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      Category : Marketing and Platforms

      • February 7, 2013

        Thursdays with Amanda: 10 Prize Ideas for Giveaways or Contests

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        Amanda Luedeke is a literary agent with MacGregor Literary. Every Thursday, she posts about growing your author platform. You can follow her on Twitter @amandaluedeke or join her Facebook group to stay current with her wheelings and dealings as an agent.

        Next week, I’ll revisit those social media critiques we were working through, but in them meantime, I thought it would be fun to list a smattering of prize ideas for giveaways…prizes that won’t cost you a fortune.

        1. Gift cards
        2. Coupons for ebooks (could be novellas, shorts, etc. that you have self-published)
        3. The chance to name a character (may only work for established authors, but the idea is the winner gets to name a character in an upcoming book)
        4. Twenty minute Skype call with the author
        5. Free book
        6. A book dedication
        7. A shout-out in the Acknowledgements section
        8. A “fan of the year” or “fan of the month” badge for their blog/website
        9. Book tchotchkes in the form of PDFs that you email to winners, such as paper dolls (for childrens or romance genres), detailed world maps (for speculative fiction genres), recipes (for historical genres, etc), paper crafts/Cubeecrafts (for childrens or speculative genres), basically anything that either appeals to readers’ children/grandchildren or to the inner nerd or hobbyist. This idea may cost a bit of money up front, but the long-term use makes it worth it.
        10. Themed gift baskets that tie in with your novel, such as gardening theme baskets for gardening cozy mysteries, etc.

        What else? What other great giveaway prizes can you think of (aside from huge doorbusters, like iPads).

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      • January 31, 2013

        Thursdays with Amanda: How to Run a Successful Twitter Party

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        Amanda Luedeke is a literary agent with MacGregor Literary. Every Thursday, she posts about growing your author platform. You can follow her on Twitter @amandaluedeke or join her Facebook group to stay current with her wheelings and dealings as an agent.

        So now that we know what Twitter parties are, here are some tips on how to make one a success:

        1. Set the parameters. When will the party take place? Who are the hosts? What are the prizes? What is the incentive to attend? Just like throwing any birthday party, baby shower or graduation open house, these questions need to be thought out beforehand. The more specific the answers, the better.
        2. Advertise like crazy. An entire marketing plan should be devised to advertise the party. You don’t want to just put it up on your blog and then Tweet it a few times and expect a huge turnout. Ask other bloggers to feature your official invite (have something like a digital flyer professionally designed) and create a retweet strategy that encourages Twitter users to share the news. (Maybe those who retweet your party invite Tweet get entered twice in one of the party drawings). Be creative, but be intentional. And don’t start advertising too far in advance. If the party is on Friday, begin advertising that Monday.
        3. Be a good host. This involves some organization and planning, but the idea is that you want to keep things moving. To do so…A) open and close the party on time, B) if a large party, don’t feel as though you have to be part of every conversation, but if a small party, feel free to greet participants by name, C) keep discussion moving, stay “on topic” and on time with your planned giveaways or featured guest interviews, D) don’t go dead on air–this means have the husband or the wife watch the kids during an evening party, and E) don’t
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      • January 24, 2013

        Thursdays with Amanda: What is a Twitter Party

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        Amanda Luedeke is a literary agent with MacGregor Literary. Every Thursday, she posts about growing your author platform. You can follow her on Twitter @amandaluedeke or join her Facebook group to stay current with her wheelings and dealings as an agent.

        Some readers of this blog have mentioned that they don’t really know what Twitter Parties are, let alone how to run one. So let’s unpack this very useful promo strategy and then next week we can go over what makes Twitter Parties successful.

        A Twitter party is exactly what it sounds. It is an online party that takes place on Twitter.

        Here’s how it works…

        An author or a company or someone who wants to promote awareness or buzz for their product, sends out party invitations through blogs, forums, Facebook, etc. They give the party a specific time, as well as a hashtag, and they advertise prizes.

        Those who want to participate (usually to win free stuff), merely need to log on to Twitter during the hours of the party and begin watching for that particular hashtag (they can do a hashtag search on Twitter, which will pull show them the Tweets that include that hashtag in real time, or they can set it up through whatever Twitter program they use to filter Tweets). But anyway, the idea is that people join the party using the provided hashtag.

        The host(s) of the party will keep things moving along, chatting with participants and running giveaways and interviews with featured guests. The key, though, is that every Tweet must have the party’s hashtag within it. Otherwise, the Tweets won’t make it to the party-goers’ feeds.

        Still with me?

        Eventually, after an hour or so of fun and chatting and giveaways and interviews, the party ends and the hosts sign off.

        Why does this work?

        It gets people talking about whatever you want them to talk about! Let’s say the focus

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      • January 17, 2013

        Thursdays with Amanda: Dispelling the Top 5 Facebook Myths

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        Amanda Luedeke is a literary agent with MacGregor Literary. Every Thursday, she posts about growing your author platform. You can follow her on Twitter @amandaluedeke or join her Facebook group to stay current with her wheelings and dealings as an agent.

         

        Note: this is a professional Facebook page. This is a personal profile.

        Every once in awhile I receive some questions regarding professional Facebook pages. You see, there are a lot of rumors surrounding the professional page, and many will claim that it’s self-sabotage to switch over (from personal to professional pages). But I entirely disagree.

        So let’s take some time to dispel the top 5 Facebook myths when it comes to using the site for marketing and promotions.

        Myth #1: The Professional Facebook Page is bad because it only shows your updates to 1/3 of your fanbase.

        This isn’t necessarily true. Your fans have the power to choose how often they see your posts. If they want to view every post, they can select that option. If they only want to view the most popular posts, they can opt for that one.

        But let’s get to the bottom of this myth. This statement is making the assumption that all of your posts in your personal profile are seen by ALL of your friends. This is not true. Go to your personal Facebook profile and think of a friend that you haven’t heard or seen much of lately. You know, one of those people that you wonder if maybe they’ve unfriended you. Now go look them up. Chances are, they’ve been posting quite frequently! But you haven’t seen their posts. Why? Because not only do you have the power to filter your feeds, Facebook sometimes selects which posts you view on your news feed and also which posts appear on the little scrolly thing in the upper righthand corner of your account. And sometimes, you

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      • January 16, 2013

        What are the best steps to take when marketing my book?

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        Someone wrote and said this: “I have a nonfiction book releasing soon. When it comes to marketing my book, what is the wisest step I can take? Should I invest in a bunch of marketing books? Take a class in marketing? Or should I simply hire a public relations firm to do it for me? I’m just trying to figure out if hiring a marketing company means I get a generic plan, and if I’d be better to do it myself. What do you recommend?”

        Here’s my thinking… 

        First, nobody is as committed to the message of your book as you are. Nobody knows the book as well as you do. Nobody has as much riding on the success of your book as you. So for that reason, I’d say that learning how to do your own marketing is probably the best step most authors can take. That doesn’t mean you have to do all of it yourself — it just means that you need to understand that you can’t off-load all of the marketing tasks and expect it to go as well as if you’re involved in it. So yes, I think one of the things you can do as an author is to learn about the process of marketing. 

        Second, there are a number of resources you can turn to, and there are numerous excellent marketing tools you can purchase (starting with some general Dummies guides, and moving to very specific marketing tools). Books on marketing are simply a low-cost way to enter the field. You get to glean from a lot of experienced people, and you’ll find both big-picture concepts as well as immediate steps to take. So I’d start by getting a handle on the field of book marketing. For a bit more money, you could order the CD series “Become a Bestselling Author.” That will help give you a step-by-step approach to creating a marketing

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      • January 15, 2013

        How much money does a publisher invest in marketing my book?

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        Someone wrote to ask, “In your experience, how much money does a publisher invest in marketing a book? How much should an author spend?”

         Whenever a large publisher decides to contract a book, they create a P&L (profit and loss) sheet that contains all the numbers involved — the cost of ink and paper and binding, the cover costs, the author advance, copyediting, shipping, overhead expenses, etc. One of the numbers on most P&L’s is “marketing costs.” Of course, at the front end of a deal the publisher doesn’t really know how much they’re going to spend on advertising or publicity. The P&L may be filled out two years before the actual books hit store shelves, and no one is really sure what the marketing commitment will be. So many of them plug in $1 per hardcover book, based on expected sales.

        In other words, if the publisher expects to sell 50,000 copies, the initial marketing budget will be $50,000. For books being flipped to trade paper, they may only budget fifty cents per book. For mass market, it’s even less. From a business point of view, that’s a fairly good rule of thumb for authors to know — the publisher will invest about a dollar per book for marketing a hardcover title. If the book in question is from a heavy hitter (say, Stephenie Meyer’s next novel), that number will obviously increase, and extra steps will be taken to promote the book. Be aware that you may not be able to easily figure out where all the money went — space ads and radio commercials have a set cost, but co-op fees, front-of-store placement, and shared advertising space can quickly add up and make spending on single titles hard to track. Still, that gives you a baseline for understanding how large publishers create a marketing budget.

        Medium-sized publishers are more apt to simply have a figure they’ll spend —

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      • January 14, 2013

        As an author, how can I build a better platform?

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        This past weekend, someone wrote to say, “You have often talked about ‘platform’ on this blog. How do you define a platform? And what do you suggest I do in order to build a platform for myself as an author?”

        An author’s platform is the collection of opportunities a writer has with potential readers. So, in many ways, a platform is simply a number. Think of it this way…

        Does he have a TV show? If so, how many viewers does he have? That’s a number. Is she on the radio? If so, how many listeners does she have? That’s a number. Does he write a column for a newspaper or magazine? If so, what’s the readership? That’s a number. Does she blog? If so, how many people read her each month? That’s a number. Every opportunity an author has is reducible to a number.

        Does he have a busy speaking schedule? If so, how many people does he speak to over the course of a year? How often? How big are the venues? Do his speeches get recorded and sold to listeners? If so, how many copies sell in a year? Is she a recognized expert in a particular area? Do people recognize her name? Does he have a popular website? Is she a regular writer for an e-zine? Does he often get contacted by the media? Do people recognize her name? 

        Some numbers are easy to add up. Others are considerably harder — but it’s usually not that difficult to come up with the number of people a writer can reach through his or her current opportunities. Let’s call each one a “touchpoint” — an opportunity for the writer to touch a reader in some way that is already established. Perhaps they listen to her on the radio, or read her blog, or go to hear her speak at conferences… for each person they reach, the writer

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      • January 10, 2013

        Thursdays with Amanda: Make an Offer They Can’t Refuse

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        Amanda Luedeke is a literary agent with MacGregor Literary. Every Thursday, she posts about growing your author platform. You can follow her on Twitter @amandaluedeke or join her Facebook group to stay current with her wheelings and dealings as an agent.

        Well, with a new year, comes a new me. So say “hello” to my more current photo.

        This week, I wanted to share something that I have found particularly effective when it comes to growing platform…

        Do you remember those months ago when I offered Free Social Media Critiques?

        And then do you recall, if you follow my Facebook group, the other week when I gave Free One-Liner Critiques?

        I did both of these things to be nice. And to gain trust. But I mostly did them to grow my platform.

        Let’s look at the numbers.

        I received roughly 115 comments on my Social Media Critique promo. That’s around 100 people (some commented more than once) who not only interacted with me online, but who were then driven to come back every Thursday in hopes that their site would be reviewed. (I’m still working through the list…just taking a break for now).

        The post was shared quite a bit on Twitter and through other venues, and the coolest part is that it attracted NEW readers to the blog. In other words, in exchange for a bit of my time, I got new readers, positioned myself as an expert, and got my name out among people who are not closely linked to me. Pretty cool.

        (Not to mention, I got free blog fodder for the rest of my life).

        Now, the Facebook promo was even more of a success.

        I had around 650 likes before the promo. In days, that number jumped to 750. My post was shared a whopping 86 TIMES on Facebook, and even more so elsewhere. It saw 145 comments and was viewed by

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      • December 20, 2012

        Thursdays with Amanda: 5 Down and Dirty Ideas for Marketing Your Book

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        Amanda Luedeke Literary AgentAmanda Luedeke is a literary agent with MacGregor Literary. Every Thursday, she posts about growing your author platform. You can follow her on Twitter @amandaluedeke or join her Facebook group to stay current with her wheelings and dealings as an agent.

        I want to take it easy this week and next as I give a chance for all the Thursdays with Amanda readers to catch up on last week’s post which highlighted ALL of my 2012 platform-building blog posts. So I thought I’d spend this week sharing 5 Ideas to Market Your Book. They’re going to be a bit random! But it’s all about thinking outside the box.

        5 DOWN AND DIRTY IDEAS FOR MARKETING YOUR BOOK

        1. You know that rack of magazines at your gym? Leave copies of your book there. And you know the front desk at your gym? Ask about leaving a flyer with a download password for a free/discounted digital copy of your book. I mean have you seen how many people read while working out?! It’s crazy.

        2. Ask your local library to feature local authors (if they don’t already).

        3. Do a Google search for book clubs in your area. Ask if they’d be willing to read your book if you provided some sort of incentive (a party at the end where they can chat about it with you, free copies, etc).

        4. Get your publisher to update your book’s Amazon and Barnes & Noble pages to reflect the holidays. An opening line that reads “The perfect gift for those who love mystery and intrigue!” speaks to your target reader and it also gives gift-givers something to go off of.

        5. Host a Twitter party in the days after Christmas. That’s when new Kindle and Nook owners are going to be looking for great content to put on their devices! So make sure you’re creating buzz.

        What are some of your

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      • December 13, 2012

        Thursdays with Amanda: How To Grow Your Author Platform…2012 blog posts

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        Amanda Luedeke Literary AgentAmanda Luedeke is a literary agent with MacGregor Literary. Every Thursday, she posts about growing your author platform. You can follow her on Twitter @amandaluedeke or join her Facebook group to stay current with her wheelings and dealings as an agent.

        Assuming that the world will NOT end and that 2013 is YOUR YEAR to get things together and develop (or further develop) that coveted author platform everyone keeps talking about, I figured I’d put together an index of all my posts this past year.

        The catch? You aren’t allowed to casually skim it. I want you reading the ones that jump out at you while you come up with a goal list of

        10 Things I WILL Do in 2013 to Grow My Author Platform

        2013 is your year! Make the most of it. Your career will thank you.

        How it all started

        Growing Platform Through Articles

        Growing Platform Through Blogging

        Growing Platform Through Conferences

        Growing Platform Through Ebooks

        Growing Platform Through Facebook

        Growing Platform Through Goodreads

        Growing Platform Through Pinterest

        Growing Platform Through Public Speaking

        Growing Platform

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