. Attending webinars can keep you abreast of these changes.

If you use eBook marketing tools like social media automated marketing platforms (e.g. HootSuite, Buffer, Marketo, InfusionSoft), review marketing analytics associated with those platforms. And make changes based on what the analytics show. Do the same with content marketing analytics.

Also, set up a Google Search Console account. Bing is another search engine it’s good to have a search console account with. Submit your author website sitemaps and ensure they are indexed by major search engines. You can check this through your search console accounts.

Content Management Systems

Additionally, you may want to work with content management systems (CMS) that have robust content marketing analytics. SEO keyword analytics, meta tag description analytics, paragraph length, image alt text, excerpt features and keyword headings are a few features to look for in content marketing analytics.

Another thing, when doing content marketing, perform keyword planning before you start writing landing pages and blog articles. Make sure your writing flows, is conversational and reads naturally. Also, focus on providing tips, insight, guidance and entertainment more than focusing on adding SEO keywords to blog articles.

About Digital Marketing Analytics

Digital marketing analytics can keep you from slipping into magical thinking as a novelist. This is an advantage. Why? Magical thinking could find you believing that your novels are going to sell loads of copies simply because you wrote the books.

If you don’t think you’re doing this, ask yourself why you’re not marketing books that you write. And, if you are marketing your books but not receiving lots of book sales, ask yourself why you aren’t doing what it takes to increase your book sales — even while you keep expecting your book sales to suddenly (somehow) pick up.

Marketing analytics can help you to steer clear of magical thinking. The length and depth of this advantage may be unknown. In fact, this advantage, can save you thousands of dollars. Also, it can save you countless hours, frustration and heartache. Really. It can.

But you can’t just have digital marketing analytics. You have to review the analytics. See what you need to change and make adjustments. This is an ongoing process. As you start to understand what works for you and take the right book marketing actions, you should see your book sales increase.

Book Marketing Platforms that Work

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book marketing books on shelf

By Books Author Denise Turney

Book marketing is a long, ongoing process. If you want a sustainable career as a writer, you need to learn and start practicing smart marketing techniques. Fortunately, there are technology tools to help.

For starters, you can get real traction at the right book marketing platforms using two strategies. One approach requires more of your time. The other approach requires more money.

Types of Book Marketing Platforms

AALBC.com, Book Daily, Artist First and Good Reads are types of marketing platforms. So too are TED Talk, Mosaic, podcasts and social media.

Book clubs, television programs that focus on books, press release distribution services and bookstores are also types of marketing platforms. But it’s your book blog and author website that are your primary platforms.

Each platform that you work should point back to either your author website or your book order page. If your only book order page is at Amazon.com or BarnesandNoble.com, point platforms to your custom sales pages at those bookseller websites.

Getting Platform Results Is Not Free

That means that your social media profiles should include the link to either your author website or book order page. When you run ads through marketing agencies like Book Daily, add a link to your book order page in your profile.

If you have the time, schedule at least an hour a day to work book marketing platforms. The more time you invest at the platforms, the better. But don’t just posts. Find out who platform influencers are. Ask influencers questions, “like” what they share and follow them.

I’m a fan of social media posts schedulers like Buffer and Hootsuite. Just log into social media accounts and posts live once a day. You can get results with 5 to 10 minutes of work per social media platform.

Social Media and More Marketing Platforms

Pick two to three social media platforms to actively posts comments, ask questions and share motivational quotes on. See if your followers, shares, likes and overall engagement don’t go up.

Build your marketing platforms by:

  • Blogging once a week or more (add keywords into your blog posts)
  • Sending direct mail to book lovers
  • Creating and distributing a weekly or a monthly book newsletter
  • Scheduling at least one YouTube or Vimeo video posts a week
  • Guest posting on high traffic websites like Huffington Post, Forbes and Entrepreneur. Include a link to your author website in your bio.
  • Attending large book club events and cultural festivals. Pass out free bookmarks or book excerpts. Stamp your author website URL on all handouts.

Take two to three of the above steps at least once a week. If you’re short on time, pay marketing agencies to do your heavy lifting. Start small with spending. Avoid giving into smooth sales pitches and getting pulled into expensive marketing deals.

Measure Book Marketing Results

Make sure that you see measurable results, and not just an increase in traffic. Why is this important? Computer bots can send loads of traffic your way, lending the appearance that tons of people are truly interested in your book, when that’s not the case.

Don’t assume that just because your profile, website URL or book cover is at book marketing platforms that you’re pulling in the right traffic. An increase in book sales is a sure sign that book marketing platforms are working.

Requests for book excerpts, author interviews, more social media followers and increased reader engagement are other signs that book marketing platforms are yielding good results. If you receive more comments that focus on your book or its topics at your book blog after launching a book marketing campaign, it could be an additional indicator that platforms you’re on are pulling in your target audience.

10 Virtual Book Marketing Tips

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By Books Author Denise Turney

Gone are the days when writer’s conferences, book festivals and live author book signings were held solely in-person. COVID-19 shifted those trends. To succeed in today’s literary world as an author, you need to implement the right virtual book marketing techniques.

Additionally, and as solitary as the book industry may seem to be, in order to thrive, bookstore owners, book publishers, literary agents, publicists and authors need to connect with each other as well as with readers. Keep reading to discover how to make these connections online.

books on laptop screen and book marketing ipad
Book marketing website

Book Marketing from Remote Locations

Traditional book marketing options have definitely changed, thanks to COVID-19. But there are still ways to develop and maintain rewarding connections with book buyers and industry leaders. This article focuses on keyways that authors and readers can connect online.

It’s important to remember that book marketing is about more than selling books. In fact, it’s while marketing books that authors get the chance to build rewarding face-to-face relationships with book buyers. Especially during book signings, writers can ask readers what appealed to them about their novel, who their favorite characters are and what they’d like to see in upcoming books.

The below tips have been proven to work in the virtual world. There’s only one tip that you might have to leave your home to complete.

These 5 Tips Support Social Distancing

The first tip is important for nearly any book marketing environment. In fact, you may want to keep using that tip and the other tips after in-person book events increase:

  1. Create a book mailing list. Looking for ways to do this? Add a “Subscribe Here” button to your website. Offer website visitors the chance to win free copies of your books as giveaways. To participate in giveaways, ask website visitors to fill out a form that requires them to provide their email address. Include a box for visitors to check, confirming that they agree to receive discount, free and informational content from you.
  2. Host a Facebook Live book reading. In fact, this is great way to stir up interest in older titles. And it’s a great way to generate interest in your soon-to-be-released novel.
  3. Build a newsletter. If you’re looking to save time, try an automated mail system like Mail Chimp, Constant Contact, Mail Monkey, etc.
  4. Schedule online radio interviews. Podcasts like Off The Shelf Books Talk Radio conduct one-hour author feature interviews.
  5. Send electronic holiday greetings. Send electronic holiday greetings to targeted recipients (e.g., readers who’ve purchased one or more books from you, book club presidents, leaders of organizations that work in the field your book is focused in).

More Book Marketing Tips in a Virtual World

  1. Design social media headers. These are professional headers that attract immediate attention. However, if you don’t have solid design skills, consider working with a talented graphics artist or website designer.
  2. Order a book marketing magnet for your car. Place the magnet on your car’s bumper or the front or back doors.
  3. Join a cross-author book promotion group. And be prepared to share other writers’ books with your contacts. Writers in the group will do the same for your titles.
  4. Introduce your books to private social media groups. But don’t just market your books. Post questions, answer questions and offer tips.
  5. Develop cool book marketing postcards to mail to your contacts. This is where you may have to leave home and go to the post office. Why? These are hard (hold-in-your-hand) postcards.

Growing Book Marketing Strategies

Social distancing or not, marketing books is not easy. To be successful, as an author, you have to be committed. This means, that you market your books even if you go days without a book sale. You market books when it’s storming outside, you feel like you’re wasting time and your outreach yields numerous “no’s”.

Also, to know which book marketing actions best fit your book, your schedule, travel and financial situation, track your efforts. You’ll love that this is as simple as tracking contacts like book clubs, radio stations, newspaper editors, librarians and social media groups on a spreadsheet. Update the spreadsheet with outreach results. For example, did your email to a local radio DJ yield you an interview? If so, log that on the spreadsheet with the date of the interview.

It can be so beneficial. In fact, when more in-person events are held, consider incorporating the above tips into your standard book marketing efforts. Also, stay creative. In other words, keep looking for and developing new, effective ways to find and connect with readers.