The Magic of Networking by Jenny Twist

This weekend and next I'm handing over my blog to my two favourite people, Jenny Twist and Tara Fox Hall who want to talk about something dear to any author's heart - promotion (and FREE promotion at that!)

So straight away...here's Jenny.

I always assumed, rather naively, that once your book was accepted by a publisher all you had to do was sit back and wait for the money to roll in. Well, it doesn't happen like that. In order for a book to sell, the author needs to have a fan base, to get fans the author needs to be actively marketed. Even the best publishers cannot spend time and money marketing an unknown author. They will only do this for new books from authors who are already best-sellers or for those whom they believe have a really good chance of becoming best-sellers - celebrities writing their autobiographies, for example.

So is this a Catch 22 situation?

Not quite.

The answer is you have to market yourself. Ultimately books sell through word of mouth, so the more people you can get to read your book, the better chance it has of becoming well-known.

I have no money at all to spend on advertising, so all my marketing is through social networking and blogging. Don’t knock it! You wouldn’t believe how many people you reach through Twitter and Facebook.

Twitter: You are only allowed 140 characters per tweet. Make every character count. Put RT at the beginning, which is an invitation for your followers to retweet. Every retweet will reach all the followers of that tweep (Twitter-speak for one who tweets) who may themselves retweet you. See how this works?

Always put the buy-link of your book in there. For example, if you are tweeting about a review by all means put the review link in as well, but include the buy link whatever happens. People buy on impulse. Make it easy for them.

Facebook: Create your own author page and post all your book news there. Invite people to share a link when you’re doing a full-on campaign. Don’t forget to include the buy link!

Join author groups - Yahoo has dozens of them. So does Facebook. I have a master spread-sheet with all the sites I post on so I don’t forget any. I also bookmark all the sites so it’s quick and easy to post one after another. Be careful to obey all the site rules. Some have certain days when you’re allowed to post, some will only allow certain kinds of posts.

Every time anything happens that gives you an excuse to say something, tweet and post it. When a new book is launched, when you have a good review, when you write a blog. You are building your fan-base. Make them remember your name. And remember, if you want people to support you, you must be prepared to support them. Thank them for sharing your link. When they retweet you, reciprocate. You will make good friends who will always support you.

Reviews sell books. Send your book for review to any review site that seems to be appropriate. Again I keep a spread-sheet for each book, tracking where I sent it and the response. As you go along, you will find the sites that like your writing and you will end up with a golden list of those you are confident will give you a good review. Here’s a site with a comprehensive list to start you off:  http://kimberlykillion.com/writers.asp#bookreviewers

Ask other authors to review your work. Offer to review theirs in turn.

Offer to do interviews and blogs. It's time-consuming, but it really does work. When I first started I used to prefer interviews because the blogger did all the hard work. All you had to do was answer the questions. Now I’d much rather write a blog myself on some subject that interests me. It’s more interesting for me than trotting out the same answers all the time and I think it’s more interesting for my readers.

Every time you do this, advertise it on the social networks. Post the link to the site and ask people to comment. Keep revisiting the site to respond to them.

Free downloads: Finally, there is one avenue I have only recently discovered that seems to work like magic. If you have self-published a book you can put it on free download every so often. Amazon’s KDP lets you do 5 free days every 90 days. Advertise it on all the free book sites and promote it like mad.
Only a fraction of the people who download it will read it. Only a fraction of those will review it. But an even smaller fraction, the golden nugget, will become fans. They will go on to buy your other books. They will tell their friends, who will tell their friends.

Stardom, here you come!     

About Jenny Twist

Jenny Twist was born in York and brought up in the West Yorkshire mill town of Heckmondwike,the eldest grandchild of a huge extended family. 

She left school at fifteen and went to work in an asbestos factory. After working in various jobs, including bacon-packer and escapologist’s assistant, she returned to full-time education and did a BA in history at Manchester and post-graduate studies at Oxford.

She stayed in Oxford working as a recruitment consultant for many years and it was there that she met and married her husband, Vic.

In 2001 they retired and moved to Southern Spain where they live with their rather eccentric dog and cat

Jenny's first book, Take One At Bedtime, was published in April 2011 and the second, the highly acclaimed Domingo’s Angel, in July 2011. Her novella, Doppelganger, was published in the anthology Curious Hearts in July 2011, Uncle Vernon, was published in Spellbound, in November 2011,  Jamey and the Alien was published in Warm Christmas Wishes in December 2011 and Mantequero was published in the anthology Winter Wonders in December 2011.  She self-published Away With the Fairies, an intriguing modern fairytale in September 2012.

Her latest novel, All in the Mind, about an old woman who mysteriously begins to get younger, appeared in October 2012.

All Jenny's titles are available from Amazon. Just click on the following links: Amazon US and Amazon UK