My New Book is Out and My Marketing Strategy Stinks!
The Three Cardinal Rules of Book Promotion: All Broken…
oil on wood 60 x 80 by Claude Nougat
My Fear of the Past trilogy is out at last, with the last book, Remember the Future, now available on Amazon and other platforms...It's been nine months of sweat and hard work, as long as giving birth to a baby!
Cause to celebrate? Yes, the baby is born, but no, I've broken all the book promotion rules! I feel just like that horse running after a red ball and jumping in the void! When he lands on that staircase, boy, it's going to hurt...
Yet I tried my best to follow all the hallowed marketing rules, but in each case, I didn't quite make it. Consider:
Cardinal Rule no. 1: keep a blog, become an expert in your "niche". Writers normally blog about what they know: books and publishing. Sure, I do that but I can't stop there, I'm just too interested in current events in any area – foreign affairs, science, health, cooking, art, travel – to stick to any given topic week in, week out.
Result? My blog looks like a Swiss Cheese, full of holes: a niche for the Euro crisis, another for contemporary art, others for the unemployment issue, the Arab Spring challenges, cooking tips…I can go on and on.
Who likes a blog that's like a Swiss cheese? I guess you do since you're reading me and that's my biggest consolation for not following the rules!
Cardinal Rule no. 2: maintain a strong presence on all social media. I try, really I do try very hard: I'm on Twitter (over 1200 followers and growing) and also on Facebook (check my new Author Page!), Google+ (still need to figure out how to add an author page there), LinkedIn, StumbleUpon, Reddit, Digg, Goodreads, Shelfari, The Reading Room,You Name it.
I've even started writing for Ezine articles as an "expert author". Two articles published so far and the editors have been very nice about it: giving me a star for being in "the limelight" and for being...photogenic! Wow, I never knew I was photogenic! Here's the picture they like:
Great, that's very, very encouraging. But you know what? My life on Internet is eating me up! If it goes on like this much longer, I won't have any time left to write! Help! I like to connect to people, I do, but I want real interaction! How can one do that with so many social networks around? And I'm not even on YouTube and haven't done a book trailer yet, much less a podcast…
So please, if my blog posts titillate (or annoy you), let me know! If you like my books, do write to me (email address in my books or here on the blog) or post a review wherever you like! I welcome the connection, say what you think!
Cardinal Rule no. 3: hone your copy writing ability for effective sales pitches This is essential for a writer. I know it is, who doesn't... If you're good at it and you have a smashing query letter, it will land you a contract with literary agents and editors within 48 hours!
Well...That's never happened to me. Yet I've won three important Italian awards with my children's book and the novel I wrote in Italian (called Un Amore Dimenticato - the precursor to my Fear of the Past Trilogy) published by a small press in Sicily got enthusiastic reviews in the local press.
Sicilians really, genuinely liked my book and marveled that a foreigner like me could understand them so well - but then, I've been married 35 years to a Sicilian and I know the island, its people and its culture intimately and perhaps can empathize all the more easily precisely because I am a foreigner, in short, a passionate, outside observer...
All this didn't cut any ice with any literary agent in America and I'm sure it has something to do with my constitutional inability to sell myself (you won't believe this but actually I'm very shy).
Yet more important is the ability to pitch your book – the famous "elevator pitch": 30 seconds to sell your idea! Fifty world-shaking words to print across your book cover!
Sorry, I can't do it. I've spent months mulling over sales pitches. Just can't think of the best way to grab you, dear reader, and convince you that my book is like nothing you've ever read before! That it throws a new light on the human condition, on how we are all the prey of our family's past, on how our fear of failure can paralyze us. We have to shake off that fear, forget the past, and daringly play the cards that heredity has bestowed upon us - that's what Tony Bellomo does, finally rising to the challenge in the third book of the trilogy...
But all that sounds like big, empty words. I just don't have that special copy writing talent that makes you want to pick up a book and read it. But some gifted writers do...That is the case of American author and blogger Kim Golden, and I'm lucky she's read the first book in my trilogy and liked it. As anyone who's followed her delightful blog (Kim Talks Books) knows, she is that rare bird who's transcended her MFA and has developed an informed and sure taste in literature all the while honing her writing talent. If she tells you a book is worth reading, you better believe her!
Judge for yourself how she's pitched my book (in a select list of Christmas reads she recommends):
"For the teenagers (and adults) on your list who prefer their Kindle to "normal" books, check out Forget the Past and Reclaim the Present, books 1 and 2 of Claude Nougat's Fear of the Past trilogy. Both books have the perfect blend of the paranormal, time travel, romance andhistorical fiction to hook readers from the first page. So what's it about, you ask? At 17, our protagonist, Tony, is a gifted video game creator suffering from burnout. He goes to Sicily (his deceased father's home) to recover and to discover his roots. One day, he finds himself drawn to an abandoned palazzoand is drawn into a strange world where the ghosts of his ancestors await Judgment Day. He also falls in love - with the ghost of the Duchess of Floridia. But can this love transcend time...? Well, you have to read tofind out. I've read book one and loved it. Going to order book 2 ASAP!"
I couldn't have done it better! Indeed, I couldn't have done it, full stop. And I'm very grateful to her for having expressed her judgment this way…
Now Kim, you can order the third book too! And let me tell you, you're in for a surprise: it's a...techno thriller! Tony is now battling both the Sicilian and Russian mafia to save the woman he loves and his creation, a new social network, a brilliant cross between Facebook and Second Life! No, in case you ask, I'm not on Second Life...
Happy Christmas and happy reading to all! Do let me know how you like the trilogy!
Claude Nougat's books are available on: Amazon , Barnes and Noble , iBookstore and Sony store .
PS: if you buy on amazon.com, just click on the banners in the right margin of this blog.
Related articlesYour blog stinks! (marketing.yell.com)
New literary website - GenreBuds (alchemyofscrawl.wordpress.com)
Bill 24 - The Democratic Process is Swiss Cheese (susanonthesoapbox.com)
oil on wood 60 x 80 by Claude Nougat
My Fear of the Past trilogy is out at last, with the last book, Remember the Future, now available on Amazon and other platforms...It's been nine months of sweat and hard work, as long as giving birth to a baby!
Cause to celebrate? Yes, the baby is born, but no, I've broken all the book promotion rules! I feel just like that horse running after a red ball and jumping in the void! When he lands on that staircase, boy, it's going to hurt...
Yet I tried my best to follow all the hallowed marketing rules, but in each case, I didn't quite make it. Consider:
Cardinal Rule no. 1: keep a blog, become an expert in your "niche". Writers normally blog about what they know: books and publishing. Sure, I do that but I can't stop there, I'm just too interested in current events in any area – foreign affairs, science, health, cooking, art, travel – to stick to any given topic week in, week out.
Result? My blog looks like a Swiss Cheese, full of holes: a niche for the Euro crisis, another for contemporary art, others for the unemployment issue, the Arab Spring challenges, cooking tips…I can go on and on.
Who likes a blog that's like a Swiss cheese? I guess you do since you're reading me and that's my biggest consolation for not following the rules!
Cardinal Rule no. 2: maintain a strong presence on all social media. I try, really I do try very hard: I'm on Twitter (over 1200 followers and growing) and also on Facebook (check my new Author Page!), Google+ (still need to figure out how to add an author page there), LinkedIn, StumbleUpon, Reddit, Digg, Goodreads, Shelfari, The Reading Room,You Name it.
I've even started writing for Ezine articles as an "expert author". Two articles published so far and the editors have been very nice about it: giving me a star for being in "the limelight" and for being...photogenic! Wow, I never knew I was photogenic! Here's the picture they like:
Great, that's very, very encouraging. But you know what? My life on Internet is eating me up! If it goes on like this much longer, I won't have any time left to write! Help! I like to connect to people, I do, but I want real interaction! How can one do that with so many social networks around? And I'm not even on YouTube and haven't done a book trailer yet, much less a podcast…
So please, if my blog posts titillate (or annoy you), let me know! If you like my books, do write to me (email address in my books or here on the blog) or post a review wherever you like! I welcome the connection, say what you think!
Cardinal Rule no. 3: hone your copy writing ability for effective sales pitches This is essential for a writer. I know it is, who doesn't... If you're good at it and you have a smashing query letter, it will land you a contract with literary agents and editors within 48 hours!
Well...That's never happened to me. Yet I've won three important Italian awards with my children's book and the novel I wrote in Italian (called Un Amore Dimenticato - the precursor to my Fear of the Past Trilogy) published by a small press in Sicily got enthusiastic reviews in the local press.
Sicilians really, genuinely liked my book and marveled that a foreigner like me could understand them so well - but then, I've been married 35 years to a Sicilian and I know the island, its people and its culture intimately and perhaps can empathize all the more easily precisely because I am a foreigner, in short, a passionate, outside observer...
All this didn't cut any ice with any literary agent in America and I'm sure it has something to do with my constitutional inability to sell myself (you won't believe this but actually I'm very shy).
Yet more important is the ability to pitch your book – the famous "elevator pitch": 30 seconds to sell your idea! Fifty world-shaking words to print across your book cover!
Sorry, I can't do it. I've spent months mulling over sales pitches. Just can't think of the best way to grab you, dear reader, and convince you that my book is like nothing you've ever read before! That it throws a new light on the human condition, on how we are all the prey of our family's past, on how our fear of failure can paralyze us. We have to shake off that fear, forget the past, and daringly play the cards that heredity has bestowed upon us - that's what Tony Bellomo does, finally rising to the challenge in the third book of the trilogy...
But all that sounds like big, empty words. I just don't have that special copy writing talent that makes you want to pick up a book and read it. But some gifted writers do...That is the case of American author and blogger Kim Golden, and I'm lucky she's read the first book in my trilogy and liked it. As anyone who's followed her delightful blog (Kim Talks Books) knows, she is that rare bird who's transcended her MFA and has developed an informed and sure taste in literature all the while honing her writing talent. If she tells you a book is worth reading, you better believe her!
Judge for yourself how she's pitched my book (in a select list of Christmas reads she recommends):
"For the teenagers (and adults) on your list who prefer their Kindle to "normal" books, check out Forget the Past and Reclaim the Present, books 1 and 2 of Claude Nougat's Fear of the Past trilogy. Both books have the perfect blend of the paranormal, time travel, romance andhistorical fiction to hook readers from the first page. So what's it about, you ask? At 17, our protagonist, Tony, is a gifted video game creator suffering from burnout. He goes to Sicily (his deceased father's home) to recover and to discover his roots. One day, he finds himself drawn to an abandoned palazzoand is drawn into a strange world where the ghosts of his ancestors await Judgment Day. He also falls in love - with the ghost of the Duchess of Floridia. But can this love transcend time...? Well, you have to read tofind out. I've read book one and loved it. Going to order book 2 ASAP!"
I couldn't have done it better! Indeed, I couldn't have done it, full stop. And I'm very grateful to her for having expressed her judgment this way…
Now Kim, you can order the third book too! And let me tell you, you're in for a surprise: it's a...techno thriller! Tony is now battling both the Sicilian and Russian mafia to save the woman he loves and his creation, a new social network, a brilliant cross between Facebook and Second Life! No, in case you ask, I'm not on Second Life...
Happy Christmas and happy reading to all! Do let me know how you like the trilogy!
Claude Nougat's books are available on: Amazon , Barnes and Noble , iBookstore and Sony store .
PS: if you buy on amazon.com, just click on the banners in the right margin of this blog.Related articlesYour blog stinks! (marketing.yell.com)
New literary website - GenreBuds (alchemyofscrawl.wordpress.com)
Bill 24 - The Democratic Process is Swiss Cheese (susanonthesoapbox.com)
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