Friday, May 1, 2015

Book Launch


It’s been said that the hard work begins AFTER you’ve finished writing your book.

No matter who you publish with, chances are that the biggest responsibility for marketing your book and getting those all important sales will fall on your shoulders. This is not a slight against publishers — small publishers usually don’t have the money or resources to support Hollywood’s version of a book launch and tour; the larger publishers, while they might contribute to your efforts, will often save their biggest campaigns for the more established and well-known authors.

If you are fortunate enough to get picked up by a publisher that can and will support your promotion efforts you will probably be asked to supply a well-thought-out marketing plan for your book.  A brief overview of what your plan should include is: a description of your book; who is your target audience; how will you/can you reach your target audience; how will you distribute your book; what venues will you use online and in-person; what is your budget; what marketing aids (swag, bookmarks, etc.) will you use; who is your competition; what is your short-term goal; what is your long-term goal. Make a list of steps you need to take to reach your goals. Study what your competition does and what works and doesn’t work for them.

Contact local venues for in-person events; look for non-traditional sites as well as bookstores and libraries, this might include bars, coffee houses, and stores which might have relevance to your book’s topic, etc. Since you are not (yet) famous you should find a hook for bringing people in to the venue such as offering a topic discussion related to your book, participating in a fund raiser for a civic group, or hosting a book launch party with food. Scour online for blogs that reach your intended audience and find those who might be willing to host you – query the blog owner and follow their guidelines if they say yes. Make a list of local media sites and contact names and prepare a press release about you and about your book, it is best if you can tie the release into something local or a timely news event.

Develop an author website (fairly static site with author and book info) AND an author blog (with relatively frequent, newsy posts). When you blog, be sure to TAG/Label your posts with keywords so search engines will pick it out easily. There are several free or inexpensive blog-sites with user-friendly formats so they don’t need to cost a fortune. Use social media: create an Author PAGE on Facebook; use Twitter to Tweet mini-announcements; create a Pinterest account and post book covers and photos that relate to your book; use Google+ to post blurbs; participate in author forums to develop a network and increase your author platform. Linking your social media sites (such as Twitter to Facebook, etc.) has both advantages and disadvantages — it’s good to update your various sites with less effort on your part, however it is a better idea to add individual posts to each site so they are not just a pure copy of the same thing.

Here are a few helpful URLs to visit when building your online presence and promotion (these are suggestions and not endorsements):




Writing Exercise: Write a short “book jacket” blurb for your book. This blurb should be useable as a book description for online sellers so it should be a good soft-sell pitch.

Writing Prompt: You were strolling on a crowded downtown city street when a stranger runs into you. The stranger runs off and shortly after you find a note in your pocket – what does it say?

Challenge Assignment:  Write different versions of your Author’s Bio to use 1) on your website, 2) on Amazon’s Author Central, and 3) in a press release.



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