Is your new book up for release? Wondering how to stir interest in people’s minds and hearts about your new book? Do you want people to share your book with their friends? Well then you have to use social media to your advantage. But if you are questioning, why social media, then here is the answer, back in the old days, book promotion depended plenty on the traditional press. Authors worked with print magazines and journals and their lengthy editorial cycles. They had to perform at many time consuming tasks and speak at physical events etc, all for promoting their book.
The success of a book promotion depended on getting it reviewed by the right publications. This meant that thousands of dollars on public relations firms who had established contacts with the top publications and creating press releases that appealed the editor’s eyes.
But long gone are those days and now authors have a wonderful advantage. Now there are millions of bloggers whose audience are large and are very actively engaged that that of the regular press. Millions of customers are just a click away from sharing the work with friends on social media sites such as LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter.
Authors should make it easy for the people to share and raise their excitement about their book. For this authors do not have to spend thousands of dollars or make it on the list of best books on some newspaper. The following are some social media marketing strategies and tips to promote your new book well:
- Website
As customers and media will visit your site before committing themselves to your book, you have to ensure that your online persona is all prepped up before your book launching time. Your website has to reflect you and your book well and it must look professional. As you will be judged on the content and design quality, take professional help. Your site must have these key pages- press/media, blog, about the book, about the author, contact, appearances etc. Your site has to be integrated with your social media platform.
- Re-tweet button
Who does not love a free sample? Some authors give a free chapter of their book as a accessible PDF. Place a re-tweeting button in a good location in one of the chapters of your book. It will help your audience who loved what they read to share it with their friends easily on twitter. When somebody clicks on this button you have placed, it will populate a pre-crafted tweet.
- Scheduling
You must decide what you want to share and when you want to share on your social media networks. You have to optimize your profile on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, Pinterest etc. Select an effective time to reach the most people with Buffer or Sprout Social.
- Visual marketing
This has become popular than ever and tweet with images are more likely to be re-tweeted, posts with images are more likely to be read and shared than those without. Combine your book promotions with an image of the cover of your book or with an image of you, the author at a book signing. You can also run a contest where readers can share a picture from your book signing enter a draw and win something. You just have to check the image sizes for different platforms and optimize them for each medium so that it is easier for the viewers to share. As for sharing, upload the image directly with a personal comment and link back to your book page. Visual marketing is a great way to promote your new book, provided you do it properly.
- Blog
You have to begin blogging long before you launch the book, at least several months in advance. A blog is the perfect platform for updating your readers on events you are participating in, any updates on your book release, any other information you want to provide your audience. Your blog is the hub of info about your next book. You can then promote your book via social media sites, linking back to your blog. Try WordPress if you do not have a blog integrated on your site.
- Be social on social media
Your social media strategy will not work for you if you do not enjoy it or if you are negative about it totally. If you are negative or spam, then you will get it back in return. So you have to enjoy yourself, engage in conversations, learn from others and share something which is interesting and you make connections. Social media is actually fun if you learn to enjoy. Friendships formed on social media can transform into phone or skype conversations, personal meetings and mutual promotions.
- Timing
Timing is very important when you are trying to promote your book online for maximum visibility. Every social media platform has a peak time for engaging the audience, and you must know when to post your content, and if you post at this time, you will have a lot of visibility which is your aim. Activity depends on the topic. Brand pages are active in the weekends and evenings, LinkedIn is more active when people get to work. For many platform, engagements increase during the week, at start of a workday and at the end of it. You must be careful and clever adjusting your time difference between you and your viewers.
- Be persistent
Do not give up things easily. One share is not enough to promote your content. Depending on one article is useless, as it will not get much engagement. You have to repeat things frequently on social media platforms which are fast moving. Popular posts on Facebook can be repeated monthly, without most of your audience remembering that you have shared it before. Even if some of them remember it, they will be happy seeing it again if they loved it. You can use different images for creating different messages, and link back to your blog content. But avoid repeating them again and again. You must not forget that some content has a lifespan. Also beware of the social media tools you are using to automatically reuse the content. Your followers can spot it and will not like it.
