Self-publishing is the easy way to go about getting published these days, but it really isn’t as easy as you may think. Yes, you can find affordable places to publish your book easily enough, but selling your book is a whole other challenge. Your goal, as a published author, should be to make money and to achieve that goal you need to do everything you can to promote your book.
You put a lot of work into your book before you published it. But your work does not stop just because your book is now in print. Here are some things you should be doing to promote your books and hopefully increase your book sales.
Get On Social Media
You need to have an author page on social media, especially on Facebook. You might even want a separate page for your book(s). You don’t just want to be using Facebook, though. From Instagram to Pinterest, other social media sites offer a lot when it comes to promotions.
Use hashtags on Twitter (it’s a must). Hashtags are how people find tweets on there, and they’ll be more like to retweet your stuff this way. You might even want to make a video for your book and post it on YouTube.
Sell Locally
While you might get a lot of international sales by using social media to promote your book, you should also promote locally. That means you should take a copy of your book with you to local stores that sell books and other locally created items. You should also look into setting up at local arts and crafts shows.
Get in touch with local schools, libraries, and bookstores that will let you come in and do signings and speeches. People love to support famous local people, and your book at least makes you famous on a local level. No one will know about it if you don’t do what you can to promote it.
Try Promotions
Don’t just rely on social media for promoting. Get some cheap business cards and leave them anywhere and everywhere. You can even make handbills and flyers to leave and hang places. When you are doing a local event, promote it with an ad in your local paper as well.
Get on sites like Goodreads where you can set up a giveaway too. Do a little research to find out where else there is to promote online that is specific to writers. Also, encourage people that do purchase your book to review it on Amazon, or any other public sites where it’s available.
The only way your book is going to sell is if you promote the heck out of it. Promote every day and come up with new fun ways you can promote your books.
