William L. Stuart

author of The Gemstone Chronicles Series

book marketing

Book Marketing Update – New Sites I have Discovered!

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I wanted to provide a book marketing update on some new sites (at least new to me) that I discovered and how things are going on the marketing front. I hope some of this will be helpful to you, too!

YA Books Central:

The first new site I want to talk about is YA Books Central. I found the site through a tweet that showed up in my feed. Since The Gemstone Chronicles is written for middle grade/YA and up, I decided to check it out to see if I could reach more of my target audience (not that I mind getting reviews from adults). I was impressed by what I found. Here are some interesting things I found out about the site:

  • The site has a ton of books and it has a separate place for Indie books. It makes it easier to find works by Indie authors
  • @yabookscentral has over 33K followers on Twitter
  • The site does offer reviews for traditionally published authors, and may review Indie books on occasion
  • YABC on Facebook has over 14,000 likes
  • Once you submit your book and it is approved (it cost me $3.99 to list my book), it is listed on the site with a cover photo and a link for sales. In the 3 days (as of April 3) since I posted my book, I have had over 50 views of the book.
  • They also have a separate page for Kid’s books

Marketing Update! All four of The Gemstone Chronicles are now on YABC! In fact, Book One: The Carnelian is HOT on the site.

If you are a YA or Kids author, this might be a great place to list your book! To give you an idea of what the site looks like, here is a link to my book: http://www.yabookscentral.com/yaindie/17879-the-carnelian-the-gemstone-chronicles-series-1

Indie Brag:

IndieBRAG: I found this site after seeing a fellow author’s BRAG medallion. BRAG stands for Book Readers Appreciation Group and they will award a BRAG Medallion for books that have passed the rigorous standards for their reviews. Here are some facts about IndieBRAG:

  • IndieBRAG is not a free site to submit a book. It costs $20 for a book to be considered for a review. Since I made a little money from the Augusta Literary Festival, I decided I would submit. We will see what happens!
  • IndieBRAG has over 9400 Facebook Likes
  • IndieBRAG has over 5300 Twitter followers

Update! I did submit my book to the site and guess what – The Carnelian was awarded a BRAG Medallion!

Marketing Update THE-GEMSTONE-CHRONICLES-BRAG-for-Web 1

The last new place I want to tell you about is Cold Coffee Cafe. I stumbled across this site on Twitter. It’s a free site for authors to join and list their books and trailers. I signed up and haven’t finished setting everything up yet, but I do have The Carnelian listed and its trailer is linked there, too. More information on Cold Coffee Cafe:

  • Just over 600 Twitter followers
  • Just over 650 likes on Facebook
  • Offers promotional packages

My page link at Cold Coffee Cafe is: http://coldcoffeecafe.com/profile/WilliamlStuart

As far as my marketing efforts are concerned, things have picked up since I have been implementing my own marketing plan. I continue to refine my strategy and, once I stumble on the key(s) to successful (and low-cost) book marketing strategies, I will share!

In conclusion, here is my Book Marketing update! I don’t know how well any of these might work within your advertising and promotional budget and strategy, but give them a look!

Connect with me:

If you want to connect with me, I can be found on Twitter, Facebook, or send me an email at bill@williamlstuart.com. Feel free to connect!!

Book Marketing Tools – The Latest Finds!!

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I haven’t done an update on my book marketing tools, efforts, and new promotional finds. I have found a few new things and will be using one shortly, so I will be able to tell you how it worked out!

ebookdiscovery.com:

First, I want to talk about ebookdiscovery.com. I found the site on Twitter and checked it out. I think this will be a good resource for me! Here are some of the features:

  • Read and Review Club: I submitted my book to this feature. And I was accepted! I provided an .epub version of The Gemstone Chronicles Book One: The Carnelian and ebookdiscovery will offer it to up to 50 of their readers. The readers can submit the  review to any of the major ebook retailers within a couple of weeks of the offering. My offering will be July 14, so I should start seeing reviews in early August. I will let everyone know how it goes.
  • Current eBook Discovery Deals: Highlights free and bargain books
  • Subscription: emails come to your inbox with the latest deals
  • An ebook recommendation opportunity
  • Opportunity to become an ebookdiscovery.com reviewer

Check out ebookdiscovery.com! It might be just the things for authors who are looking for reviews or for readers who want to become reviewers!

The Books Machine:

Another new site to visit and check out is The Books Machine. This is not a free site, but they advertise offering up your book to thousands of potential readers for a pretty low price. This is how it works:

  • Register your book with the site and select your program
  • The author decides who gets the free review copies
  • The author must offer at least 5 copies per month, but if the author has multiple books, a combination of the books is acceptable
  • The reader has to contact the author and give a reason why they would be a good reviewer
  • Each reader has a star rating and the author gets to rate their reviewers
  • The reviewer generally has 30 days to post their review
  • The cost is $10/month, but there are discounts for longer term commitments

I haven’t tried The Books Machine, but I’m thinking it might be a nice way to pick up some reviews. After my ebookdiscovery.com run, I might give it a one month trial and see what happens!

That’s my latest update on the book marketing tools, efforts, and promotional opportunities I am currently working on for The Gemstone Chronicles. Except for one other thing I am contemplating. I think I might have a version of my bookmark turned into a magnet to attach to the tailgate of my truck and see what happens. I live in the Atlanta suburbs and my truck is seen by hundreds of drivers each day, so perhaps a reader will check it the books after seeing the information on the magnet. Here is the magnet:

Book Marketing Tools Sign-with-Layers-Small

What do you think?

Connect with me:

What new promotional and marketing opportunities have you found? What works for you? Leave me a comment and let me know. If you want to connect with me, I can be found on Twitter, Facebook, and Goodreads, or you email me at bill@williamlstuart.com!

Book Marketing – Book Trailers!!!

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Book Marketing – Book Trailers!!! One of the hottest trends to help with book marketing these days are book trailers. Book trailers are a great tool for authors to use to generate book buzz, so I decided I would do some research and see if I could develop one for The Gemstone Chronicles Book One: The Carnelian. Before I show it, I wanted to go through the process that I used. Maybe it will help one of you readers with your own trailer!

Book Trailers Drow

Steps:

I started my trailer by developing slides in PowerPoint. You don’t have to do it that way. There are services that will create a trailer for you. Or, you can do it yourself. Step by step, it works something like this:

  • Decide what you want to say about your book – write a script if you need to
  • Find some images that fit what you want to say in your script
  • Find music that fits the images and your book
  • Make sure you give attribution for the images and music. Sometimes you have to pay for a license to use the images and the music, so do your research! I used www.incompetech.com for the music.
  • Edit it all together and there you have it – a book trailer

I know this is a greatly simplified set of directions, but if you follow steps like this, you can make a trailer. You can Google it to find many helpful hints, examples, and step by step instructions. Once you’ve made the trailer draft, I recommend running it by friends, family, and other authors, and be prepared for some criticism (constructive, I hope). I ran my rough draft by a whole group of people (that fit the recommendations listed above) and got a ton of feedback. As a result, I reduced the length, changed the font, and made a few other changes. It made the end result much better, I think!

Formats:

Making the trailer wasn’t all that difficult. It can be a slide show or it can be converted into a .mp4 or .wmv (or other formats, depending on what devices you want to be able to view it). I converted mine to .mp4 so viewers can see it on most devices. The conversion from PowerPoint slides to the .mp4 was easy, too! Just save the file as .mp4 and PowerPoint converts it. Works the same way to save the file as a .wmv, so easy as can be!

Where to post the trailer?

Now that the trailer is made, what do you do with it? I will post mine on my website, include it on MyBookTable, put it on my Facebook fan page, and I might even start my own YouTube channel. I will be at the Augusta Literary Festival March 7 and I can run it at my table during the day. As a part of my overall marketing plan, I intend to use it extensively to generate interest in the book and I will be working on trailers for the other books of the series!

Finally, here is the trailer! Take a look and let me know what you think!!

Have you done a book trailer or had one created for your books? I would love to see them, so post a link in the comments. Who knows, I might end up buying books based on the trailers!

Connect with me:

If you want to connect with me, I can be found on Twitter, Facebook, and Goodreads, or you can contact me through email at bill@williamlstuart.com.

Book Marketing Part 4 – I Can See Clearly Now!!

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I know everyone is probably getting tired of seeing my posts about book marketing, so I think I will wrap up the series with Book Marketing Part 4 – I can see clearly now! This one will deal with more of the sites I have discovered and have either tried or want to try. Hopefully, these will help you with your own book marketing efforts!

Book Marketing Part 4 Sunny Day

AUTHORSdB:

AuthorsdB is a great site that is free for authors to join. I’m listed there, but I have to admit I need to explore the offerings the site offers. I know that there are reviewers, author services, and some marketing help at AuthorsdB. You can grab a widget, enter your cover in a cover contest, and a lot of other things. Check it out and see what they can do for you!

IndieReader:

IndieReader.com is another site I have visited and am interested in trying out some of their services. They offer everything from reviews to news articles about the Indie book world. The reviews, though, are not free. They will do a review for $225 (with a turnaround time of 5-9 weeks) or a rush review for an additional $75 (with a turnaround time of 4-6 weeks). If your book is reviewed and receives a 4 or 5 star rating, IndieReader will include your book in their curation service that makes recommendations to Scribd, Bibliolabs, Huffington Post, and USA Today.

There are many other services available on IndieReader, so I’m planning on doing more investigation and see what opportunities are there!

theindietribe.com:

Theindietribe.com is a cool site that offers a lot to authors. From proofreading, review exchange (you do have to buy the books to review), writing tips, and many others, it is a one-stop shop for many authors. As with IndieReader, I will have investigate all of the offerings and opportunities at theindietribe! Look for a follow up report in the future.

The Readers Gazette World:

The Readers Gazette World is something new to me. I recently started following them on Twitter and have been impressed by the amount of activity I see there. I haven’t signed up on their website yet, but I will check it out in the next few days. You have to use Facebook to access most of the features of the site, but they offer quizzes, games, blogs, and short stories, as well as promotional opportunities.

Self-Publishing Review:

Another site worth looking at is Self-Publishing Review. They offer book reviews for a price, but the prices range from $59-$249 and the turnaround time is 2-4 weeks. The lowest price option doesn’t include a star rating, so if you want that option, you have to pick one of the other options. SPR also offers editorial services, a book launch service, and SPR Awards, so give them a look.

Readers Favorite:

Readers Favorite is a great site that offers reviews and awards for deserving books. I submitted my first book for a free review and it took a while before it was picked up by a reviewer, but picked up it was. I can’t wait to hear back for my reviewer. Readers Favorite only posts 4 and 5 star reviews, but if the review doesn’t meet that standard, the author is contacted with constructive criticism.

However, if your book earns a 4 or 5 star review, they do a great job of getting the word out. If you happen to receive a 5 star review, then you get an award that you can place on the book and everyone can see it is an award-winning book. They also sponsor the Readers Favorite Book Awards that can get more publicity for your book. It costs $89 to enter in one category. Add your book to multiple categories for an additional fee. I may enter my book!

Check out Readers Favorite and see if it’s a fit for you. I know it’s something I will use!

Bublish:

Another site that I’m taking a close look at is Bublish. Bublish allows the author to upload an .epub of their book(s) and publish excerpt bubbles along with background from the author. A basic membership is free, but for $9.99/month (or $99/year), there are some extras. I like the concept and read a couple of bubbles from authors on the site. The bubbles were great and the background from the author helped put them in context. Bublish runs a lot of Twitter promos for the bubbles, so here is a great opportunity to get exposure for not a lot of money. I’ll be setting up my Bublish account in the very near future and will provide an update on how it goes.

That’s it for now. I hope that I have been able to provide some new sites and promotional and marketing opportunities for Indie authors (and even traditionally published authors who are working on promoting your books). I know that working on this series of posts has helped me define what my marketing focus will be in 2015. I’ll be putting my marketing plan together using some of the information I gleaned from my research, and I’ll let you know how it goes.

Connect with me:

If any of these ideas from this post (or the previous 3 posts) have helped your marketing efforts, please leave me a comment and let me know. If you want to connect with me, I can be found at Twitter, Facebook, and Goodreads, and you can always contact me at bill@williamlstuart.com.

You can find The Gemstone Chronicles on Amazon, Smashwords, Barnes&Noble, and many other outlets. If you read one (or all of them), please consider leaving a review. I would love to know what y’all think!

Book Marketing Part 3 – The Fog Begins to Lift!!

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Book Marketing Part 3 Fog Lifting

Book Marketing Part 3:

In my previous posts on the book marketing topic, I talked about some of the things that I have tried from a marketing perspective. Book Marketing Part 3 – The Fog Begins to Lift means that some of this marketing stuff is beginning to become clear to me. Working through some of the topics I have has helped clarify things for me and will help me formulate a marketing plan for 2015. Today, I want to talk about KDP, Kindle Select, Kindle Unlimited and a few others. Let’s get started!

Kindle, KDP, Kindle Select, Kindle Unlimited, and Smashwords

I published all 4 of The Gemstone Chronicles on Kindle, Smashwords, and Createspace. As most of you know, Kindle is the heavyweight in the self-publishing world, so you must have a presence there (at least that’s my opinion). If you are part of Kindle Direct (KDP), then you can publish on other platforms and expand your market options. That is where I personally have seen the best results. If you are part of Kindle Select or Kindle Unlimited, then you can only sell ebooks through Amazon. This can be good or bad, depending on your perspective.

Some authors who unpublished their works on Smashwords, Kobo, iBooks, etc. to go exclusive on Kindle Unlimited and have done very well with that strategy. I know others who locked themselves into the 3 month Kindle Select program and didn’t see any boost at all. I tried Kindle Select and it didn’t work for me. While I still get a majority of my ebooks sales through Amazon, I do get a nice percentage of sales from Smashwords (and via Kobo, iBooks, and other outlets with whom Smashwords partners). I haven’t tried Kindle Unlimited as I don’t want to withdraw my books from those other outlets.

As with other book marketing options, you just have to try them to see which works best for your situation. Remember, too, that these companies are all for-profit organizations, so the decisions they make are in their best interests, not necessarily yours. I’m certainly not bashing the companies for making a profit. Without profits, they wouldn’t be in existence, but they are going to make decisions that most benefit themselves.

BookBub

Bookbub is an interesting site to visit and consider. I cannot say that I have used Bookbub, but that is simply a matter of economics for me. As I have mentioned in the previous posts, I have little to no promotional budget, so BookBub just doesn’t work for me at this time. I know authors who have used it and done very well. Let me give you some BookBub stats for what it would be for one of my books.

For Fantasy, Bookbub has 950,000+ subscribers. Depending on the price of the book, there are different prices for the promotion that range between $175 and $875. A fantasy book averages 17,400 downloads and 1360 sales. The range of sales is 210 – 3530. What this means to me is that I could reduce the price of a book to $0.99, pay $325 for the promotion, and, if I sell the average, make $1021. However, if I sell on the low-end (210 books sold), then I lose money.

However, it isn’t simply a make or lose money decision. If I run that promotion and I sell 210 of The Carnelian and sell 210 of The Amethyst (for which I didn’t pay any promotional fee to BookBub) as a result of a reader becoming interested in the series after buying the first book as part of the promotion, then I come out ahead. Remember, this is about promotion and marketing, so getting the book out there to the public is the goal! Here is the link to BookBub’s listing requirements. This page will give you all the information you need to try to get listed on BookBub!

As I sell books, I do try to set some aside for promotional efforts. Once I get enough saved up, I think I will give BookBub a try. I have heard that it isn’t the easiest place to get accepted, and many authors I have talked with have submitted multiple times before getting accepted. Don’t be discouraged! If you don’t get on BookBub initially, try other options until BookBub accepts your submission!

BookViral

BookViral is similar to BookBub in that it is a pay site. Unlike BookBub, though, BookViral provides a review and promotional activity for a period of time. I did give BookViral a try for The Carnelian (here is the link) and did get some sales from it, but I don’t think I recovered the amount spent for the listing. The review was great and they do a good job of tweeting it, posting it on Facebook, and other social media sites, so there certainly is a lot of exposure to be gained from the site. It is reasonably priced, I think, and cost me about $120 to do the promotion.

Since the links provided at BookViral are links to Amazon, the selling price is whatever you have at that time. it might be a good option to try while you are waiting on acceptance from BookBub, although BookViral does say that they have standards for approval as well, so I can’t say how difficult it is to get accepted. I know that they did accept mine on first submission.

Clean Indie Reads

Clean Indie Reads is a great website I found a couple of years ago. The site targets middle grade and up and is the home of flinch-free fiction. This means there isn’t any erotica or sexually explicit material, minimal curse words (including no “F words”), and no graphic violence or gore. My books are middle grade and up and meet the other criteria. It was a great place to list them. CIR consists of a great bunch of authors that are always ready to help and will retweet and provide support for the CIR group. If you have flinch-free books, give CIR a try!! Here is a link to my CIR page so you can get an idea of what it’s like.

There are so many options out there for marketing opportunities. I tried to provide a bit of information in book marketing part 3. This small sampling and those from the previous posts cannot begin to list them all. In my next post, I’ll introduce some other opportunities of which I am aware. If you want to share what has worked for your and your marketing efforts, leave me a comment. I would love to check them out! Let’s all sell more books in 2015!

Connect with me:

Connect with me! Find me on Twitter, Facebook, and Goodreads! I always enjoy meeting new people and making new connections. If you have read any of The Gemstone Chronicles, I would love to know what you thought and would appreciate a review on Amazon, Goodreads, or Smashwords! Happy New Year and best wishes for a fantastic 2015!!

 

Book Marketing Part 2 – Onward Through the Fog!!

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In the first of my posts relating to my experiences with book marketing, I talked about a few methods I discovered to help with my book marketing efforts. In this post, Book Marketing Part 2 – Onward Through the Fog, I will continue with more marketing opportunities I have found. Some of these I have used successfully and some not so successfully, but, as I have said before, authors have to find what works best for their books! I will start with blogs.

Blogs:

I highly recommend every author create a blog. Having a blog does a number of things for authors. First, it gives a place to discuss all things related to your books. On your blog, you can discuss upcoming releases, share reviews from readers, create the all-important relationships with readers, and generally improve writing skills. While a blog isn’t a novel, it’s still writing. Practice never hurts, and a blog is an opportunity to experiment with different styles or simply hone your normal style. And, a little shameless self promotion never hurts and since it is your site, promote away! Here is the cover of the first book of my series (my shameless self promotion):

Part 2 The Carnelian Cover

I use my blog (as you have probably noticed) to write about more than The Gemstone Chronicles. I write posts on gemstone hunting, gold prospecting, vacations, my dream car (1973 Corvette Convertible), submarines, and other things that interest me. It isn’t that marketing my books aren’t important to me, but there are so many other things to talk about that I just included them. I used to post reviews on my blog, too, and I could go back to doing that, but I decided to post the reviews where they would help the authors more. My reviews now go on Amazon (in multiple countries since many of my author friends are in other countries and this gives them exposure in their markets), Goodreads, and Barnes and Noble.

Selling on my blog:

I know authors who sell their books through their site, post reviews for other authors, and have created an amazing fan base. A blog is fantastic for all of those and much more. Blogs don’t have to be a major monetary investment as there are a number of free hosting options out there. I spent a little bit of money on mine and have my own domain as it provides the option for selling ads or other revenue sources, should I choose to do that in the future. The WordPress Booktable plug-in allows me to list my books with links to sites that sell them. I do keep a few copies of each of my books on hand so that if someone asks for an autographed copy, I can send it right along.

Other blogs:

I don’t visit other blogs as often as I should, although I subscribe to a number of them and get a feed about their posts. I will visit them on occasion and take a look, but I don’t comment as much as I should. This is an untapped resource for me, but I want to make sure I am commenting because I enjoyed the information in the post. I don’t want to comment simply to try to gain favor with blogger. I rarely ask for reviews from bloggers, so I don’t think I’m in danger of that, but still, I want to make constructive comments. And don’t limit yourself to book review blogs. If you are interested in a blog, read it, comment, and help the blogger build an audience. Again, this is about relationships!

There are ways to use blogs, though, that will help book marketing. Blog tours are great and relatively inexpensive (and sometimes free). Check them out and see what they can do for you. Remember that bloggers are writers, too, so helping bloggers build audiences is helping out fellow writers. I know I try! Below are some blogs I follow:

Never Enough Thyme

Blogs-Of-A-Bookaholic

A Little Bit of R&R – Book Blog

Mark Brandon Allen

You can also find other blogs and sites I follow on my Links Tab!

I could go on and on about blogs, but I think you get the gist. Start blogging and meeting new bloggers, it’s worth the time and effort!

Shifting gears now to discuss one of my favorite sites, the Independent Author Network!

Independent Author Network (#IAN1):

One of the first sites I joined was the independent Author Network. It’s a one-time set up fee of $24.95 to join and list 1-6 of your books. You get an author page with links to selling sites. You can list your books in the IAN store, and you get to interact with some pretty amazing authors. There is a social network page for members only that is part of the membership. IAN tweets over 100 member pages per day, 7 days a week, so that is a ton of free exposure. Members also tweet other members pages and links to multiply the exposure. Using the #IAN1 will help, too. You can even post links to book trailers and radio interviews! Give IAN a try, but remember, you can help determine how many visitors your page gets each month. If you happen to have the most in a month, you win more free publicity, so give IAN a try! Find my IAN page here!

Indie Authors & Readers

Author Marketing Club

Book Marketing & Book Promotion

Book Reviewers

LinkedIn:

Most people know LinkedIn as a professional network that connects people in similar industries and similar occupations with others. It’s a great place for finding new opportunities for employment, making connections in new organizations, and finding help with business related questions. Authors are professionals and have many of the same networking and opportunity questions as those in other professions, so why not leverage LinkedIn as part of your marketing strategy. There are groups to follow, people to connect with, and professional sources to find – all with the click of the mouse on LinkedIn.

LinkedIn Resources:

There are a ton of book reviewers, editors, authors, writing coaches, and publishers for you to connect with and tap into their knowledge base. One of the great things about LinkedIn is that you can find groups that match all of your interests. For instance, I joined groups about gold prospecting, submarines, Naval Nuclear Power, and business groups, as well as writing, publishing, book promotion, and reviews. This may seem redundant to some of the groups on Facebook and that may be true, but it seems to be a different set of people in these groups. I have found some of the best resources on LinkedIn and, like any of the other sites, the Indie authors are very helpful! Find me on LinkedIn here! I listed some of my favorite LinkedIn groups below.

Book Reviewers

Book Marketing

Self Published and Indie Author Networking Group

Book Writing, Self Publishing, and Marketing for Business People

I hope some of these sites and groups will help you with your marketing plan and branding of your books! I know they have helped me tremendously. But, that begs a question: what sites, blogs, or groups have helped you discover and create effective marketing plans? Leave me a comment and let me know. I’m always willing to learn new things!!

Connect with me:

Find me on Twitter, Facebook, and Goodreads! I look forward to meeting you!