For example one way that you can connect directly with your readers is by starting a Facebook page for your book. Then you can suggest the page to friends and get the word out. If you decide that you would still like to have more followers for your page on Facebook you can also start a Facebook ad campaign which is custom designed to the needs of the creator.
With all the tools of technology available to the author it is amazing what can be produced on a small dime. With an advertising campaign on a shoe string budget of just $30 a week it is possible to generate ads with over 300 likes. And when this happens other people begin to talk about your page amongst their friends.
Facebook will also send you a customized report of how many clicks you are generating per week and how many people are seeing your ad; also it is possible to update your ad midstream in a campaign. This means that you can add new content to your advertisement, which the Facebook staff will then approve within a matter of hours. With new content constantly in your ad you are able to reach new readers who will be interested in your content.
With a Facebook page for your book and one for yourself as an author you are able to share daily progress about yourself as an author and any new milestones which you reach with your book. People inherently want to have a part in that, with a Facebook page they are able to follow your progress step by step and feel like they are actively contributing to the progress by following you and talking about it with their friends.
Constant updates to both pages are necessary, at a minimum on a daily basis and if possible much more to ensure that readers have the most current content. If you do not have any content to share which is related to your book, share something which is related to the subject matter. If you are writing a book about werewolves, share folklore about werewolves to ensure that your readers are constantly entertained. This can be other content from the internet and does not have to be directly from your site.
Your blog. Yes it is necessary to have a blog, if you write under your real name and also write under a pen name it is necessary to have two. Think of small little things to write about such as what gives you inspiration, your personal reading list, updates about where you are going with your work. All of these little things will keep your readers hungering for more as you update them. It is small little personal touches which keep a reader coming back for more so that they can learn as much as possible about the author.
YouTube. Create a YouTube channel about your book and your work, discuss what the motivation was for you to write your book. Explain the story behind your book to your fans, and tell them about the characters in the book or about your area of expertise. As you move forward with other pursuits you are more marketable with a following and a fan base to prospective agents.
As well, there is no more personal a way for your fans to be able to interact with you than by seeing you even in your home in front of your own web cam discussing your book with them. This will build a relationship with the readers that publishers would die to have because it takes out the middle man and allows you to reach the readers directly.
Your Brand. When we talk about the brand, we are talking about an image, a presence, an email template even. Take the time to understand the intricacies of your email platform, develop a template that is inherently yours. When you are talking to perspective agents, producers, writers, etc. you want to ensure that you have an email which will stand out from your competitors and from other authors.
Your brand image must be consistent across the board so people understand who you are and the image you are projecting. Brand schizophrenia is one of the worst issues that a writer can have, for example, portraying yourself as an erotica writer and as a children’s book writer can be a bit confusing for readers, agents, and anyone doing a simple Google search. That is the beauty of brand consistency, and also the need for a pen name rolled up in one simple sentence.
Chapter II: Planning Your Niche in the Popular Market
So you have decided to write that book finally…what book that is on the top sellers list is it like? That needs to be your first question, look at other books in the category you are writing in and see what has worked for them and what hasn’t. Are there 1000 books which have tried to copy the formula which E. L. James utilized? If so following in her exact footsteps will not be the way to go.
Although it has worked for her, she was the first to come up with this blue print, for this reason it worked. With the thousands of copycat writers out there however, if you use the same aspects of her writing you will find yourself one in a herd of authors trying to be a part of the same plan. This will not work for you.
The “Look Inside” this book feature that Amazon offers on its site is a wonderful tool that you should use to your advantage. It allows you to “Look Inside” books which are similar to yours and read some of the content. You can browse the table of contents, you can see the chapters and content, and see what else is out there.
Research is part of any authors due diligence, when you pitch a nonfiction book to a publisher they ask you specifically to write a book proposal. Part of that proposal involves finding other writers who are similar to you, why your book is different, and what your marketing plan is for the book.
Large publishers will spend some money in the realm of marketing, but a lot of the time this is left up to the author as well. The publisher believes that an author must have skin in the game and for this reason they usually do not cover the cost of all marketing. However, if you are a self-published author, marketing your own book will be more important than ever. For this reason homework and due diligence are merely a step in the road to becoming a best-selling Kindle author.
Isolate the elements that the other author has used to make their work stand out. Is it for example a lot of credible research and charts to back up their viewpoint? Is it memorable characters and awesome plot development? The key element is to find what they have used that has been popular and sold and to completely customize this for your own use.
Just as you will find the winning elements in a manuscript there are always things which could have been done better. For example, should a chapter have had more research on a particular topic? Could a character have been just a little more juicy with a few more paragraphs of description?
If you really want to do your due diligence, buy a hard copy of the book and mark the manuscript with flaws and accolades. This way as you are creating your own book you are able to reference the manuscript as many times as you want to see the way a particular author handled a situation. Do not hesitate to write in books, I remember as a child I was always told never to write in books, when I look back now I find that some of the best ideas I ever generated were in the margins of texts while I was reading them. Remember, the whole reason you bought a hard copy was to learn, so treat it like a textbook blueprint for your book.
Now that you know what works and what does not it is time to form a blue print for your books. As Aristotle said, you cannot understand a whole without understanding the sum of its parts. For this reason, you must draw up an outline which will become your beginning blue print for the book.
Do not concern yourself with whether or not this is going to be a fiction or a non-fiction book, the whole point at this moment in time is to merely get your ideas and your words down on paper so they can be edited and tweaked as you move along in the process. This is merely a skeleton to begin in the process of building the book.