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A3: Authors Assisting Authors

Public Group active 1 week ago

The world has changed and, unless you’re Stephen King (by the way Stephen, you’re welcome to join the group), a glitzy worldwide marketing campaign is probably not going to be what makes your book a bestseller. Even if you’re lucky enough to charm a publisher, you’ll likely be doing lots of self promotion.

But what should you do?

What works, what doesn’t?

What’s up with Twitter?

Can blogging really help me sell books?

The publishing industry is full of advice on what you should do to sell more books. Sometimes it seems people are more focused on talking about what to do rather than what works. Authors Assisting Authors (A3 as in A cubed, i.e. AAA) is a community for not only discussing techniques but giving feedback about what worked. In other words, “Did the promotion result in book sales?”

With more and more self publishing authors emerging everyday, author promotional campaigns will soon become the lifeline of the industry. Getting the word out is easy if you land a guest spot on Oprah, but short of sitting on a talk show couch we authors have some serious marketing work to do. And without unlimited marketing dollars, that requires that we focus on what gets the job done.

You’ve got ideas and you’ve learned a few tricks of the trade along the way. Share them with other A3 members and they’ll help you too. Regardless if you want book turners (turns your book to face out on local bookstore shelves) or a review on Amazon, Authors Assisting Authors is a one stop shop to contribute, help and share the love.

Announcing Your Book, ”What works?” (8 posts)

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  • Avatar Image digitaldarwin said 7 months ago:

    Press releases seem to have gone the way of the dodo bird with most press releasing services focusing on search engine optimization rather than connecting with the media.

    What new book announcement strategies have you employed with success?

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  • Avatar Image Nathan Lowell said 7 months ago:

    Build the audience first. Then tell them directly.

    Kinda brute force, but when you have a mailing list of fans, it’s pretty easy to drop them a line to give them heads up on an early release and reward them for their loyalty, as an example.

    Not only that, but if they’re really rabid fans, they’ll take up the early release and blurb your new work all over teh interwebz so that the buzz is out there before the book is.

    Key is having a few thousand people to prim the pump with.

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  • Avatar Image mattyoungmark said 7 months ago:

    Since I was publishing my first book and didn’t have a previously established fan base, I did a similar thing on a smaller scale with Facebook. I spent a few months leading up to the book release cultivating my friends list (going through other friends’ lists and reconnecting with anyone I knew even tangentially), and posted regular updates on the publishing process. By the time the book came out, many of them were excited to buy it, and pimped it to their friends as well. One guy I hadn’t seen since high school bought twenty copies wholesale to sell at events he puts on in SF.

    Obviously, selling to family and friends is a pretty limited market, but it can be a nice little kickstart.

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  • Avatar Image Nathan Lowell said 7 months ago:

    I didn’t have a fanbase when I started either, but podcasting it as a serialized audiobook gave me entree to a fanbase within a couple of months. It cost next to nothing to produce, served an underserved market niche (hungry mp3 players), and was part of an established community so that I had a starting point beyond my living room.

    Three years later. A lot has changed, but if you’re looking for an audience, I still recommend this. write your book. podcast it first. see if anybody likes it. If you have an audience after 3 months, they’ll be asking for it in dead tree mode.

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  • Avatar Image arielceylan said 6 months ago:

    What approach should one use when trying to create excitement? Would people want to read about writers in the editing process and writing process?

    As you can guess, I’m still trying to figure out which way to go with my advertising.

    Ariel Ceylan

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  • Avatar Image Nathan Lowell said 5 months, 3 weeks ago:

    Look at http://podiobooks.com and http://community.podiobooks.com for active communities dedicated to podcasting longer works (novellas or bigger). If you produce a podcast of your book, you’ve got a ready made audience right there.

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  • Avatar Image arielceylan said 5 months, 1 week ago:

    Cool.

    Ariel Ceylan

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  • Avatar Image sujatha said 2 months, 1 week ago:

    What approach should one use when trying to create excitement? Would people want to read about writers in the editing process and writing process?

    As you can guess, I’m still trying to figure out which way to go with my advertising.

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