WRITERS WANT TO SELL BOOKS and consumer perceptions are the reason people buy books. They have certain things in mind that cause them to lay down their green to get your black and white. They have this good feeling, or this desire to learn, or to know, and they look for things that will fill their hungry little baby book-reading bellies. You need to build a following of hungry readers.
Those who publish their own work will find that they have the following problems starting out. Book buyers believe the following:
- Self-published books are trash that no publisher will touch.
nceived and poorly produced, and the prejudice remains.”- Bookstore and amazon are where they buy books, not from authors.
- Reviews for self-published books are written by novices, so the book must be written by a novice.
- Social marketing tools are worse than reviews.
- I don’t trust a book author I don’t know.
It doesn’t matter that these perceptions are wrong. It matters that they carry them.
I tell people to think of their work as a small radio station broadcast. They need to keep their writing in focus and develop a fan base. They should be willing to listen to their listeners. Social media is the way to do that. You should be willing to give stuff away. You need to think on terms of building a fan base and fans like stuff that is free. Giving people your time and effort to write a blog, or to give out a free short story, or to feature portions of a book you’ve written, is a way for them to sample your style.
Trust is something that is built. Trust comes from developing it like any other relationship you have, you are in. If you aren’t willing to put the time into that relationship, then it will die on the vine. Too often people are not willing to taste the sour grapes of criticism and analysis. Readers and critics should have a stab at your work.
At the radio station, you go in for a three hours shift every day. You may have the shift no one else wants the 3 am to 6 am shift. That’s much like releasing your own book. You have an audience of ten. You sell those first ten copies, and you notice not everyone is really into your work.
At 3 in the morning, not many folks are going to be into whatever style of music you have, but if you are playing Jazz, then there will be some lovers of Jazz around. You are focusing in on them. You don’t start adding country and rock when you are attracting jazz listeners. So don’t deviate from the format. You’d better darn well love writing in the genre you choose so that those who love that genre can hook into your groove. Give ‘em that jazz, all the jazz you’ve got.
One record doesn’t make a musician. One song doesn’t make a set. Keep composing. Get that next tune down. Quit thinking about being on top of the mountain when you are at the bottom. It takes a great deal of time and effort to climb a mountain. Do the work; build that set of music your station plays, all in the same genre. Give it some time – lots of time. Build that following. Go from 5 to 10 to 100, and see if you can’t mix up that to 1,000. You as a DJ out to get out with one of those colorful vans and drop some tunes on college campuses or at an event like the Surfing International competition. Hand out stickers, give children balloons. Give out this (maybe use a lottery ticket system):
Here is a great page to learn more about Publicity>>>>>>
Here are two more cool ideas:
On Kindle Use Authograph or used KDP Select Promotion.
Add a Mailing list to your web site or blog.
Here are 30 steps to marketing a kindle book.
If you want to go crazy, have your car covered in a skin:
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