How to be your own book publicist

When it comes to book promotion, many authors are paralyzed because they don’t know what to do or where to begin.

Others are trying the latest tactic because they’ve heard that’s what everyone else is doing. (Remember Periscope?)

Still others are putting their trust and money into a book publicist or book promotion specialist rather than figuring it out for themselves. It’s a decent option when you have more money than time.

But can you do it yourself, instead?

Knowledge is power

Whether you can afford a book publicist or not, authors often suffer from a lack of information, information overload, or both. You might not know enough about what you should be doing, or you’ve read so much about book promotion that you can’t sort out what does and doesn’t apply to you.

What often results, the “tactic of the month” approach, comes from a lack of information about the best strategy to use – and every book deserves its own strategy.

The key to being your own book publicist is asking and answering the right questions.

DIY book publicist questions

Here are a few questions to ask yourself when starting the book publicity and promotion process.

• Who did I write the book for? Who is my target audience – my ideal reader?
• What do I know about them?
• Where do I need to be to reach them? What do they read, watch, or listen to? Are they online, offline, or both?
• If they’re online, what social networks do they use?
• What’s the best strategy for reaching them? Should I leverage my networks, tap into the research I did for the book, or focus on a specific tactic that I think will work best?
• How much time do I have for book promotion?
• What are the most cost-effective tactics, and will they help me get my book title in front of my target audience?
• What promotional activities do I enjoy the most, and are they the types of things that will help me reach the right people for this book? If not, what should I learn how to do?
• Is there anything I should outsource to someone who’s better suited for the task?
• What are the one or two things I have time for that will have an impact? What resources are available to teach me how to execute them effectively?

Finding the answers

It will take time to answer these questions, so pour yourself a cup of coffee and settle in.

Here are a few resources from this site that will help:

• The free Book Marketing Plan Template is a fill-in-the-blanks form with instructions and links to more how-to information online. It will help you get the focus you need while outlining some of the tactics you’ll want to consider.
• My affordable, one-hour video training program, “Who Will Buy Your Book: How to Figure and Find Your Target Audience,” walks you through that process. The premium version gives you the social media and book category demographics you need, too.
• Learn more about who will benefit from working with a book publicist in “Should you hire a book publicist?”
• Become informed about what you should and shouldn’t expect from a book publicist in “7 things you need to know about working with a book publicist.”
• Discover how to vet and hire an outside service in “How one author got ripped off and how you can avoid it.”
• Take my self-study course on using HARO to snag priceless author and book publicity. HARO is every book publicist’s secret weapon. Why pay a pro to use it for you when I can teach you how to do an even better job yourself?

Finally, don’t wait to take action. Your book deserves more attention than it’s getting.

What are you doing to market your books that’s working? Please tell us in a comment.