When I published Highway to Hell, and when it was republished by MayDecember publications, I was new to the whole marketing thing, but the concept was simple enough. I had a book, I needed people to buy it, and so I headed out into the world to shout my title from the rooftops, but just enough so as not to become a spammer or any other such online undesirable.
I never really got it mastered, but hey, I’m in this for the long haul… hence this post. I will not try to hide what this post is. It is a question, a call for aid if you will, because I am well, at a loss.
When I had one title, the process seemed simple to put into effect… the results were something different. Now however, I find myself faced with multiple projects, 4 of which (and soon to be nine) are part of a running serial the Diaries of the Damned. So how do you market multiple titles?
I mean, do I promote the most recent serial and hope new readers then also by the previous ones? Or am I working backwards? Should I advertise the first and hope people follow the titles? I mean sure, tweeting and linking to them all is best, but in what order? I do not want to become a spammer.
Should I do one per day… per week? I am at a loss.
Official Site of Alex Laybourne - Author 
Sorry Alex, as an author with an only ‘child’, I haven’t got a clue how you’re supposed to promote so many of them. But…I am so impressed you have so many! If nothing else, you have a very good chance of getting repeat sales once people read, and like, the first one. With just a little bit of luck you could get a lovely snowball effect. Either way… CONGRATULATIONS!
Thanks Meeks. It would seem that all opinions are the same. Promote the writer, produce the books. That I can do 🙂
I’m getting excited for my trip to Australia now. Only a few weeks to go
If you only have a few days then Sydney is probably one of the best places to go – the harbour really is spectacular. 🙂
Yeah the office where I am going to be working, the clients office I should say is not far from the harbor. Just the otherside from what I have seen online,so I will at least get to see that, and the opera house. 🙂 We land sunday morning at 5am, then work monday – wednesday and fly home thursday, so I will try to just jump straight into the daily pattern and spend sunday exploring.
Ugh, if it’s a straight flight you may find you’re a bit jet-lagged. If you get a chance, go to Taronga Zoo. It’s right there on the Harbour and you’ll be able to see most of our weird and wonderful animals there in one place. I’m really looking forward to reading your reactions to Sydney. To get a real feel for Australia though you have to get out of the big cities on the coast and go inland. Maybe another time. 🙂
I hope so, yeah we stop in singapore but don’t believe we stop for long
Not long enough to be interesting, unfortunately. Try to get some rest. 🙂
I don’t think you have to worry about what order you promote. People talking about awesome books is the best and, in my opinion, the only truly effective way to market. So just work on writing books that get people talking about you to their friends and writing great reviews. The rest will take care of itself.
Thank you Andrew, I am very reasssured to hear that. Everybody seems to be thinking along the same lines, and it is an approach that I actaully understand. Things change so frequently with Amazon and their regulations etc. but promoting me, getting people talking, that is fairly simple.
Word of mouth and multiple titles are a great way to get your name out there. I’m kinda in the same boat with my books and I refuse to be a spammer. I’ve taken to rotating my titles and their blurbs I send out and only do it once or twice a day of twitter. Usually once in the morning and once in the evening during the periods when my followers are the most active. (There’s a website that can help you find those peaks and it’s free. I’ll ask the wife what it is when she gets up.)
There are also a few hashtags that help. #BYNR(Book Your Next Read) is a twitter user and community of authors that retweet one another. I’ve gotten a good number of retweets from them in return for sharing their blurbs. Also, #amwriting #amediting #AuthorRT #RT and genre based #horror #fantasy #mystery, etc are good. I try not to use more than four as it’s considered bad practice. By who, I don’t know, but I try to behave. Following book bloggers and followers of an author in the same genre is also recommended.
Those have helped me some. From what I’ve heard and understand, with Amazon tweaking their algorythms(Sp?) and set up no one is selling as much as they were before the new year. In a way, we’re being forced to start over with marketing 101. It seems more like a war of attrition than anything else. .
Hope this helps.
Here’s that website https://followerwonk.com/ Go to Analyze Followers and put your own twitter name in there. It’ll give you all the information about when your followers are the most active.
Thanks for the hastags, I will try some of them out. I never use more than three or four in a tweet, but like you, I am not sure why that is. Thanks for the website, I will check it out. I had been working on a continental split, UK and Europe, plus US. One post around 9 am my time and another around 15:00. This might help me narrow it down even further.
Amazon do seem to like changing things just as we get used to them. One day we will master it all, I am sure.
Since hashtags are supposed to get our attention, I think of them like headlights. So a tweet that’s full of them is like being blinded by a million lights. It’s annoying and makes me not want to read the tweet at all. I figure that’s the reason it’s best to limit them.
I have a formula, charts, data and 18 months of sales to back up what I’m doing… OK, actually I just promote whatever I ‘feel’ at the moment, whether it’s the latest release or the first or somewhere in the middle. You’re never going to know where your readers jumped off from, and I’ve learned I can post and post about a certain horror novella I have out and find new readers, after seeing it, went right to my zombie books and started buying from there. I think it’s more important to promote YOU and your BRAND and let the readers feel like they made the choice to start at a certain point. And keep pumping out releases that are quality, and they will keep coming back.
Armand Rosamilia
Thanks Armand, that was exaectly my plan. I was just never sure if it was the right one. I just want to keep churning out good books, and promote as I go, no set thing, becuase the plan is for all new readers to buy the rest anywa. 🙂 Thanks for dropping by.
thats a very good point andrew, and as nice metaphor. There could be a blog post in there somewhere. 🙂