Digital Proofer No Bull Self-Promoti... Authored by Jennifer-Crystal J... 6.0" x 9.0" (15.24 x 22.86 cm) Black & White on White paper 130 pages ISBN-13: 9781544744773 No Bull Self-Publishing presents… ISBN-10: 1544744773 Please carefully review your Digital Proof download for formatting, grammar, and design issues that may need to be corrected. No Bull Self-Promotion We recommend that you review your book three times, with each time focusing on a different aspect. Check the format, including headers, footers, page 1 numbers, spacing, table of contents, and index. for Independent Authors 2 Review any images or graphics and captions if applicable. 3 Read the book for grammatical errors and typos. Jennifer-Crystal Johnson Once you are satisfied with your review, you can approve your proof and move forward to the next step in the publishing process. To print this proof we recommend that you scale the PDF to fit the size of your printer paper. www.NoBullSelfPublishing.com No Bull Self-Promotion for Independent Authors No Bull Self-Promotion for Independent Authors www.NoBullSelfPublishing.com www.NoBullSelfPublishing.com Copyright © 2015-2017 by Jennifer-Crystal Johnson Need to Learn the “How to” Part? All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including Before we get into the nitty-gritty of marketing your books, where photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical are you in your publishing process? If you’re still writing your book, methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, great! That’s the perfect place to be while you’re learning about except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews everything you should do once your book gets close to publication and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. as well as after its release. ISBN-13: 978-1544744773 But you need a published book to promote, don’t you? ;) ISBN-10: 1544744773 If you’re even a little bit worried about the self-publishing process, Written and Prepared for Publication by Jennifer-Crystal Johnson don’t be; No Bull has you covered there, too. www.JenniferCrystalJohnson.com I’ve taken my 10+ years of experience and condensed it down into Published by No Bull Self-Publishing a streamlined process of self-publishing that works every single time www.NoBullSelfPublishing.com without a need to double-check formatting (although I usually do so anyway, just to be sure). In Association with Broken Publications www.BrokenPublications.com If you’d like to learn directly from me how to self-publish your books without all the struggle and uncertainty, check out our new A big thank you goes out to Alesha Escobar for book cover design No Bull Self-Publishing Academy! feedback & tweaks: http://www.thecreativealchemy.com/ Here you can enroll in the courses of your choice based on your needs as an author and self-publisher. Because there’s so much to Disclaimer: know, the courses are broken down into individual self-publishing Although the author and publisher have made every effort to ensure options and teach you in-depth about all things self-publishing with that the information in this book was correct at press time, the said options. author and publisher do not assume and hereby disclaim any liability to any party for any loss, damage, or disruption caused by Need to know more? Visit our training hub here: errors or omissions, whether such errors or omissions result from https://no-bull-self-publishing.teachable.com/ negligence, accident, or any other cause. 2 3 No Bull Self-Promotion for Independent Authors No Bull Self-Promotion for Independent Authors www.NoBullSelfPublishing.com www.NoBullSelfPublishing.com Other Books You Might Enjoy by Jennifer- You can also enroll in our first course, No Bull! Self-Publish Your Kindle eBook in 1 Week for FREE. Crystal Johnson BECAUSE YOU OWN THIS BOOK… Fiction: I’ve decided to offer you an additional 25% off of Fibers: A Science Fiction Conspiracy Thriller (The Infiltration enrollment in the first No Bull Academy course. Seem crazy? Well, Trilogy Book 1), 2016 maybe. I’d like to be able to offer you all of this for free, but http://amzn.to/2n11NIq unfortunately still need to make a living ;). BUT… I’m willing to take a pay cut if you’re willing to learn with me, so let’s get this Poetry: show on the road! Napkin Poetry, 2011 https://no-bull-self-publishing.teachable.com/p/kindle- http://amzn.to/2ntykVp publishing/?product_id=256153&coupon_code=NOBULLBOO K Nonfiction: (Use this special link or coupon code NOBULLBOOK.) The Ten Pillars of a Happy Relationship, 2014 I look forward to seeing you there! http://amzn.to/2n0TV9N — Jen PS— If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to reach out to me: [email protected]. 4 5 No Bull Self-Promotion for Independent Authors No Bull Self-Promotion for Independent Authors www.NoBullSelfPublishing.com www.NoBullSelfPublishing.com Table of Contents This book is dedicated to all authors, indie or other, who Need to Learn the “How to” Part? 3 have ever struggled with marketing. Other Books You Might Enjoy by Jennifer-Crystal Johnson 5 Some of the most difficult hurdles are those you Dedication 6 overcome with inner work rather than outer busy-ness. Table of Contents 7 An Introduction 9 What NOT to Do 13 Things to Keep in Mind About Marketing 17 While You’re Revising 23 Blogging 31 Generate Excitement 37 Categories & Keywords 41 So, You’re Published... Now What? 47 The Blog Tour 53 Getting Book Reviews 55 Shoestring Advertising & Publicity 63 Managing Social Media 67 Giveaways 71 Free eBook Promotions 75 Building a Promo Group or Street Team 79 Online Book Events on Facebook 81 (Often) FREE Online Book Promotion 85 And to my students—past, present, and future: Radio & Podcast Interviews 91 Your dreams are closer than you think. Working with Audio: Author Podcasts, Audiobooks, and Short Story Videos 95 <3 Repurposing Content 101 Growing Your Email List as an Author 107 Unconventional Marketing Ideas (Online and IRL) 109 6 7 No Bull Self-Promotion for Independent Authors No Bull Self-Promotion for Independent Authors www.NoBullSelfPublishing.com www.NoBullSelfPublishing.com Your Marketing Plan: How to Implement Your Ideas An Introduction Without Breaking the Bank (or Losing Your Mind) 115 Zen Marketing for Amazing Authorpreneurs (That’s 121 You!) Ah, the life of an indie author! You spend countless hours writing, Still Need to Learn the “How to” Part? 125 researching, revising, self-editing, gathering feedback from willing Bonus Materials 127 participants, seeking out professional services, and then finally... About the Author 129 your book is done! Now you can finally hit that “publish” button on CreateSpace or KDP or Lulu (or whatever other platform you choose to use) and see your book off as it enters the public eye. But then what? You watch your sales like a hawk in anticipation, wondering how many copies you might sell on the first day, hoping and praying and following a number of strange superstitions to the letter to encourage the people of the universe to buy and enjoy your book.... And the next day, you’ve sold a measly three copies. Oh, lord. There are a lot of book marketing “gurus” out there, all with tips and tricks and habits that worked for them but may or may not work for you. For example, you wouldn’t use the same strategies to market a children’s book that you would use to market poetry or a horror novel, right? There is an overwhelming amount of information out there about marketing, all of which acted as a sort of invisible barrier between me and even trying to market my books. Why? Because each and every niche strategy, marketing plan, or individual marketing tactic makes promises about what it can do without telling you exactly how to do it or what exact tools to use so you don’t wind up spending 8 9 No Bull Self-Promotion for Independent Authors No Bull Self-Promotion for Independent Authors www.NoBullSelfPublishing.com www.NoBullSelfPublishing.com thousands of dollars. Oftentimes experts in the field will promise tens of thousands of people, in which case… of course their launches the world and give away free training just to upsell you to buy their will work! They have an audience. Duh! coaching sessions without any actual guarantees (and when it comes to marketing, there are no guarantees at all). These are often You know what’s great, though? A lot of the strategies overlap from promises that people will make to sell you their books or products, one expert to another. So, about four years into my marketing but then you try to use their strategies and it just doesn’t work as research and getting a general feel for the field online, I started well for you or for your book as an indie author in your specific noticing things repeating themselves. Strategies, tactics, and general genre. advice about marketing began to form a repetitive pattern. And that sucks. Because now you’re out the money you spent on Once I realized that, my invisible barrier started breaking down and the book, class, or coaching, the time you spent on it and taking I gathered the courage to just start trying things. I’m still trying notes, and the time you spent testing whatever strategies were things. And the fact is I will probably continue to try things for years presented to see if they would actually work.