The Top 4 Book Marketing Tactics in Today's World

Here are the top four book promotion activities you can engage in to sell more books in today's world . . .

1. Speak. Speaking builds a word-of-mouth army better than anything else. Speak locally - at garden clubs, libraries, bookstores, Rotary clubs, JCs, poetry nights, story swaps, book club meetings, etc. Then expand out to a wider area, to nearby cities, to nearby states. Eventually, expand out to an even wider audience.

When someone hears you speak, they become a bigger fan than if they had just read your book. If they like you when they hear you speak, they will tell ten times more people than by just reading your book.

2. Book yourself on national TV. TV is still the largest mass market media. It still reaches more people than any other media - and with more impact. It's worth spending the time contacting the ten or twenty news and talk shows that reach your audience. For most national TV shows, you can get the contact information in one of two ways: 1. from their websites, and 2. via your network of friends and fellow authors.

Your appearance on one major TV show will not only expose you to millions of viewers, but it also opens the door to dozens and sometimes hundreds of other media: newspapers, magazines, radio, more TV shows, etc.

3. Create relationships with high-traffic websites. How many major high-traffic websites that attract your target reader have you created relationships with? Are these real relationships where you contribute content to them on a regular basis? In today’s world, Internet relationships are the key to marketing success.

Uncover five to ten top websites that already reach the audience you want to reach. Look over their sites until you find a way to contact someone behind the site - a webmaster, an editor, the founder. Then email them with an offer of free content for their readers: an interview with you, a review copy of your book, a free article (that is really good), some tips for their readers, a Q&A column on your specialty, etc. Their obligation, in return, is to link to your website or sales page.

4. Do a Superstar Blog Tour. Or a Mega Blog Tour. Or a Blogpalooza. I’m not talking about the old-style humdrum virtual book tour of 15 or 20 blogs. I’m talking about an event blog tour that creates Internet buzz on a major scale. Event blog tours can build brands, create incredible website traffic, and sell tons of books.

The neat thing is that effective event blog tours take less time to carry out than the traditional Amazon Bestseller Campaign - and are almost always more effective in selling books, building a brand, and driving traffic.

If you want to know more about event blog tours, check out this recording of me speaking about the value and method of carrying out an effective impact blog tour: http://www.bookmarket.com/blog-tour-palooza.htm.

Conclusion

These four book marketing techniques work for almost any kind of book: fiction, nonfiction, memoirs, children's books, how-to, spiritual, business, even cookbooks. You don't have to do all four. Start with one and work it hard – you'll get better results than doing Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, EzineArticles, or other Internet marketing flavors of the week.



John Kremer is the author of 1001 Ways to Market Your Books. If you want to launch a SuperStar Blog Tour™, Mega Blog Tour™, or Blogpalooza™, check out http://www.bookmarket.com/blog-tour-palooza.htm.

Book Promotion Tweets You Can Use: First Two Weeks in September

There are some great book marketing lessons and book promotion tips included within these short tweets that I shared during the first two weeks in September . . .

Book Promotion Ideas

Book Promotion Carnival #7 - Book promotion tips, Internet marketing, book marketing tips - http://askjohnkremer.com/book-promotion-carnival-7

Spend about half an hour to one hour a day on online book promotion. More than that and you are wasting time.

Selling Books on the Street Corners - the legal technicalities - http://askjohnkremer.com/selling-books-on-the-street-corners

Book Promotion Carnival #6 - http://askjohnkremer.com/book-promotion-carnival-6 with book promotion tip and Internet marketing tip

Book Publicity Resources

Raising Arizona Kids - editorial contacts - http://magagenie.com/raising-arizona-kids

Arizona Parenting editors - http://magagenie.com/arizona-parenting

Internet Book Marketing Tips


QR PR Quick Response Codes | Top 10 Uses for QR Codes - http://bookmarketingbestsellers.com/video-10-uses-for-qr-codes

Miscellaneous Tips

If it’s nothing more than a smile, give that away and keep on giving it. - Beth Brown

Oprah Winfrey Greatest Quotations (or at least some of them) - http://myincrediblewebsite.com/oprah-winfrey-greatest-quotations

A hunch is creativity trying to tell you something. - Frank Capra, director

The above are just some of the tweets I sent out during the past two weeks. What more did you miss? Follow my tweets at http://twitter.com/johnkremer



John Kremer is the author of 1001 Ways to Market Your Books. If you want to launch a SuperStar Blog Tour™, a Mega Blog Tour™, or a Blogpalooza™, watch this space for more details later this week.

Book Marketing Tweets You Can Use: August 2011

There are some great book marketing lessons and book promotion tips included within these short tweets that I shared during the last two weeks of August . . .

Book Promotion Carnival #5 - http://askjohnkremer.com/book-promotion-carnival-5 - Internet marketing tips for book authors

The Frugal Book Promoter: Asking for Help from Partners - http://askjohnkremer.com/the-frugal-book-promoter-asking-for-help-from-partnershttp://askthepublicist.com/creative-penny-pinching-make-a-splash-at-a-fair

Listen; there's a hell of a good universe next door: let's go. - e. e. cummings - I love this poet.

Need answers to your book marketing and book publishing questions? Check out http://www.askjohnkremer.com

24 Reasons Selling is Better Than Sex | BNET - http://www.bnet.com/blog/salesmachine/24-reasons-selling-is-better-than-sex/17252

What Book Marketing Books Should I Read? - http://askjohnkremer.com/what-book-marketing-books-should-i-read

Free ebooks on marketing, publicity, business, and Internet marketing - http://www.freebooksforall.com/business.htm

What Is the Best Way to Market Poetry? - http://askjohnkremer.com/what-is-the-best-way-to-market-poetry

How Tim O'Reilly Bootstrapped O'Reilly Media with Happy Accidents - http://blog.bookmarket.com/2011/08/how-tim-oreilly-bootstrapped-oreilly.html

How Do I Market a Christian Thriller? - http://askjohnkremer.com/how-do-i-market-a-christian-thriller

The Golden Key to Internet Marketing: It's All About Relationships - http://askjohnkremer.com/the-golden-key-to-internet-marketing

The above are just some of the tweets I sent out during the past two weeks. What more did you miss? Follow my tweets at http://twitter.com/johnkremer



John Kremer is the author of 1001 Ways to Market Your Books. If you want to launch a SuperStar Blog Tour™, a Mega Blog Tour™, or a Blogpalooza™, watch this space for news in the coming week.

101 Ways to Blog as a Book Author - Updated Again

We all know that blogging is one of the best ways to get attention in today's Internet world. A blog is a godsend to your website, bringing it traffic, fans, and more. But you have to post regularly to your blog: twice a week or more.

Stuck for what to blog about? Here are some tips for novelists and children's book writers as well as writers of nonfiction: memoirs,  business books, spiritual titles, cookbooks, self-help, travel, and more.

1. Review other novels or books in your field, especially from other lesser-known novelists or book authors.
2. Write a blog post using the voice of one of your main characters. For nonfiction authors, write a blog post using the voice of Abraham Lincoln, Gandhi, Plato, Teddy Roosevelt, Dr. Oz. Henry David Thoreau or some other famous person in your field.
3. Tell stories. Have that main character tell some side stories not included in the novel. For nonfiction authors, you can tell stories you did not feature in your book, especially new testimonial stories you receive.
4. Write about the setting - time and/or place. Use some of the research you did to ensure that your novel was accurate.
5. Invite your readers to review your book. Feature their testimonials on your blog.
6. Interview some of your readers: via Q&A text or via an Internet radio show or via a teleseminar.
7. Podcast your book, one section at a time.
8. Write about trends in your genre or subject area.
9. Write about your favorite novelists (especially those that write in your genre) or book authors in your field. Include their photos and a sampling of their books.
10. Answer questions from your readers.
11. Fill in the back stories of some of your minor characters. Fill in the back story to your nonfiction book.
12. Write a new story featuring one of those characters.
13. Feature excerpts from your upcoming novels or books. Ask for feedback.
14. Link to the blogs of your favorite authors. Tell readers why those blogs would interest them.
15. Link to book review sites. Recommend your favorites.
16. Create a hall of fame for your genre or topic. Of course, include yourself. For a sample, see my Self-Publishing Hall of Fame.
17. Feature events. Write a blog for each of your upcoming book signing events, online events, etc. Invite your readers to attend - or to let their friends know about your events.
18. Write a follow-up post on each of your events describing what happened. Take photos of the event and post them here.
19. Review book trailers for novels you like (or other books as well). Feature the book trailer videos in the blog post. Here's an incredibly easy book trailer any author could duplicate in a few minutes: http://blog.bookmarket.com/2010/12/cool-book-trailer-incredibly-easy-to.html.
20. Write about your writing routine. Describe when you write (morning, evening, weekends), where you write (the proverbial garret, a coffee shop, at the kitchen table), and how you prepare to write (eat a banana, listen to music, kick your husband or wife out of the house). You could easily stretch this out into three or four short blog posts.
21. Share the genesis of your novel or nonfiction book. How did it come about? What ideas, events, characters, etc. inspired you to write the book?
22. Give an inside look. Describe how you went about plotting your novel. For nonfiction authors, describe how you went about organizing the book, why you included some things and excluded other info.
23. Write about a hobby you have.
24. Write about a cause that's important to you: charitable, political, social, ecological, or spiritual.
25. Write about your spouse, your children, or other members of your family.
26. Write about your town, your state, your country, your world, your galaxy.
27. Opine on the state of the nation. Opine on world affairs.
28. Opine on scandals. Write about Weiner, Schwarzenegger, Sheen, and other fools. You can relate it to what you know, like I did on this post about Weiner and Twitter: http://blog.bookmarket.com/2011/06/twitter-how-easy-is-it-to-fake-account.html.
29. Write about a hot issue, especially one that relates to the content of your novel or book.
30. Describe how you go about doing research for your novel or book. Book research? Google? Websites? Travel?
31. Share some of the interesting tidbits, facts, insights you discovered as you did your research. Share things that didn't make it into your novel or book. Share the facts that became key items in your book.
32. Review websites, blogs, courses, or events on writing, research, plotting, etc. that you like. Feature the book covers or banner images in the blog post.
33. Share the novels or books you are reading now. What's on your nightstand? What's in your purse or briefcase? What books did you take to the shore during vacation? You don't have to review these books. All you have to do is share them in a listing or discussion.
34. Survey your readers' opinions on any key issue in your books. You could do a number of posts. Announce the surveys. Then promote the surveys. Then announce the results. That's worth at least three blog posts, probably more.
35. Run a contest. Ask people to name their favorite character and describe why they like the character. For nonfiction books, ask readers to describe the most important tip they learned from your book. Offer a free book, sample chapter from your new novel or book, a phone call from you, or something else as a prize.
36. Feature your reader comments in upcoming blog posts.
37. Have your readers interview you. Encourage them to send in a series of questions you will answer.
38. Ask your readers to pick which character in your novel is most like them. For nonfiction books, ask your readers to tell you which story you told most touched them.
39. Tell your readers which character in your novel is most like you. For nonfiction authors, let them know which story has most meaning to you - and why.
40. Interview book reviewers.
41. Interview bloggers.
42. Interview booksellers.
43. Interview a celebrity in your field.
44. Interview a major celebrity that has a passion for your field. For example, interview a movie star that loves dogs or is a vegetarian or fights for the preservation of the ocean. In this example, the celebrity should be passionate for the topic you write about.
45. Feature your favorite bookstores (with photos). Describe why you love them.
46. Interview your favorite novelists or book authors.
47. Write a ditty. Write a poem. Share a short story.
48. Expose your inner being. Share your feelings.
49. Let readers know about your day.
50. Post photos or videos of your favorite novelists and other book authors. Write a little introduction.
51. Join in the Amazon Bestseller Campaigns of your fellow authors. Promote these campaigns via your blog
52. Join in the blog tours of your fellow authors. Promote these blog tours via your blog.
53. Have a reader interview one of your characters with you responding as the character. For nonfiction authors, have readers send in a list of questions for an expert to answer. Ask the expert to respond via your blog. Here is an example of a blogger interviewing a character in a novel: http://www.thebookbuff.blogspot.com.
54. Report about the launch parties and other promotional activities of your fellow authors.
55. Have readers vote for variations of your book covers and/or book titles.
56. Write guest posts on other blogs. It's a great way to exchange blog posts with other authors. Plus, of course, it exposes you, your book, and your blog to other readers.
57. Post photos of your readers and fans. Feature them reading your book.
58. Run a promotion asking readers to send you photos of them reading your book in unusual places: foreign locations, mountaintops, in the water, at the dining room table, in a restaurant, while standing in line for the latest version of the iPhone, while dancing a jig, at a location featured in your novel or book, up a tree, down a sewer, at the zoo (perhaps with a monkey reading your book, in a bookstore.
59. Feature photos of yourself with your book in the same locations. Have fun with it. Make it a game for yourself.
60. Feature tweets and Facebook posts where others write about your book or you.
61. Create a controversy. Comment on a news story, blog post, current event, historical event, website, or tweet. Say something outrageous and let 'er rip.
62. Write about a service you used in writing or promoting your book. Tell your readers why you liked or did not like the service.
63. Share a quote you like. For example, see http://blog.bookmarket.com/2011/03/whats-important-heres-one-way-to-decide.html.
64. Share your tweets or Facebook posts. At least several times a month, I feature some of my most important or useful tweets with the readers of my blog. For example, see http://blog.bookmarket.com/2011/06/book-marketing-tweets-you-can-use-june_20.html.
65. Write a how-to post. For novelists, tell people how to cook a dish featured in your novel, or how to sew a corset, or how to sail the seven seas, or how to spot a vampire (something, obviously related to your novel). For nonfiction authors, feature tips or how-to advice related to your book.
66. Create videos. Post them to YouTube and then embed them in a blog post. Check out this video I created on advertisements in ebooks: http://blog.bookmarket.com/2011/04/ebook-advertisments-video-reveals-7.html.
67. Share any video that inspires you, even if it is off-topic. Here's recent blog post I wrote that featured an up-and-coming viral video: http://blog.bookmarket.com/2011/06/dance-like-no-one-is-watching-next.html. Watch the video. You'll be glad you did.
68. Create a video channel playlist and embed it on your blog. There are many tools to do this. Here's one example: http://blog.bookmarket.com/2011/03/google-gadget-showcases-your-youtube.html.
69. Share a song you really like. Link to a music video on YouTube or a link to a music site where people can buy the song. Minutes after Susan Boyle's video went viral on YouTube, I shared a link because I found her signing and story so inspirational.
70. Share a photo you really like. Something like this wonderful library desk made of books: http://blog.bookmarket.com/2010/09/cool-library-desk-created-completely.html.
71. Feature an excerpt from a magazine article you liked. For instance, see Books add warmth to any room (from Allure magazine): http://blog.bookmarket.com/2011/04/books-add-warmth-to-any-room-miles-redd.html.
72. Offer a freebie for download. I offered a collection of quotations in the form of an ebook: http://blog.bookmarket.com/2011/04/quotations-from-john-kremer-get-book.html.
73. Cross-pollinate. If you have more than one blog, feature blog posts from your other blogs. Besides this blog, I also blog at AskJohnKremer.com, AskThePublicist.com, AskTheBooksellers.com, AskTheBookPrinter.com, AskTheCoverDesigner.com, and MagaGenie.com.
74. Index your blog and post a link to the index. See my index at http://www.bookmarket.com/bestofblog.htm.
75. Share content from a book, like this great first line from a novel: http://blog.bookmarket.com/2010/07/great-first-line-for-novel.html. Or these great first lines: http://askthecoverdesigner.com/first-lines-draw-the-reader-in-make-them-great.
76. Share a great line from a TV show or movie. The TV show or movie should be current and hot, a classic, or right on target for your topic. Or simply funny. Funny goes viral.
77. Share a joke. Jokes go viral. Even better if the joke ties into your topic or novel.
78. Create a bibliography for your genre or topic. Feature the best books you recommend.
79. Create a glossary for your genre or topic. Define some of the key terms for romance novels, for science fiction, for rabbit hunting, for crocheting, for what you write about.
80. Share a fact. Give your readers some tidbit they likely don't know about your topic. This can be a short blog, something like this: Did you know that 1200 years ago there were probably 12 million kiwis in New Zealand. Today there are only 70,000.
81. Promote your news. Let your readers know about your new books, new products, new updates.
82. Blog about new pages you've added to your website. Or new websites you've created. Here's the blog post I created to promote the launch of my AskJohnKremer.com website: http://blog.bookmarket.com/2011/04/ask-john-kremer-q-website-check-it-out.html.
83. Congratulate someone. Give them a thumbs up when they publish a new book, launch a new product, do some great service for humanity, have a new baby, get married. You don't have to tie it into your book or topic.
84. Thank someone publicly. When someone does something especially nice for you, thank them in public via your blog.
85. Make a prediction. Here's something I tweeted over a year ago that still hasn't really come true. Alas. - You heard it here first: The economy has begun to turn the corner. People are beginning to trust themselves again. Good times coming again.
86. Raise money for a charity. Offer to donate to a specific charity for every book sold during a specific week or month. Promote this via your blog, tweets, Facebook posts, etc.
87. Ask a provocative question. Encourage people to share their answers in the comments section for that post. Joel Comm once tweeted this question: What would you do if you discovered $100,000 hidden away in your basement? He got 3.5 pages of replies in less than an hour.
88. Solicit help. When Jeff Rivera was fighting gay prejudice in Costa Rica, he asked his Facebook followers and others to write emails to a list of government leaders and thought leaders in Costa Rica. It helped.
89. Celebrate milestones. Blog about your company anniversary, the two-year anniversary of the publication of your book, the 700th post on your blog (coming soon right here).
90. Announce awards and honors. If you receive any awards for your book or honors for yourself, blog about them. Link, of course, to the site of the award giver as well.
91. Excerpt your book. Run a series of excerpts from your book. They can be short paragraphs, tips, entire chapters, a story, whatever you want to share.
92. Ask for feedback on your blog and blog posts. Ask for feedback on your website design.
93. Share personal stories. I tweeted and posted on Facebook when I had a heart attack scare a week ago. Not only did it personalize me for my followers and fans, but it encourage me when I received so many good wishes.
94. Have your dog or cat write a blog post. Chances are, of course, that you'll have to write the post, but do it in the voice of your pet.
95. Invite family to blog. Ask your wife, husband, child, mother, father, or favorite aunt to write a guest blog post. The post can be about you, your book, your website, or whatever they want to write about.
96. Invite your friend or neighbor to write a guest blog post. Again, the post can be about you, your book, your website, or whatever they want to write about.
97. Create a scavenger hunt. Ask your readers to find a specific blog post where you wrote about xyz. Or have them find three specific passages in your book. Or three webpages on your website. This scavenger hunt can be a great tool to encourage people to explore your book, blog, or website in greater depth.
98. Solicit money. If you need to raise funds for the reprinting of your book or to produce a book trailer, create a Kickstarter.com project and promote it through your blog. Better yet, have your child create the project and let them write about it on your blog. Children can be very effective promoters of their parent's work. And cute.
99. Recruit joint venture partners. When you are working on an Amazon Bestseller Campaign or a BookTourPalooza blog tour, solicit partners via your blog. Write about what you propose to do, and ask your readers if they want to help. You can do solicit JV partners for any promotion campaign.
100. Create a holiday. Anyone can create a new holiday, commemorative week or month, special day of recognition, or related date. You can check out CelebrateToday.com where I feature over 18,500 such special events. Mother's Day, Father's Day, and Memorial Day were all days created by individuals or organizations. Take Your Daughter to Work Day was created by the National Organization of Women. What day could you create to promote your book or the topic of your book?
101. Ask for contributions to a new book. I did that for my 4-Minute Momentum series of books (still working on them). Here are some sample 6-word memoirs from the book Six-Word Memoirs on Love & Heartbreak. I bet the authors solicited many of these memoirs via their blog or social networks. - Married by Elvis, divorced by Friday. It's like my heart has sciatica. It's worth it, despite your mother. She defines happiness, I defy gravity.
102. Share a mistake. Admit it when you make a mistake. It makes you human. Humans are more fun to read.
103. Create a meme. That's what Tim Ferriss did in creating his fourhourworkweek.com/blog. Here are a few memes being created on Twitter: Let's go all the way tonight, no regrets, just spuds... #replacelovewithspud - Come for the funeral, stay for the all meat buffet. #funeralhomeslogans - #mysuperpowerwouldbe Teleportation! NO MORE TRAFFIC! NO MORE WAITING AT THE AIRPORT!
104. Invent a new word, and blog about it. Something like the two words I recently created: booktourpalooza and blogtourpalooza (with accompanying websites soon to come).
105. Use Google to find more ideas. Follow the advice here: http://www.marketingtechblog.com/technology/how-to-get-blog-ideas-using-google.
106. Make a list - like this one. People love lists. And they love to pass them on. Please tweet about this list. And come back to visit again. I'll be adding more ideas as you pass on your great ideas - and as I come up with more of my own.

People care about novelists and book authors. You don't have to be perfect. You don't have to be professorial. You don't have to be journalistic. Tell the truth. Keep it simple. Cut a vein and let it bleed on the screen.

As noted in this update to the original post, this list can also be used by nonfiction writers. I focused on fiction because fiction writers often ask what they should blog about. Or what they should write articles about. Or what they should do for press releases.

The above ideas, obviously, can be used for more than blogging: article syndication, press releases, new products, newsletter articles, videos, Facebook fan pages, tweets, website content, and much more.

Let me know in the comments below of other ways that you blog about books or other products. Thanks for sharing.


John Kremer is the author of 1001 Ways to Market Your Books as well as webmaster at http://www.bookmarket.com, http://www.bookmarket.com/blog-tour-palooza.htm, and http://www.tenmillioneyeballs.com.

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If you like this blog post, you also like these:

31 Ways to Promote Your Facebook Page. You can read it here: http://askjohnkremer.com/31-ways-to-promote-your-facebook-page.

36 Ways to Help a Book Author You Love. You can read it here: http://bookmarket.com/loveawriter.htm.

Red Hot Special Savings: Ten Million Eyeballs

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Neat Story: Simple Website Monetization Idea

At the very beginning of this year, Jason Sadler started an interesting experiment: I Wear Your Shirt, a project where every day, Jason would wear one shirt from one company per day and post his image on YouTube, Twitter, Ustream, and more. In essence, he would be a walking, talking billboard.

He also had an intriguing price structure: He only charged $1 for a company to have him wear its apparel on January 1st, $2 on the 2nd, etc. until December 31st, where the price would be $365. While each amount isn't that big, it added up. So did the attention.

The result: He sold out every day and will make over $70,000 this year alone ($66,795 + other contests and deals). Jason just launched his 2010 calendar, and in less than 24 hours, he sold 115+ days.

Check him out at http://www.iwearyourshirt.com.

Video from August 17th:

Get Real Followers on Twitter

Last week in my weekly newsletter I said that there are two ways you can get 5,000 more Twitter followers in the next four weeks.



1. Read my Twitter Mania Manual and do what it says. Download it for free at http://www.bookmarket.com/50Waysto Tweet.htm.

2. Pay me (John Kremer) $1,000 and provide me with access to your Twitter account, and I will add 5,000 new followers to your Twitter profile in the next four weeks. Note: This offer is only good for authors who have fewer than 5,000 current followers on Twitter. If you'd like to take advantage of this offer, email JohnKremer@BookMarket.com.

I am proud of all of you for taking the first choice above. I offered the second option because I was told that many people wanted hands-on help to follow my simply guidelines in the free Twitter Mania Manual.

Well, no one took me up on that offer. Note: It was a legitimate offer. I would have helped any author to get legitimate, targeted, interested, non-spamming followers -- 5,000 people who would have had a real and legitimate interest in the author's work.

I am glad that all of you took the first option, because Twitter is all about building real relationships. And those are always better to build yourself rather than pay someone money to do it for you.

If you would like my guidance and feedback while you do it yourself, I'd be happy to help. For that service -- one month of Twitter feedback -- the fee is only $200. But you can do it well for yourself simply by reading and following the advice in the free Twitter Mania Manual. Download for free at http://www.bookmarket.com/50WaystoTweet.htm

If you want my feedback, email JohnKremer@BookMarket.com or call 575-751-3398. Again, the fee is only $200. A bargain at that price.

Getting to #1 in One Day

The following note was posted by Joely Black, author of Amnar: The Awakening, in a forum on the Book Marketing Network (http://bookmarket.ning.com).

When Amnar: The Awakening launched on Podiobooks.com, the only real promotion it received came from my blog and using Twitter (where I'm known as TheCharmQuark). Two days later, it was the top most downloaded audiobook, and today it's at No.2. This is very impressive as I'm going into negotiation with software and games developers and it presents a very good case.

Twitter has to be used in the right way to make it work, and I know it intimidates a lot of new users. If you're prepared to do the work to keep talking to your fanbase and build up a good reputation it can really work wonders for you.

John's comments: Online promotion can work. Even the minimal effort that Joely has done so far has resulted in sales.

You have to know what you are doing. Scattering effort over many sites, or not doing the right promotion won't produce the results you want. You have to create the right relationships -- with your partner websites as well as with your potential customers (or fanbase).

For more on that, check out the Relationships Matter Marketing Program

What Publishers Can Learn from the Web

The following post has been contributed by Caitlin Smith . . .

The internet has become a valuable marketplace for booksellers, a great community resource for readers, and an essential marketing tool for publishers. Successful ventures of all kinds have exploded on the web in recent years, from blogs to new formats for buying and selling media. Why not tap into some of these ideas for your own work? Here are some lessons that publishers can take from the success of the web and apply to their own practices.

Make reading a social experience. The internet creates the perfect environment to make reading more social. Online communities are great places to bring readers together and get them talking. One way to take advantage of this is to set up online book clubs and forums, letting these customers come together and enjoy reading as a group rather than just as individuals and letting them say what they loved about a particular book, basically selling it for you.

Use social networking for marketing plans. Want to know where the fans and potential audience for your author’s works are? Social media can help you create targeted marketing plans and organize book tours where turnouts will be significant. Whether you employ a social networking page or just track subscribers to an author’s blog, these tools can help you get a much better handle on where and how to market.

Find untapped talent. The Internet has turned out many celebrities in recent years that became successes from relative anonymity. Finding new talent for your publishing company may be a little easier if you monitor places like blogs, where humor, good writing and other important skills can come to light. Better yet, you can subscribe to blogs and follow your potential finds to see how they evolve.

Use electronic formats. These days keeping manuscripts in paper only format just doesn’t make sense. Using both print and electronic means to get your book out there can be smart and will allow you more flexibility in how you promote the material. Releasing small sections of the book to fan blogs and on your own site can be an excellent way to build up anticipation about an impending publication.

Make it to buy online. It’s estimated the Amazon’s Kindle format will sell millions of digital publications this year. As electronic books grow in popularity both in text and audio format it’s essential that you keep up and make your books easy to acquire through online means. Paper copies should be easy to buy from your site as well, increasing easy availability to whatever format your customers like best.

Twitter, Facebook, etc. Changing Global Politics

This 17-minute video from Clay Shirky speaking at TED explains why Twitter, Facebook and other social media can change the face of politics in the world. Case in point today: the Iran elections.



While news from Iran streams to the world, Clay Shirky shows how Facebook, Twitter and TXTs help citizens in repressive regimes to report on real news, bypassing censors (however briefly). The end of top-down control of news is changing the nature of politics.

Book Marketing 2.0: 5 ways you can use Web 2.0 tools to promote your book

This is a guest post from Joanna Penn, author and blogger at The Creative Penn: Writing, publishing options, internet sales and promotion...for your book.



It is an exciting time to be an author! New technologies in digital printing and distribution are enabling authors to publish online with print-on-demand and ebooks. Technology is also changing the way you can market your book.

Book marketing used to involve sending out physical copies to reviewers and journalists. You were generally marketing only to a local or country wide audience. You used a publicist because they had the relationships with people. The author was quite removed from the reviewer, the journalist or the reader.

Web 2.0 changes that. It enables relationships with people through social networking, blogging and instant messaging. You can now talk to journalists, reviewers and your readers directly.

If you build a relationship with someone, they are more likely to promote you, buy your book or want to interview you for a story. You can now promote to a global audience and sell globally through ebook retailers and online bookstores. Book marketing is still about relationships – but those relationships can now be online, and global.

Here are some Web 2.0 tools that you can use to promote your book (and the bonus is they are free!):

1. Use Twitter to find a journalist to target for your book/niche. Search for journalists on WeFollow and search.twitter.com. Listen to what they are tweeting about, Retweet them and get noticed. Build a relationship and then pitch. You can also set up a Twilert for your niche topic and you will receive a daily email with who is talking about it. Join the conversation and get noticed.

2. Pitch a targeted blogger for a book review. Don't just use book review sites as they are overcrowded. Pick a blogger in your genre who doesn't review books normally. Comment on their blog and get noticed. Get them some traffic by promoting them somehow. Build the relationship and then introduce your book.

3. Use your press release in multiple ways. Send it to the targeted journalist, but also post it on your blog/website media page. Then turn it into a .PDF and post it on Scribd and Docstoc, both of which are great for document search traffic. Put your website and free offer details on the bottom of the page and include keywords in the search terms. Then turn it into an article and post it on EzineArticles.com with your resource box for more traffic.

4. Use HARO to get notified of journalists looking for a story. This “Help a Reporter Out” service will sent you an email daily with all the stories that journalists are looking for. Have your press release ready to go. Research the journalist and story online as soon as you receive the email. Tweak the press release so it fits the requirements and you have a direct line to that journalist.

5. Record your book and submit it on Podiobooks.com. You can record your book with a basic plug-in microphone and free software Audacity. At the beginning and end of every podcast you can mention your website and where people can buy the print book. You can use the audio on your blog as a giveaway and network with other podcasters in your niche to get segments on their shows. If you can get people's attention for the hours it will take to listen your book, then you have definitely built a fan base!

These are just some of the tools available to you online for book marketing. Web 2.0 gives the power to the author, but you have to actually use the tools to get the exposure.

You have your book – now let people know about it!

There are many more ideas in the Author 2.0 Blueprint: How to use Web 2.0 tools to write, publish, sell and promote your book: http://budurl.com/tzz8.

Ten Million Eyeballs: Red-Hot Special Offer: Extended Until Wednesday noon

After paying taxes in April, I've run into a cash-flow problem and need some quick cash, so I'm offering my Ten Million Eyeballs online marketing course in a RED-HOT SPECIAL. For the next few days (until Wednesday, May 20th, at noon), you can sign up for the Ten Million Eyeballs basic course for only $197. But you have to act now.

Read all about the program here: http://www.TenMillionEyeballs.com.

To sign up for the Red-Hot Ten Million Eyeballs Special, click here.

The 30-Day Twitter Challenge

Recommend this blog post in a tweet, by clicking here
Note: You can edit the tweet before you send it out.



BookMarket.com's website Alexa rank was 169,425 in late January. On May 22nd, BookMarket.com's Alexa rank was 81,087! That 88,000 improvement was due to my Twitter activity.

As a bonus, according to Alexa.com, 24.7% of the visitors to BookMarket.com now come directly from Twitter.

If you have not yet joined Twitter, do it today. And be sure to follow me there via http://www.twitter.com/johnkremer.

Here are a few of the things that I've been doing on Twitter:

1. I actively sought to follow interesting people, especially authors, publishers, publicists, and Internet marketers. Many of them, in turn, followed me. I now have over 9,500 followers.

2. I welcome every follower with a link to my Twitter tools pages: http://www.bookmarket.com/twitter.htm.

3. I post at least 10 tweets per day. I always try to include some useful tips. Here are 126 Ways to Tweet: http://www.bookmarket.com/50WaystoTweet.htm.

4. I include three or four great quotations each day. These get retweeted more than anything else. People like to retweet quotes.

5. I retweet other people. That's one of the ways to build relationships via Twitter.

6. I actually read the tweets of other people. I don't spend a lot of time doing that, but whenever I scan the tweets of the people I'm following, I always discover interesting websites and blogs to visit.

7. I visit those websites and blog posts. I've written about 20 or 30 comments in the past month.

8. I answer people's DM and @johnkremer questions and concerns. Participating in such conversations is essential to good relationships.

9. About one in ten posts might point to a blog post or web page update at BookMarket.com.

That's the essence of my Twitter activity. It takes about 30 minutes per day to manage my Twitter profiles. The key benefit of this activity has been the incredible jump in the Alexa rank for BookMarket.com: an 85,000 jump in less than four months.

Now, if you don't regularly check Alexa rankings, you might not know how incredible that jump is. A 85,000 jump when your site ranks in the millions is nothing, but such a jump in the top 200,000 is unusual.

Alexa ranks reflect how many people are visiting a website. A jump like BookMarket.com has seen is incredibly dramatic. It means many more people are visiting BookMarket.com. Prior to my renewed Twitter activity in late January, BookMarket.com was hovering in the 160,000s for many months. No significant movement despite my other online marketing activities. The 85,000 jump has occurred over the past four months with the only change in online activity being the points noted above regarding my Twitter activity.

This is why I've been encouraging people to join Twitter and get involved. I don't know if you'll get the same results, but I provide you with all the tools at http://www.bookmarket.com/twitter.htm and linked pages.

Why not take a 30-day Twitter challenge? Join, spend a little time each day on Twitter, follow interesting people, make some new friends, grow your business (or reputation as an author).

Marlon Sander's 21-Step Cheat Sheet to Profiting from Twitter

I'm sharing this great post on how to profit from Twitter.com

Marlon Sander's 21-Step Cheat Sheet to Profiting from Twitter
by Marlon Sanders

This article has been updated and moved to a new website: http://bookmarketingbestsellers.com/22-step-cheat-sheet-to-profit-from-twitter

Tweet Later Professional: An Incredible Twitter Tool

Tweet Later: http://www.tweetlater.com/84911.html — Allows you to post tweets to be sent later as well as to send automatic messages every time someone new follows you? Users can set up Tweets to happen later on in the day, week, or month. Also allows you to set up Twitter alerts for any keywords, people, companies, etc. that you want to track. Alerts are sent to you via email. Also allows you to auto follow those who follow you and send them a welcome message. Finally, if you have multiple Twitter accounts, it allows you to tweet to one or more accounts at the same time (I use this to tweet quotes I like to more than one account).



Their free service allows you to do all the above. Their new professional service allows you to direct message all your followers, integrates Ping.fm, schedule @replies and direct messages, and read and post to all your Twitter accounts at once.

Neat service. I use it every day. TweetLater.com makes life on Twitter a lot easier.

Another Online Video Tool for Distributing Your Videos

The above is an online tool for distributing your new videos over many video-sharing networks. Be alert that this video features a loud explosion right at the beginning of the video.

For more such video distribution tools, go to http://www.bookmarket.com/videoautomation.htm. Neat stuff. And powerful.

Twitter Tools and Resources updated

I've just added a ton of new resources for using Twitter effectively. Check out the list at http://www.bookmarket.com/twitter.htm.

I've also created a separate page featuring the best Twitter guides and handbooks. You can find that page here: http://www.bookmarket.com/twitter-guide.htm.

New Resource Pages at BookMarket.com

Here are a few of the new pages I've recently added to BookMarket.com:

Group Blog Sites features blogging sites like Huffington Post that host hundreds of authors who blog. If you don't have time to write and market a personal blog, you might want to consider blogging on a group blog: http://www.bookmarket.com/groupblog.htm.

Keyword Search Tools to help you target the right websites to help you sell books: http://www.bookmarket.com/keywords.htm.

Twitter Tools and resources to help you Twitter effectively: http://www.bookmarket.com/twitter.htm.

Video Distribution Sites and services that allow you to post your new videos to dozens of video-sharing websites with just a few clicks: http://www.bookmarket.com/videoautomation.htm.

New York Times Tries YouTube: You Too?

On Tuesday, a full-page ad in the New York Times newspaper announced the debut of its YouTube series of Conversations featuring famous people talking about their favorite sections of the newspaper. Even with a full page ad in the NYT, however, the videos featuring famous people still have only a few hundred to a few thousand views.

For example, the following video with John Leguizamo has so far had 783 views (at least 3 are mine) in three days. In five years since this article was original posted, this video has received a little over 4,000 views. And that's with the power of the New York Times and the celebrity of John Leguizamo!



Why do I bring this up? Because many of you are putting videos up on YouTube and expecting an avalanche of views.

Well, consider this: If the New York Times can only get a few hundred views of some of their videos after a FULL PAGE ad, celebrity spokespeople, and a key feature in the Marketing Vox ezine, how do you expect your video to get views?

I've seen other major companies put videos up on YouTube and declare victory with a few thousand views, but personally (and professionally) I don't think a YouTube video is successful without half a million views.

And if you want that many views, you have to do more than simply put a video up. And do more than pay for a full-page ad in the New York Times. You have to learn how to use the viral power of the Internet.

10 Million Eyeballs: Up Your Alexa Rank Now!

If you were to get 10 million eyeballs to see, hear, or learn about you, your book, or your website, here are a few of the things that would happen:

1. The Alexa rank for your website would jump from wherever it is to somewhere in the top 150,000 sites in the world (out of more than 150 million sites and counting).

2. You will get from 60,000 to 200,000 unique visitors to your website every month. Some months your traffic would spike to half a million to a million unique visitors.

3. Based on that many visitors, even if you only convert 1/10 of 1% to customers, that's 60 to 200 sales per month. For a $20 book, that means income of $1,200 to $4,000 per month.

4. Even if you don't sell one book or any services, you will receive $500 to $10,000 every month from Google for AdSense and display ads.

5. If you decide to sell display ads directly to companies that want to reach your visitors, you should be able to generate $300 to $1,000 per page per month from display ads. The richer your website is in content, the more you'll make in ad income.

If you attend one of my Ten Million Eyeball Events in Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Denver, or Atlanta -- and follow my advice -- I guarantee that you will generate at least 10 million eyeballs in the next two years and could easily generate 5 to 10 million eyeballs every month within a year or less.

For details, go to http://www.tenmillioneyeballs.com.