3 Mistakes AUTHORS Make When Promoting Online
Hi, I’m Sharvette Mitchell, Creative Director for Mitchell Productions Web Design and Social Media Coaching where we help YOU build something amazing. This video (see below) deals with “Three mistakes I see authors making when it comes to online promotion.”
1) Start promoting NOW!
Authors wait until the last minute to start promoting their book. They wait until the book comes out to start promoting online. Really, as soon as you know you’re going to be writing a book, you need to be out there promoting yourself, building your brand, getting acknowledged as a writer, as an author.
You need to be building your connections on Facebook, Twitter, Periscope, wherever you hang out online. You need to be finding out where your readers hang out online and connect there. What Facebook groups are they in? What LinkedIn groups are they in? Those are the things that you want to start doing before your book even comes out. The mistake is that a lot of authors wait until the book comes out to start doing these things, so get a move on it!
2) Get a website designed NOW!
Mistake number two I see is that some authors wait until the book comes out to have a website created. Here’s the problem with that… Your cover for your book or the inside of your book needs to have your contact information. One key & critical part of that is your website address. Imagine you have these books and you’re selling thousands, and hundreds of thousands of books and you don’t have a website address inside the book. This is a missed opportunity for media, book clubs and readers to kept in contact with you and purchase future books.
I recommend that as soon as possible and as soon as your budget allows that you get a website up and running. It can have your bio, it can have your professional picture and it definitely needs to have a blog. A blog is just articles that showcases that you’re a writer, that you’re working on things. It helps to establish your web presence, your brand and it helps to build your credibility in the author world.
3) Make it easy to purchase your book!
The third mistake I see is that when authors are promoting the book, they’ll say, “Hey, my book is available on Amazon. Go buy it,” and they don’t provide any links. They don’t put the direct link of where the book is available on Amazon. Here’s the problem with that… the average consumer doesn’t want to work to try to buy your product. If they have to go to Amazon, type in the author’s name or type in the title to try to find your book, you’ve probably missed about fifty percent of your sales.
Here’s how you alleviate that mistake, whenever you are promoting on Social Media or your blog, always put a direct link of where that book can be purchased, either on your website or on Amazon or whatever other platform you’re using to sell that particular book. You want to give them the direct link so the fewer amount of clicks they have to make, the higher your sales are going to go up.
Alright, so those are my three areas where I see authors making mistakes. Hopefully those tips will be helpful to you so that you can eliminate that from your book marketing. Good luck with writing and completing your book!
Schedule a web design consultation for your new book! Click here.
