How to market your book… with editor Becky Hunter
So, you’ve written a book, gone through the editing process, and have now either signed with an agent and got a publishing deal, or decided to self-publish. Now comes the difficult part, selling the book! All authors, whether new or established, worry about their book selling. The market is very unpredictable and there are no guarantees in publishing – some books that initially slipped under publishers’ radars go on to sell thousands of copies, and some books that were bought for a very high advance do not go onto sell to consumers. This can, understandably, be very nerve-wracking, but I like to think that it’s also exciting, because it means there is always the chance that your book will take the world by storm!
When we’re talking about marketing a book, really, we’re talking about how to get it noticed. There are entire courses on this, and how you, as an author, go about doing it will in part depend on whether you are self-published or traditionally published. If the latter, you will have a team of people working on your book at the publishing house – including a publicist and a marketeer. (Broadly speaking, a publicist is someone who is generating ‘free’ coverage – features, reviews, radio interviews, events, etc. and a marketeer looks at paid-for promotions, such as Facebook advertising, producing trailers, etc.) If you are self-published, you will either be trying to fulfil those roles yourself, or else hiring freelance professionals – which, of course, costs money. I can’t cover everything here, but I’m going to outline some key things you can do, whether self-published or published, and which are (mostly) free or minimal cost to you, the author.
Social Media Presence. I know, we hear about this a lot! One thing I’ve been asked a few times from authors is whether this is essential – and the short answer is no, it’s not. Plenty of authors are incredibly successful and don’t use social media at all! It is also by no means needed before you are trying to get published. Whilst some people find it useful to see what agents/publishers/other authors are tweeting about, and find that it is a nice community to be a part of, having a social media presence – unless you are a massive influencer with millions of followers – will not make a difference in terms of getting a publishing deal. However, once you have a deal or have decided to self-publish, it can be helpful to have a presence. I advise authors to use Twitter and Instagram, but it can also be useful to set up a Facebook page, if you spend a lot of time on Facebook. Below are a couple of tips on how to use social media to your best advantage:
Your bio (the bit at the top of your Twitter/Instagram page): People love a photo! If you can include a photo of you – or even a drawing of you if you’re shy – then that will immediately help in terms of gaining followers. Your profile should be short and to the point. Some personal information helps, ‘lover of books, movies and chocolate’, or that kind of thing, and then a line about your book – putting the title in capitals – when it is published, and who by. If you have an agent, lots of authors like to put their agent’s details here too.
Content: Don’t just push your book out endlessly, as it will put people off – be strategic with this. In terms of book content, people love to hear about success, so if you reach a certain number of reviews on Amazon, hit a certain chart position, sell the book in another country, sign a book deal (or a second book deal), then absolutely – share away and convey your excitement! Whenever you have news, like a new cover design or a new title, that’s a great thing to share with your followers. A quote from another author or lovely blogger review can be good to share – but be sure to thank the author/reviewer when you do. Around publication, you can get away with more posts about your book – so you can do countdowns (two weeks to go!), publication day tweets, and share any tweetcards or the like that you or your publisher have created. In amongst posts about your own book, try to mix it up a bit. Posting about your writing journey often works well – so photos of a blank page on your computer as you start a new book, photos of any research trips, photos of you at your desk… And then a really good thing to do is to share other books you are reading and loving. Take a photo of the physical book or the cover on your kindle, and share along with a few words about why you’re loving it. Tagging the author is always a good idea – we all need to be supportive of one another, and, on the cynical side, you never know when it might pay back!
Hashtags: Absolutely use them, if you feel comfortable, but do what feels right to you here – you don’t have to use them. Hashtagging your book title can be a useful way of keeping track of who is talking about the book (and means you can thank reviewers), so that’s the one hashtag I would encourage you to use. Then, the more specific you can be, the better. So using #book will feel a bit amateurish, but #writerslife or #authorsofinstagram will get more engagement.
Engage & Follow: You will get the most engagement (and your content will reach the most people) if you get involved a little on social media. This can be time consuming, so how much you want to do it is up to you – and it’s more important around publication than any other time. In terms of what you can do, following people in the community is useful – so book bloggers, authors you are reading or admire, authors who are doing well in your genre, editors, agents, publicists. If you’re not sure where to start, go onto the page of an author you admire and see who they are following, and start there. Twitter/Instagram will give you suggestions once you start! Then, try to engage with the people you are following. Like posts, comment if you have something to say – even if it’s just to compliment their photo. When you see someone else having success, congratulate them!
Bloggers. There are many wonderful book bloggers who read and share their love for books, and help readers to discover them. They use their own blogs, Twitter, Facebook or Instagram, or a mixture of all of these, and they mostly do this completely for free. Remember that – they are doing this purely for the love of reading and to help support authors! If you are working with a publisher, they will probably liaise with bloggers on your behalf, but even if they do that you may still find bloggers approach you asking for a proof (an advance copy) of your book. You can direct them to your publicist, if you like, but be polite and grateful, whatever you do – they want to read your book and whatever the outcome, that is a great thing! Often, a publisher will organise a ‘blog tour’ around publication, where a different blogger will post a review of the book on a different day for, say, two weeks. Social media will help here – the bloggers will often tag you in their posts, and then you can thank them and share the review to your page. If you’re self-published, or if your publisher isn’t handling the blogger side, which does happen, one option is to hire a blog tour organiser to set up a blog tour for you (this should cost between £100-£200). This can work well, because they know all the bloggers, they can support you on social media, tell you what you need to do, and it will feel more professional, coming from them. Another option is to approach bloggers yourself, either to set up a blog tour or to just gain a bit of ‘noise’ and reviews. Some bloggers have email details on their Twitter or Instagram pages, so you can be in touch with them that way, otherwise use the DM function. Bloggers can be a great way to get your book noticed, but some ‘rules’ here:
Be polite. I’ve said this already, but it’s so important. Be polite, courteous, and thankful. They are helping you, and they are doing it for free. If they say no, do not push – it will do no good!
Look at what they like to read. Often they will state their genre preferences in their bio, so is your book in that genre? If not, then it’s a waste of both their time and your time to pitch to them – and remember, you are pitching your book! If they don’t list their preferences then look at what they’ve read recently, and see if your book could fit.
Be patient. If they agree to read it but don’t give you a date, then I’d wait a good few months before following up. They have a HUGE TBR!! If they agree to post on a certain date, but you don’t see the post, then it’s fine to follow up with a gentle nudge – but again, be polite, not aggressive. I know it can be really frustrating, but it does no good to be demanding – it really doesn’t (unlike in other industries, perhaps). You don’t want to get known as the pushy, nasty author in blogger circles! (I’m sure you will be polite, you are reading this after all so are doing your research, but the amount of times I’ve heard bad stories from a blogger or author about such and such an author – you don’t want that to be you!)
Networking. If you are able to, go to some events. Attend literary festivals and introduce yourself to people there. If you’re a crime author or aspiring crime author, go to Harrogate Crime Festival, for example. It’s the crime festival to go to! Attend the events – you might learn something from other authors anyway – and then grab a drink at the bar later. Don’t be pushy (again!) but do say hello and get chatting. You can share stories – being an author can be lonely and often people will be delighted to make the connection, and you never know where that might take you… Look out for events in your area if you can’t travel further afield – and keep an eye out for virtual events!
Local bookshops. If you have a bookshop in your village, town or city, then go in and introduce yourself. Let them know who you are and where you live, and ask if you can drop a copy of your book in with them for someone to read (give it to them for free!). Hopefully, they will then order some copies in and get you to sign them, and promote you as a local author. It helps if you buy books from them!
Local radio & local press. In general, national journalists don’t like to be approached by authors direct – they’d rather hear from your publicist if you want them to review/write a feature. However, if you can get in touch with your local newspaper or local/regional radio station (the regional BBC radio is a good place to start here), then often they will be interested in doing something with you. This needs to be around publication – so get in touch around a month before pub. If the book was published six months ago, then it’s older ‘old news’ to the press – sorry! – so wait for the next book. Email is often the best way to get in touch. Introduce yourself, make sure you say that you’re local/where you live (or if you have any connections to the area – e.g. if you live in London but you set your book in Cornwall, then BBC Radio Cornwall might be interested in speaking with you), and a brief paragraph of what your book is about. Keep it brief and to the point. If you have a particular ‘hook’ or interesting thing to talk about, then even better. What’s unique about you or your book? That’s a good thing to lead with. With regard to the national papers, I’d usually advise to go with a professional here. However it can be useful to follow national journalists – those that write about books or those that write lifestyle features – on social media. Sometimes, journalists tweet about people they are looking to speak to – a recent one I saw was whether you’d met the love of your life in an interesting or unusual place – and if you see that tweet and think ‘that’s me!’ and you are happy to talk to them about it, reply to the tweet. They will plug your book in return for speaking to you about your story!
As I said at the beginning, this is such a huge topic, but hopefully this gives you some ideas on where to start marketing your book. Make sure the book is absolutely the best it can be before you start thinking about this stage, and be proud of what you’ve accomplished so far – you’ve written a book and that is a huge deal!
Good luck!
Becky Hunter has over eight years’ experience in publishing, at both Penguin Random House and Hachette. Part of the PR team, she has worked across a variety of genres – both fiction and non-fiction. She has successfully launched many debut authors, and currently works freelance in publishing, in both an editorial and PR capacity. Becky is also an author and writes under two different pseudonyms. Bad Seed, (Orion, 2019)and a women’s fiction title under a different pen name will be published by Headline in 2021. She is available for reports and mentoring – please contact the Cornerstones office for details.
