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Networking tips for authors

29 November 2018

Why network?

For some authors, the concept of ‘networking’ is like pulling teeth—painful and to be avoided at all costs. However, it could present useful opportunities, and there are different ways to make the most of these opportunities.

But first, we need to have a quick look at why you might want to network in the first place. Here are a few reasons:

To sell more books
To sell more books through a distribution channel (i.e. bulk sales, gift channels)
To introduce your concepts to a new audience
To generate paid opportunities for teaching, consulting etc.
To promote reading, literature, poetry etc.

After you have considered your reason (or reasons) for wanting to network, you then need to decide what feels comfortable for you, or at least, not so uncomfortable that you won’t do it. That said, I would like to encourage you to start with some comfortable options first and then challenge yourself once you build a little more courage.

Most people probably think of networking as attending an event with a bunch of random strangers and then after listening to someone else’s elevator pitch, being ready to fire off your own elevator pitch, even if it is not relevant to the person you are talking to. I would suggest that you avoid these types of events unless there is a really great speaker or entertainment that you can enjoy!

Find the right audience

If your mission is to sell more books, you need to network with people who will be interested in buying your books! Children’s books are usually of interest to parents, teachers and librarians and well-read friends and family members who buy them as presents—although this last group can be difficult to herd into one spot. However, teachers and librarians do congregate at schools and association events and they are often looking for speakers and authors to interview. These small and often local audiences are usually very excited to meet a ‘real author’ and understand more about your book.

Local bookshops that you personally support are also usually open to suggestions, or are good sources for recommendations for events.

Guest speaking at conferences, events, meetup groups, book groups or book launches can also help you tap into the right ‘audience profile’ for your publication. If you are attending one that is of interest, be bold and introduce yourself as willing to speak ‘next year’ if a place is available. If you get listed on the program, connect with the other speakers before the event to give them a heads-up about your presentation, and a direct opportunity to come up and network with you at the conference. After the conference, post your presentation online where it can provide further networking opportunities.

If you are attending events, please remember to arrive early (so it is not so intimidating) and if you leave last, you can be sure that there will be some extrovert who is very willing to talk to you right until the very end! If it really is too much, praise yourself for turning up and leave when convenient (I have done this several times, particularly when all I am getting is a sales pitch).

Once you develop some real courage, you can go along to other non-specific events and try meeting people serendipitously. But be willing to help them first before expecting them to provide you with referrals or suggestions on other individuals or networks to tap into. I always find that asking for information is so much easier than asking for book sales!

Build online networks

Do you have an up-to-date online presence? You should have an informative website, a LinkedIn Profile (regardless of your genre) and some other relevant social media for your audience (Google expects you to have both a website and a social media presence nowadays). Does your online presence allow people to contact you directly, or click on a link and complete an online form to reach you or your agent or publisher? If you can Search Engine Optimise (SEO) your content online, you can once again be networking 24/7 if people can find you for your selected search keywords. For example, Google ‘LinkedIn Specialist’ and you will see my name on the first page of Google search results.

If you can find the sweet spot of physically networking where your audience is, I encourage you to also do the following online:

Promote the fact that you will be attending before you attend
Take photos on the day (I prefer from the back of the room to de-identify the audience) and perhaps one or two with the organisers and share these on social media (make sure you also use hashtags and ping the organisation and/or organisers in the post)
Invite all guests to connect with you on LinkedIn by turning on Bluetooth on their phone, opening the LinkedIn App, clicking on My Network (the two people on the bottom of the screen) and then ‘Find Nearby’ and connecting live and in real time. I also offer a free book to the first person who appears on my phone screen
Follow up with a favourable Google Review for the organiser, personally thank them for the opportunity via a direct email and offer anyone you do connect with either a book extract or some other electronic ‘perk’ for connecting by direct email

Ultimately, networking is about introducing yourself to people, finding a way to maintain that connection after the meeting (connecting on social media is simpler than emailing and potentially spamming and annoying them) and then continuing to release good quality content that keeps them interested into the future.

Sue Ellson is the author of 120 Ways To Achieve Your Purpose With LinkedIn, 120 Ways To Attract The Right Career Or Business, 120 Ways To Market Your Business Hyper Locally, and Gigsters. Learn more at www.sueellson.com or email sueellson@sueellson.com.

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Features

Self-publishing essentials with Ellie Marney: promo, marketing and all that jazz (part two)

29 November 2018

Your book promotion footprint

In the first article in this series on book marketing, we talked about why marketing your book is worthwhile, why you’re the best person to market it, and the differences between promotion and marketing. Now it’s time to talk about the things that make you and your book stand out from the crowd, and how to develop those things organically to create a ‘promotional footprint’.

Your best assets

Before you rush out and make a website, buy Facebook advertising, and sign up for Instagram, it’s important to have a few concepts figured out. It will save you a lot of time (and money) later.

First tip: First, think about yourself: who are you as a person and as an author? Are you outgoing or quiet? How do you best engage with people—in groups or one-to-one? What sorts of social media do you use (if any)? What themes and ideas come to the fore in your books? Apart from writing, what are your personal interests? These things may not seem important, but they can help inform the strategies you use to market your book and engage with your intended audience.

Your personal platform, or ‘brand’, is a combination of your presence on social media, the tone you take in email newsletters and the way you present in public. This should (ideally) reflect who you are in real life, otherwise it will be tiring to maintain and will seem fake to your audience. Are you a quiet, introverted person? Then use social media like Instagram, that’s not too wordy or overwhelming, and engage like a special confidante with your readers via email. If you’re outgoing and extroverted instead, go louder. Above all, for publicity, play to your strengths. Be yourself—just tidied up a bit for public consumption.

Second tip: Think about the things that make your book special. What is it about? Why is it different from other books on similar themes? Why did you write it? What’s unique about it? How does it compare to other books in the same genre or category? Understanding the things that set your book apart can be the key to marketing it effectively.

Promotion is—to a large extent—about making your book stand out from the crowd. To do that, you first need to know what your book is giving your ideal reader. Only you really understand what makes your book valuable. Is it jam-packed with interesting facts? A hugely entertaining page-turner? A collection of special recipes? Whatever it is that makes your book worth reading is what makes it worth buying.

Third tip: Think about that ideal reader: your audience (i.e. the folks most likely to read your book). They’re the people you wrote for. How old are they? What’s their gender or identity? Where do they hang out, in real life and online? How do they like to read—paperbacks, ebooks, from libraries, on their commute? Figuring out as much as you can about your ideal reader is really important for what is called targeted marketing, and you’ll go back to this information a lot later.

You might think marketing is about throwing your book out to the four corners of the earth—not so. Targeting your audience is important, as it saves you from wasting your efforts on people who aren’t ever going to pick up your book. Knowing who to target is also really important for things like advertising, which needs a tight audience to be effective.

Fourth tip: Consider how much time you have for promotion—you might already have a day job, or a family, so consider all the variables. Also think about a timeline for marketing—when and for how long will you promote this particular book? You’ll also want to a timeline for results—when will you assess the effectiveness of your promotion? Be prepared to spend time keeping track of results.

Social media presence, attending events, scheduling advertising … it all takes time. Devoting an hour a day to marketing is about the minimum requirement, so think about where you will fit that in. It’s customary to promote a book heavily at release time, and maybe a while after, but marketing efforts for indie authors (especially on standalone and first-in-series titles) can happen anytime, over longer periods. And you should know what works and what doesn’t—schedule regular checks of your sales against your marketing efforts, to make sure you’re not wasting your time and money.

Fifth tip: Finally, work out how much money you can afford to invest. Paid promotion can be very effective, but it can also be costly, so sort out a budget. And remember, all marketing is a financial investment—the time you spend marketing your book is time you could be using to earn money in some other way, so factor that in.

Don’t waste money needlessly. Work out what things you feel comfortable doing yourself (like posting on social media and sending out your own newsletters) and what things you might need to outsource (like making a website). Tap into your own skills—but remember there are people who can help if necessary. And make a budget for advertising and stick to it.

Next time, we’ll talk about promotional basics and how to get started.

Ellie Marney is a teacher and hybrid YA author. She lives in Victoria with her family, and her latest book, White Night (Allen & Unwin), was published in March 2018. Find her at www.elliemarney.com or on Twitter or Instagram.

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Features

Self-publishing essentials with Ellie Marney: promotion, marketing and all that jazz (part one)

30 October 2018

Writer, publisher, promoter So you’ve written a book, gone through the tricky process of prepping it for publication, and then…

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Author Spotlight

Ebony McKenna on ‘The Girl and the Ghost’

30 October 2018

Ebony McKenna, winner of the 2018 Romance Writers of Australia’s Romantic Book of the Year, spoke with Independent Publishing about her book The Girl and the Ghost, and her experiences in self-publishing.

Describe your latest book in under 50 words.

In The Girl and The Ghost, publicity-shy student Morgan Parker has a family who lurch from one PR disaster to another. To Morgan’s shock and surprise, she finds a ghost in her room. He’s come with the house and provides a welcome distraction to the mayhem of real life.

Why self-publish?

I love being able to control the timing of my stories to take advantage of different celebrations through the year. I have a Christmas story coming out in early December. I’m part of an anthology of ghostly romances released last year around Halloween, and the next will go out in the lead-up to Valentine’s Day. I also launched The Girl and The Ghost on an auspicious date—Friday the 13th!

Self-publishing means I get to mix shorter stories in between longer novels and bring out incredibly useful nonfiction editing and business guides to help other authors.

What year did you start and where are you based?

I was traditionally published in 2010, then started self-publishing in 2014. I published ebooks to begin with, as distribution was so easy! A year later I dipped the proverbial toe in the ‘print waters’ and love how practical that side of self-publishing (and distribution) is now. I’m based in Melbourne, and I’m really lucky that the printer I use—IngramSpark—is in the same city. That keeps delivery prices low when I need copies.

How many people did you contract on your book and what did you do yourself?

I’ve hired editors in the past but these days I’ve developed a thorough checklist, so I can edit my own work. This prompted me to create an ‘Edit Your Own’ series for authors to follow.

When I first began and knew nothing, I used other companies to format and distribute my ebooks. Since then, I’ve learned as much as I can about formatting for ebook and print, so I can do that myself. I also format for other authors.

I buy my own ISBNs, fill all the forms in, register for lending rights, list my titles with library suppliers, contact libraries etc. I do just about everything myself these days except the covers.

I always bring in professionals for cover designs. Covers are incredibly important and must convey to the reader that the book is not simply worth their money, it’s also worth their time.

What makes your book unique?

My ‘voice’ is very Australian, with local references and humour. The Girl and the Ghost is packed with lashings of swoon-filled moments and bold teenagers with crazy ideas that sometimes even work.

What has been your biggest success?

The Girl and the Ghost is my seventh and most successful novel—the reviews have been consistently incredible and it recently took out the Ruby award for Romantic Book of the Year from the Romance Writers of Australia. It’s unusual for a self-published book to win, and unheard of for a YA novel to win. Plus, I edited this book myself using all the methods I’ve gathered over the years, so this feels like a true validation of my efforts.

What has been your biggest challenge?

Cutting through a crowded marketplace is by far the biggest (and ongoing) challenge—and it’s not unique to self-published authors. Traditionally published authors also face this huge challenge, even when their publishers have marketing budgets. You must consistently produce the very best quality books you can.

What would be your top tip for those starting out in self-publishing?

Be as professional as possible in all aspects of the business—because this is a business.

What will you publish next?

I’m writing rebooted fairytales which tie in with my four-part ‘Ondine’ series. It’s so much fun playing in this fictional sandpit. I’m writing with a huge grin!

For more information on the author and her books, visit www.ebonymckenna.com.

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