A beautiful Sunday morning here in Southern Ontario, cold but with a robins-egg blue sky and a touch of fresh snow, patterned with long shadows by the rising sun.
The work for this winter is two-fold: marketing The Child on the Terrace and rewriting Saving Fillide. Last week I reviewed a critique of the first twenty pages of Saving Fillide by an editor, Lindsay Guzzardo, of The Editorial Company. Included in her recommendations was advice that I read Self-Editing for Fiction Writers, by Renni Browne and Dave King, which I had some years ago and Syd Field’s Screenplay, The Foundations of Screenwriting.
Screenwriting? No, I’m not writing a movie or television script, but Field’s book is an excellent source of advice about plotting.
Marketing. Marketing wasn’t a part of the writing career that I gave much thought to in 1998 when I scribbled the beginning of Murderous Roots but since then I’ve spent many hours thinking about it, designing web sites and book launch pages, researching promotional sites and twitter services. The list of people who would be happy to take money for alerting the world of the internet to a new book is endless. A list of sites I’ve looked at and think worthwhile to consider include:
1. Enchanted Book Promotions. This service provides everything from a one day book launch package to a full promotional service with blog tours of many lengths.
2. AskDavid. This tweeting service and book review site is inexpensive, easy to use and delivers.
3. BooksgoSocial Lawrence O’Bryan’s business includes promotion, book reviews, an author page and a very active Facebook page for authors to connect with other authors.
4. 1888PressRelease: Another paid service that I’ve used twice before. Packages vary in add-ons. You can pick which package has the most potential value for your writing business.
5. Booklaunch.io A site that allows you to design a book landing page with all the required elements, including video trailers and links to many online booksellers imbedded in the page. Click to see mine for No Motive for Murder.
Book review sites:
6. The Book Report Book review site on radio.
7. The New Kindle Book Review This site has a book contest as well as reviews.
8. Dealsharingaunt Book reviews, contests and giveaways.
Other Suggestions:
9. Authors you know. Ask for review.
10. Authors you have an introduction to. Can’t hurt to ask politely.
11. Local Media:
Newspapers, radio stations, television stations.
Other ways to market
12. The authors pages at Crime Writers of Canada, The Writers Union of Canada, Canadian Authors Association.
13. Email your friends.
14. Mailchimp: Mailchimp is a service which allows you to set up an email sign-up page, develop a marketing letter and send it off in a marketing campaign.
15. Email librarians in the neighbourhood that a new book is available.
16. Book contests: I’m looking at a number of contests and lists of contests to send The Child on the Terrace to this year.
Epic’s awards for e-books.
Ippys awards for books from independents, self-published, small presses.
So that’s it so far. But the most important is word of mouth, so don’t forget Facebook, Goodreads, Wattpad, tell your friends, tell your aunt, tell your coworkers, tell the checkout girls at the grocery store. Take those speaking engagements, go to the book clubs. Blog. And sometime in there find time to work on the next book.
writingthoughts 