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Writing Wednesday/Book Advertising

WritingWednesday

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Wednesday is the day I share what I have learned on my journey to publication, marketing and publishing again. If you have any questions please feel free to leave them in the comments and I will do my best to answer them.

Book Advertising

In past weeks I’ve written about how important it is for authors to have a marketing plan. A marketing plan contains three components, Marketing; Advertising and Public Relations.  They are all different and equally important to ensure the success of any business including the business of selling books. We’ve all heard the saying you have to spend money to make money. Advertising is the marketing you pay for and should be an essential part of your marketing plan. That said, you should not rush out and haphazardly start ordering ads. A little research and a good plan can make the difference between ads that actually sell books and opening the door and tossing your money into the wind.

If you wrote a proposal for your book (and I hope you did) you, already know who your target audience is. If not you can learn more about proposals here: https://doreenmcgettigan.com/?p=5141

When creating your advertising plan you need to figure out how to reach that target audience. If you can afford an advertising agency, great but it is not necessary.

As writers when we think of advertising I imagine most of us think of a full page ad in the New York Times Book section. If you can afford that, go for it but chances are you will not recoup your investment.

The mistakes I made when first advertising Bristol boyz Stomp were to just choose as many outlets as I could afford without a plan.

My advice would be to concentrate on advertising outlets that are available to you locally. Most local media outlets will offer you a consultant free of charge. Keep in mind that there job is to sell you advertising and you will need to read between the lines before deciding what is best for you and your book.

Print Advertising- Look into local ‘free’ newspapers, magazines, college/university newspapers and special sections of local larger newspapers. Most of these have the capacity to target specific demographic areas. Billboards are another form of print advertising. I know an author that had great success with a billboard on a major highway and another that did not have success with the billboard on the same highway. One was a business book and the other was a novel. It is now obvious to me that business people spend a lot of time on that highway so the ad for the business book caught their eye. Billboards are very expensive so before making that decision, make sure the people reading it are likely readers of your book. There are less expensive alternatives to billboards. Look into train stations, bus and taxi advertising opportunities.

billboard

T.V. Advertising- During the Super bowl 30 second ads go for 4.5 million dollars but there are many less expensive alternatives. Look into rates/specials with your local T.V and cable companies. They too in most cases can target specific demographics.

TV

Radio- Some smaller, local radio stations have specific and loyal audiences. If one of them is an eldercare show and your book is on care-giving, the audience would be interested in your book. In that case radio advertising would be a good investment.

radio

Internet- the opportunities for online advertising are diverse. What worked for me was placing ads on my local t.v. news outlet website and paid Facebook ads. What didn’t work for me were book blog tours. I had some success placing ads on websites/blogs that featured topics ‘my readers’ would be interested in.

internet photo

Once you create your marketing/advertising/PR plan try to stick with it for at least a quarter but don’t be afraid to tweak it a little if something is clearly working or not working. Consistency matters when it comes to marketing.

What paid ads have prompted you to pay for a book?

Happy Writing,

Doreen

 

 

 

 

 

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24 thoughts on “Writing Wednesday/Book Advertising”

  1. I definitely think there is a lot more pressure on writers these days to market their books. They have to do a lot more social media and other marketing tactics that they never had to do before. On the other side, I have access to authors, something I would have never imagined growing up with a book in my face!

  2. Thank you for this. I hadn’t considered actually PAYING for promoting a book; I considered just free/word-of-mouth sorts of things such as social media and press releases. It makes sense, though. As ALL you share does! Thank you.

  3. ALWAYS good info from you, Doreen. Thanks for that! As an author I, too, did things that didn’t work. It was all a learning process and you cut through it all for us. Awesome!

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