How to Get Your Book Known

If you are a newly published author, then you know how difficult it is to get your book out there before lots of people. Sure, the publisher will help you--a little bit--, but most of the promoting is up to YOU.

Family and friends are typically wonderful supports, and when you publish your first book, they rush to purchase a copy. But our worlds are so small and soon, the people we know run out. What then? How do we keep the pages of our story fluttering?

Here are some of the things that I have seen, in my short career, work the most effectively in terms of getting larger groups of peoples' interest:

1. Make appearances. If you have children in school or you teach at a school or you know someone who teaches, request a guest visit to discuss your book. This visit can lead to many types of discussions like how you got a publisher, your favorite part of writing the story, some of the challenges you faced, how to not give up on your dream, etc,.

2. Do an inteview-- theauthorsshows.com is an online radio broadcast that allots you a fifteen minute Q&A slot about your novel. I posted the interview on all my social media sites and received a lot of interest and shares.

3. Participate in a book/library event. There's not enough publicity of the physical book these days, and people love to be reminded of the tangible. One of the colleges I work at hosted a library/book event to celebrate reading, and in its one hour venue sparked student and staff interest. It was an awesome way to connect with other avid readers.

4. Contests are amazing. People love to win things. My publisher entered two copies of Intent into a goodreads contest and nearly 800 people entered!

5. I thought that most people preferred to buy books online, through Amazon, for instance. So I was surprised to discover that when I brought copies of my book to church that my Sunday School friends were anxious to buy directly from me. I even sold a copy to my local video store clerk. You never know.

6. When Intent was first released, I purchased 250 bookmarks to promote it. I have handed them out to students, to an In&Out worker, to anyone who seems interested. I keep them in my car and in my work bag because you never know who you might run into.