Five Tips for Marketing Your Masterpiece, Part Two by Meaghan Burnett

Last week author marketing representative Meaghan Burnett shared two of the five tips she has for writers wanting to market their books through social media. -- Sandy 

Meaghan: What platforms should you be using?

Tip #3-Author Central: Did you know you should always set up your Author Central Account on Amazon? Author Central is set up to be its own sort of social media integration. You can connect your blog, your Twitter, and more. You can set up your events such as book signings and interviews on Amazon for people who are interested in your book. Amazon Central can also give you limited statistics from Neilsen Bookscan. While it doesn’t cover all areas of your sales, it can give you some insight to your numbers before you get your royalty check. The link to open an Amazon Central account is https://authorcentral.amazon.com/.

#4- Goodreads: Goodreads is a fast-growing book review platform and media site. With its still somewhat recent purchase by Amazon, there is word of an up and coming site rework. Some new features have been added recently including an “Ask the author spot” for authors to interact with their readers directly. Goodreads is one of the least-used sites that can have direct impact on your sales. The giveaways typically help your numbers greatly as they invite people to read your description to sign up for free print books. While you only give away whatever number you specify, the increased traffic reading about your work gives you the option to expand your reach. Also, the author profile in Goodreads offers you another outlet to share your blog/website and build a stronger following. You can link your blog to Goodreads for people to be able to read excerpts and then they are taken to your site to read the full blog. As author traffic on your blog or website is always a great thing. Goodreads is ONLY for readers. This makes it one of the best sites for getting word out about your book. You can learn how to open an author profile and load your book on Goodreads at https://www.goodreads.com/author/program.

#5- Facebook: Dynamic ad placement with targeting. Many of you have probably seen Facebook ads. You likely have clicked on a sponsored story to read it without realizing it was a paid ad. Perhaps you tried Facebook ads but didn’t think you got your money’s worth. Let me ask you this: Did you direct your ad to your target demographic? If your market is women 30-50 with a Christian base, did you direct the add to only target women of this age with interests of Christianity and reading? Is your book a niche book? These targeted ads help you to save money by only soliciting the audience you need to reach. The goal isn’t to covert people, it is to sell your book to the people who are looking for something like what you have. Facebook is one of the best platforms for this. You don’t need to spend tons to get results, but here are some tips:

• Make sure you use the advanced options tab.
• Set a start and an end date. Check it 2x. (Many an author has been duped into spending more than they wished this way . . . and Facebook doesn’t usually refund them.)
• Set your target parameters.
• Set a fixed budget. $5-7 dollars a day is more than sufficient for a week run.
• The right column ad is generally a wasted option. Stick with the sponsored stories option and make sure your content is good.
• Don’t use the word Facebook in your ad or they will decline it.

Now that you have some new tips you haven’t tried yet in your marketing, I hope you enjoy the results. Remember that you can be your best advocate in this process and the stronger your media platforms, the more appealing your book can be to publishers. A strong social media platform can help you turn the tide between a successful launch and a dud. 

Have you run Facebook ads? Any success? What about Goodreads? Are you there? Do you have an Author Central page on Amazon?

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Meaghan Burnett is an entrepreneur who started managing her family’s three businesses when she was eighteen and found she had a knack for developing new business strategies that helped make the businesses successful. She then expanded her horizons and started working for the largest international airline in the world. Meaghan started her own freelance consulting business in December of 2012 and has worked with clients from all over the country. To pursue her passion for literature, Meaghan began working with Lighthouse Publishing of the Carolinas in 2013. She began in design, but turned her focus and efforts exclusively to marketing in order to help authors build their brands, make their marks on history, and be successful. Meaghan lives in Syracuse, NY with her family and can be contacted at BurnettAuthorStrategies@gmail.com or on her website at MeaghanBurnett.com. 

Five Tips for Marketing Your Masterpiece, Part One by Meaghan Burnett

I'm in the throes of marketing The Yuletide Angel, which releases in ONE WEEK!! (You read that right--blatant self-promotion.) My publisher, Lighthouse Publishing of the Carolinas, assigns a marketing representative to each author, a guide to helping launch the book with as much success as possible. My rep is Meaghan Burnett. I've asked her to give an overview of marketing tips. This is the first of two posts with her social media advice. -- Sandy

Meaghan: You’ve spent months to years of your life writing your masterpiece. It’s taken countless hours, wracked your brain. You’ve fought for it—with the publishing house, finally getting accepted and published—or you made the decision to self-publish. The work is finally complete! Well . . . not really. Now your publisher wants you to market your work. Isn’t that what the publishing house is for? If you self-published, you’re at this precipice where your book is out. It’s launched, but how are people going to find it? 

In today’s market with all genres becoming more crowded, editors and publishing houses are much more selective with their marketing efforts. The days of handing in your manuscript and your publisher doing all the marketing is waning. A new model where the author is proficient in social media is becoming the norm. Publishers want you to be able to help push your book. If you’re self-publishing, marketing your own work is a must, however what platforms should you be using?

Twitter, Facebook, Goodreads, Google +, LinkedIn, YouTube, Vine . . . the list goes on. Do you need ALL of these? No, not really. Remember this: you need to tap into the social media of your target market. Who is your audience? If you haven’t thought of this, you should take a moment and determine the target for which you are aiming. Facebook is used by 98% of adults between 25-35. That is an astronomical number. It is by far the largest social media site in the world. Facebook is a must for authors. Twitter and Goodreads are both great platforms as well.

While I won’t tell you what platforms are best for you, I will give you five tips you may not have known about the most popular platforms. You'll find the first two here, and I'll discuss the final three in the second post next Wednesday. 

#1- Google Authorship: Google + is one of those platforms most authors just don’t consider a necessity. This is a critical problem. When you are talking about looking something up, how often do you say, “Let’s Google it”? Google is the most used search engine and therefore is a critical tool for authors. Google Authorship is a tool for authors to take ownership of their work. By doing this on Google + you boost your credibility with Google and therefore they boost your ranking in the search results. Google Authorship and Google + are often the first to second platforms I tell an author to set up. The link for setting up a Google Authorship for your blog or website is https://plus.google.com/authorship. 

An update: Since the writing and posting of this information, Google has discontinued its Google Authorship.

#2- Twitter Lists: Did you know you can follow people on Twitter without actually following them? Twitter Lists is a great tool for authors because it allows you to follow lists of items that you don’t necessarily want to directly follow. For example, if you want to keep tabs on local publishing houses and media outlets, you can make a list of Media/Publishing that will allow you to see only those in the thread. This tool can help you as an author find publishers who are looking for your type of book, or journalists looking for a story like your book’s launch. I have found this is critical for book deal sites during your sales as well as reviewer sites. For example, here is a list of eBook deal sites you can list your book deals on https://twitter.com/AuthorNetworks/lists/book-deal-sites.

Make sure to read the second part of Meaghan's post next Wednesday, October 8, when she'll provide advice about working with three more social media sites. What social media sites work best for you? What type of posts provide you with the most success?

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Meaghan Burnett is an entrepreneur who started managing her family’s three businesses when she was eighteen and found she had a knack for developing new business strategies that helped make the businesses successful. She then expanded her horizons and started working for the largest international airline in the world. Meaghan started her own freelance consulting business in December of 2012 and has worked with clients from all over the country. To pursue her passion for literature, Meaghan began working with Lighthouse Publishing of the Carolinas in 2013. She began in design, but turned her focus and efforts exclusively to marketing in order to help authors build their brands, make their marks on history, and be successful. Meaghan lives in Syracuse, NY with her family and can be contacted at BurnettAuthorStrategies@gmail.com or on her website at MeaghanBurnett.com.