Self Published Author | Category | Marketing & Publicity

How to Use Video Blogging to Boost Your Book Marketing

by Penny C. Sansevieri
Bowker | Tue Apr 30, 2019

If you’re ready to step up your book marketing, an option you may not have considered before that can be very successful is video blogging.

You may be saying to yourself how getting the lighting just right, or making sure your hair is perfect, or even figuring out what your good side is can be a real hassle.

I totally understand that. But I can’t say enough how much I love the responses I get from video blogging. Why? It’s so engaging and always beats the other content I put out, so I highly recommend this fantastic book marketing strategy.

How much work is it?

Writing a blog and making a video blog is very similar, but believe it or not, video blogs involve less work.

Keep in mind that the most exciting and interesting video blogging content is less than 2 minutes.

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How Strategic Creativity Can Increase Your Sales

by Brian Jud
Bowker | Tue Apr 23, 2019

Book publishers exhibit a unique balance of strategic thinking and creativity — to a point. They sporadically apply innovation to all the tasks that must be done to get a book published (editing, internal layout, cover design and pricing). But this dance with originality usually ends with delivery of the first printing. Authors — working with their publishers — are more likely to reach large-scale success by applying strategy and creativity to the post-production tasks of distribution and promotion of their books.

The typical distribution actions are to get the book lodged on Amazon.com and arrange distribution through bookstores and to libraries. Promotion is usually limited to social media, social networking and reviews. Nothing accomplished to this point has served to differentiate the product from the other 1,000,000-plus books published last year. The result? Poor sales.

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Why You Need a Reader Profile to Sell More Books

by Penny C. Sansevieri
Bowker | Tue Apr 16, 2019

Everyone going into business should do market research. Authors are no different and should be sure to devote time to building a reader profile. Knowing your reader will help you decide what strategies are best for you to use as you market your book.

While it may sound technical, this step is critical to your success as an author. The reality is that your book is not for everyone. Nor is it for “all women with hopes and dreams.”

You have to be realistic. Inspiration and visions are important, but if what you want to do is sell books, then you cannot afford to skip reader profiles. They will show you how to find the right people, and through which channels.

Here are some of the key primary benefits of creating reader profiles.

People are complex.

Your potential buyers have limited free time, just like you.

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Customize Your Pitch to Each Catcher

by Brian Jud
Bowker | Tue Apr 9, 2019

Whether you are cooking a meal, planning a vacation or making a sales presentation, it is the preparation that determines the relative success of the outcome. The more time you put into preparing your sales presentation — what you will say and how you will say it — the more likely it is that you will get the order.

Your presentation to a corporate buyer, media producer or book distributor is not about your book, it is about how your content can solve your prospects’ problems. The corporate buyer wants to increase sales. The producer wants a good show for the audience, and a distributor wants to keep the pipeline to retailers full and flowing.

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Get More Business from Existing Customers

by Brian Jud
Bowker | Tue Apr 2, 2019

Selling books to corporate buyers in large, non-returnable quantities is a profitable way to build your publishing business. As an added benefit, satisfied buyers can place blanket (recurring) orders for future, planned deliveries. These are even more profitable since it is easier and less expensive to sell to existing customers than it is to find new ones.

Nurturing recurring revenue with one customer is different from getting the initial order. These buyers need to be reminded of the benefits of your content — at the point in time they are about to make a new buying decision. If you contact them on a regular basis, your chances of a positive reception are improved.

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One For the Books — Why Companies Should Use Books as Promotional Products

by Brian Jud
Bowker | Tue Mar 26, 2019

For many years, corporate buyers have been purchasing coffee mugs, cameras, apparel, watches and other items to use as promotional items. These are tools used to increase sales, encourage buyers to remain loyal to a product or to change their loyalty from competitors. Until recently, there has been little awareness about using books to accomplish these goals. Therefore, you may have to first convince the buyers of the viability of using a book as a promotional tool.

There are many reasons why a book makes a versatile and profitable promotional product. Primarily, there millions of existing titles on an endless variety of topics, and if the appropriate title does not exist it can be created and customized. Below is a list of additional reasons why books are superior to many other promotional items.

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A Quick Way to Publish Better Books

by Brian Jud
Bowker | Tue Mar 19, 2019

Have you ever done something and later regretted having done it? Or wished you could change part of what you did? There is a way you can minimize mistakes in producing and marketing your books. And this one simple step can help you become more profitable. It is not difficult and can even be done for free.

The one step is test marketing – asking people to comment on your title, cover design, page layout, one-sheet, piece of selling literature, or even a sales presentation. If you experiment beforehand with different ways of accomplishing a task, you can reduce errors and make the result more productive in generating revenue.

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Blog Commenting: Your Book Marketing Secret Weapon

by Penny C. Sansevieri
Bowker | Tue Mar 12, 2019

Blog commenting is my secret weapon to connect with high profile names in book publishing and the most popular bloggers on the internet. It’s true that following them on social media is a great place to start, but being more interactive will help to develop those connections.

When was the last time you commented on a blog? Perhaps they were covering a story or topic that was really captivating, and you wanted to participate in the conversation. What if you attempted to do this professionally, with blogs and people you admire and would like to network with? Did you know this can also help you show up higher in search results, too?

We’ve been using blog commenting for years as an excellent book marketing tool for our author clients, and although the structure of blogging campaigns has changed over the years (as Google has), the concept has remained the same.

What is Blog Commenting?

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Book Marketing Tips Introverts Will Love

by Penny C. Sansevieri
Bowker | Tue Mar 5, 2019

How many times does shyness or fear of public speaking hold you back from marketing your book? Is pressure, stress, or avoidance of large groups of people getting the better of you? You’re not the only one. A lot of authors I’m in contact with are introverts.

Truth be told, I am also. If you’ve ever seen me speak at a conference, you’d swear I was lying. Me, an introvert? Say it isn’t so! What you need to know is that I overcame it — and so can you. I’m what you might call a “selective introvert.” Now, I can stand in front of a crowd of people and do what needs to be done, but then afterward I’ll escape out the side door and hide in my room. I hate networking; honestly, I’m not good at it at all.

9 Book Marketing Tips for Introverts

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How to Find More Buyers

by Brian Jud
Bowker | Tue Feb 26, 2019

When I ask authors to describe their target readers the most frequent response is “everybody who likes (their topic).” It is difficult, time consuming and expensive to market to everybody. Defining your primary target readers and buyers is a basic, required task for selling books. But if you limit your marketing to those people you are significantly limiting your sales and revenue.

For example, suppose you have a book to help divorced parents deal with their children’s trauma of being bounced back and forth between mother and father. Divorced parents would comprise the expected target segment, and most authors would stop there. However, the actual market is much larger – without being labeled as “everybody.”

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