We're excited to share a guest post by Tany Soussana, a veteran literary and entertainment publicist. In this insightful piece, Tany shares invaluable tips on promoting your book effectively to ensure it reaches its full potential.
Congratulations are in order if you are an author who has made it this far—getting your book published. Be it independently or traditionally (where the landscape has changed). Your glorious book was certainly no easy milestone to accomplish. Upon reaching your published fait accompli, I trust a sigh of relief, plus a good pat on the back, were not too far behind. What could be sweeter? We’ll get to that in just a bit.
Much like the arduous process of writing your manuscript, the path to publication was far from simple. Yet, you made it and here you are on the flip side of being published. Remember how you felt when that day finally came and your manuscript turned into its current book form? Yes, a real book—by your making! The exhilaration you must have felt when you first saw and held an actual printed copy of your book as if it was a newborn baby.
Following your first published day of reckoning, you most likely shared the wonderful news with your family, friends, co-workers, and anyone else you could possibly think of. After all, this was a big deal in your life. Becoming a published author.
Further considering the labor pains it took to even deliver your first published body of work; perhaps for some of you, this felt more like giving birth to triplets. Sound familiar? If this semblance of a flashback to publishing nirvana is hitting home for you, then do not pass—go! As in, go on to the next part of the work that awaits your book, which is getting it noticed if sales mean anything to you.
As you have no doubt discovered by now, your book journey hasn’t stopped there, with just getting it published, but has started a whole new chapter that perhaps you weren’t prepared for or better equipped for. Yes, you now have to feed your book baby for it to grow and prosper. Think of growth as building momentum for your book to be publicly embraced by your future readers. In the publishing world, that means the big buzz word, “exposure,” for breathing life into your ultimate sales (what we all want). Welcome to the true business of publishing, where it now comes down to promotion, getting the word out, and drawing attention for selling your book.
This next vital step along your book’s lifespan will help to increase visibility and attract new readers. That’s right, straight-out promotion. Love it or hate it, it’s a must for achieving sales. Effective promotion is indispensable in generating buzz around your book, increasing sales, and reaching a broader audience. This process involves careful planning, producing engaging content, and utilizing various marketing strategies to leverage your book’s platform and reach a wider audience. Your success as an author is contingent on how you will maximize your promotional efforts to extend your book’s reach—where the greater the audience, the greater the sales.
Think of promotion as mighty fuel for driving book sales. Your book’s gas. It’s up to you now as to how far you want to take your book ride. The power of promotion is an invaluable tool. It helps to increase visibility while generating interest in your book. Whereas, building awareness propels sales. This involves reaching out to target audiences, permeating the public consciousness, through various marketing strategies.
If you are an author who is looking to make a difference between where your book is at now (perhaps just puttering along), or where it can be—with promotional reinforcement (best-laid plans), to support its growth and ultimate sales, then let me ask you this: If not now, when?
Just like the jubilation of sharing your book's release with loved ones, bear in mind that as a proud author it is now up to you to keep your book baby alive, which brings us back to addressing this big question: How are you promoting your book? This is particularly key during the launch phase when your book is making its entry into the market. Promotion, particularly through PR (Public Relations), plays a pivotal role in a book’s success.
So what do these promotional tactics look like? To help boost your sales activity, considering the value of PR will help to pave that course forward for you. Working together with a PR representative (aka, publicist) for their expert guidance through this process will benefit your book. In other words, don’t go down this uncharted path alone; especially for author newbies who may be less familiar with how the promotional terrain works. The sustenance of your book depends on it, where bringing in PR support will help to increase your book’s exposure through media, such as print articles and electronic interviews (television, radio, podcasts). Your promotional playing field should further encompass these smart marketing elements (to reinforce your media coverage), such as advertising, social media, blogs, and viral content. These facets collaborate to formulate a comprehensive marketing platform from which to grow your book’s profile, into “high-profile,” and increase your sales effectiveness.
If you aspire to secure media for your book with features in print, radio, and television, then PR is the optimal route by which to achieve these objectives. A publicist can assist you in navigating the media trenches and forging connections to effectively promote your book. PR serves as a fundamental instrument in establishing a platform for your book, while complementing other marketing endeavors as well.
The realm of marketing your book can be intricate and multifaceted. There are numerous considerations to contemplate when determining how to best promote your book and devise a “positioning” strategy that serves you. The reassuring fact is that there exists a myriad of marketing avenues at your disposal, each offering its distinct advantages.
To gain public recognition for both your book and yourself as an author, particularly through media exposure, it's important to acquaint yourself with the power of PR as facilitated through a publicist—and potentially your book’s new BFF. Whether it pertains to your current published book or forthcoming works, a publicist can prove to be a valuable ally in promoting your publications effectively.
To ensure your success in today’s competitive book market, it is crucial to also consider that without the proper promotional support, your book may struggle to gain visibility and relevance, and eventually fade into obscurity. Considering the time and effort you have dedicated to writing your book, isn’t it worth weighing in what it will take for your book to reach its fullest potential in the public domain? Through a PR plan, facilitated through the professional support of a publicist, this will make the difference between where your book is now, perhaps thirsting for public attention, and where it should be.
Imagine a comprehensive marketing strategy that serves your book’s platform. Having the expertise of a publicist in your corner can be beneficial as they will help to showcase your book's unique features, create a compelling marketing narrative, and introduce its value to the appropriate audience within your topical scope. Yes, they do all that heavy lifting for you.
Further considering, a publicist’s primary function is to establish a strong media foothold through an outreach plan that enhances the visibility of your book in relevant markets. Through media placements, interviews, reviews, and other promotional activities, your publicist can generate excitement around your book, significantly increasing public awareness as helping to drive book sales.
If your book is about to be published and you are counting down within that timely window to when it will be fresh off the presses, this is the most crucial period to start on its promotion—think pre-sales—as best facilitated through a publicist. Their role will be instrumental in leveraging your book’s most competitive edge and delivering it to the appropriate book trade and consumer sectors; where “buzz” starts to take off and the longevity of your book depends on it.
Having an effective media strategy in place through this professional guidance will help to influence groundswell exposure among the broadest audience.
Plain and simple, the key to effective promotion lies in creating and sustaining public interest in your book. Your springboard to maximizing awareness vis-à-vis media opportunities will help to maintain public intrigue, as amplifying your book’s impact and securing long-term success in the publishing arena.
It is imperative to further understand that without skilled promotion backing the launch of your book, it may just go unnoticed and undiscovered. Imagine a book languishing in a drawer, receiving no attention or traction. Don’t let “yours” go there! This lack of activity can be detrimental to a book's success as it takes nothing short of promotion, as best supported through media coverage, to boost book sales.
Also consider, for those of you with regular jobs (until your book takes off), while you are toiling at work, how many hours and how many days are passing by as your beautiful published book possibly just sits there, going unnoticed—clicking its heels three times hoping to get lucky?
In no short order, you must take proactive steps. If you want your book to stand out and make a lasting impression, utilizing the power of publicity (media exposure) will play a key role in generating the needed buzz for your book; bringing us back to sales and what we all want.
Remember, the road ahead for authors is all the same for reaching that bestseller slice of the rainbow. When that is, and how that is, only time will tell. The publicity course is a different experience for every author.
So do your author-self a favor by not overlooking that needed detail in your book’s journey, at least by publishing standards—and that is the promotional value of PR. Your book will depend on this critical role and contribution to its livelihood. Let’s also not forget, getting your book released was only the first step of many yet to be taken; before your book can claim its place and actually start to create traction on a wider scale.
If you are an author with a newly released book, or soon-to-be-released, start creating movement on your book now. Get your publicity strategy in place to help not only create awareness about your book, but as importantly, to increase it. Set your sights on that proactive endgame.
For those of you who may have ventured into DIY promotional activities (without the professional support of a publicist), then you probably also realized how truly tough it is in the marketing and media trenches; particularly for newbie authors, let alone the seasoned ones.
Your book should be enjoying its rightful place in the marketplace. Don’t you think? Why spend your precious time and energy writing and publishing a book (going through that whole exercise possibly years in the making), if you don’t really have a marketing plan or any idea for promoting it properly to ensure its ultimate success? This should be part of every author’s agenda upon completing their book. Creating exposure! Especially advance exposure (pre-publication). Just think of all those pre-sales.
Do your promotion right and let expert advice help to get you there for meeting your book’s objectives. Are you ready to take the PR plunge? By now you must have drawn your own conclusions about what it’s going to take to move your book needle UP. The mighty promotional push is indeed a process, and not an easy one, best not attempted alone. PR support will make a difference from leveraging your public presence, to effectively saturating the competitive book world. The place where you want to be found.
Start to enjoy the value of the media spotlight beaming on your prized book and you as its author. If not now, when? With a proactive marketing strategy in high gear, people will be made aware of your book’s availability along with all the fanfare to embrace it.
Interested in promoting your book? Contact us for more information.
Tany Soussana is a veteran literary and entertainment publicist whose roots in PR stem from her tenure at the prestigious firm, Rogers & Cowan. She went from working in the company’s Motion Picture Group and Personalities Unit, to running the Literary Division—responsible for its start-up as a result of her unprecedented, successful campaign for the diet mega-bestseller and fitness phenomenon, The Zone. A whole new boom in books started being enjoyed by the company, predominantly recognized for its clout in entertainment. Upon leaving Rogers & Cowan, Soussana has since opened her Los Angeles-based PR company, The Soussana Group–TSGpr in tandem with her content marketing service, epiContent, where she has continued to represent a mix of clients in publishing and entertainment. Her combined literary/entertainment background has provided an added value to authors keen on the crossover potential of their books to the screen. In recent years, her service has also dove-tailed into ghostwriting—an organic progression that evolved when a PR author client asked her to pen their next book. Fast forward from that experience, Soussana currently has two published books as a ghostwriter with both already bestsellers.
Thank you to Tany Soussana for these fantastic insights. If you're interested in learning more about book promotion or need assistance, feel free to reach out to her at The Soussana Group–TSGpr. Stay tuned for more expert advice on Kindle Book Hub!
