How to Market and Promote: If you’re self-publishing and want your books to reach as many people as possible, you need to master a new skill: how to promote your self-published book.
Marketing and promoting a self-published book takes time and effort, so you better be prepared.
Speaking of preparing, this post outlines how you can market and promote your self-published book.
But before we dive into more details about that, let’s take a look at publishing your book first.
Where to Publish Your Book
While there are many companies you can publish your book under, only three stand out. Here’s are the top three companies for self-published books:
1. Kindle Direct Publishing
Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) is the biggest self-publishing company in the industry. Operated by Amazon, many authors prefer to publish via KDP because of its flexibility and royalties.
If you publish on KDP, you can keep up to 70% royalty. This is by far the biggest royalty any company has offered self-published authors.
Kindle also offers high-quality print books that can reach readers worldwide. In a nutshell, KDP is an easy, fast, and free way for authors to publish their work on a global scale.
Side note: My book Wealth & Fitness: The Keys to Self Improvement is available on Kindle, so I speak from experience.
2. Draft2Digital
Draft2Digital (D2D) is another platform for self-published books. Second to KDP, it offers authors a lot of flexibility in terms of design and book formats. They have pre-made elements that you can easily use with just a few clicks.
D2D also offers authors great royalties. Just like KDP, D2D lets authors publish their books for free.
3. IngramSpark
IngramSpark allows you to manage, print, and globally distribute your book. While it has many similar features to KDP and D2D, IngramSpark charges you a fee to publish your book.
On the bright side, IngramSpark allows you to take pre-orders for print books and offers hardcovers, things that KDP and D2D do not offer.
How to Market and Promote Your Self-Published Book
Here’s how to market and promote your self-published book:
1. Offer your book to family and friends.
First of all, tap your family and friends. However, many authors feel shy to promote their books to family and friends.
Why? Simply because deep down, they feel like their book is not good enough.
This is a limiting belief that takes back both aspiring and current authors. But think about this: If you think your book is not good enough, why publish it in the first place? Why write a book if you won’t share it with the world, let alone your loved ones?
Remember, your book is good enough. After all, if there are people willing to support your book, it’s your loved ones.
2. Harness the power of social media. (H3)
Billions of people use social media. From Facebook to Instagram, you can get the eyeballs you want, as long as you do it right.
While there are many strategies you can use to promote your self-published book via social media, there are three performance indicators you must look at: interest, engagement, and conversions.
You must put out content that sparks readers’ interest. It must then be great enough so that people will engage with it. Lastly, you must put out content that will convert interested and engaged users to buyers.
3. Take advantage of your blog.
Contrary to popular belief, blogs are not dead. In fact, the number of blog visits has been steadily increasing all over the world. More people have been reading blogs now more than ever, partly thanks to the pandemic.
So, if you have a website for your book or a personal blog, use it to your advantage. Promote your book to your readers and show them what a spectacular author you are.
Pro tip: Use your blog to get leads. At the end of your blog post, put an opt-in form to get emails and names. You can then follow the next step to market the heck out of your self-published book.
4. Send emails.
Now that you know how to get leads using your blog, it’s time to know how to promote your self-published book through emails.
Email marketing is nothing new, yet many self-published authors fail to do it.
Simply put, email marketing means sending a series of emails to your leads, so you can convert them to paying customers.
You can start by sending a welcome email, followed by a sneak peek into your book. Then, you can continue nurturing your leads by giving them valuable information related to your book.
5. Make the most out of your publishing platforms.
I suggest publishing your book on at least three platforms. But take note, you can publish your book on as many platforms as you want.
By publishing your book on several platforms, you can take advantage of the exposure they offer.
Doing so also gives people options to choose from. This gives people the chance to buy your book no matter where they are as well.
6. Make your book available for pre-sales.
Another effective yet often overlooked way to promote your self-published book is by offering pre-sales.
For one, this lets you see how many readers are really interested in your book. Second, you can use this information to make the right strategy to market your book. You can also use pre-sales to create a sense of urgency and scarcity around your book by limiting them.
7. Get reviews from beta readers.
Now that we’ve talked about how to promote your self-published book through social media, your blog, and emails, let’s talk about how they connect.
Now that you have audiences from multiple places, it’s time to look for beta readers. To do this, you can post on Facebook, announce it on your blog, and send emails.
In case you don’t know, beta are those offered to read a book in advance for a book review. This means that you have to give out copies before publication for free.
While this screams ‘I’m losing sales’, it does not. Just think about what you’ll gain from a marketing perspective using all the reviews you’re going to get.
Plus, think about your own shopping habits—when you shop online, you read reviews. So, having reviews about your book can help you sell it.
Conclusion
Knowing how to market and promote your self-published book is the first step towards a fulfilling, passive-income generating life. Print or bookmark the guide above and your book should be getting attention in no time.
