The most persistent question in the book world is how do I sell my book? F. Scott Fitzgerald thought about it. Maya Angelou thought about it. You’re thinking about it.
To answer that question, let’s start by looking at what all successful authors have done. They have –
That’s a nice linear progression. It reads like a narrative in three acts. And maybe that’s a good way for authors to think about how they are going to answer their own how do I sell my book? question.
Books are a funny business. It is the only industry in which, every year, hundreds of thousands of new “products” are introduced. No other industry comes close – not music, not film, not fashion, not software, not video games.
So right off the bat, you’re in a unique position, with a truly unique product.
That, of course, presents definite [understatement alert] marketing challenges to the creator of each of these new products – that would be, of course, you, the author.
Now, the products in those other industries tend to have large marketing budgets helping them compete for attention and dollars. Some books do, too, of course. But we’re assuming if you’re reading this blog post, you’re not one of those authors with a GIANT marketing operation supporting your book.
Rest assured, you’re in good company.
For the author asking “how do I sell my book”, the answer can be found in four parts –
At Storiad, we’re not overly fond of “pie in the sky” theoretical fluff. We’re more partial to “try this, then try that” practical solutions. So without further ado and whatnot, let’s get down to figuring out practical ways to sell more books.
As an author, you have a binary choice to make: put forth a sustained effort and sell more books, or don’t put forth a sustained effort and sell less books.
That may be a harsh assessment, but it’s also true: there can only be one of two dueling outcomes: not-so-great book sales vs. great book sales.
We’re assuming you’re of the “I want great book sales” variety of authors, and now present you with an outline of how to establish a good bookselling mindset.
We are going to establish a bookselling belief system that consists of the following five tenets;
So what is the Mindset you need to sell lots of books?
I own a one-of-a-kind book asset that people would consider buying once they know the book is available for sale.
And it’s up to me to build the awareness to sell my book.
With your mindset all squared away, it’s now time for chat about Effort. That is the operative word. In the interest of saying the obvious, lots of effort, yay, book sales. Not a lot of effort, boo, poor book sales. Simplicity is a virtue.
Organizing your Efforts is a question of establishing an interconnected series of … wait for it … habits: good habits, creative habits, productive habits, and measurable habits.
You want to get into the habit of doing things sequentially, repeatedly, but not in a mindless, rote kind of way. Think of it as developing the necessary skill set to perform an important job. You’re getting into a rhythm that will soon become an integral part of your day (a lot like your writing process, dare we say?)
So what are the Habits you need to sell lots of books?
Get into the rhythm of understanding what the market is for your book, who are the people in that market most likely to be interested in your book, and how best to communicate with them to sell my book.
Let’s return for a moment to the idea of getting into a book marketing rhythm similar to your book writing. Establishing a sustainable time commitment should be comparable to the time commitments you’ve established for your writing.
Let’s say you can commit to eight hours per week to marketing your book. Here is a suggested breakdown of how those hours could be productively allocated –
So what are the Time Commitments you need to sell lots of books?
Dedicate enough time per week to research my book’s market, communicate with the participants,
and engage my professional network to sell my book.
If you want to build a long-lasting book marketing campaign, you will need to have certain tools to perform certain tasks. The tasks can be categorized as follows:
Think of assembling your business applications as a narrative on how to tell the story of your book – get organized, package it nicely, find people who seem likely to be interested, tell them about it, and achieve a review, recommendation, or sale.
Spoiler Alert: Everything we describe next is available to authors on Storiad (Please check out the Storiad Features Page for more details).
With that little plug out of the way, here we go.
If you love it when a plan comes together, you’re in luck.
A practical marketing plan organizes your tasks, establishes your book marketing sales goals, sets your daily schedule, keeps you focused on moving towards your goal, and, of course, measuring your success –
How you present your book is everything. Make it easy, informative, and entertaining to get to know you and your book –
How are you going to find those people most likely to want to review, recommend, and buy your book?
Take your Research results and message them via email, contact form, or social media –
Think of your video event as a virtual bookstore event or author reading at a fraction of the cost. The Covid-19 pandemic has made video meetings second nature. This is a great way to interact with your audience all over the country, if not the world –
We will go out on a limb and say it’s both who you know and what you know that makes for good networking. In practical terms, this means you need to know both things and people in order to get your book promoted –
The more you know about book marketing, the better book marketer you’ll become, the more books you’ll sell –
Here are some questions you can ask yourself: Are your book marketing efforts successful? That is are you getting the desired reviews and book sales? Is the money you’re spending on your book marketing efforts giving you a positive return?
So what are the Business Applications you need to employ to sell lots of books?
Get organized → Make your book stand out in the market → Find your audience → Communicate with them →
Keep on learning & improving → Measure your progress
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All right. That’s it. You now should have a pretty good practical outline on how to go about selling a lot more books by concentrating on four things –
And of course the friendly people at Storiad are always here to help.
Bye for now!
The Storiad Team
