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We’ve been talking about the incredibly useful freebie you can offer to your audience from your website. This is, perhaps, a free ebooklet of 10 to 50 pages or so that provides information, resources, ideas, tips, techniques, etc. related to the theme/topic of your nonfiction book.

Today, we’ll cover how to promote that freebie—how to entice people to download it from your website. And why do you want to promote something that is free—what will you get out of it anyway?

First, let me say that anything that will put your name before your particular audience is a good marketing move, don’t you think? People are more apt to buy a book by someone they have at least heard of. If they are interested in your topic and they find your free ebooklet informative or, in some other way, of benefit to them, they are more apt to buy one or more books that you have written. They are more inclined to consider any services you offer.

People LOVE getting something for free. Here’s an illustration of that point—I’ve been able to attract somewhere between 300 and 500 people to my site over the past year or so to download my free ebooklets. And most of these people had never heard of Patricia Fry. Sure, I go out and speak to hundreds of people throughout the US every year. I personally meet another hundred or two at book festivals each year. I also get exposure as the director of SPAWN and through the articles I write for a variety of writing/publishing publications. I have several books for authors and they are everywhere. But, still, many of the people who learn about my free offer of an ebooklet have not heard of me or my books.

They come to my website for the freebie and learn something about me and my work in the process. Not only does my website give them a peek into who I am and what I do—depending on how long they stay there—but the freebie, while it is highly informational, also promotes me and my work.

Okay, so how do you promote the freebie? Pretty much the same way you promote your books and/or your services. You go where your audience is. I promote my freebie through some of the articles I write for various publications they read. I promote it in this blog and when I am guest blogger. I tell folks about it when I speak. I announce it in the discussion groups I belong to and my member organization newsletters. I mention it in materials I hand out at book festivals and so forth. I talk about it when I do a podcast or webinar. I promote it through my social media pages. Some of my friends are promoting it, too. Even those who have downloaded my freebies sometimes promote it. I had someone stand up during a talk I was giving at a conference earlier this year and say, “You must go to Patricia’s site and download this free ebooklet. It is fabulous.” She had a copy of it right there with her. This was my freebie, “50 Reasons Why You Should Write That Book.” It’s now for sale at my website for $3.95.

You could also mention it on your business card. Business cards are so inexpensive to produce these days, you might create one just to hand out to those folks you think might be interested in your freebie. Leave a few of them at your local business center, print shop, library, bookstores, art center, and so forth.

Would love to hear from those of you with additional promotional ideas I haven’t mentioned here. PLFry620@yahoo.com

Have you visited my amazon.com page to see my latest book? What do you think of the cover design? Why not be among the first to order this unique and highly useful book—well, highly useful to anyone who is promoting or will soon be promoting a book. Type in the title of the book AND my name: Talk Up Your Book—Patricia Fry.

Here’s access to my current freebie—50 Ways to Promote Your Ebook.
http://www.patriciafry.com

First an announcement—Amazon.com has my latest book up. The cover design changed in midstream and I’ve been waiting for Amazon to make the change at their site. It is done! Please go to Amazon and see the interesting, colorful cover. Oh yes, and buy the book. It’s:
Talk Up Your Book, How to Sell Your Book Through Public Speaking, Interviews, Signings, Festivals, Conferences and More. http://www.amazon.com

Type in my name, Patricia Fry and “Talk Up Your Book.” Would love your feedback—and your order. If you are involved in or will soon be involved in book promotion, I have to tell you that personality sells books. This is a great resource and guide for any author of fiction, nonfiction, memoir, children’s books, and others.

Your Freebie
Yesterday, we talked about that freebie I recommend you offer from your website. Today, I want share some ideas for promoting it. The point of offering something of value to your audience free is to attract more of your readers and potential readers to your website so they are aware of your offerings and to demonstrate the scope of your expertise in your book’s topic. You want to entice people to your site so they can learn more about you and your books. You want them to become familiar with you so they will consider purchasing your current book and any future books you may produce, as well.

So how do you spread the word about your freebie? Here are 10 ideas.
• Mention it in the bio or tagline at the end of the articles/stories you submit to various publications related to your topic/genre.
• Send a notice about your freebie to your emailing list.
• Announce it at Twitter, Facebook and your other social media accounts.
• Talk about it in your blog posts.
• Mention it when you are a guest blogger.
• Talk about it when you go out to speak.
• Include it in your handouts.
• Talk about it in related forums in which you participate.
• Ask to have it mentioned in the announcements sections in your organization newsletters.
• Hand out vouchers for the freebie when you do book festivals and signings.

You might be saying about now, “Gosh, that’s kind of like the same things I would do when promoting my book.” YES! Promotion is promotion.

Tomorrow, I will talk about how to use the information you receive from the people who download your freebie.

In the meantime, I’d love to hear about some of the freebies you are offering from your site or discuss with you some that might work for you. I am currently offering “50 Ways to Promote Your Ebook.” It has been extremely popular. I am working on my next freebie—“50 Ways to Prepare for Publishing Success.”
http://www.patriciafry.com
PLFry620@yahoo.com

I have talked to you about the value of offering something free at your website—something that will attract your readers.

If you use the 25, 50 or 75-ways to fly a kite, remodel a closet, photograph a squirrel, make $10,000 or whatever the theme of your book is, you also have 25, 50 or 75 new article/blog possibilities.

Think about it, each of your ideas, points, ways, etc. can be used independently—either as is or greatly expanded—to create entire articles or blog posts. You should also be able to repurpose them into presentations and maybe even books.

For example, one of my “ways” to be successfully published is to write a book proposal. I have also written a complete book on that topic. It is How to Write a Successful Book Proposal. One of my tips is to engage in public speaking. I have just come out with a book on how to sell books through public speaking, book festivals and such. I’m waiting for the first copies of Talk Up Your Book to land in my office as we speak.

If you have taken the time to create a free ebooklet for your website as a means to attract your readers, a good project for you today would be to sit down with it and figure out ways to expand on this item and maybe repurpose it.

Tomorrow, I’ll talk about how to promote your freebie in order to get people to visit your website and down load it.

Sunday, I’d like to talk about using your freebie to promote yourself, your books and your services.

In the meantime, if you would like a copy of my current free ebooklet, 50 Ways to Promote Your Ebook, just go to http://www.patriciafry.com

Also check out my showcase of books at: http://www.matilijapress.com
You won’t find Talk Up Your Book there, yet. It is at Amazon.com, but the wrong book cover is still being shown. I will make the big announcement about this book once all of the promotional pieces are in place.

Do you have a nonfiction book to promote? Do you promote it through your own website? Why not offer something free at your website in order to get people coming there? I mean, if they don’t come to your website, they may not become familiar with your book and they certainly won’t buy it.

Offer a free download and you receive the names and email addresses of those who are interested in the topic or genre of your book. So it’s also a great way for you to build your emailing list.

I’ve been offering free ebooks that would be of interest to my audience for a couple of years now. Because of this, my emailing list has grown to around 300 or 400 names. Just this week, I have had over 100 people download my free ebook. The one I am offering now is “50 Ways to Promote Your Ebook.” Before this, I had one called “50 Reasons Why You Should Write That Book.” I am working on a new one with the title “50 Ways to Prepare for Publishing Success.”

These are titles that would be of interest to someone who would purchase my books, “Publish Your Book,” “Promote Your Book” and “Talk Up Your Book,” as well as my older books on writing a book proposal, creating a freelance article-writing business and so forth. Some of these people might also be looking for an editor at some point, right? In other words, those who are interested in the free ebooklets are my audience.

But if no one is coming to your website before you offer a freebie, how are you going to get them there after you start offering it? Good question. The answer is, you’re going to spread the word through your Facebook page, at Twitter, in articles that you write for appropriate publications, in your blog and at popular blog sites that also attract your audience. If you can’t get an invitation as a guest blogger, at least leave comments at other blog sites. I mean useful comments with a brief mention of your freebie and a link to your site.

I have a wonderful client in Canada who is branding herself as an expert in a specialized type of education. She has followed this advice and has now written a couple of ebooklets to offer free at her site. Her ebooklets are enormously useful as they also include dozens of links to other resources for those who want to know more about some of the concepts she has included in her list of 50 reasons, tips, techniques. Of course, she also promotes her book in the ebooklet and her services.

Are you stymied as to what to put in an ebooklet like this? Perhaps your book is on woodworking or quilting. How about “50 Things You Can Make with Wood” or “25 Quilt Patterns for the Beginner.” For a book on relationships: “50 Ways to Surprise and Delight Your Spouse.” If your book has a travel theme: “25 Ways to Enjoy a Close-to-Home Vacation,” or “50 Ways to Bond as a Family While Traveling.”

Can you use this idea for a novel? Sure. My unpublished novel, for example, has a lot of cats in it. I might promote this book through an ebooklet titled, “25 Unusual Things Cats Sometimes do,” or “25 Ways to Enjoy Your Cat,” or “10 True and Unusual Cat Stories.”

For a Western romance novel, for example, how about ebooklets on “25 Little-Known Facts About the Old West” or “25 Tips for Writing a Love Scene.” For any type of novel, consider this: “50 Examples of Character Development.”

While you’re driving, taking a walk, working out at the gym or sitting in a boring meeting, you might start making mental notes for some of the ebooklet titles you could produce in order to entice more visitors to your website, thus let more people know about your book.

For an example of one of these freebie ebooklets, download my latest one today:
http://www.patriciafry.com

Check out my showcase of books here:
http://www.matilijapress.com

Do you subscribe to newsletters related to the theme or genre of your book? Perhaps you belong to an organization that produces a monthly newsletter. First, I’d like to suggest that you read it religiously. And I also recommend that you contribute to it, if this is an option.

Most editors who write/compile newsletters are hungry for contributions. You should be eager to put your name out in front of your audience as often as possible. Now isn’t that a win-win situation for everyone?

But so many authors don’t think about writing articles as a way to promote their books. And few see their favorite newsletters and enewsletters as opportunities to reach their readers. Here’s your assignment for today:

1: Take inventory of all of the newsletters (including enewsletters, of course) that you subscribe to and/or receive. If you aren’t getting newsletters related to your book’s theme or genre, start seeking some out and subscribe. Many are FREE, such as SPAWNews, the monthly enewsletter for SPAWN (Small Publishers, Artists and Writers Network).

2: Study those newsletters from front to back and determine what type of articles are used, the basic word count, the style and focus of the articles, etc.

3: Determine what is missing that you could contribute and begin formulating a few articles.

4: Study the submission guidelines. If you can’t find them at the website or in the newsletters, contact the editor and ask about the deadline, where to send the article, word count, etc.

5: Write the piece to conform and send it before the deadline.

6: Include your name, title of your book and your website in the byline at the end of the article.

But this should not be the end of the story. Put on your thinking cap and come up with additional ideas for articles and keep submitting them to appropriate newsletters, enewsletters, websites, bulletins, magazines and so forth. You will become known in your field, genre. You will sell books that you would not otherwise sell. You will develop material for your website. You will come up with new ideas for articles and books.

I’d love to hear from those of you who take this advice.

Contact me here: PLFry620@yahoo.com
Visit my book showcase: http://www.matilijapress.com

Check out my editorial services: http://www.patriciafry.com

Some people try to keep their book a secret until after it’s published. Authors do this because they may be embarrassed to tell anyone they are writing a book. What if they can’t actually finish it? What if the book doesn’t turn out as they envision? What if they never get it published?

Others are afraid someone might steal their idea and produce a book on their subject or the theme of their novel or children’s book. They want to be the first (and only) to publish a book like this.

I can see where these authors are coming from. But I also believe that these attitudes can get in the way of a successful book project. We need to be talking about our books in progress—letting friends, family, acquaintances, colleagues, coworkers, strangers know that we’re coming out with a book that will help them get a better night’s sleep, decorate on a budget, or get along better with employers, for example. We should be priming readers for our amazing romantic mystery, adventure novel or children’s activity book.

Don’t you know that your job as a book promoter will be easier if your audience already knows something about your book when you approach them with your promo material? If they’ve been waiting for it, they may buy it as soon as it comes out. It’s those people who never heard of you or your book who will need to be convinced to even consider buying it. The thing is, if you wait until your book is a book to start talking about it, promotion will be much harder and take much more effort and time.

So there’s a lot to be said for taking a risk and talking about your book, even though you fear that someone might try to copy it (which is pretty far-fetched). And it makes sense to risk embarrassment and shame in case you don’t ever finish your book if it means that you have a large following ready to purchase your book when it does debut.

That’s why I’m going to share this with you.

I finished the first draft of my first novel yesterday. There’s more work to be done on it. I have left it for someone to read and I will finish the writing sometime this fall. I’m already thinking about sequels. I have also been working on my description. Here’s my first attempt at that:

The Klepto Cat Mystery
When Savannah Jordan agrees to help her aunt recover from a broken foot, she doesn’t expect to walk into a mystery, become part of a surveillance team, be kidnapped by a deranged stranger and fall in love with the local veterinarian. Beloved neighborhood cats are missing—the community can only guess at their fate—and Aunt Margaret’s life is being threatened. Is it because she has the clue to the missing cats or is it something more sinister?

If you like light mysteries with only a little terror, if you’re infatuated with interesting cats and if you love a love story, you may want to read this book.

Let me know if you’d like to be put on my mailing list to be notified when this book is published: PLFry620@yahoo.com

For Patricia Fry’s showcase of books
http://www.matilijapress.com

For more about Patricia Fry
http://www.patriciafry.com

How do you go after book reviews? Do you hope that reviewers will find you? Do you know how to locate book reviewers and contact them? There are numerous book review directories, for example, and you’ll find individual reviewers’ websites online. Also, you can locate book reviewers by studying the amazon.com pages for books similar to yours as well as these authors’ website pages, to find out who is reviewing their books.

Most book reviewers do not charge for reviewing your book. I’ve had probably over a hundred reviews over the years and I’ve never paid for one.

There are also peer/reader reviews. Amazon.com invites readers to review the books they’ve read. I just wrote such a review this morning for a novel I read. Sometimes I just remember on my own to write a review for a book I particularly liked. But this time, the author posted a plea for reader reviewers at a discussion group I belong to. I’d read the book and liked it, so I wrote a brief review and posted it at Amazon and shared it with our mutual list.

Why did I go to the trouble and take the time to do this? Sure I am busy like the rest of you. But I did this for a fellow author—to help and encourage her. I also did it for myself. I am working on a novel and I hope that other authors who read it will review it.

What do reader reviews do for you? Some readers are swayed to purchase a book because of a review. More of them are swayed by many positive reviews. So if your book happens to have dozens of peer reviews posted at Amazon.com, it is featured in several magazines read by your audience, colleagues post it at their sites as recommended reading, etc. you are definitely going to make more sales. How do I know that? Because the more people who know about your book, the more sale you will make. Doesn’t that make sense?

So if you have been timid about soliciting reviews for your book and if sales are weak, maybe it is time to step up and start asking readers, friends, colleagues, appropriate organization leaders, appropriate magazine editors, etc. to write a brief (or elaborate) review of your book and post it where your potential readers will find it.

For more about how to solicit book reviews, be sure to read Promote Your Book, Over 250 Proven Tips and Techniques for the Enterprising Author. It’s at amazon.com and most other online and downtown bookstores. You’ll also find it here:
http://www.matilijapress.com