Writing and Publishing News

I’m experiencing the learning curve again—had to buy a new computer yesterday. My five-year-old computer began growling at me from time to time. I knew it was on its way out. Yesterday, it became ferocious—the noise even scared the cats. We were able to replace it and transfer the files without much of a glitch. Some of my photos are missing, however—we’ll have to go back and try to retrieve them from the external hard drive we use for backup. In particular, I need my publicity photo and the image of my new book, which bloggers, editors, conference directors, etc. want when they’re planning some sort of publicity.

Do you have a publicity photo to send when you will be featured in the newspaper, a magazine or at a website? Do you have a professional quality photo you can send for promo purposes when you are scheduled to speak or to be a guest blogger? You’ll also need it for brochures, fliers, posters and, most likely, for your own website. You’ll also want a good image of your book cover at your site and to send out for publicity purposes.

I’ve seen some pretty awful author publicity photos. This is unfortunate and unnecessary. Everyone can clean up their act enough to pose for a decent photo. Some authors prefer using casual shots of themselves in nature or with their dog or horse. I’ve seen some informal photos that are quite appropriate and others that are not—they are blurred, low-quality shots, for example.

I like to advise authors to use photos that depict the subject or theme of their book nicely—a shot with you wearing an apron and holding a plate of cupcakes to promote your book on cupcake baking, for example. If your adventure novel features a lot of scenes in the wilderness, use a picture of yourself posing near an old tree. It is typical for a mystery writer to use a shot of themselves in their office looking pensive, don’t you think? For a book on parenting, you’d want your photo to have a maternal or paternal feel to it.

If you’re like me and you have a variety of books on a variety of topics, a single photo depicting your friendly/professional demeanor is probably in order.

If you’re undecided as to the image you want to portray in your publicity photo, brainstorm this with colleagues and friends. But I warn you, they will choose the photo you dislike most in every case. I don’t know why this is—but others see us so very differently than we see ourselves. And the shot that appeals to others might be your least favorite.

Hire a professional photographer and tell him or her what you hope to portray in your picture. Show the photographer your book(s). He or she may have some suggestions. They might also recommend the best color for you to wear for the shot. A busy print fabric is usually discouraged, for example. And you don’t want to use overpowering colors.

If you are not good with your hair and makeup, get help. You really do want to look your best.

For more about your publicity photo and many, many other aspects of book promotion, order my new book today: Promote Your Book, Over 250 Proven, Low-Cost Tips and Techniques for the Enterprising Author. http://amzn.to/oe56Ia

Do you have fun promoting your book? When we talk about book promotion, we refer to it as work—hard work. But, really, don’t you find it kind of fun, too? If not, perhaps you’re not approaching it right.

Try some of these activities and see if you can lighten up a bit and actually enjoy the process of book promotion:

1: Have a book launch party in a spacious room or patio. Invite all of your friends, acquaintances, relatives, neighbors—in fact, the whole town. Order a huge cake and a vat of lemonade for refreshments. If you have the event at a business, they might provide some of the goodies and even order balloons or flowers to make the event even more festive.

2: Plan a few speaking engagements every month. Now don’t you enjoy getting out of the office and mingling with other people who are interested in your book? I usually have a good time when I am the center of attention and I am allowed to talk about my book.

3: Sign up for three or four book festivals, flea markets and other such events every year. Here’s another opportunity to be out in the public where there’s a lot going on and share stories related to your book with people who are all in a good mood.

4: Talk some of your friends into having home parties where you can create an entertaining afternoon or evening around the theme of your book. Bring costumes and ask guests to help you act out a scene from your novel. Or bring aprons and invite them to share in making something from your recipe book.

5: Have signings in fun places that are conducive to the theme of your book, such as a small airport, a toy store, a golf course, gift shop, hobby shop, animal shelter, etc. I attended a book signing at a cupcake bakery a few weeks ago. I’ve done book signings in an upscale pet store, outdoor bookstore and museums.

Book promotion is serious business. But this doesn’t mean that you can’t have fun while selling books. If you are already doing these things only you aren’t enjoying the process, try changing your outlook—your perspective. Once you’ve made the arrangements for an event, forget about selling books. Think only about creating an enjoyable evening or afternoon for the people in attendance. Leave your business hat at home, lighten up and just enjoy yourself.

Let me know how it works out for you.
http://www.patriciafry.com
http://www.matilijapress.com

By the way, these are just a few of the over 250 book promotion ideas in my new book, Promote Your Book. http://amzn.to/oe56Ia

It has been a good few days as far as publicity for my new book, Promote Your Book, Over 250 Proven, Low-Cost Tips and Techniques for the Enterprising Author. And that’s pretty much because I have been constantly putting myself out there. I’ve had two professionals with followings recommend my blog in their interviews this week and a few articles published (with bios mentioning the new book), including one accepted by Jim Barnes at Independent Publishers. It will go live before the weekend: http://www.independentpublisher.com/article.php?page=1471

Tomorrow my guest blog for Christina Hollis goes live at http://www.christinahollis.com

Also, the publicist from the publishing house says that we’ll have something in The Writer about my book very soon.

Now if only they would get the Kindle and other digital versions up and running… I have customers waiting to purchase the book on Kindle.

I’ve been watching my book’s ranking at Amazon. This seems to be a fickle system. Not quite sure how much validity or clout it holds. Last week, we were in the 800,000’s. Yesterday we were at 200,000-something. This morning we rank 453,166.

While some other books in my category are lower, some others by known professionals are higher. In case you’re wondering, lower is better.

Some authors organize mass buying sprees for their books in order to generate a higher rankings. They ask everyone who plans to purchase a copy of their book to do so on a certain day at a certain time so the blast of orders will make the book rank really high. I’m not sure what the point of this is. Isn’t this sort of an artificial way of getting that ranking? And how long will it last? Also, who cares? I don’t think I’ve ever bought a book based on the way it ranked at Amazon, have you?

It is an interesting system, though, and one that publishers and authors seem to pay close attention to, even if no one else does.

Did you know that the ranking figures might change by the hour—not the day or the week—but the hour! Well, this is true of those with very high rankings. Books within the typical ranking range (10,000 on up into the millions) are calculated once a day. And, according to some analysts of this ranking system, a large jump up the ranking scale does not necessarily indicate huge sales. Depending on what is happening with other books within the range, a big jump could mean only one or two sales.

You can actually track your own book sales at Amazon through a handful of sites. But most offer a disclaimer indicating that the results are only minimally accurate. Here’s one such site:
http://www.ranktracer.com

I see that Aaron Shepard’s Sales Rank Express has closed down.

Do you try to keep track of your book’s ranking at Amazon? What have you learned about this process? About your book sales?

Of course, if you are the publisher/distributor, and Amazon is ordering books from you, you have a pretty clear idea of Amazon sales. They are going to order more books when they have sold most of those in stock. But when you have a publisher, they get the orders and you don’t know anything about your sales figures until you get your royalty check.

For more information about my new book, Promote Your Book, Over 250 Proven, Low-Cost Tips and Techniques for the Enterprising Author, visit the book’s Amazon page. Order the book and watch the ranking figures change. Now there’s a fun way to spend your afternoon.
http://amzn.to/oe56Ia