This book – How to Publish and Promote Online by M.J. Rose and Angela Adair-Hoy – is a collection of very short chapters contributed by a variety of authors with expertise in the areas covered. Although overall the book is geared toward online publishing, there are a number of helpful chapters that are equally applicable to the print publisher. The edition I have is from 2001 and it’s amazing how much technology has changed in these seven years, making some of the ideas and references obsolete. It’s an easy-read, though, and has numerous lists of specific resources, like Where to Send Book-Related Press Releases and Announcements Online, Where to Get e-books Reviewed, Cheap Advertising, More Essential Online Resources, and more.

The book is divided into three parts:

Part I – Everything You Need to Know About Publishing On- and Offline

Part II – Self-Publishing Success Stories

Part III – Pounding the Virtual Pavement: Selling Your Book Online

One of the things I really found helpful in this book were a couple of chapters of interview questions and responses from people in the book review and radio industry. Their input was varied, but gave an interesting perspective of their preferences when dealing with authors. That, and a number of other factors, assisted me in coming up with my 3 Keys to Marketing for the Self-Publisher. The authors are also forthright in identifying and revealing ideas and marketing strategies that didn’t work for them. Their experiences enable them to give good advice for where to spend money and what strategies to pass up.

Overall, the book provides a handy reference tool for authors and self-publishers trying to navigate their way around the web and the lists are especially time-saving in that someone else has done the legwork in identifying good places to publicize your work. I probably won’t buy this book, but it’s definitely one worth checking out from the library again when I get to that stage of my marketing plan.

In the course of my reading, I’ve boiled the immense world of marketing into 3 easy-to-remember tips. Although I have been garnering lots of great marketing ideas from the books I’ve been reading on the topic, it is easy to feel like marketing a book successfully is an impossible task. But by the time I finished reading How to Publish and Promote Online by M.J. Rose and Angela Adair-Hoy tonight, some common themes seemed to emerge.

I think that condensing the broad concept of marketing into these 3 general areas will give me a better sense of structure and enable me to focus my efforts more effectively in the days ahead. And actually, come to think of it, I almost feel a twinge of excitement at the thought of marketing now, whereas before I felt only dread and total incompetence in the field. Now I can develop specific strategies in an effort to achieve each of these three goals. So, here are the 3 keys:

1. Know your target audience. Be specific. Identify your niche market. Don’t just assume that everyone is interested in your book or you will be lost and ineffective when implementing marketing strategies.

2. Be creative. Look for new, unique ways to present your book to the public and potential reviewers and publicity outlets. While there is certain protocol that should be followed for certain situations, don’t be afraid to branch out and try new approaches to get your book noticed.

3. Market early and often. Don’t wait until your book is published to begin publicizing and promoting it. Take time early on in the process to develop a plan and set it in motion.

If you disagree with the primary importance of these 3 keys or have other suggestions, please don’t tell me. I rather like the simplicity of this system and don’t want anyone to complicate it for me again. 🙂

Anyone who does any research in the field of self-publishing will quickly learn that there are three keys to selling books. 1. Marketing, 2. Marketing, 3. Marketing

For anyone feeling uncertain about how to approach the vast world of marketing possibilities (and I’m pretty sure that includes just about every author-turned-self-publisher!), just pick up this arsenal of “100 No-Cost Low-Cost Weapons to Help You Sell Your Work” – Guerrilla Marketing for Writers by Jay Conrad Levinson, Rick Frishman & Michael Larsen. One can’t help but feel as they read this book that the authors are really serious about wanting to help writers achieve success in their marketing efforts. Although it’s written with the assumption that the author’s goal is to be picked up by one of the big publishing houses, it is equally useful for the self-publisher. Perhaps even more so, because every time I read, “Your publisher should…” or “Ask your publisher if…” I made a mental note that I am my publisher and those are responsibilities that I too must shoulder.

The book is divided into four parts as follows:

Part I – Guerrilla Marketing: The Right Idea at the Right Time

Part II – Weapons that Make You a Guerrilla

Part III – Weapons Galore to Help You Sell More

Part IV – Weapons that are All About You

Each of these is subdivided into smaller categories into which are placed each of the individual “weapons” – specific marketing ideas. The Table of Contents lists each of these individually and serves as the perfect place to mark the strategies you want to use first. If I wasn’t borrowing this book from the library, that’s exactly what I would have done. In fact, the book would have been very well-marked by the time I finished it if it was mine.

In addition to all the practical strategies, the authors share numerous additional “guerrilla tactics” – ideas submitted by other authors, and “war stories” – real life examples of the guerrilla tactics and weapons in action. I can’t wait to get my own copy of this book and start marking it up! I’ve also just begun perusing the wealth of information and resources contained on the Guerrilla Marketing website. Between the book and the website, it’s almost as good as having an experienced mentor guiding you through the steps to effectively market your book!

Lulu.com has some helpful tips on their marketing page about what a press release is, what a newswire is, and how to write good ones. They also include several links to recommended free and fee-based newswire services. It looks like they have lots of additional resources in the sidebar that are worth exploring as well.

Here’s a handy little banner that you can place on your blog or website to help me spread the word about this new blog! Just copy the html code below and insert it into the html code of your blog or website. Thanks!

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