The Beginners Guide To Marketing A Self-Published Book

Once you self-publish or use print-on-demand, you need to let book buyers know that it's available. Sure some people will happen upon it, but you'll sell a lot more if you work on promoting it. Here are some ways to promote that recently published book.

Most self-published authors don't have a paid publicist working for them, so they need to be innovative to get the word out on their own. The internet makes a great tool for spreading the word.

The recommendations below are all ones that I've used in promoting my mother's book, My Flint Hills childhood.

Best of luck to you with your book and reaching an audience of readers for it.

Ideas to Promote Your Self-Published Book


1. Have your friends and family tuned in to promote your book. My mom even left a copy with her hairdresser to promote to customers who came in. Who knows how many sales that might generate.

2. Be sure to set up the profile and bookstore at the print-on-demand site. Write a good blurb for the book, describe your credentials for the profile and put a good photo with it. This is what potential buyers see when coming to the online bookstore. Add tags and a category if that's offered.
If the site has a preview option, like blurb.com, then be sure you've checked the box for that feature to work.

3. If the site offers a badge (or widget), follow their directions to place that on your blog, Facebook profile and other websites that you have.
Take advantage of any post-to-the-web links that the site offers, like Stumble upon, Digg, etc. If they don't offer these, you can find them on your own and plug in your book's web address to get more attention for it.

4. Create an author's website where you can put contact information, and press releases. Make it clean looking, so readers can easily find the press release, the link to where to buy the book, and information about the author. I suggest having this separate from a blog, so it can be more focused.

Wordpress is one site where you can choose a format, add in your text, photos and links to create a professional looking site for free in just a few hours. I've included links to my sister's and mother's author websites that I created for them on Wordpress. That will give you some idea of this.

5. Brainstorm and come up with a list of newspapers, magazines and websites that would find you and/or your book topic interesting. Write a press release to post on your author website. Send the press release to these media outlets. You can add and subtract paragraphs in the standard press release to tailor it to special audiences.

6. Send lots of emails. Spam your friends. Well, try to be tactful about it, but do email them and exclaim about your excitement over finishing your book. Give them the link to preview the book or at least to see the cover. Try not to get too pushy about their buying a copy, but you do want to let them know about it. Do this via email, or regular mail.

7. Contact local radio and television to see if they want to interview you about your book. Publishers send out review copies to media for nationally published authors. This is too expensive to do for a print-on-demand book. Use your press releases to generate media interest.

8. Contact local clubs to see if they would like you to speak about your book or have an author reading. The local public library is a good site for a reading or book signing. Ask the librarian if they would want to host it.

9. Take a copy of your book to show to local bookstores, museums and gift shops. They may take some on consignment to sell in their shop.