Daddy's Christmas Angel

Monday, October 10, 2011

What Do You Do to Advertise Your Books?

How should authors go about advertising? That's a question we all ponder on a daily basis. Should we set up a blog book tour? Should we hire someone with more knowledge and contacts than we have to set it up for us? We do interviews. We visit lots of blogs. We post on as many sites as possible. Yet sometimes we can't help but wonder if much of what we do is simply lost in cyberspace.

I hope not.

The people I've met by blogging in the last year and a half  have been wonderful and inspirational. I don't know that meeting these folks has resulted in any book sales, but my life is richer just from getting to know them.

I was interested to read an information request on one of my lists yesterday. A writer wanted to know if she had a well-edited book, could she expect to realize $1000 in sales each month from that book? She has received a variety of answers from that question, including one that said she should expect to put sales proceeds back into promotion, advertising, and building name-recognition for about the first five years.

How and when to advertise is a complicated issue. What's important to you about advertising? Do you have a magic formula to share?

Here's my next event in advertising. There'll be a lot of writers tailgating, so hope we find some new readers along the way.

Fall for a Writer Tailgate Party-Book Signing
October 15th, 2011, 10Am-2Pm
3714 Richmond Rd., Keswick, VA

6 comments:

Pauline Barclay said...

Good luck with your marketing, if I spent as much time writing as I do trying to market my books, I'd have written a library full.... laugh! Thanks for sharing your thoughts and I'll be back for morw. Have a fabby day!

Notes Along the Way with Mary Montague Sikes said...

Thanks, Pauline!Amazing how promo can suck away time. I'd rather be writing...

Alex J. Cavanaugh said...

I've never paid for advertising - my publisher does that. But I've done a blog tour and many online interviews. I think it's been the connections I've made that have fueled so many sales of my books though.

Notes Along the Way with Mary Montague Sikes said...

Thanks, Alex, for your comment. You have developed quite a following which is golden as you promote your book just by talking about it with online friends!

Creepy Query Girl said...

I see my blog as half advertising and half support system. Without the community I would have never gotten this far. My blog is funny and pink but sometimes kind of dark because that's how my books are!

Matthew MacNish said...

Hi Monti. I'm here as the co-host from the Pay It Forward blogfest. Thanks so much for signing up.

And I wasn't following your blog until just now, so the fest is working!