9 Tips For How to Market Your Book on a Limited Budget
By: Phyllis Zimbler
Submitted: 2008-10-17 20:27:22 | Word Count: 500
There are thousands of ways to market your book. And after months of marketing my book MRS. LIEUTENANT: A SHARON GOLD NOVEL, I’ve come up with a list of what I’ve found to be the most effective and important tips for getting the word out on a limited budget about your book.
Tip #1 – Get a website:
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Have a website ready to go the moment your book is out. And then connect your website directly to your book’s page on Amazon (and other sites too). (For example, see www.mrslieutenant.com.)
Tip #2 – Write discussion guidelines:
Have discussion guidelines available to download as a pdf off your website. And if you’ve written an adult book, consider including a section of questions for teens.
Tip #3 – Provide free chapters:
Have the first few chapters available as free pdf downloads off your website. This is a great way to get readers “hooked” on reading the rest of the book.
Tip #4 – Do read some books on promoting your book:
Some of the books I found particularly helpful are:
Sell Your Book on Amazon by Brent Sampson (terrific ways to establish a presence on Amazon)
Red Hot Internet Publicity by Penny C. Sansevieri (you can sign up for free email info at amarketingexpert.com)
Plug Your Book by Steve Weber (subtitle: Online Book Marketing for Authors)
1001 Ways to Market Your Books (sixth edition) by John Kremer (huge book so for now I only read Chapter 12 “How to Sell Books Via Computer”) (you can sign up for free email info from him at bookmarket.com)
Tip #5 – Collect all the publicity tips you can and jump on any opportunities:
Joan Stewart the Publicity Hound (sign up for free email info at publicityhound.com) has great pr tips. And sign up on helpareporter.com to get email updates for story sources that reporters need.
Tip #6 – Start a blog as soon as possible, preferably before your book is published:
Unfortunately I only learned this wisdom right before my book was published, but I did jump right in once I did learn. (See www.mrslieutenant.blogspot.com.)
Tip #7 – Optimize your Amazon presence:
Make sure you take full advantage of author tools on Amazon, including having your blog feed into your AmazonConnect feature on your book’s page.
Tip #8 – Ask book bloggers to review your book:
And if they say yes, be sure to give them a free copy for themselves as well as a free copy for a contest in connection with your book. Book giveaways on book blogs are major attention getters for people who read. (And if book bloggers really like your book, they’re often willing to post the review from their blog on Amazon and other book sites.)
Tip #9 – Take a virtual book tour:
I used pumpupyourbookpromotion.com to take a month long virtual book tour (your book is featured on blogs with either a review or an interview or both), and I found the experience extremely effective for developing relationships with book bloggers.
Author Resource:-
Follow Phyllis Zimbler Miller on Twitter at @ZimblerMiller and connect with her on Facebook and LinkedIn as Phyllis Zimbler Miller. You can join her two groups on Facebook -- "Mrs. Lieutenant: A Sharon Gold Novel" and "Information Mavens." Visit her website http://www.millermosaic.com.
