As promised a couple of days ago, today we feature an interview with marketing expert and author, Shel Horowitz. This is what's called a "virtual book tour" and we're pleased Shel Horowitz took some time to answer our questions about marketing for authors as he roams the blogosphere promoting his new book, Grassroots Marketing for Authors and Publishers. I'll bet if you have a question for Shel and post it in the comments below, he'll stop by and respond! Without further ado, here's the interview with Shel Horowitz...
Q. In a nutshell, what are the key points of your book and who will it benefit most?
A. That "if you build it, they will come" doesn't work for book marketing Whether they publish traditionally, self-publish, or use a subsidy house, authors bear the brunt of promotion. Fortunately, there are hundreds of low-cost/no-cost ways to promote a book. I wrote Grassroots Marketing for Authors and Publishers to provide this toolbox to authors and small publishers.
Q. What's your opinion on using new media like podcasting, video and book trailers for promoting a book?
A. There seems to be a trend toward video/trailers for fiction, and it's beginning to spread to non-fiction. I think these will start being considerably more effective as they evolve, but much of what I've seen has been pretty simplistic and not terribly good at convincing me to buy.
Podcasting is just a teleseminar that can be replayed indefinitely, and I think those can be very powerful. But just as TV didn't supplant radio which didn't supplant print, we add these to our toolbox without eliminating traditional media.
Q. We think it's important for an author to use a blog to build a platform to get known and promote their book. What's your opinion on blogs as a marketing tool?
A. I love 'em. Most authors should have at least one blog, and that blog should be pretty focused on promoting the message. For most of us, this is *not* "what I had for breakfast," but "this is how my book ties into today's news" or "this is new information on the theme I write about."
I've been blogging since 2005, and also post comments frequently on other people's blogs. One easy thing to do is to add your e-mail signature (modified so as to be appropriate for the format--for instance you don't want your e-address harvestable by spambots) when you comment. That builds links, interest in your book, and so forth.
One of my goals for my blog is to eventually turn it into a paid syndicated column, and that definitely influences the structure of some of my posts. My blog focuses on business ethics, the subject of my award-winning sixth book, Principled Profit: Marketing That Puts People First. I'm thinking about starting another blog to focus on book marketing, now that I have this newer book.
Q. From your experience, what is the biggest obstacle or challenge authors face when marketing their book?
A. Because it's so easy to be published these days, it's much harder to sort the good books from the junk. And many people don't bother to make the effort and just buy best-sellers. Standing out in a crowd of 181,189 different books published in just one year, in just one country, is a massive challenge. But at the same time, the democratization of technology, the access to amazingly powerful research and marketing tools, makes this a challenge that can be more easily overcome than in the past. Just think of how much easier it is to reach 2000 people on a targeted discussion list than to type 10 letters out one at a time and snail-mail them--as authors had to do even just a few decades ago.
Q. What's your number one recommendation to a new author for getting the word out about their book?
A. Develop a great website for your book and then go bring traffic to it. Grassroots Marketing for Authors and Publishers discusses seven different models for an author or publisher website, one of which is a pure blog (and a blog can be easily incorporated into most of the others). But remember that websites are only one small fraction of what's possible in cyberspace. I discuss a whole lot of other methods too, both online and off.
About Shel Horowitz
"I make the world insist on knowing why you're special," says copywriter, marketing consultant, speaker, and seven-time author Shel Horowitz. His books have been published by houses as large as Simon & Schuster and as small as his own self-publishing venture. Shel set up his business in 1981, with an initial marketing investment of just $12. He lives with his wife, novelist D. Dina Friedman, and two teenage children in a historic farmhouse in Hadley, Massachusetts, where he used his marketing skills to organize a mass movement that successfully protected 100 acres of mountain land.
Shel's most recent books are Grassroots Marketing for Authors and Publishers and Apex Award winner Principled Profit: Marketing That Puts People First. He's the founder of the Business Ethics Pledge, at http://www.business-ethics-pledge.org
Very helpful interview of one of the masters at authentic ways to make your book memorable and spur more sales.
Thanks!
Anyone author who has just finished writing their book should dive into reading Shel's book because that advance planning will pay off.
And, Shel, re your comment on the use of podcasts, I agree. To leverage success, it takes strategic integration of the podcast with the newsletter, blog and other services - all under the umbrella of a distinctive brand.
And, I know first hand that Build a Better Blog is a great example of that, for you to tout on the rest of your book tour.
Denise & Patsi's interview of me re SmartPartnering was aimed at packing alot of tips into the time we had together. Very professional - and convivial.
I've been on over 60 podcasts by now and notice that it takes a real strategic bent and follow-through to embody all three parts: integration of the interview into the rest of the business, great questions to elicit valuable content and obvious warmth so people enjoy listening and warm up to the interviewers.
That means that anyone reading this comment should look at this whole site and see how their message can reinforce Denise and Patsi's brand, then pitch them on getting interviewed.
Posted by: Kare Anderson | Tuesday, April 03, 2007 at 09:00 AM