These are some of the best pointers for driving sales to your book! Whether you are a self-published author or a traditionally published author, these key points are essential in turning your writing career into an actual profitable business.
Build a large email list with at least 50,000 – 100,000 subscribers.
Email list building and utilizing this tool has been around for a long time, and in essence, is on the best ways to generate book sales from all of the social media platforms. It is an inexpensive tool and is easy for any author to use, especially if you are taking advantage of your own author website to draw in subscribers. If you start actively working on building this list, and regularly posting content about your book across social media, not only will you see this list grow, but you will see the sales grow as well.
Forego your speaking fee in exchange for a big book purchase, such as 250 – 1,000 copies.
Do you get paid to speak about your book or about the historical content behind you book? Consider asking the event director to exchange your speaking fee for buying your books instead. If you get $2000 to speak at an event, then get them to buy $2000 in books in exchange, and make sure they purchase the book through a retailer such as your publisher
website, or a local bookshop. After the event, the books are either shipped directly to the individual attendees, or given as a gift to each person who attends. It is vital, if you are doing speaking events to spread them across the US, and make sure sales are spread out as well, so that you are not flagged by The New York Times and banned from their bestseller lists. Yes, they do take note of bulk sales, so you want to make sure you are spreading the bulk sales across the US with your speaking events.
Ask business clients to buy books in bulk for their employees.
Do you have a niche theme that a business might want to buy? You can receive custom orders if you use the approach of asking businesses to buy 500 - 5000 copies to distribute to their employees. Again, as above, have them buy the books through a reporting bookstore, through Amazon, or your publisher website, then the sales can count towards your book becoming a best seller.
Schedule appearances with other influencers to access their large audiences.
But what if I don't have a large audience? In today's society where there is a plethora of influencers, you can piggyback on someone else's audience. If you can secure an author interview on a well-known podcast, TV show, influencer blog, or video webinar, or even on Tiktok or Instagram, you can reach a larger group of readers. It takes some legwork but you can tap into a deep well of possible fans by doing this.
Just recently, an influencer stopped at a table for an author who was trying to promote his book, he chatted with the author, then posted his book on his Instagram feed as a favor to the author. Guess what? Within two days, the book went viral and propelled the author into the bestseller category on Amazon. He went from having two reviews to having nearly 700 sales and reviews!!
It is in an author's best interest to tap into this network of influencers to help promote their book, especially during the critical pre-order phase.
Create a launch team of rabid fans who spread word of mouth.
What is a launch team? This is a group of people who volunteer (yes, volunteer) to tell other people about your book. What do they do? They post details about your book across social media, they read and review your book, form book clubs or spread the word via reading clubs, buy books for their family and friends, and more!! What do you need to give them for their efforts? You can schedule a one-on-one chat session, give them bonus content, book discounts, event passes, or anything else you can think of as a gift. Let's face it, people love free 'tchotzke', so be creative with your gifts!! With that in mind, take a look at the following:
How to get pre-order for the bestseller lists
It takes a lot of effort to build a large audience. But, how do you get thousands of people to pre-order a book several weeks in advance? Use the power of irresistible incentives. Give away free stuff that people can’t refuse. Below are effectives incentives that you can use to build an audience:
Give away the first 3 – 5 chapters from the book in a digital format
Offer access to a private webinar with the author
Win a free coaching session or Q&A chat with the author
Offer discounts and coupons related to other products and services
Receive entry into a private online discussion group
Along with these options, the amount of stuff you can do to spur readers to pre-order a book is endless. However, you must understand that success is dependent on how well you create a sense of urgency. You must do this in order for readers to feel like they are missing out on a great opportunity. In marketing, the rule is 'if a customer sees an ad seven times, he or she will more likely use or purchase the item'. So, are you posting about your pre-order or marketing your book to all of you contacts at least seven times? If not, you are not creating a sense of urgency!!
They need to know that the incentives to buy your book will disappear when your book releases, and that sense of 'buy now' will be the incentive to overcome a natural procrastination that most people have. It is common knowledge that most pre-order sales come at the last two weeks before the book is launched, so that final rush to purchase can make or break your sales if you are trying to make the bestseller list.
In truth, believe it or not but you don't have to have a huge advertising budget in order to make the New York Times bestseller list. You don't even need your own podcast or TV show. While those things help, you can build your own audience through email, securing speaking engagements, connecting with influencers, and offering incentives.
Time and time again, the key is putting as much passion in getting the word out about your book that you put into writing it. If you know you have something worthy of reading, if you want people to admire your hard work, your 'baby', then pound the virtual pavement, so to speak. This is your writing career, after all, so don't leave it solely in the hands of others to promote your book.
Long gone is the olden days when literally pounding the pavement by actually walking from door to door was the only option... With the internet, worldwide influencers, and email marketing campaigns, your reach is now the stars!!
So, what is your goal after reading this article? We'd love to hear your comments!!
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