Marketing for Fun: 1:2

Back in December I wrote about a fun way to market your book: creating unique quizzes on Quiblo and other similar sites.

I want to revisit the "Marketing for Fun" topic today.

A few weeks ago, contriving ways to antagonize @mikecane on Twitter (I know it isn't mature, not the point!), I went on CafePress's site and created a free shop, uploaded an image I created in Photoshop, chose a cute T-shirt option to put it on, and then began to tweet about its creation and availability to @mikecane to (successfully) annoy him.

And although I was giggling with glee like a little kid as I created the CafePress shop, I was also really excited about what it could do for book marketing.

Why not, after all the blogging, Twittering, Facebook grouping and fan paging, go on and create a CafePress site offering materials that feature parts of your book? It's a fun departure from social networking because it allows you to think creatively! And you can buy a T-shirt!

There are a few things I know about copyright that I'll share with you. This is not actual legal advice as I am not a licensed legal advice giving person, but is instead just me saying some stuff that I think pertains to copyright. I repeat, this is not legal advice. Do not send your attorney after me (I have no money anyway ...).

If your book cover has images that you or your designer purchased from a site such as iStockphoto, you cannot use it on purchasable goods without the proper extended licenses. You can, according to their customer support line, use the images for any freebies you want though. This means, that if you create a mug on CafePress with your book cover on it without the extended license, you can buy it yourself and then give it as a gift, but you can't make it available to sell ... got it?

But you CAN take excerpts from your text and put in on the shirt because you own the rights to your text. And, if your book is available through Wheatmark, we'll be happy to lend you our bookstore URL to list as a purchase site on the promotional item.

You can also use any of your own photos as long as you took them or have permission from the photographer.

Are you going to become a major clothing or promotional item retailer? Not likely. But it is just one more way to get your marketing message out there.

CafePress and Zazzle are both great options for creating unique promotional items in support of your work.

Try it out today!

Laying the Groundwork for Your Book Marketing Outreach

“The mistake so many marketers make is that they conjoin the urgency of making another sale with the timing to earn the right to make that sale. In other words, you must build trust before you need it. Building trust right when you want to make a sale is just too late.” ~ Seth Godin

It's never too early to begin marketing outreach for your book. Book not published yet? Great--that's an ideal time to begin your marketing outreach, or ramp up your efforts in that direction.
It takes a great deal of time and effort to establish yourself as a trusted presence with the audience to whom you are trying to market your book.
Begin your publicity, sales and marketing research and networking as early as possible:

• Use your existing contacts
• Start commenting on relevant blogs
• Join pertinent groups and attend meetings
• Volunteer for a related cause
• Partner with another person who shares a common interest or expertise in your book’s subject.

Make the effort and give yourself time to establish relationships and make valuable connections that will help when you’re ready to begin marketing your book in earnest.

Book Publicity: Are You Reaching Libraries?

If you are marketing your book to libraries, it can be frustrating not to know how many libraries (and which ones) have actually ordered your book as a result of your book publicity campaign. Your publisher sends you a sales report containing the number of books sold, but because of privacy laws you will never know the identity of the purchaser, or in this case, which libraries have bought your book.

Wouldn't it be great to know if your book made it to the libraries on your marketing list? Sure, you can call up every single one of them or search their online databases one by one, but now there is a better way. WorldCat is a site where you can search the holdings of thousands of libraries worldwide. Try it! Enter your book's title or just check out this sample title.

Book Marketecture: A Step-by-Step Workbook for Creating Your Book Marketing Plan

After much time and effort, the free PDF version of Book Marketecture: A Workbook for Creating Your Book Marketing Plan is now posted on our website and available for download.

I authored the workbook and my co-workers Susan Wenger and Hayley Love edited and designed the layout. We created the workbook for self-published authors, and it starts with the basics -- how to create a marketing plan for your book. I've been in book marketing for more than 15 years and I know that when it comes to marketing your book, a well-thought-out, targeted plan can mean the difference between success and failure.

Book Marketecture is filled with exercises, activities, and resources designed to help you:

• define your unique marketing goals


• determine your key marketing message


• identify and reach your book’s specific core market within your budget and timeline

To download a free copy of Book Marketecture: A Step-by-Step Workbook for Creating Your Book Marketing Plan, visit the Wheatmark website at: http://www.wheatmark.com/free-book-marketing-workbook.cfm

We hope you find the Book Marketecture workbook a valuable tool for effectively marketing your book, and would love to hear your feedback and whether you found the exercises and activities helpful, or where the workbook could be improved. Thanks!
~ Kat Meyer
Manager, Book Sales and Marketing
Wheatmark, Inc.

Sell Yourself, Not Your Book!

Here's a book marketing advice I hope you'll take the right way:

Forget about trying to sell your book. Nobody is interested in buying your book.

What people are interested in is you, your services, your cause—and not a book.

There are many, many great books. But hardly any book out there can sell itself on its own. The bestselling books out there became bestsellers not because their authors were trying to sell books.

You will sell the most copies when people you have sold yourself to will want to get you and your ideas packaged between two book covers. It is not a book they are looking for, therefore, it's not a book you should be selling to them. Sell them yourself—in the form of a book. Most authors get it backwards: They are trying to sell a book instead of selling themselves. They are using their profession to sell their book, when in fact they should be using the book to sell their professional services.

What you want to do is to market not your book, but what your book is about. Use your book to promote your business, your practice, your cause. If you are a professional speaker, sell your speaking service using your book, rather than try to sell your book using your speaking business. If you are a counselor, use the fact that you've written a book about relationships as a way to solidify your credentials. If you are exposing human rights abuses in your book, all the more you should be thinking about advancing (marketing!) your cause, not your book.

"I don't know how to market a book!" is the most common excuse I hear from authors. Forget marketing books. How good are you at marketing YOU? Are you or your service marketable? Can you sell yourself? If the answer is yes, you don't need to know that much about book marketing. When you "market your book," do not market it, market yourself. Market your practice, your services, your advice, your concept, your cause! If you do a good job marketing YOU, your book sales will follow.