Talk Up Your Book is outselling my other two recent books—Promote Your Book and Publish Your Book. At least that’s what the Amazon stats show this morning. Unfortunately when you are not the publisher, you don’t get the orders and the only accounting you have of books sold through online and downtown outlets is through your royalty statement.
But it does give an author a bit of a thrill to see ranking numbers at Amazon under 500,000; 300,000 and, as in my case this morning, under 100,000. Could this indicated increase in sales be the result of my personalized promotion over the last few weeks? Not only did I contact my massive email list, but I did a blast to newsletters, magazines and enewsletters in my niche market.
There are 10 reviews posted for Talk Up Your Book at amazon.com now and I got word from the publisher that the book will be on Kindle soon. Any day now.
I had to remind the publicist to make this happen, though. Keep this in mind if you land a publisher and have use of a publicist for a brief period once your book is published. You aren’t the only book they are promoting, so you have to sometimes remind them to follow-through with aspects of your marketing program.
I tell authors, you must consider yourself the CEO of your book. And this is true whether you self-publish, go with a pay-to-publish company or land a traditional publisher. You are in charge of your book’s success and you are responsible if that book fails. You can’t say, “My book failed because there is no market for it.” It failed because you didn’t bother to research the market thoroughly enough or you rejected the information you found and published it anyway.
You can’t say, “My book failed because bookstores won’t carry it.” If you want the book in bookstores, it is up to you to promote it enough to the right people so it is selling in bookstores.
You can’t say that your book failed because of anyone or anything else. Your success or failure is all on your shoulders. You are in charge from the germ of an idea to publication and beyond. This is why I wrote Publish Your Book. To help you prepare for success from the very beginning.
I’m off to talk about the psychology of a book proposal to a large group of authors in Palm Springs today. While I’m gone, go to amazon.com and purchase the books I’ve written just for you. If you are starting out as an author or struggling, read Publish Your Book. If you need help promoting your book and understanding promotion, read Promote Your Book. If you would like to step up your promotional efforts and get personal with your readers, by all means, you need Talk Up Your Book.
I wanted to let you know that I really enjoyed your presentation at the Palm Springs Writers Guild on Saturday. It was GREAT and I really appreciate your taking time to chat a bit during the Networking Session. I found your presentation to be most valuable and especially relevant.