Promoting their work and marketing are what separate the successful from the unsuccessful in business, not the quality of their work but the quality of their marketing. Kindle publishing if no different. Don’t get me wrong write a good book and pour your heart and soul into it. But that alone isn’t going to sell it. You have to not only do good work but more importantly market your work well. Being a great marketer is more important than being a great writer when it comes to making it selling books. That might seem a bit weird but it’s the truth.
Now just because you need to market and advertise doesn’t mean you need to market and advertise the way that you’re probably thinking. You don’t need to use a heavy handed approach nor do you need to spend 6k on Amazon ads to sell 10k worth of books (though anytime you’re seeing a positive ROI keep doing it). Here are some simple ways to promote and advertise your book that all writers can be comfortable with. On that note something else I would encourage writers who want to be successful do is get comfortable with sales and marketing ASAP, it’s where the money is at.
Marketing To Your Email List
This is something I’ve neglected. Despite everyone and their brother talking about how important this stat is it took me forever to finally get around to installing one. However your email list is your most important thing that you have as far as the business of selling books is concerned. Your email list is there so you can build relationships and connections with those on your list. So they become closer and closer to you which will lead them buying more and more books for you if you constantly provide them value and help them solve their problems.
However you have to ask them to get any money. They aren’t just going to read an email from you and think “Hey you know I really like this guy I think I’ll go and buy one of his books”. It doesn’t work that way. Sure you might get one or two sales like that but relying on that is a great way to survive on bologna and cheese sandwiches for the rest of your life. To make sure that your list is aware of your books and buying them you need to put a call to action in every single email that you send.
It doesn’t have to be too big or flashy (though it shouldn’t be hidden) just at the end of the email put something like “By the way if (topic discussed in email) interests you then you’ll want to check out (book related to topic in email) where I delve much deeper into this subject” or something to that extent. Or you only have one book simply have the same call to action but feature different reviews, benefits of reading, and success stories with your email subscribers. Remember the funnel talked about before. Social media to lead to content, content to lead to email, email to lead to sales. If you’re sending emails without a call to action your plugging up the funnel right where it’s going to give you something.
Write More Books
The best way to market the current books that you have is to write more books. Don’t just throw up whatever just to have warm bodies up there but the more you write the easier it is for new readers to find your books as well as more ways in which your current readers can engage with your content and you can make some money. The more books that you put up the more that they market one another and lead to one another. You’ll see those who make it on kindle generally have a large collection of books under their belt. Just about every author I’ve found that wasn’t through a blog, podcast, or content was through seeing enough of their books up there with other books that I bought.
At first you just ignore them but then when they keep popping up again and again you give them a chance. Maybe buy one book that stands out in particular to you. And then I mean if it sucks you just toss it and ignore them but if it’s good you’re going to dive in. No one takes a bite of a fat juicy steak and think’s “No more I’m good” they dig in and eat every last bite of it. When I see someone with two or three books up and no giant platform behind it (i.e. hundreds of thousands on email list or something like that) I know they’re not doing well. Their book may be dominating their niche but that doesn’t mean much. Being a best seller means nothing if it’s not a big niche.
Writing more and more books (that give value, solve your readers problems, and are quality) has an exponential effect of how your sales numbers grow. A guy who wrote twenty books may not be selling that many. But then after publishing thirsty make a couple of grand a month. It’s weird how this stuff works. It’s not linear I’ll say that much. Like blog traffic. If you keep writing in the eleventh month you’re going to hit a huge spike. I went from about 4k views my 10th month to 30k my 11th month. Kept the same posting schedule I had since my first month. Growth is just weird like that.
Summary
Build an email list that you send emails too and make sure to include some type of call to action in every email. Then write books and more books…and more books. It’s not rocket science but it will help you on your path to success and financial independence through kindle self-publishing. Also remember the growth is not linear and often doesn’t make sense at first glance (or tenth) keep putting out those books. You never know which is the one that’s gonna blow everything up.
