Want to know what other authors, especially self-published authors, are doing to sell books?
Annie was able to ask them. Annie asked authors to reveal the best ways they found to sell their books.
The results were quite diversified as everyone had an interesting and varied approach to selling their book.
“By the way,” says Annie “I found the authors to be resourceful, creative and determined in their approach to selling books, but one thing I noticed is that all the authors put in a lot of time, passion and resources to creating a fun and exciting experience for themselves and their audience, whether it be a talk at the local library or a ‘LIVE and ON THE AIR’ radio talk show interview.”
Overall theme is to ‘get up close and personal’ with your readers to get book sales!
The authors that were active in publicity and promotion reported that they loved publishing their book, even if at the end of the day, sales were not through the roof. But the authors that wanted overnight success quickly and expected bestseller status to just happen for them, were predictably disappointed.
There’s competition for book sales but there is a way to get reader’s attention!
Annie continues “there are so many books available for sale and many other major media outlets such as the streaming movie companies, not to mention tons of ‘apps’ all screaming for people to download them, that the biggest challenge authors faced was how to even get their readers’ attention. But there is a way to do this – to get your readers attention.
The secret is to get ‘up close and personal’ so your potential reader so they can experience your voice, personality, passion, humor, mission, purpose and feel like they know you personally. You can do this with talks, workshops, book parties, readings, radio talk show interviews and podcasts. Think to yourself, ‘if there is a reader that is right for my book, I want to reach them.’ It’s a tall order but it’s the kind of thinking that keeps you marching forward in your book promotion.”
Here are some of the ways the authors shared with Annie in this series on “how to get book sales” with many more ideas and strategies to come in additional posts. As mentioned above, authors were quite creative and how they sold their book varies from traveling the country, selling out of their trunks to speaking events where they took advantage of back of the room sales to appearing on radio talk shows via ‘phoners’ where they were booked as the guest and were able to mention their book in the interview.
The overall publicity strategy first of all is to get your reader’s attention.
And this turned out to be the hardest aspect for authors selling books. How do you get anyone’s attention in this crowded marketplace? There is a tremendous amount of competition by outside forces to get consumer attention. All of these firms have large marketing budgets with plenty of staff that allows them yo get in front of consumers, including your potential readers. In contrast, many authors just have access to their love of writing, passion, family and friends to sell their book. Time to expand and think bigger.
How do you use publicity for sales in this hyper-competitive race for consumer attention?
Here are some of the ways authors found to sell their book:
- Feature your book in your own personal newsletter if you have one. Or start one to build for the future.
- Ask your friends who have newsletters to let you write a paragraph about your book or include a list of tips that pertain to the subject matter of your book. Your intro should be short but include the name of your book and of course, always be thinking about how you can serve the readers better rather than how can you sell your book.
- Get authentic Amazon reviews. One author advised other authors to get honest reviews and not ones that were placed or purchased. Earn your reviews by writing a great book. At the end of the day, a good book lives on but a book that can’t live up to “planted” reviews will lose its sizzle and hurt the author’s brand.
- Authors generally live in locations that have a local newspaper. The one thing local newspapers love is local stories about the people in their communities. Approach the features editor of your newspaper with your prepared book materials and many times they will write a feature on you. Imagine, an author living right in our community! P.S. Be sure to invite the right editor of your local newspapers to all of your events. New best friend? I think so! (but no pestering allowed or the strategy can backfire on you). The goal is to get a feature on you and your book. Once you attain this goal, it’s done!
Want Annie To Present To Your Group Or Association?
Annie is available to present on numerous publicity strategies in online telephone venues, teleseminars or podcasts for your group or association of authors, experts and speakers. Let Annie know via email annie@anniejenningspr.com of your interest.
Want ‘up close and personal’ PR?
Be sure to connect with Annie for the type of publicity that is difficult to get on your own, such as radio talk show interviews or online media on branded websites.
Annie Jennings PR is a top national publicity firm specializing in booking authors, experts and C-suite executives in the media. Annie is a publicity professional who has booked thousands of media placements for clients to help them share their messages and build up their careers, reputations and national expert status.