The Best Way to Push a Book

There is no best way. There is every way. As a publisher said to me a long time ago you have to do everything now. And what everything is nobody can say. One thing is for sure you better get creative and always be thinking about the next thing. Online promotion is clearly the best ways authors can affect their sales. Going to bookstores will only get you so far if most of the bookstore don't have your book. In essence you are now the bookstore.

And that does mean social media. And that does mean paid promotions. And it does mean standing outside Kane County Cougar Stadium handing out baseball cards for your book. Something which I have done many times for The Pitcher. And going to every festival you can find and always carrying the card with your book on it because you never know who you might bump into.

And it means trying to network And it means doing libraries and schools and bookstores. It means doing radio and television if you can get it. And it means trying the weird stuff that is just emerging on the net. Who had ever heard of Fiverr six months ago?

So the best way to promote your book? Do everything then do everything else.

www.williamhazelgrove.com
The Pitcher

Why Do Anything?

It comes like that. It numbs out your head and you are paralyzed. A fog really before the world and you sit in your car or in front of your computer or at your desk and the enormity of the task hits you. And it comes just like that. Why do anything? Maybe it is better to go back to bed because it all seems so hard. Writers know what I am talking about. Entrepreneurs  know it. People who have  lost their jobs. It is the knowledge that if you don't do it nobody else will

And that can get you in the strangest times. Take book marketing. A thankless toiling job with little result. And yeah the writing is great but marketing feels like a trudge up a hill with a weight on your back with buckets of mud on each foot. You get the picture. Its a bit like Walt in Breaking Bad. The reason that show was and is so popular is not because of the meth component but because Walt is a middle class guy who goes bad. He hits the f it moment.

And who has not felt that? But of course right behind this is the moment where you try again. You put one foot in front of the other and really what is the alternative? To do nothing. Certainly the odds are against you but isn't that true in life? So it is the action taken that wins out. Really it comes down to just do something. Anything.

You can always deal meth if all else fails.

www.williamhazelgrove.com
 

Why PR Doesnt Work Anymore For Books

Used to be you did the big hits. USA Today. NY Times. NPR. If you could get them. You did newspapers and local television and radio and went on tour and the PR people booked you into these circuits and everything worked pretty much the way it was supposed to. That was because people all listened to the same sources.  And the PR people could deliver on what they set out to do...now all bets are off.

Social Media has moved in on the vacuum of the collapse of newspapers and mainstream media. I don't mean collapse like they are not there I mean that they are there in a different formats. There are no book sections left really. Go try and get a book covered in a newspaper. Very difficult. All the people who covered my earlier books are gone. Their positions don't even exist. Television and radio is deluged with content now. Books are way down on the totem pole if they are on the pole at all.

And worse than all this PR people don't really get social media. It is too personal. It really has to be done by the author for it to work because it is not big hits but a million small ones. You couldn't pay a PR person enough to pull this off though some may try. The truth is it is an eat what you kill world now and every author must master PR or risk not selling.

On the positive side it is a poor mans game again. You just have to roll up your sleeves.

www.williamhazelgrove.com
The Pitcher

Do Blog Tours Work?

OK. Im taking a moment from my Indie bookstore tour to comment on something online like Blog Tours. The blog tour was pretty mysterious to me before The Pitcher. I actually contracted someone to do Rocket Man. They disappeared with 90 bucks and were never heard from again. But I preserved and cued one up for The Pitcher. Alright lets talk about what a blog tour is and where it came from. A blog tour is a tour of blogs.

Not to be confused with the Author Tour. A rarer beast in danger of extinction. The blog tour occurs and you never leave your desk. You never leave your bed. A very appealing aspect of the Blog Tour is that once it is set up it is pretty auto pilot. Alright so what is it. Two components to the blog tour: The Book Blast and the actual Blog Tour. Now the book blast is the first phase of the tour if you will. It is a coordinated day where blogs list your book with an excerpt and a summary. There are no reviews at this point.

Then follows the Blog Tour which is comprised of reviews and interviews and more excerpts. This usually follows the released of the book and takes a while to set up. Usually about six weeks because people need to read the book and you have to respond to interview questions. It is amazing the coordination that goes into a good Blog Tour. Usually the Blog Tour is spread out over ten days and then it ends.

And what do you have at the end. Well a lot of presence for one. All those people who follow the blogs see your book and this should spike sales. Of course no one is really sure how much it sells but it has to help. Certainly a lot easier than driving to all over the place.

www.williamhazelgrove.com
The Pitcher
The Pitcher Blog Tour

 

What Media Does an Author Pursue?

You could just go after the newspapers. They used to be pretty good at covering novels. But a lot of these journalists are gone. I know that most of the people who covered my other books are no longer employed by the paper. If there are reviews they are assigned out. So that leaves radio. The bookshows used to be a safe bet. A lot of them are gone and the ones that are left are on a shoestring. Of course there is NPR and I have done that but it is not a sure thing ever. And the other question is how many books does radio really sell?

So that leaves the internet. This is where most authors now make their stand. At least one can take a shot. But again what do you pursue? The Social Sites? Twitter. Blog. All of it. Yes all of it. That is the approach now. Do it all but of course you quickly realize this is impossible. There are just not enough hours in the day and if there were you would be bleary eyed and spent. Forget about writing. That is not even an option.

So what media does an author pursue? Local media is not a bad bet. A local author has a good shot at a local paper. And local papers can be picked up by bigger papers. And of course blog. Tweet. Interact socially. Do your newsletter. Do giveaways. Take a shot at a radio interview. Give speeches. Go to festivals. Jump up and down. Scream. Build a website. Build another website. Give books to teachers. Give books to anyone who will review. Pray.

www.williamhazelgrove.com
The PItcher