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Last week I presented two webinars, one with around 550 registered attendees. I think we had around 150 on the live webinar.
I do want to mention that webinars aren’t always as easy as they look. It seems for the first half of the June 20th webinar on Article Marketing, I couldn’t see the questions attendees were putting in the chat box.
The reason for this is when in a PowerPoint presentation, if you’re using your full screen in the Slide Presentation feature, you can’t see anything but the PP slides.
I did have my laptop up and was on it as an attendee to try to keep an eye on things, but the scrolling ‘thing’ on the chat got stuck and I couldn’t see any chat comments or questions.
I do apologize though for this. I’m sure it was frustrating to the attendees. Fortunately, it all worked out.
Okay, now to the replay links:
Article Contenthttp://www.anymeeting.com/WebConference-beta/RecordingDefault.aspx?c_psrid=EB51D7838748 Design Your Own Ebook Cover Screensharing Webinar ReplayRecording URL:
http://www.anymeeting.com/writersonthemove/EB52DF84834C On this replay, I think the screensharing and voice are a bit off. The screen is a bit ahead of the audio. I’m not sure why this happened and am sorry for this technical problem, but it’s still easy to follow along.
A note: The book cover at the top of this post was made with Microsoft Office 2010.
ALSO: One of the attendees of the Article Marketing webinar asked about freelance writing pricing and I couldn’t think of the title of a book that’s recommended by a number of freelancers, it’s: What to Charge: Pricing Strategies for Freelancers and Consultants. Below is the Amazon link, if you’re interested.
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If you'd like more information on both webinar topics you can check out:
Design Your Own eBook Cover in 10 Easy Stepshttp://karencioffifreelancewriter.com/books-on-marketing/design-your-own-ebook-cover-in-10-easy-steps/Article Marketing: Increase Website Traffic Using Properly Formatted and Search Engine Discovery Optimized Content http://karencioffifreelancewriter.com/books-on-marketing/article-marketing-with-formatted-and-optimized-content/ AND, finally, PLEASE check out the new website design for The Writing World newsletter:http://thewritingworld.com===================
Beyond Book Sales Income: Book Marketing and Diversification
I love the internet . . . you can find almost anything and learn just about anything by doing a search. In a webinar provided by Steve Harrison of Quantum Leap. The guest speaker was Jack Canfield. For those of you who haven’t yet hear of him (this would be amazing if you are in the writing field), Canfield is the co-creator of Chicken Soup for the Soul.
Canfield and Mark Victor Hansen had a dream. They would have a New York Times best selling book. But, the road to success wasn’t easy . . . they received 144 rejections from publishers. This did not stop them—they moved forward with visualization and positive projection techniques. Chicken Soup for the Soul came out in 1993. Since they didn’t have enough money for a publicist so they did their own marketing. By 1995, they won the Abby Award and the Southern California Publicist Award.
This was the second teleseminar I had the privilege of attending featuring Canfield. The information offered was geared toward the strategies needed to make money publishing books through marketing and diversification. This concept is very similar to a video clip I watched of Robert Kiyosaki, author of Rich Dad Poor Dad, which was also presented by Steve Harrison.
So, what exactly are the concepts of
book marketing and diversification?8 Book Marketing and Diversification Tips to Help Make Money
1. Build a platform.Start your platform when you are thinking of writing a book—don’t wait until you are published. Creating connections, contacts, and readers takes time.
2. Realize you will most probably not get rich writing books.Yes, that’s right, you will not automatically become wealthy from book publication. But, while you won’t get rich, it will open doors that will not otherwise be open. This is the opportunity for diversification—don’t just look straight ahead—use your peripheral vision.
3. Learn how to market and sell YOU and your books.Never stop learning about writing and
book marketing. Read about the subjects; attend conferences and teleseminars; join writing and marketing groups; and follow blogs that provide valuable and up-to-date information. But, remember, you don’t want to just sell your books, you want to sell what you have to offer along with your books.
4. Research areas you can diversify in.If you are published there are a number of doors that will magically open. You can create e-books; you can present teleseminars, webinars, or workshops; you can offer classes or coaching; you can even write a book about your experiences and successes.
Tip: Before you start charging for your expertise, offer some free services. This will help establish you as an expert in your field.
5. Never stop selling.Find new avenues to sell your books and services. Utilize some of the suggestions in #4 above.
6. Build your subscriber list. According to expert marketer Jim Edwards, if you don't have a list that's continually growing, you're sunk.
You'll need to develop a trusting relationship with your readers by providing quality information on a regular basis, along with quality products.
7. Believe you can do it.This is probably the most important tip for success. Canfield is a firm believer in the power of tweaking your subconscious and projection.
8. Pay it forwar
Small Business Marketing - Know Your Customer’s Online Behavior
Small business marketing, specifically internet marketing, boils down to predicting online behavior in terms of what it will take to turn a visitor into a customer.
According to the “experienced marketers and expert testers” at MarketingExperiments.com, this is a key element to success.
You’ve done your research and created a product or service to sell to others. And, you’ve researched your target market. Everything is in place to attract potential customers to your site.
But, once you get the prospect to your site, then what?
The purpose of bringing visitors to your site is the have them buy what you’re selling – this is called conversion. The ratio of the number of visitors to the number of buyers is your conversion rate.
Knowing your
customer’s online behavior will help you enhance your site’s conversion rate.
According to a webinar presented by Marketing Experiments, How to Increase Conversion in 2012, for every action or step you want a visitor to take, it must be worth his time and money – it must be worth the opportunity cost.
In other words, the buyer must feel that choosing your product or service is of greater benefit compared to spending that money and time on another product or service. And, each step in the buying process must equate to a perceived benefit. The perceived value must outweigh the perceived cost, including time and effort.
The webinar offered four factors or key principles to
small business marketing that will help guide the potential customer to the desired
online behavior:
1. Appeal – Is your product desired enough by the prospect? Have you made your product and promo copy effective and enticing enough?
2. Exclusivity – Can the prospect find your product or service elsewhere online or is your offer unique and exclusive?
3. Credibility – Are your promo copy claims believable enough for the prospect to take action?
4. Clarity – Can the prospect quickly and easily understand what your site and offer is about? And, are the steps needed to purchase what you’re offering easy to follow and minimal? Having an effective heading that conveys the value of the offer, is essential to this element.
These four key principles are necessary to your
small business marketing strategy – they’re needed to effectively lead a customer through the steps of buying.
Testing and research demonstrate that you must have “an unbroken chain of Yeses” in order to get the conversion. Along with this you must reduce buyer anxiety that usually appears during an involved buying process.
This means you must simplify the buying experience for the customer to allow for a smooth flow that maintains “cognitive momentum.”
Steps you can take to simplify the customer’s buying experience include:
• Have an effective image on your site – studies show that images increase clicks
• Have a clean and uncluttered page – clutter causes distraction, which breaks the “yes” chain
• Make the shopping cart steps as minimal as possible – keep it short and simple
In its simplest form, your ‘
small business marketing customer value proposition’ needs to answer the question of ‘why should that customer buy from you, rather than from your competitor.’ And, you must convey that answer
From OWNI.eu
By Candy Gourlay
EVERYONE is blogging.
Don't believe all those reports that blogging is in decline because people prefer the ease of Twitter and Facebook. There are a LOT of blogs out there. Especially in the world of writers, aspiring or otherwise.
Even publishers, traditionally Jurassic in their attitudes to new technology, are urging their authors to blog. In fact, several
Today's guest post is by author and expert book marketer Penny Sansevieri.
12 Ways to Create a Mailing List that Will Sell Books
Penny C. SansevieriWe've all heard this: capture email addresses on your website so you can market to them again. So we do, we capture email addresses and then we wonder what to do with them. What if you don't really have news? Do you mail the list anyway? How can I monetize my list, and how much is too much?
We've had The Book Marketing Expert Newsletter for over eight years now and the newsletter, bursting in content, is one of the best promotional tools my company has. We've never done a single piece of advertisement for my firm, all of it has come from word of mouth, online, and our newsletter.
The key to a good newsletter list is simple really and the biggest piece of this is you've got to have something useful to say. While your friends and family might enjoy hearing about your latest book signing, people who happened onto your site and subscribed to your ezine might become bored with this information and unsubscribe. If you have a list or are considering starting one, consider these tips to get you going and help you maximize your newsletter.
1.
Timing: How often you send the newsletter will really depend on your crowd, but I don't recommend anything less than once a month. I know some people who send a quarterly newsletter and that's fine if you don't really have much to say, but if you're looking for content so you can send the newsletter more frequently, then read on; I have some ideas and ways of maximizing the use of content for your newsletter.
2.
Distribution: How will you send your newsletter? If your plan is to email it, forget it unless you have less than 100 subscribers. Anything over that and you should consider using a service like Aweber or Constant Contact. These places will handle your subscribes and unsubscribes for you. If you start mailing to a list larger than 50 from your email service, you run the risk of getting shut down for spam.
3.
Easy Opt In: Make it easy for people to sign up. Make sure there's a sign-up on your website, preferably the home page and then a mention of it again on your most popular page which, for most of us, is our blog. The opt-in will take new subscribers to your welcome page (which we'll talk about in a minute) and handle sending your new readers right into the mailing list.
4.
Ethical Bribe: So what will you give readers to get their email? It might not be enough just to tout that you have this fabulous newsletter; in fact, often it isn't. Have something that they'll want, a key item: e-book, tip sheet, whatever will entice readers to sign up for your newsletter. Here's a hint: give them something they'll have to keep referring to again and again so that your name and book stays in front of them.
5.
Free: There are some folks in the industry who try to charge for their newsletters. Listen, I get it. A newsletter is a lot of work, but if done properly, it is a key promotional tool and therefore, should be free. Magazines can charge for subscriptions, you can't. Make it free. Don't even put a value on it. I know folks who do this, too. I think the value of the newsletter should be evident in its content, not in the price you chose to put on it.
6.
Welcome pages: After someone signs up for your newsletter, what will they see? A simple thank you page o
The time and effort you put into writing your book paid off – you got a publishing contract. And, now you’re book will be out in a few months. It’s time to get your visibility and platform in place and you will take your first step by creating a website.
Sorry, there’s no way around this one – you must create a web presence. The first tool in your
book marketing visibility toolbox is a website, and it should be created before your book is published. You can choose a website or a blog and you can get either type for free from sites such as Wordpress.com or Blogger.com.
Book Marketing - Website vs. BlogsiteIf you find the thought of having to create a website daunting, go for Blogger.com; it is very user friendly and good for beginners. And with its updates, it has a number of features much like a website.
One major drawback to Blogger though is you cannot upload ebooks or pdfs to link to in order to offer them for free or for sale. So, if this is something you’ll be doing, you will have to use a website like WordPress, Yola, or Weebly.
Just be sure the one you choose has a blog feature, because you will need to provide quality content on a regular basis to create an informational funnel.
If you like the user-friendly ease of Blogger, you can create a free website just for the purpose of uploading PDFs and link them to your Blogger site.
Whichever you choose as your visibility site, be sure to carefully think about the domain name you use. Allow it to be easily searchable and relevant to the content you will be offering on the site. It’s often a good idea to have a least one site with ‘your name’ as the title of a website. This site will have information about you as the author: a Media Page, an About You Page, and a page that lists all your books.
Another issue to think about when creating a website is whether to make is simple of busy.
Book Marketing - Simple is a Better StrategyMarketing expert Mike Volpe of Hubspot.com points out that it’s more important to spend time, and money if necessary, on content rather than a flashy website design; simple works. In fact, simpler usually leads to a higher conversion rate. The conversion rate is the ratio of visitors who buy your book, product, or service.
Volpe also stresses that you should have control over your site. This means you should be able to manage it. You don’t want to run to a web designer for every little change you want to make to your site, or to do something as simple as adding content.
To reinforce this ‘simple is better strategy,’ Google says that milliseconds count in regard to your page load time. If your page is slow to load, you’ll get a poorer score with Google.
Tip: Should you decide you do need help to create a site, don’t hire an expensive web designer. Look for someone who wants to establish themselves as a website creator, or someone who does it in his spare time, you will pay much less. And, try to make arrangements that will include the designer teach you how to manage your own site. This will make updates, changes, and posting much easier, and less expensive.
Book Marketing - Make Your Site Optimized for the Search EnginesIf you choose a WordPress site, go through the dashboard and sections carefully, and fill in how you want your site to work. There are also a number of plugins for WordPress that will help your site get noticed and i
SEO Marketing Tips to Help Get Links to Your SiteThe most effective way to get links to your site is through content and SEO marketing.Here are the four of the most popular SEO marketing content strategies to use:1. Write keyword rich and quality blog posts and alert your social networks that there’s fresh content on your site. If it’s valuable content, readers will be motivated to share it with their networks, moving it to viral status.
2. Do guest blogging on quality and ‘relevant to your platform’ sites.
3. Post quality and polished content to article directories that other website and blogsite owners will find of value and can post to their sites for free.
When writing for article directories or even guest blogging, make your ‘author bio’ as compelling a possible. You want to get people to click on your link. Your ‘bio’ is just as important as your article content. The reader needs to know that by clicking on your link, she will be benefited with more valuable information.
As an example, Joe Smith could use the following as his author bio: Joe Smith is a published author, ghostwriter, and freelance writer. Learn more about writing and marketing at www. joesmith.comIt’s not likely that people will really care about what Joe Smith does – what they want is to know what will be in it for them if they click on his link. It’s all about the WITFM (what’s in it for me).
So, a more effective author bio might be:To learn more about writing and marketing and to pick up two free e-books on writing and marketing, go to joesmith.com and sign up for his free newsletter, A Writer’s World.Do you see and understand the difference? Make the reader want to click on the link.
4. Create and publish informational videos to sites like YouTube. Video marketing is gaining momentum in being a ‘heavy hitter’ for creating visibility and website traffic.
Another 'SEO marketing tips' strategy to use to get traffic to your site is ‘link bait.’With this strategy you submit well written and valuable articles to sites like Digg.com and even article directories like Associated Content and Ezine Articles. If the article is very informative or entertaining, or the ‘good’ form of controversial, it will get picked up by the site and put on its home page. Now you’re talking lots of visibility and traffic resulting in lots of links.
Most, if not all, of the 'SEO marketing tips' strategies discussed have the potential to make your information marketing content go viral; this generates more visibility and traffic to your website, increasing your links.There is obviously much more involved in
SEO marketing, but this is part of the basics.
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Related Articles:How to Drive Traffic to a Website Using Expert Informational ContentWebsites That Work: 7 Key Factors (Part 1)SEO and Marketing: Basic Tips and Definitions
2 Comments on SEO Marketing Tips to Help Get Links to Your Site, last added: 11/30/2011
Marketing Online Guru That You Are…No Problem
by Robert W. Walker
Online marketing is an entirely different animal than “real world” marketing. Doing blogs, blog tours, some his and her blog tours with my writer wife, Miranda, and am ever online at all the “usual” places building relationships. And even online, you are seldom successful in selling your book so much as selling a laugh or a philosophical point you wish to make, and engaging in give and take, so in effect you’re selling your self—or rather getting folks to care about you or your point of view or that of your dog, Pongo, in the photo with me, or that photo of me with Will Smith or Captain Jack Sparrow—even if they are cardboard cutouts…. Sad truth is that Pongo sells far more books than I ever could. However, if people like you and what you have to say, they eventually will go find a copy of your book.
Recently, a dear friend I met online named Ann Charles said this to me: “There are some questions I’d love to hear the answer to if we were kicking back at the bar at a writers’ conference and these are: What do you mean that you don’t sell your book so much as sell yourself? I thought that after you have an actual book to promote—something besides just air and a name (which is what I have to try to promote)—that you could focus on selling that book and not worry so much about selling yourself.”
The book jobbers who sell to the bookstores say it best; if they like me, they will buy my stock. If students like and respect their teacher, they will buy what the teacher is selling. Online be as likeable as you can be; use humor, exaggeration, have fun with it and know it takes time to create online relationships.
“But what precisely are you doing to sell yourself online? Are you just trying to be entertaining with fun stories to get the blog readers to like you? Are you throwing cover quotes and details about your books at them? Are you telling how you came up with the idea and talking about what you are currently working on? And what is the impression about Rob W. Walker that you are hoping/trying to leave in your wake online?”
Excellent questions. Short answer is YES to all of the above. Spread it around, have cover art and photos do double and triple duty. Blog on humorous events in your life, childhood moments, any behind the book stories you can safely share. Mix it up and do not always post about your books. Let signature lines do that for you. Give advice, give help, give of yourself and be gracious with your knowledge and humor. Lots of humor. Leave ‘em laughing. Spend time answering the tweets and facebook comments of others. It requires time and commitment but what relationship doesn’t?
Below is a list of exciting links that all writers should be aware of and visit often, so I will slip it across the bar to you.
A Newbie’s Guide To Publishing/ JA Konrath: http://jakonrath.blogspot.com A free download 250,000 words worth of tips, hints, tricks, and advice. Over 750 pages long. And it's free
Book Promotion
http://www.authorsden.com
http://crimespace.ning.com
http://www.redroom.com
http://www.publicityhound.com
http://www.burryman.com
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/internet_marketing_for_novel_writers.php
http://www.bauuinstitute.com/Marketing/PressRelease1.html
http://www.author-promotion.com/promotionalresources.html
Facebook
MySpace
Safest Way To Search For An Agent:
http://www.sff.net/people/victoriastrauss/agentsearch.html
LitMatch: http://www.litmatch.net/#
Other Cool Helpful Websites:
Crime Scene Investigation: http://www.crime-scene-investigator.net
DNA Forensics: www.ornl.gov/hgmis/elsi/forensics.shtml
Cops and Crime: http://www.terryburns.net/COPS_CRIME.htm
Links
KateMessner is the author of THE BRILLIANT FALL OF GIANNA Z. and SUGAR AND ICE (Walker/Bloomsbury, Dec. 2010), the MARTY MCGUIRE series with Scholastic (Spring 2011), and two forthcoming picture books with Chronicle Books.
"The Brilliant Fall of Gianna Z" - Gianna Zales is a star runner with one more hurdle to jump before she goes to cross-country sectionals – a monster leaf collection project. To get it done, she’ll have to survive a rival who desperately wants to take her place at sectionals, a grandmother who leaves her false teeth in the refrigerator, and a best friend whose feelings about her are changing like the leaves. Gianna Z needs a stroke of brilliance to make it work!
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Hi Shelli, thanks for having me!
You asked me to talk a little about Skype tours and why I find them useful use.
When my middle grade novel THE BRILLIANT FALL OF GIANNA Z. came out in September, one of my goals was to make a personal connection with as many teachers, librarians, and young readers as possible. In addition to writing for kids, though, I’m also a middle school English teacher, and spending too much time out of my classroom at the beginning of the school year was out of the question. Thankfully, technology came to the rescue!
If you’re part of the online children’s literature world, you’ve probably already heard a thing or two about Skype author visits – a low-cost or no-cost way for classrooms, libraries, and book clubs to connect kids and authors. As someone who wears two hats – both author and teacher – I’m a huge fan of this new kind of author visit for a few reasons.
- Flexibility. Though I love visiting schools in person, I spend a limited number of days out of my own classroom each year and get more requests than I’m able to accommodate. Skyping with some schools allows me to connect with kids, librarians, and teachers I would have missed otherwise. I can Skype with a classroom on the other side of the world during my 40-minute lunch hour or after school, and hang up in time to teach my afternoon class or make dinner.
- Cost. While traditional author visits are amazing opportunities, they are cost prohibitive for many schools. If you know an educator, you probably know that many schools are facing dire financial situations right now – the worst they’ve seen in years. Enrichment activities like author visits
Now, you may have noticed but I haven't blogged in, well, forever.
Actually, that isn't quite true. I'm the main blogger for the BookKids blog these days, and I have been getting 3 posts a week up like clock work. I manage to get those up because I have a dedicated 2 hours every Sunday at the store to work on the kids blog. It's amazing what a set time, an editorial calendar and a small financial incentive(I do mean small) does for a person's blogging. So, head over there to see the books I've been reading.
But over here in editorial/publishing land. I have been working non-stop on getting all my online marketing stuff ready in time for this year's BEA. That means new websites for Blooming Tree and CBAY Books (you can see how far I've gotten on CBAY here. All of my books are going to get new kid-friendly, activity oriented sites. The authors are getting newsrooms (here's PJ's work in progress). CBAY Books has it's own Twitter feed and Facebook page. Actually, it would be great if 13 more people would fan that page. Then I can change it's url to facebook.com/cbaybooks instead of the unwieldy thing it currently is.
As you can see, this is a lot of posting and uploading. Not surprising this is falling by the way side.
However as I learned with the BookKids Blog, I just need some discipline, so I'm going to start setting aside 2 hours a week for this blog too. That should enable me to get 3 posts up a week, minimum.
And this week, I thought I'd start by discussing the NBN sales conference I'm attending. I'm here to tell the NBN sales force all about the CBAY and BTP line of books. In two hours I'll present, and then hopefully, they'll go out and sell.
I'll have an update once I've presented.
I just read
The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan and what an amazing book it is. I am quite overcome. It's not just the magical writing - it's the story of my life!
Near the end one the characters talks about being born in the
Year of the Tiger. I paid close attention because I was born in the Year of the Tiger. As was my mother. And my daughter.
...Then she told me why a tiger is gold and black. It has two ways. The gold side leaps with its fierce heart. The black side stands still with cunning, hiding its gold between trees, seeing and not being seen, waiting patiently for things to come.
It is five months till the publication of
Tall Story and my gold side is leaping.
So little time, so much marketing to do. Not to mention another novel to write.
At the same time, my black side is cringing in the shadows. Is it too soon to begin trumpeting my book? Isn't it too crushingly embarrassing to tell people yes, it's really good? What if I set up a Facebook page and nobody becomes a fan? What if I come across as vain and annoying? Whatifwhatifwhatifwhatif?
Chatting with my nephew (on my husband's side), an aspiring conductor, about the business of networking - he told me something that really brought home to me what an enormous task I am facing. I paraphrase:
Our instinct is to be self deprecating. We don't want to shout about how good we are because we don't want people to dislike us. But there comes a point when this becomes a real problem. We actually have to get better at telling people that we are good at what we do.
Get over yourself, I tell myself sternly. Just get on with it.
So in the mornings, I write a few hundred words towards my new novel. And in the afternoons I work on a list of Things to Do to promote my book.
One of the nice things about social networking sites is that they all seem to come with free badges and widgets. You can use these badges to promote your site. Some of them even let you customize what you place on them or choose the colors so that your badge will coordinate with the rest of your site.
However, with so many badges and widgets from different sites to chose from, there is always the chance that you can place so many badges on your site that they become overwhelming. You don't want to clutter the sidebars of your site or blog. Too many badges are overwhelming for the reader and often leads him/her to not click on any at all. You have to be selective in the ones you choose to permanently display.
For example, on Facebook alone I have the ability to create 7 different badges -- 1 for my profile, 1 for this blog's page, 1 for CBAY Books' page, and 1 for each of CBAY's different books' pages. Now if I place all 7 of those badges on my sidebar, they would just get lost. Instead, I just placed the most relevant Facebook badge -- the one for Buried in the Slush Pile's page.
The only other widgets I have on this page's sidebar all relate directly to this blog. Remember to place your own badges sparingly as well.
Yesterday we talked about writing keyword rich text and practiced writing keyword rich bios. Today we'll discuss one of those places you can use those bios.
Now, I realize that most people are acquainted with Facebook, and that the majority of you already have profiles there. But have you considered how useful the place is for book marketing?
For starters, you can set up a page devoted to your book. I set up the following 4 pages this morning. To do all 4 pages, it took me less than 1 hour. You can see them by clicking on their badges below:
Admittedly, I just set them up this morning, so they don't have a ton of content on them yet. But you can see all the different places content can be added. And there are some great things you can do:
- Add your blog using the Networked Blogs app.
Then, when you update your blog, it automatically updates on your page. - Upload photos.
You can add book covers, interior artwork, photos from events, fan art, etc. - Upload video -- like book trailers.
- Post events.
Let people know about release parties, contests, or other activities related to your book. - Have discussions about your book.
Fans can ask you questions about the character or possible sequels or embarrassing personal questions you can then choose to ignore.
The possibilities are almost literally endless. And once you add the badge to your blog and/or website (like I did on the right hand side), people will join the site as fans. For once, you don't have to find them, they'll find you.
And of course, the best part about all of it is that it's free.
I admit it. I'm becoming increasingly dependent on YouTube videos to keep my blog updated regularly.
But seriously, you guys, I am interested in your FURTHER EDUCATION. Especially you PUBLISHED writer guys, the ones who are no longer on the slushpile, the ones who have a book out, or a book about to come out, the ones who are still asking yourselves everyday, 'should I have a website?' 'should I blog?' 'should I do a video?' 'is it worth the time?'
My answer is ... AAAARGH. Some people don't deserve their success.
Anyway, here is John Green (again!) showing you guys how to keep faith with your young audience:
Moral of the blog post: if you're about to be published, be seen by your audience and your book will be sold. You can't procrastinate over marketing your book (unlike when you're writing it).
I love that Google is today celebrating the
40th anniversary of Eric Carle's Very Hungry Caterpillar which apparently sells a copy somewhere in the world every 30 seconds.
Today is also the
launch of Google's Street View, by which anyone can punch a city post code into
Google Maps and see the location in 360 degree photographic views.
The launch of anything that smacks of new technology has of course prompted fear and trembling over issues of privacy, with
Google acting quickly to remove objectionable photos. When the service was launched in the US, a new past-time of
streetspotting was invented.
The literary possibilities of Google Street View are mind-boggling. Do have a listen to
tonight's episode of Front Row (20 March, Friday), the radio arts programme, in which
Ian Rankin and
Graham Hurley discuss the cons (readers can visit fictional locations and the disconnect between story and reality might might get in the way of the story's believability) and the pros (oooh, the story ideas... Street View as murder alibi ... Street View revealing the future).
If you've written a book that has to do with archaeological digs and ancient civilizations like
The Mummy Snatchers of Memphis by my friend
Natasha Narayan - Google Earth claims to be able to give you access to the past, "With a simple click, take a look at suburban sprawl, melting icecaps, coastal erosion and more". As well as dive under oceans, etc etc.
There is some muttering that Google's ubiquity, so dangerously Microsoft-like, has pushed the corporation over to the Dark Side ... that Google has betrayed its famous motto,
Don't Be Evil.
Are we in danger of being exploited by the Google juggernaut marauding into every corner of our lives?
Perhaps.
Meanwhile why not exploit everything that Google has to offer first?
The Overnight Fame of Steffi McBride Youtube book trailer
I was going to focus today. FOCUS!
But when I heard about the Steffi McBride book, all the little bits of blogging material that I've been trying to ignore in the name of writing my novel came rushing to the fore - so important to share this, especially i
n the current downturn. So I've got to just quickly tell you about Steffi McBride and all the other stuff that might be meaningful to the Rise and Fall of Us as writers.
I heard about Steffi McBride in today's
Guardian RSS feed which highlighted Andrew Croft's new novel
The Overnight Fame of Steffi Mcbride - or more precisely, how the author is using Web 2.0 to the hilt to promote the novel:
But what, arguably, makes Steffi more interesting than your average airhead celeb is that she's the figment of an author's imagination and these tantalising - or annoying - insights into her star-studded existence come courtesy of her updates on Twitter, the social media "microblogging" site, and her Facebook page. Read the article
The book trailer is appealing (a bit long but quite appealing - makes authors want to rush out to the nearest drama school in search of cheap but capable talent to star in their book trailers). And suddenly all that wasted time in Facebook turns out to be an investment in my future success as a writer ... I'm off to friend Steffi now (for the record, her friend count is only 33 at the moment, will be interesting to check back in a few weeks). It will also be interesting to see what FB does to the page. FB took down the FB page of Vern,
Sarah Macintyre's wonderful comic creation for the
DFC comics, on the basis that
Vern was not human.
The article appears on the heels of a series of guest blogs on book marketing running on the agent Nathan Bransford's blog . Bestselling author
Michelle Moran (
Nefertiti) blogged in two parts.
The first part was about the nitty gritty of the business, the lingo, the marketing department, the publicity department ...
So you’re a few months away from publishing your debut novel. Your publishing house has suggested that you pitch in to help promote your own work, but you don’t have the first clue as to where you should start. Or perhaps you’ve already published your first book without doing any of your own publicity and marketing and now the hard realization has hit that this time around, without a significant change on your part, your career is going to end as quickly as it began. Now you’re willing to try something – anything. But what works? What doesn’t work? What should you be doing? Michelle Moran on Book Marketing Part 1
Michelle's second blog was about blogging, websites, online reviewers ...
... don’t be afraid to try new ways of publicity and marketing, even if you’ve never heard of anyone else doing it before. This is what a great publicist will do for you, and what you want to do for yourself. There are so many ways of promoting a book that aren’t widely used, and many of them are free. Michelle Moran on Book Marketing Part 2
And finally, the
guest blogger on Nathan's blog today is
M.J. Rose (
The Reincarnationist), who shares this lovely kernel:
Not even the most brilliant pr and marketing can sell a book people just do not want to read. M.J. Rose on Book Marketing
Having gotten that off my chest, I can now go back to work. Enjoy, everyone.
Meg Cabot has left the UK (Chicklish is running a Meg Cabot week featuring interviews they blagged while Meg was here).
I still think it's unfair that nobody told me she was coming.
Moving on, Meg is now in South Africa.
Lucky for you, Notes from the Slushpile had spies carefully embedded at Exclusive Books in Capetown where Meg made an appearance.
Nicky Schmidt — aka Atyllah (a chicken from outer space ... but that's another loooong story)— packs her report with some cogent thoughts about authors and marketing.
Noting Meg's powerful online presence, Nicky writes:
I’m amazed at how much of the marketing is electronic – almost the whole customer relationship management side of her marketing is done via the internet – aside from the book tours and books signings. But the key marketing focus, it strikes me, aside from having a decent product, is customer relationship management. It’s interesting that in an increasingly competitive market authors are having to focus less on their product and far more on customer relationships in order to up and sustain sales figures. It’s no longer solely about how good the book is, but it’s also about how accessible you are to your market and how you woo them. That gives authors two full time jobs rolled into one – writer/entertainer and marketer.
Read Nicky's full report here - it's mandatory reading for anyone who is working on their strategy to dominate the world ... er, market their books.
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, 
) is a cool online personality only because he's trying to sell his books ... but look at what he got from his social network on his birthday -
I've just finished building Sarwat Chadda's website in anticipation of the May launch of his "goth-lit" thriller, 
Hi Karen, interesting post. I have a few of the Chicken Soup For The Soul books. I'd have never guessed that they received 144 rejections from publishers. A great reminder to never give up.
Hi, Susanne,
I was also surprised when I learned how many rejections Chicken Soup received. It is a great lesson for perseverance!
Hi Karen,
Terrific post filled with essential tips. Thanks!
All the best,
Donna
I coach authors how to get on TV and that is another way to make some serious money. Consulting gigs, speaking gigs and even more book deals come your way after getting on TV. OK, thanks, Edward Smith.
Donna, Thanks for stopping by!
Edward, maybe a visitor will check out your site. Thanks for stopping by.