Book promotion is something that is more often than not overlooked by a lot of authors while releasing their books. As an author, who wants their story to be read by as many people as possible, marketing your book is not an option, it is a prerogative to ensure your book reaches a large number of audiences.
Any relevant marketing campaign, in essence, is about captivating the public with a story that you have to tell and inspiring them to share it because of its likeability.
In a day and age where we are continually bombarded with adverts for everything from high budget shows to the smallest of products, to stand out in such a space, one requires tools and techniques that enable them to increase their visibility in a crowd.
Here are some engaging ways in which you can promote your book by building familiarity between the audience and the story you have to tell;
- Recording an Audio Book
Promoting your book by ensuring that there is an audio version of the same enables your book to bite into a more significant and different type of audience altogether.
With popular music streaming platforms such as Spotify and Youtube releasing audiobooks, the process has become easy and efficient.
According to livemint.com, big publishing houses have turned to releasing audiobooks to adapt to the changing needs of the audience. (source: https://www.livemint.com/industry/media/uptake-of-audiobooks-and-ebooks-grows-amid-covid-19-pandemic-11590509317854.html)
Audiobooks can be easily discovered and since the cost to convert a book into an audiobook is relatively low, the profit margin is high.
- Visual Book Trailer
A book trailer is a short video introduction to a book. Just like a movie trailer captures the essence of the story, clearly defines its genre and builds relativity with an audience inclined towards that genre, a book trailer does the same.
In recent years many authors have indulged in investing in book trailers, especially in fictional genres. Renowned Indian author Amish Tripathi released trailers for his best-selling books The Scion of Ikshavaku, Sita — Warrior of Mithila and Immortals of Meluha (Shiva trilogy) which have garnered more than a whopping million views on each.
This goes to show that book trailers are not just a means to promote your book but also an end to earn revenues on the trailers made.
To gain insight into the time and cost that goes into making a book trailer, please click here
- Press Release and Radio Interviews
A press release is essentially an official statement delivered to various persons of media to provide information or make an announcement.
For a book, a press release comprises of the book cover, details of the book and approximately five links for e-commerce websites for readers to purchase.
The aim of a press release is it to get the word out about you as an author and your book.
Readers are more inclined towards purchasing your book if they are familiar with your brand as an author. Radio interviews enable prospective readers to relate to you as you talk about the book you are promoting.
According to a study carried out by the Association of Consumer Research on the effect of Product Familiarity on Product Evaluation, product familiarity was related positively to the degree of confidence in brand selection in a purchase situation. (Source: https://www.acrwebsite.org/volumes/9331)
Hence, it is vital to incorporate marketing tools such as press release and radio interviews to increase the familiarity of your book with the audience.
- Blogger Reviews
As with any other product, when purchasing a book, the prospective reader turns to reviews to base her final opinion of the book on, which in turn influences her decision to buy the book.
When seeking out reviews for any product, the consumer searches for relevant and credible sources.
According to a study conducted by the Journal of Information Technology and Management, when consumers read online reviews, they pay attention not only to review scores but to other contextual information such as a reviewer’s reputation and reviewer exposure. (Source: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10799-008-0041-2#citeas)
Blogger reviews enable authors to generate reviews favourable to their book. And ensure that prospective readers are consuming reviews by credible sources trusted by them. Blogger reviews increase the probability of a potential reader buying your book.
- Collaborate with Social Media Influencers
Collaborating with social media influencers hinges on the psychological tool called the ‘halo effect’. It refers to the tendency of an individual’s positive impressions to influence the appraisal we make of the brand that the individual is associated with.
When you associate your book with a social media influencer, it increases the chances of people who follow her, to follow you as well as purchase your book. It also enables you to reach the exact type of audience that you want to, depending on the social media influencer you collaborate with.
- Social Media Management
Social media management is a broad term that encapsulates various processes. From setting up an account, creating content, maintaining social media hygiene to defining your target audience, social media management is an important and ongoing process.
Social media platforms provide the opportunity to target only those who have an extremely high probability of purchasing your book. This enables immediate exposure and impactful advertising. However, it is important that you create appealing display advertisements that these potential readers can relate with. Every post you put out must resonate with the flavour of your overall social media page.
Various publishing houses provide an in-depth social media management plan that not only covers content creation and advertisement throughout all social media platforms but also provides you with monthly analysis reports. These reports act as guides to continually enhancing and improving your overall social media presence.
- Book Events
Book events such as book launches and author readings go way back in time and have always proved to be fruitful for promoting a book.
It provides the opportunity for readers to ask their questions and resolve their doubts regarding the story, characters and essence of the book. It initiates a forum for healthy discussion and benefits both the readers and the author.
Organising a book event includes ensuring venue branding, PR and media presence, pre-event and post-event press release, event invites and the availability of professional photographers and videographers on-site to capture it all. Although this might seem like a mammoth task, various publishing houses organise events effortlessly and successfully.
- Author Website
Having an author website is one of the most critical steps for promoting your book. An author’s website gives the book credibility and makes your brand more premium. Every renowned author has a website of their own that acts as a curation of all their works. This makes it easy for any reader to view all that you have written at once.
Although many argue the viability of an author website with the presence of social media, proponents of the former stress on its various benefits.
It functions as a platform for media and other publishers to reach you and allows readers and fans to interact with you. It provides links to the authors’ social media pages, and most importantly, it helps search results and makes you accessible to readers.
Thus, book promotion is the key to ensure a successful book launch and a gradual increase in the number of readers. Stable media coverage over the course of your book launch helps in establishing yourself as a renowned author which in turn appeals to the audience and acts as a catalyst in generating buzz about your book.
Whether an author wants to hire a publicist or not is up to her. However, it is advised that one must hire a publicist as they already have the tools and resources to ensure a successful book launch.
Visit us online at www.becomeshakespeare.com to learn more about our social media marketing and book promotions.
