Now that I have a book… How do I market it?

Posted by Fitzy

November 6, 2007

Hi all…

So now that you have a book published… How do you get it to your audience?

Here’s the cover for my book by the way. I think it turned out great. The artist, Jason Adams, did an amazing job.

Well… I’m still working on that little issue myself, but my plan goes like this and I’ll keep writing articles documenting my progress as I go through the steps.

Publish the book. (Done)
Publish the eBook. (Done)
Make the book available via the Lulu.com store. (Done)
Make the eBook available via a roleplaying game eBook distribution site such as RPGNow, DriveThruRPG, or Indie Press Revolution. (Done via RPGNow and DriveThruRPG, waiting on IPR)
Make the book available via my website. (Done as soon as I validate an issue with the cover one more time in a printed copy I ordered yesterday.)
Get into the Barnes & Noble distribution system. They have a form and process to go through to get this started.
Purchase a set of books (perhaps 10 or 20) at cost from Lulu.com to sell via local game stores.
Get into the Amazon.com distribution system. This process appears less than straightforward, but I will get back to you with my thoughts as soon as I dive in more thoroughly.
Send out Press Releases. Lulu.com helps some with this (offers some ideas for where to submit a press release) but get one written and ready to send out. I’ll provide some good resources about writing press releases in a separate article.

Wow. That’s all. Nine easy steps. I’m about halfway done and will get the rest kicked off as soon as I make sure the book looks better (had to correct an issue with the cover, since the spine was out of whack).

If you’ve gone through the process of marketing your books, I’d love to hear from you. What worked? What didn’t? What recommendations would you make for other independent authors?

Thanks for your time. Have a great day!

–Fitz