Episode 5 - Many Hands Make Write Work - Book Marketing

Hi guys!

Are you starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel in creating a novel? I am and it feels exciting because that means I am close to releasing another story to my readers. :-) 

If you are just joining me and you want to read what I've talked about so far, by all means, click here so you can catch up. Also, you can join my mailing list to learn about my upcoming books, contests, events, and more.

Let's talk about book marketing and promotion.  

This is KEY in order for a book to do well.  Can I write a story and just put it up on KDP(more about that in a moment) 

Sure! 

But if no one is seeing my story or knows who I am and where to find it this kind of makes my book pointless unless I do something about it.

So, here's what happens when the story creation, blurb, cover, and beta-readers/editors have torn through everything to give you a basically completed copy of a book:

You can go two ways.  

Choice one, if you are publishing through amazon, is Kindle Direct Publishing or KDP for short. 

*Kindle Direct Publishing is Amazon.com's e-book publishing unit launched in November 2007, concurrently with the first Amazon Kindle device. Amazon launched Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP), originally called Digital Text Platform, to be used by authors and publishers, to independently publish their books directly to the Kindle Store.

Authors can upload documents in several formats for delivery via Whispernet and charge between $0.99 and $200.00 for their works.^[1] These documents may be written in 34 languages.^[2]

In 2016, Amazon also added a paperback option, which uses print-on-demand technology with the goal of offering digital and print to self-publishers. Amazon has been promoting to its authors the capability of publishing both e-books and paperbacks through the same platform.

Choice two, if you want to publish to other retailers such as Barnes and Noble, Kobo, Apple, etc., is Draft2Digital or D2D for short. 

**What is Draft2Digital?

While not the first e-publishing aggregator on the market, Draft2Digital (D2D) has become Indie Publishing’s preferred method for “wide” distribution since it launched in 2012. 

How does Draft2Digital work?

Draft2Digital’s service offers a simple way to directly sell ebooks with (almost) every major retailer. Instead of creating separate accounts with Amazon, Kobo, Apple Books, etc., you can:

• Set up a single Draft2Digital account; 
• Upload your manuscript files; 
• Let D2D publish your ebook to over a dozen of the biggest retailers; and
• Manage your pricing and payments through your D2D dashboard

This approach to ‘wide’ distribution can save authors hours of work every week by taking the task of monitoring and managing multiple accounts off their hands. This leaves you more time to run ads, write your next book, or do your laundry (whichever’s more important on any given day).

Marketing a book is difficult if you lack funds, but not impossible.  There are many ways to market your book(free)and still get a good result. Believe me, I am living proof of this.  I am no-where a NYT(New York Times) bestselling author that has a specific or even a (ha-ha wishful thinking!)unlimited marketing budget

One way is to market towards your mailing list(don't forget to join mine here if you haven't already) 

Social media is definitely important and handy when it come to marketing the book. I am onFacebook, Instagram and Twitter. Goodreads too(as both an author and a reader, because I am an avid reader)Goodreads also shows me which authros in my genre are popular and I sometimes try to analyze their marketing methods.

Refreshing an older book by updating a cover is a marketing method I've used. In fact, I've recently turned a standalone book(Code Pink)into a series based on the female detective. My upcoming book, Dissemble, is a story featuring the same detective.

I tend to do an eBook promotion at least once a month. This gets me new readers that are interetsing in reading my type of stories. Also great for expsore are newsletter swaps,. A swap is when I feature another author's book on my newsletter and that author does the same for me on their newsletter. 

It's a win-win!

Be sure to check out the final episode where I will talk about launching the completed book!

*=Information taken from Wikipedia

**=Information taken from Reedsy