Book Marketing Trends

Today’s post is courtesy of guest author, Carole Audet.

As a certified author’s assistant, I help my clients with all stages of getting their expertise out of their heads and into published books. When an author chooses to go the true self-publishing route, which has many advantages, I always recommend printing through Lightning Source. Lightning Source (LSI) is owned by Ingram Book Company, so printing through LSI means publishers automatically have book distribution through Ingram. This gives self-published authors the same privileges and advantages as authors published through traditional publishers. Ingram takes care of the shipping and returns and it’s all set up through the publishers’ LSI accounts. Distribution can also be arranged for Canada, Australia, United Kingdom, and the European Union through the LSI account.

Another benefit of printing at LSI is that most books get an automatic listing on Amazon.com. Amazon.com has many added features for authors to promote themselves, including setting up an Amazon Author Central page, and submitting titles for the Search Inside the Book program. On the Author Central page, an author can include her bio and image, link her blog so each post automatically shows on the page, upload a video, and link her Twitter account. A new feature on the Author Central page is that a unique URL to the page can be created to use in the author’s marketing materials.

A great way to connect with a large number of potential readers is to conduct a virtual book tour, and the way to prepare a virtual book tour is to start with a book blog or author blog if the author has more than one book. As most of you know, one of the best ways to drive traffic to your blog is to guest blog, and that is the backbone of a virtual book tour. A virtual book tour can be organized to take place in a variety of ways including over the course of a day, a month or even a year. The idea is to find blogs whose topics are similar to those of the book. Readers of the blogs are sure to find the guest posts of interest as well, and will be provided with a link back to the author’s blog where information about how to purchase the book will be provided. For visitors not quite ready to purchase, it’s a great idea to subscribe them to your list by providing a free download, such as one chapter from the book.

And while much of the content for a virtual book tour needs to be created by the authors themselves, all the behind-the-scenes work can be outsourced. Nonfiction authors typically have a business, clients, speaking engagements, etc. that they need to focus on, and they don’t need to create more work for themselves by trying to go it alone on a virtual book tour. That’s where an Online Book Marketing Specialist (OBMS) comes in. OBMSs are trained to create the author or book blog, and take care of all the details of organizing and implementing a virtual book tour.

Like always, follow-up is crucial when guest blogging. Like every social media avenue, it’s about building relationships. Once the guest post has been scheduled and published, it’s important for the guest blogger to continue to interact with the audience when comments are posted. And, a great way to stimulate a conversation about a blog post is to end it with a question. So, are you ready to get your expertise out of your head and into a published book?

About the author:

Carole Audet is a Certified Ghostwriter, Certified Professional Author’s Assistant, and Certified Online Book Marketing Specialist. A journalism graduate, Carole loves speaking with people to write about their unique stories. She also enjoys helping busy professionals get their expertise out of their heads and into published books.

www.intouchonline.ca ~ carole [at] intouchonline.ca ~ 705-325-9439

Please click here for an example of a book blog.