Bill Conrad's Blog - Posts Tagged "self-publishing"
Bill’s guide to Self-Publishing
So, you have written a book and want to make some money. Hopefully, this guide will help you in some way. Let’s start off with what you have so far. You have written a book, shown it to somebody, they liked it and you have self-edited it many times. At this point in your own mind, your work must be the best it can be without outside help.
What you now need to do:
You need a copy of Microsoft Word and your book needs to be in Word format. At this point, it should not have any formatting unless this is a major part of your work. You will then need a short 1 paragraph summary of your work (including the ending) and a detailed ~2-page summary of your work (including the ending.) You need to describe the category of our book will be placed. IE, Science fiction, drama. Look at the possible book categories on Amazon and pick up to 4.
Now comes the hardest part [well, it was for me.] You need to write a “book description.” This is an advertisement, teaser and, summary of your work. Look online for tips on how to create one and then go to Amazon and just start reading book descriptions. I recommend reading at least 50 and reading them should take at least 4 hours. Really take a deep dive into this. Look at the classics, look at your favorites, look at ones with lots of stars and then look at ones with 1 star. Your goal is to determine the format and what the good book descriptions read like and what a bad book descriptions read like. Remember when I suggested you write a short paragraph of your work? Start there and then take a stab at writing your own book description. It needs to be sharp, get the reader’s attention quickly and then deliver a knockout “buy it now” teaser blow. Show it to as many people as you can to get their feedback.
Now, you have a major decision you have to make. Traditional publishing or self-publishing or hardcore self-publishing. Let’s start with hardcore self-publishing. This means going to a printer, making 10,000 copies of your book and selling them. My father did this for many years with ceramics textbooks. While this used to be popular with the “how to” kinds of books that were advertised in the back of magazines, hardcore self-publishing isn’t really done today.
Traditional publishing has become a really strange environment. You must first locate a “book representative” to present your work to a publisher. Book representatives often want $ up front [$2K] and then they take 20% of your profit. Publishers WILL NOT talk to you without a book representative. Locating a competent book representative is a difficult task. In my opinion, traditional publishing has been dying for many years. To me, this isn’t the future and if you want to get ahead of the game, self-publishing is your best bet.
Self-publishing has two different approaches that can be done in parallel. The first is on-demand printing and the second is an electronic book (eBook.) On-demand printing is really cool. Once the book is formatted, the printing house keeps an electronic copy on their servers. When somebody orders the book, it is simply printed and mailed directly to them. This allows for a lot of flexibility. eBooks can be sold on several sites.
The second major decision you have to make is if you should use a “self-publishing helper.” This is a person who will guide you through the process and make sure your work is the best it can be. For a first self-published book, I recommend using a self-publishing helper as they will guide you through the process. The problem is that this person will be expensive. They usually charge $50-100 per hour or a flat rate for the project.
What are the costs? I know I am going to get a lot of disagreements over this, but expect to pay $5,000 for all the steps including a self-publishing helper. Yes, you’re probably can get it done for less, but if your goal is to make a profit, spending a significant amount of money up front is a necessary step. Sorry for the bad news. Also, remember that your first book will tell the public a lot about you. If your first book is poorly done with bad reviews, it will take a long time to gain the public’s interest in your subsequent works. Start out strong!
Here are the steps necessary for self-publishing.
1) A professional person needs to look over your book. You are going to need to pay for this opinion. Probably $500. They will first professionally determine if your work is worth the massive $/effort that you are about to undertake. Then they will point out areas that have major problems. IE, bad ending, move chapter 2 after chapter 5, start your book with X and part Y doesn’t make sense. A big issue for me was when my main character made several “critical decisions.” I didn’t explain to the reader what was going through their head. My character simply reacted in one sentence and then the plot moved on. I had to do a lot of additional writing to “help the reader” see what I was thinking.
2) Your work needs to be professionally edited. How do you find an editor? Look online for one and there are sites where they advertise and people rate them. This is going to be an expensive process. Good editors charge a minimum of $65 an hour. $75 is a better number. There will be a few back and forth passes. You will be using the “review” function in Microsoft Word. Not using the review function will make this process impossible and it essential to have Microsoft Word. Now, there is a major problem. At best the English language is a vague collection of rules we sometimes follow. All editors are different and their edited result will likely not agree these “established” rules. Even worse, they will not agree with their own rules and flip-flop on the changes you paid them to make. In addition, they will never agree with your rules. In addition, there is the style, flow, sentence structure, dialog and paragraph breaks. These will all be different than your writing style. My advice is to go with the “flow of the editor” as best as you can because this is going to challenge you. Important tip. As you are doing this process. Make mental notes so that the next time you write, the editor will have less to do. This gives you more control and saves you money. It also makes you a better writer.
3) I am sure you have already come up with a title for your work. Now, brainstorm with as many people you can and come up with at least 30 alternate titles. Somehow pick the best one. If you have a publishing helper that knows the industry, they can help in this area. Important tip. Do not use a title that has already been used. For example, the Steven King book “Christine.” Your unrelated children’s book “Christine” would be completely confused with the one by Steven King. Parents would never buy this for their child no matter how well it is written. Another example is the Beatles song, “A Hard Day's Night.” Your book “A Hard Day's Night” about WWII combat would be associated with this song. All of this could lead to lawsuits and other issues. Play it safe and avoid this.
4) Go over your book description with a professional book person and an editor. There will be a lot of work in this area. This is the most important part of the whole publishing process. If your book description is even slightly less than perfect, people will not “buy it now.” Plan to spend as much time as you can in this area. Important tip. Print your work on an oversized paper or use a whiteboard to go over it from a large perspective.
5) Write a bio about yourself and find your best picture. Professionally edit this bio and show it to people.
6) Get an ISBN/Library of Congress/Copyright number. This is an easy step that requires ~$100
7) Now that you have a work comes a part that was extremely difficult for me. You need endorsements. IE, Bob Smith, New York Times book editor wrote, “This is a fantastic book. Get yourself a copy.” You will need to have a few of these for the back of your book cover. How do you get this to happen? That’s the hard part. I have a few suggestions. Do you know anybody that is famous in some way? Ask them first. By this point, you should have made a few contacts in your online writing groups. Start by asking them. When that doesn’t work, post and ask the group. As a last resort, pay for a review. They’re expensive and range from $99 to $3K. I know, this is an awful option and the review you pay for will most likely be poorly written.
8) You need to hire a cover designer. How to find one? Same as finding an editor. There are sights where they advertise with reviews. You will send them a 2 page summary of your work, your ideas on what the cover should look like, categories of other works and images of book covers that you like. At this point, the title and overall book will need to be finalized. For example, you cannot change the main character from male to female. The cover designer will design the cover, the spine and the back cover. How much will they charge? Depends on what you want. Also, you will have to pay for the rights to photographs you may use. Make sure you keep the documentation that came when you purchased the photograph rights. Expect to pay at least $300. Romance books all have paintings on the front. That’s got to cost a lot. Important tip. DO NOT just copy something from the internet and call it yours. This WILL BITE YOU HARD.
9) Now that everything is wrapped up and the book is finalized, you need to do a copy edit. This is an expensive process that takes a master. They go over the book and look for typos and other grammar nit-picky stuff. Ideally, they will also check facts, point out logic issues and give your work another perspective. This is the final point where you can make changes. Now, you’re committed and no more changes can be made.
10) Your book is then formatted for on-demand printing. You get a copy, look at it and make a few changes as possible. They really hate it when you make changes at this stage and it is expensive. Important tip. It has been my experience that the thing you will change the most at this stage is the copyright page and table of contents. Make sure you go over this carefully before formatting for printing.
11) Format the book as an ebook. This will generate both MOBI and epub formats. Review it in several readers to make sure it comes out correctly.
12) Create an Amazon, Kubo and Barns Nobel account. Get your AISN number from Amazon. Now, you have a decision to make. Use Amazon KDP select or not. In my opinion, the advantage of KDP select is minimal. I used it for a free book giveaway which didn’t really help. If you use KDP select then your eBook cannot be on other sites. Amazon will check, so be careful. My advice is to try KDP select for 3 months, see no benefit and never look back.
13) There are several sites that will promote your book for free. Before your book is released, set up accounts 2 weeks early and inform them of your release date. Put on your book description, bio, picture, ISBN number, amazon link, AISN number Kubo link and Barns Nobel link.
Here are the best ones I found:
https://www.bookbub.com/home/
http://bookbrag.com/add-your-book/
http://bookoftheday.org/add-book/
http://bookpinning.com/?sws=home/subm...
http://discountbookman.com/book-promo...
http://bookteddy.com/submit-book-free
http://indiebooklounge.com/register.php
http://mybookplace.net/submit-your-book/
http://pretty-hot.com/submit-your-book/
http://www.bookdaily.com/authorsignup
http://www.humanmade.net/submission-form
http://zwoodlebooks.com/submissions/
https://bookpraiser.com/listyourbook/
https://www.authorsden.com/join/Defau...
https://www.readersintheknow.com/aphe...
14) Put your book info on Goodreads and any other site that will host information about you.
15) That’s it. Time for marketing.
For more tips, check out: https://www.thebookdesigner.com/
You’re the best -Bill
February 5, 2018
What you now need to do:
You need a copy of Microsoft Word and your book needs to be in Word format. At this point, it should not have any formatting unless this is a major part of your work. You will then need a short 1 paragraph summary of your work (including the ending) and a detailed ~2-page summary of your work (including the ending.) You need to describe the category of our book will be placed. IE, Science fiction, drama. Look at the possible book categories on Amazon and pick up to 4.
Now comes the hardest part [well, it was for me.] You need to write a “book description.” This is an advertisement, teaser and, summary of your work. Look online for tips on how to create one and then go to Amazon and just start reading book descriptions. I recommend reading at least 50 and reading them should take at least 4 hours. Really take a deep dive into this. Look at the classics, look at your favorites, look at ones with lots of stars and then look at ones with 1 star. Your goal is to determine the format and what the good book descriptions read like and what a bad book descriptions read like. Remember when I suggested you write a short paragraph of your work? Start there and then take a stab at writing your own book description. It needs to be sharp, get the reader’s attention quickly and then deliver a knockout “buy it now” teaser blow. Show it to as many people as you can to get their feedback.
Now, you have a major decision you have to make. Traditional publishing or self-publishing or hardcore self-publishing. Let’s start with hardcore self-publishing. This means going to a printer, making 10,000 copies of your book and selling them. My father did this for many years with ceramics textbooks. While this used to be popular with the “how to” kinds of books that were advertised in the back of magazines, hardcore self-publishing isn’t really done today.
Traditional publishing has become a really strange environment. You must first locate a “book representative” to present your work to a publisher. Book representatives often want $ up front [$2K] and then they take 20% of your profit. Publishers WILL NOT talk to you without a book representative. Locating a competent book representative is a difficult task. In my opinion, traditional publishing has been dying for many years. To me, this isn’t the future and if you want to get ahead of the game, self-publishing is your best bet.
Self-publishing has two different approaches that can be done in parallel. The first is on-demand printing and the second is an electronic book (eBook.) On-demand printing is really cool. Once the book is formatted, the printing house keeps an electronic copy on their servers. When somebody orders the book, it is simply printed and mailed directly to them. This allows for a lot of flexibility. eBooks can be sold on several sites.
The second major decision you have to make is if you should use a “self-publishing helper.” This is a person who will guide you through the process and make sure your work is the best it can be. For a first self-published book, I recommend using a self-publishing helper as they will guide you through the process. The problem is that this person will be expensive. They usually charge $50-100 per hour or a flat rate for the project.
What are the costs? I know I am going to get a lot of disagreements over this, but expect to pay $5,000 for all the steps including a self-publishing helper. Yes, you’re probably can get it done for less, but if your goal is to make a profit, spending a significant amount of money up front is a necessary step. Sorry for the bad news. Also, remember that your first book will tell the public a lot about you. If your first book is poorly done with bad reviews, it will take a long time to gain the public’s interest in your subsequent works. Start out strong!
Here are the steps necessary for self-publishing.
1) A professional person needs to look over your book. You are going to need to pay for this opinion. Probably $500. They will first professionally determine if your work is worth the massive $/effort that you are about to undertake. Then they will point out areas that have major problems. IE, bad ending, move chapter 2 after chapter 5, start your book with X and part Y doesn’t make sense. A big issue for me was when my main character made several “critical decisions.” I didn’t explain to the reader what was going through their head. My character simply reacted in one sentence and then the plot moved on. I had to do a lot of additional writing to “help the reader” see what I was thinking.
2) Your work needs to be professionally edited. How do you find an editor? Look online for one and there are sites where they advertise and people rate them. This is going to be an expensive process. Good editors charge a minimum of $65 an hour. $75 is a better number. There will be a few back and forth passes. You will be using the “review” function in Microsoft Word. Not using the review function will make this process impossible and it essential to have Microsoft Word. Now, there is a major problem. At best the English language is a vague collection of rules we sometimes follow. All editors are different and their edited result will likely not agree these “established” rules. Even worse, they will not agree with their own rules and flip-flop on the changes you paid them to make. In addition, they will never agree with your rules. In addition, there is the style, flow, sentence structure, dialog and paragraph breaks. These will all be different than your writing style. My advice is to go with the “flow of the editor” as best as you can because this is going to challenge you. Important tip. As you are doing this process. Make mental notes so that the next time you write, the editor will have less to do. This gives you more control and saves you money. It also makes you a better writer.
3) I am sure you have already come up with a title for your work. Now, brainstorm with as many people you can and come up with at least 30 alternate titles. Somehow pick the best one. If you have a publishing helper that knows the industry, they can help in this area. Important tip. Do not use a title that has already been used. For example, the Steven King book “Christine.” Your unrelated children’s book “Christine” would be completely confused with the one by Steven King. Parents would never buy this for their child no matter how well it is written. Another example is the Beatles song, “A Hard Day's Night.” Your book “A Hard Day's Night” about WWII combat would be associated with this song. All of this could lead to lawsuits and other issues. Play it safe and avoid this.
4) Go over your book description with a professional book person and an editor. There will be a lot of work in this area. This is the most important part of the whole publishing process. If your book description is even slightly less than perfect, people will not “buy it now.” Plan to spend as much time as you can in this area. Important tip. Print your work on an oversized paper or use a whiteboard to go over it from a large perspective.
5) Write a bio about yourself and find your best picture. Professionally edit this bio and show it to people.
6) Get an ISBN/Library of Congress/Copyright number. This is an easy step that requires ~$100
7) Now that you have a work comes a part that was extremely difficult for me. You need endorsements. IE, Bob Smith, New York Times book editor wrote, “This is a fantastic book. Get yourself a copy.” You will need to have a few of these for the back of your book cover. How do you get this to happen? That’s the hard part. I have a few suggestions. Do you know anybody that is famous in some way? Ask them first. By this point, you should have made a few contacts in your online writing groups. Start by asking them. When that doesn’t work, post and ask the group. As a last resort, pay for a review. They’re expensive and range from $99 to $3K. I know, this is an awful option and the review you pay for will most likely be poorly written.
8) You need to hire a cover designer. How to find one? Same as finding an editor. There are sights where they advertise with reviews. You will send them a 2 page summary of your work, your ideas on what the cover should look like, categories of other works and images of book covers that you like. At this point, the title and overall book will need to be finalized. For example, you cannot change the main character from male to female. The cover designer will design the cover, the spine and the back cover. How much will they charge? Depends on what you want. Also, you will have to pay for the rights to photographs you may use. Make sure you keep the documentation that came when you purchased the photograph rights. Expect to pay at least $300. Romance books all have paintings on the front. That’s got to cost a lot. Important tip. DO NOT just copy something from the internet and call it yours. This WILL BITE YOU HARD.
9) Now that everything is wrapped up and the book is finalized, you need to do a copy edit. This is an expensive process that takes a master. They go over the book and look for typos and other grammar nit-picky stuff. Ideally, they will also check facts, point out logic issues and give your work another perspective. This is the final point where you can make changes. Now, you’re committed and no more changes can be made.
10) Your book is then formatted for on-demand printing. You get a copy, look at it and make a few changes as possible. They really hate it when you make changes at this stage and it is expensive. Important tip. It has been my experience that the thing you will change the most at this stage is the copyright page and table of contents. Make sure you go over this carefully before formatting for printing.
11) Format the book as an ebook. This will generate both MOBI and epub formats. Review it in several readers to make sure it comes out correctly.
12) Create an Amazon, Kubo and Barns Nobel account. Get your AISN number from Amazon. Now, you have a decision to make. Use Amazon KDP select or not. In my opinion, the advantage of KDP select is minimal. I used it for a free book giveaway which didn’t really help. If you use KDP select then your eBook cannot be on other sites. Amazon will check, so be careful. My advice is to try KDP select for 3 months, see no benefit and never look back.
13) There are several sites that will promote your book for free. Before your book is released, set up accounts 2 weeks early and inform them of your release date. Put on your book description, bio, picture, ISBN number, amazon link, AISN number Kubo link and Barns Nobel link.
Here are the best ones I found:
https://www.bookbub.com/home/
http://bookbrag.com/add-your-book/
http://bookoftheday.org/add-book/
http://bookpinning.com/?sws=home/subm...
http://discountbookman.com/book-promo...
http://bookteddy.com/submit-book-free
http://indiebooklounge.com/register.php
http://mybookplace.net/submit-your-book/
http://pretty-hot.com/submit-your-book/
http://www.bookdaily.com/authorsignup
http://www.humanmade.net/submission-form
http://zwoodlebooks.com/submissions/
https://bookpraiser.com/listyourbook/
https://www.authorsden.com/join/Defau...
https://www.readersintheknow.com/aphe...
14) Put your book info on Goodreads and any other site that will host information about you.
15) That’s it. Time for marketing.
For more tips, check out: https://www.thebookdesigner.com/
You’re the best -Bill
February 5, 2018
Bill’s Guild to Self-Publishing Marketing
So, you have written a book and want to market it? Well, you may have come to the wrong place, but hear me out. I am a self-published author and I have dabbled in making my book marketable. The results have been less than successful. So why read a book marketing guide by somebody like me? Well, the principals are still the same whether I have been successful at using them or not. Also, you often learn more from failure than from success. Here you will find an outline of the basic self-publishing marketing steps.
The beginning.
At this point, you have written a book, gotten it professionally edited, a professional cover designed, you have an ISBN number, it has been formatted for ebook and/or print on demand and is now available online for sale on Amazon, Kubo, Barns and Nobel. Quite an accomplishment. The problem is that 500 people a month are in the same boat. Many of them already have successful books that their readers are eager to read more. The trick to somehow get people to click “buy it now.”
In order to get attention, you need to attack this problem from several fronts. Let’s start with the most important one. YOU NEED AMAZON REVIEWS! LOTS OF THEM! As I am writing this article, I have a grand total of ZERO! Yes, this is really bad and I am working on it. The first part of the plan is to send a copy of your work to every friend you have. Two months later, pester them (often) for a review. Keep this up until each one of them writes their review. This is the essential foundation and it is absolutely critical to your success. This is also the step I am stuck on.
There is still one site that you can buy Amazon reviews. $300 buys you up to 10 badly written reviews. Should you do this? The reviews of the reviews say no, but still consider this option. Also, it is likely that Amazon will sue them into the ground soon, get their list and do something to the people who paid for reviews. Be careful!
If you read my previous blog, you will have by now written at least 200 book reviews on Goodreads and Amazon. Consider posting these reviews to Barns and Nobel and Kubo. Your new goal is to look for books on Goodreads that only have a few reviews. Comb through them to see if they have a website or some other external way of contacting the author. Email them and say that you will do a review exchange. This means that you offer to buy their book on Amazon, at least pretend to read their book and write a review. In addition, you then cross-post your review to Goodreads. The other author will look at your 200 reviews and feel that they are getting a good deal. Is this ethical? It’s a simple review exchange. You’re not getting paid or doing something dishonest. The important part of this is that you are requesting externally to Amazon and Goodreads. NOTE: both sites monitor their internal communications and “review exchanges” would get their attention. Another source of authors is on forms like Writers Helping Writers.
You need a website dedicated to your work. There are lots of great website hosting companies that have great online free website building programs. For example Godaddy. Of course, I chose not to use the online website builders. Why? I am old school and really wanted to make my own site. I wanted a program that I had on my computer that I could endlessly edit offline. My other motivation was that in case the online hosting company didn’t work out, I could take my work to any other web hosting company and put it there. The point is that I had full control. My overall motivation was that this is how it used to be done and I didn’t like the pre-made web pages on Godaddy and the other places.
So, my quest began. My first stop was the gold standard Microsoft Front Page. To my great surprise, it is no longer supported. I had used Corel website creator in the past and gave it a try. Wow, had it turned awful. I went through every possible program from Adobe, Google and a bunch of others. Pure junk. I ended up finding a free program called Rocketcake. It was small, fast, worked fantastically and I loved it. The downside was that it isn’t too powerful and it was a bit difficult to get it to work on my host company, WHP. Incidentally, WHP is the least expensive website hosting company. Coincidence? Hmm. Rocketcake did do one thing that the other website builder programs completely failed at. It showed how my website would look on mobile devices. Most Godaddy [and other similar companies] generated web pages look awful on small devices. Do people use the internet on their phones? Hmm. Perhaps there was some logic to my decision.
Your next option is to generate buzz on groups like Twitter and Instagram. How do you do this? I have no idea. Twitter and Instagram are simply not my scene. There are online guides that I chose not to read.
Next idea is free promotions. Several sites let you post your work for free to generate buzz. I tried this with KDP select with limited results. 15 people downloaded my book with little fan fair.
Hire a publicist. This is something I have to investigate further. I have no idea how much they cost or what they do. I know from reading Writers Helping Writers that they can be successful, but I don’t have any metrics.
Post often to your blog. Keep your blog fresh and mention your book often.
There are Facebook groups for authors and books. For example, Writers helping Writers. However, it seems this group has gone away. Post as often as you can, but don’t be a pest.
Do an advertising campaign on Amazon. This is completely counterintuitive. Amazon is supposed to do this for free as they are a retailer. Alas, no. Amazon makes you fork over money to up your rankings. I have not tried this yet, I need to get at least 20 reviews first. Nobody is going to buy a book with no reviews and it would be a waste of money.
Do an advertising campaign on Barns and Nobel or Kubo. They seem to be much better at promoting books and I am investigating this idea. I have to get some reviews on their site first.
Last but not least, write more books. The more you have, the more you can market on the same dime. It just takes one great book to get lots of people to “buy it now.” I am well on my way to doing this.
Unfortunately, that’s all I got on the subject of promoting a book. Now at this point, you should be upset and think, “There have got to be more options. When I search on book promoting, there are hundreds of links.” This is completely true. Let’s explore what these other links are offering. 90% of them do two things. First. they send out spam. Do you read spam? Do you want your great book to be associated with that kind of “gray” marketing? Second. they “tweet to 10,000 followers.” How does this help you? Having 10,000 nobody’s tweet to 10,000 nobody’s. Do these people even speak English? Are they just robots tweeting to robots? Where is the proof that they are doing what they claim? Where is the Return On Investment study to back this kind of marketing up? To me, this approach is a complete waste of money.
There are lots of sites that offer to promote your book on their site (for a price of course.) When you send money to “great book site” you can see your book right on their front page. Here is the issue. The only place readers go to find out about books is Goodreads; they don’t care about those other sites. Those “great book sites” only exist to extract money from authors. If you look closely, you can see that they all look kind of the same. I suspect they are made by the same 3 people.
There are lots of sites that offer a package deal. The ones I investigated are just a combination of the tweet/spam/put your book on worthless sites. Or they “manage” your Amazon advertising campaign. Or they “promote you on Google.” You can do all of the last two yourself for much less money.
What about Book Bloggers? They certainly can promote your work. First off, if they often want $ up front. Second, they are an arrogant group and can give you a rotten review even after you paid them. My suggestion is that if they have a place you can email them a summary of your work then do it. If they respond back asking for a copy, send it. I generally found that these people were high on their own arrogance. You can tell by reading their poorly worded book reviews.
What about paying to up your search rank on Google? Hard to say. People generally search for books they already know about on Google and that’s the catch. You want to be known, but nobody knows about you. That is why Goodreads is important.
What about getting your book on a website list of “100 great books you have to read.” Hard to say. It is worth investigating. Make sure you are not paying for this option. Your work should stand on its own otherwise the list is useless.
Now at this point, you are probably thinking, “You’re not inspiring me.” Ya, I know. This is a tough road to follow. The idea that your work would instantly get read, get positive reviews and the checks would roll in is a fantasy. So where does this lead us?
Well, that’s my advice on how to market a self-published book. You now know all the pitfalls and what needs to be done. My best advice is to outline a clear goal and follow it. Hopefully, you understand that this is a long road that is going to require a lot of effort.
The beginning.
At this point, you have written a book, gotten it professionally edited, a professional cover designed, you have an ISBN number, it has been formatted for ebook and/or print on demand and is now available online for sale on Amazon, Kubo, Barns and Nobel. Quite an accomplishment. The problem is that 500 people a month are in the same boat. Many of them already have successful books that their readers are eager to read more. The trick to somehow get people to click “buy it now.”
In order to get attention, you need to attack this problem from several fronts. Let’s start with the most important one. YOU NEED AMAZON REVIEWS! LOTS OF THEM! As I am writing this article, I have a grand total of ZERO! Yes, this is really bad and I am working on it. The first part of the plan is to send a copy of your work to every friend you have. Two months later, pester them (often) for a review. Keep this up until each one of them writes their review. This is the essential foundation and it is absolutely critical to your success. This is also the step I am stuck on.
There is still one site that you can buy Amazon reviews. $300 buys you up to 10 badly written reviews. Should you do this? The reviews of the reviews say no, but still consider this option. Also, it is likely that Amazon will sue them into the ground soon, get their list and do something to the people who paid for reviews. Be careful!
If you read my previous blog, you will have by now written at least 200 book reviews on Goodreads and Amazon. Consider posting these reviews to Barns and Nobel and Kubo. Your new goal is to look for books on Goodreads that only have a few reviews. Comb through them to see if they have a website or some other external way of contacting the author. Email them and say that you will do a review exchange. This means that you offer to buy their book on Amazon, at least pretend to read their book and write a review. In addition, you then cross-post your review to Goodreads. The other author will look at your 200 reviews and feel that they are getting a good deal. Is this ethical? It’s a simple review exchange. You’re not getting paid or doing something dishonest. The important part of this is that you are requesting externally to Amazon and Goodreads. NOTE: both sites monitor their internal communications and “review exchanges” would get their attention. Another source of authors is on forms like Writers Helping Writers.
You need a website dedicated to your work. There are lots of great website hosting companies that have great online free website building programs. For example Godaddy. Of course, I chose not to use the online website builders. Why? I am old school and really wanted to make my own site. I wanted a program that I had on my computer that I could endlessly edit offline. My other motivation was that in case the online hosting company didn’t work out, I could take my work to any other web hosting company and put it there. The point is that I had full control. My overall motivation was that this is how it used to be done and I didn’t like the pre-made web pages on Godaddy and the other places.
So, my quest began. My first stop was the gold standard Microsoft Front Page. To my great surprise, it is no longer supported. I had used Corel website creator in the past and gave it a try. Wow, had it turned awful. I went through every possible program from Adobe, Google and a bunch of others. Pure junk. I ended up finding a free program called Rocketcake. It was small, fast, worked fantastically and I loved it. The downside was that it isn’t too powerful and it was a bit difficult to get it to work on my host company, WHP. Incidentally, WHP is the least expensive website hosting company. Coincidence? Hmm. Rocketcake did do one thing that the other website builder programs completely failed at. It showed how my website would look on mobile devices. Most Godaddy [and other similar companies] generated web pages look awful on small devices. Do people use the internet on their phones? Hmm. Perhaps there was some logic to my decision.
Your next option is to generate buzz on groups like Twitter and Instagram. How do you do this? I have no idea. Twitter and Instagram are simply not my scene. There are online guides that I chose not to read.
Next idea is free promotions. Several sites let you post your work for free to generate buzz. I tried this with KDP select with limited results. 15 people downloaded my book with little fan fair.
Hire a publicist. This is something I have to investigate further. I have no idea how much they cost or what they do. I know from reading Writers Helping Writers that they can be successful, but I don’t have any metrics.
Post often to your blog. Keep your blog fresh and mention your book often.
There are Facebook groups for authors and books. For example, Writers helping Writers. However, it seems this group has gone away. Post as often as you can, but don’t be a pest.
Do an advertising campaign on Amazon. This is completely counterintuitive. Amazon is supposed to do this for free as they are a retailer. Alas, no. Amazon makes you fork over money to up your rankings. I have not tried this yet, I need to get at least 20 reviews first. Nobody is going to buy a book with no reviews and it would be a waste of money.
Do an advertising campaign on Barns and Nobel or Kubo. They seem to be much better at promoting books and I am investigating this idea. I have to get some reviews on their site first.
Last but not least, write more books. The more you have, the more you can market on the same dime. It just takes one great book to get lots of people to “buy it now.” I am well on my way to doing this.
Unfortunately, that’s all I got on the subject of promoting a book. Now at this point, you should be upset and think, “There have got to be more options. When I search on book promoting, there are hundreds of links.” This is completely true. Let’s explore what these other links are offering. 90% of them do two things. First. they send out spam. Do you read spam? Do you want your great book to be associated with that kind of “gray” marketing? Second. they “tweet to 10,000 followers.” How does this help you? Having 10,000 nobody’s tweet to 10,000 nobody’s. Do these people even speak English? Are they just robots tweeting to robots? Where is the proof that they are doing what they claim? Where is the Return On Investment study to back this kind of marketing up? To me, this approach is a complete waste of money.
There are lots of sites that offer to promote your book on their site (for a price of course.) When you send money to “great book site” you can see your book right on their front page. Here is the issue. The only place readers go to find out about books is Goodreads; they don’t care about those other sites. Those “great book sites” only exist to extract money from authors. If you look closely, you can see that they all look kind of the same. I suspect they are made by the same 3 people.
There are lots of sites that offer a package deal. The ones I investigated are just a combination of the tweet/spam/put your book on worthless sites. Or they “manage” your Amazon advertising campaign. Or they “promote you on Google.” You can do all of the last two yourself for much less money.
What about Book Bloggers? They certainly can promote your work. First off, if they often want $ up front. Second, they are an arrogant group and can give you a rotten review even after you paid them. My suggestion is that if they have a place you can email them a summary of your work then do it. If they respond back asking for a copy, send it. I generally found that these people were high on their own arrogance. You can tell by reading their poorly worded book reviews.
What about paying to up your search rank on Google? Hard to say. People generally search for books they already know about on Google and that’s the catch. You want to be known, but nobody knows about you. That is why Goodreads is important.
What about getting your book on a website list of “100 great books you have to read.” Hard to say. It is worth investigating. Make sure you are not paying for this option. Your work should stand on its own otherwise the list is useless.
Now at this point, you are probably thinking, “You’re not inspiring me.” Ya, I know. This is a tough road to follow. The idea that your work would instantly get read, get positive reviews and the checks would roll in is a fantasy. So where does this lead us?
Well, that’s my advice on how to market a self-published book. You now know all the pitfalls and what needs to be done. My best advice is to outline a clear goal and follow it. Hopefully, you understand that this is a long road that is going to require a lot of effort.
