7 Tips to Promote Your Book for FREE

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Do you want more readers for your books and articles?  There is a cornucopia of free and effective promotion tools for writers on the Internet. You can achieve these marketing goals through online activities in a fun way, as most writers already like to hang out in cyberspace, networking and blogging.

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1. Join Book Communities
As an author it is a MUST to be a member of these communities and a free (other than your time) way to introduce your book(s) and show your book titles. Join Goodreads, Wattpad, Scribd, BookMoch or Shelfari. More on my blog about book communities and for direct links. Post snippets (or chapters) of your book to excite potential readers at Wattpad – see my blog about Wattpad: 15 million readers before the book was even published.
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2. Use Your Signature
Never send out an email without your author’s signature. You have probably heard this advice before, but: do you use the gains of e-mail signatures to market and promote your books?
Every day you send out emails to friends, business colleagues, your lawyer or accountant, potential clients, potential readers … If you have an email signature, you are constantly sending people “passive” marketing, spreading the word about you, your brand and your books. Create your email signature right now!
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3. Involve Social Networks
Show up on Google+, Twitter, Pinterest, Tumblr, Facebook and Linkedin (be at least on Google+ and one more of these networking sites).  Click on “public” when posting on Google+ and your content will be immediately picked up by Google’s search engines. If you share interesting links (and your blog posts), and offer great free information, you will quickly become a favorite in these social networks. Your followers and connections on Social Media will later become your fan base, read and subscribe to your blog posts and newsletters and read / buy your books.
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4. Comment on Other Blogs
Take the time to find bloggers who write about topics similar to those you write about. When they have something good to say or you can add something to what they have written, leave a comment on their blog. Each time you do so, you leave behind a link to yourself, your website, or your blog. If people who read your comment find what you have written interesting, they will click on the link to find out more about you. They may then decide to become regular blog readers or subscribers, newsletter subscribers, or book buyers.
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5. Start and Maintain a Blog Yourself
Blogs serve as the best tool for increasing online visibility as these are constantly updated and thus attractive for search engines. The more visible you, your book, your website, and your blog become, the more traffic (readers) your blog will attract. This means more buyers for your book now or when it is released. To create a successful blog, write about something you feel passionate about and do so often and consistently. That’s all it takes.
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6. Contribute Content to e-Zine Article Directories
Recycle parts of your blogged book manuscript or blog posts into short articles you can post in content farms or e-zine article directories, such as Ezinearticles.com, Amazines.com, or Blogs of the Week and many more.  Almost all have a resource box for a short bio and a link back to your website, book, blog, or subscription form. These articles are picked up by other bloggers, newsletter editors, e-zine editors, etc., and each time your resource box is featured. Readers click on your links to find out more about you, subscribe to your blog and newsletter or purchase your book.  You can even use an e-zine article distribution services, such as http://www.submityourarticle.com, and get your articles distributed to hundreds of e-zine directories at once, making it available to hundred- thousands of new readers and possible book fans.
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7. Optimize your Amazon Page
The first step of all you can do to climb up to bestseller status:

– “autograph” Kindle books
– choose the best categories for your books and update them regularely
– add tags/keywords/subjects to your book listing for more exposure
– add lots of reviews, “About the Author” and additional information to your Amazon sales page
– get the most out of your Amazon Central account, create a brilliant authors page
– find out which part of your books your customers highlight the most on the Kindle and post it on your website or blog.
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No Money? No Problem!
Success in social media book marketing, using the tools described here, doesn’t require any financial investment. Depending on your level of involvement, it may demand a strong time commitment, at least in the beginning.  Yet, as more you use these marketing tools, as faster you can handle them and as more visitors and buyers you will get.

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If you would like to get more support in all things publishing, have your book intensively promoted and learn how to navigate social media sites – or to learn how you can make yourself a name as an author through content writing: We offer all this and more for only $179 for three months – or less than $2 per day! Learn more about this customized Online Seminar / Consulting for writers: http://www.111Publishing.com/Seminars

Please check out all previous posts of this blog (there are more than 1,100 of them : ) if you haven’t already. Why not sign up to receive them regularly by email? Just click on “Follow” in the upper line on each page – and then on “LIKE” next to it. There is also the “SHARE” button underneath each article where you can submit the article to Pinterest, Google+, Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr and StumpleUpon.
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How to Let Publicity Work For You

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Have you (and your book) been mentioned in a national newspaper, such as USA Today, Chicago Tribune or the NY Times? Or your hometown newspaper? Have you been interviewed by a local radio station? Endorsements of traditional media, even if it’s simply mentioning your name, is marketing gold if you are trying to get a book into more readers hands. Don’t miss to let everyone know about it:

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Post it on Your Author Pages
Authors barely ever use all the space they get on their Amazon or Goodreads author pages. Scan the article or parts of it and add it as a photo to your page. If it was a video interview, get a copy to place it on YouTube and all free video sharing sites and certainly on all your author pages at online retailers.
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Let People on Social Media Know
No matter if it was an article or a taped interview, post it on all the forums you are a member with, including a link, an image or a quote.
This can be done more frequently on Google+, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn – and with images on Pinterest. You can even mention and promote upcoming shows on your site – and on theirs. And certainly post after the show how awesome it was.
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Add it to Your e-Book
Why not adding snippets of the article (quote or image of the article, or a link to the video) as endorsement into your e-book, either in the first introduction pages or at the end of the book?
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Post it on Your Website and Blog
The endorsements implied by recognition from the media make you appear more trustworthy and credible – and thus more appealing – than your competition.
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Use it as Reference for Speaking Engagements
When applying you will greatly boost your chances of getting the gig if the people, hiring speakers know that you have received media attention. Make sure it’s on your speaker profile and in your marketing material.

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Whether you have paid someone to help you get media exposure or you have done the work yourself, you have made an investment in Public Relation. Get a great return on that investment and leverage the rewards for a long time, provided, you put it to work for you!

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If you would like to get more support in all things publishing, have your book intensively promoted and learn how to navigate social media sites – or to learn how you can make yourself a name as an author through content writing: We offer all this and more for only $159 for three months! Learn more about this individual book marketing help: http://www.111Publishing.com/Seminars
Or visit http://www.e-book-pr.com/book-promo/  to advertise your new book, specials, your KDP Select Free Days or the new Kindle Countdown Deals.

Please check out all previous posts of this blog (there are more than 970 of them : ) if you haven’t already. Why not sign up to receive them regularly by email? Just click on “Follow” in the upper line on each page – and then on “LIKE” next to it. There is also the “SHARE” button underneath each article where you can submit the article to Pinterest, Google+, Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr and StumpleUpon.
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Did You Think About It, Before Writing Your Book?

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There are a couple of hard questions you should ask yourself before writing and publishing a book. Having heard all these stories during the last years about (very few) authors who self-published their books and became famous / rich, might tempt you to follow their path.

90% of all authors I talk to, haven’t done their research. There are lots of questions any author should ask (and answer) before writing – not only as independent writer, but also before pitching to publishers:

• how many books of this topic (sometimes even with the same title) are out there already
• where are these books sold and for which price
• who are the customers of these books
• how are these books received and which ones are bestselling
• in which categories / genres are these competitive books listed
• what cover designs have been chosen for these books
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Research First and Build a Solid Foundation
Barely any author is really planning their book and its promotion. Only when frustration sets in, they think about getting help.  Becoming an author-publisher is a long-term commitment and requires hundreds of small steps on the path to success!  Before you even attempt to write, develop and market an e-book, or paper book for that matter, create yourself a road map.

The problem is that too many authors are in a hurry to start writing and don’t lay a foundation for book marketing. They spend all this time writing, and then they have no readers and customers to buy their books.
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Ask yourself some hard questions:

• Who will be your e-book readers?
• Is there a demand for your eBook product?
• Is your e-book a “must have” purchase?
• How much will people pay for your product?
• Does the purchase of your eBook lead to additional e-book sales?
• How much money will you need to fund your project?
• How likely are you to excel among the competition?
• How do you contact and “pitch” your product to your potential buyers?
• How to you get the important book reviews?
• Do you have already lots of followers in your social networks?

Writing your book is only 20% of the work, 80% is marketing! Having a plan on how you intend to market, publicize and sell your book before starting to write it is crucial.

• Choose your book content
• Start marketing your book, even before writing it
• Design and format it into a perfect downloadable file
• Create a professional cover for your e-book
• Select the e-book retailer to upload your book (Amazon, Apple, B&N, Sony…)
• Continue marketing your book

You are responsible for providing your own ongoing marketing for e-published work – the same as for paper books that are often not very well marketed. A book might be great, but if nobody knows about it, it won’t sell. Authors can’t count on the public seeing their books on shelves or in store windows – they have to find it on the internet.
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The Statistics are Dire 
There are more than one million books published in the USA alone every year.  Of those, some two thirds are self-published.  Book sales are declining, having peaked in 2007.  Your nonfiction book published in 2014 will, on average, sell less than 250 copies per year, fewer than 3,000 over its lifetime, which is increasingly short since publishers don’t back-list as much as they used to.
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Create Your Own Market 
More books, fewer sales means that publishers have less money to spend on marketing to try to reach those increasingly rare readers.  Less help from the publisher means that the author has to do more and more him/herself.  So you not only have to write the book, you also have to figure out how to sell it. How will anyone hear about your book?  They won’t see it – there’s a less than 1% chance that your book will be stocked in a bookstore.
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Establish Yourself as Expert
In an era of increasing specialization, and a daily explosion in knowledge, experts have clout and authority.  So if you want to be at the head of your field, you need that book – especially if you’re a consultant or something similar, who’s hired because of your expertise.  And then you’ll probably need another book in a few years’ time.  But let’s worry about the next book later.
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Become a Professional Public Speaker
Public speakers – the paid ones – still need a book to point to.  Even (former) President Clinton has had to write books to keep himself in the public eye. That’s why it’s important to get clear from the outset why you are writing this book.
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Don’t Let You Fool By These Bogus Stories
Writers claim to have sold hundred-thousands of their books in short time or claim bestseller status, and cash in on these stories.  When you look behind the scenes, they have either paid for hundreds of reviews or a service company bought ten-thousands of their own books (which these authors had to advance), catapulting them to New York Times bestseller status. All this false hype brings writers to think their book is a failure if not showing up in bestseller lists. Wrong!

Don’t Be Discouraged
Just do more research into your book market, learn everything about book publishing and marketing, and built step by step your author platform and brand.  And for your next book:  Do the research first!!! Before you start writing.

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If you would like to get help in all things publishing, have your book intensively promoted and learn how to navigate social media sites: We offer all this and more for only $159 for 3 months! Learn more about this individual book marketing help: http://www.111Publishing.com/Seminars
Or visit http://www.e-book-pr.com/book-promo/ to advertise your new book, specials or your KDP Select Free Days.

Please check out all previous posts of this blog (there are more than 940 of them : ) if you haven’t already. Why not sign up to receive them regularly by email? Just click on “Follow” in the upper line on each page – and then on “LIKE” next to it. There is also the “SHARE” button underneath each article where you can submit the article to Pinterest, Google+, Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr and StumpleUpon.

Thanks a lot for following:

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http://www.e-Book-PR.com/

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Your Success-Plan to Author-Publishing

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Before you explore author-publishing possibilities in this series, lets first have a look at your business plans as an author and the most important question: Why are you writing?  Are you creating for yourself (as a hobby, just for the fun of writing),  or for an audience? If you’re creating for yourself, it means: Writing is worthwhile for you, regardless of who sees your work.
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Can You Answer These Questions:

• How many books with the same topic / the same genre are on the market?
• What is the sales ranking of these works?
• How are these books priced?
• What is the social media ranking of the most successful writers in this genre?
• Where are these books sold on- and off-line?

The advise you read here is based on the assumption that you want to entertain, inform, increase your audience and eventually earn some money with your writing.
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If You’re Producing Work for an Audience:

• playing by at least some rules of the industry
• caring what others think of your work
• establishing an authors platform from which to communicate
• interacting with your audience and being available to them
• doing things not for your art, but out of service to your audience
• putting on a performance, or adopting some kind of “brand”
• marketing your work and being visible

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Why Should Authors Have a Business Plan?
Unfortunately many writers first create their work – and ask questions later.  Any author can write a book, but only a successful author knows she/he is now in business.  Again: “Writing is an art – publishing is a business!”  A serious business!
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There’s no point to go without some kind of strategy in place if your objectives really are in building a writing career. It’s never too early to treat your writing as a business – no one would open a brick&mortar business without a plan!

A business plan can help new (and established) authors to clarify the proper publishing path for their works. A business plan serves as a road map, helping to keep the project and related endeavors like marketing and platform-building on schedule and for the author to track the results of his or her efforts.

The business plan starts when you start thinking about writing a book, it covers all aspects of your future work. At the moment you begin a novel or non-fiction book, you must already have a clear vision of the message, the audience and even the venues where it can be sold.

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Traditional Business Plans Have These Components:

• Executive summary
• Business description
• Market strategies
• Competitive analysis
• Design and development plan
• Operations and management plan
• Financial factors

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Sounds a Bit Theoretical? OK, Here is the Version for Author-Publishing:

• The topic of your work fiction / non-fiction
• You target audience / readers
• Your competition online and in book stores
• The likely contents, length, format etc. of the book
• Your marketing and promotional strategies
• The expenses you face for publishing and promotions.

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It is vital to have a business plan because your books and you are the products to be sold. It makes some writers uneasy, but without a plan, you can’t figure out a way for your book to sell. Think of it as your map, guiding you from starving writer to successful author.
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What makes your book so special?
No point in writing a book if you don’t know why or if it’s special. Many writers write books they’d love to read, many write books who’s marketing studies show readers are buying, some write books because the subject is risky or has never been explored before. Know why you and your book is special – and most important: what is the readers benefit of buying your novel or non-fiction book.
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Who Will Want to Buy Your Book?
Jot down all those people who likely will want your book, why they’ll want it and how effective they will be at getting more people to want it. Know who your readership target is. Do you have enough (at least 2,000 on each social media outlet) contacts to spread the word about your book? And with contacts I don’t mean other writers, I mean READERS, bookworms, book lovers, book clubs, avid readers, reviewers! That’s the type of audience you will want to look for.
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What is Your Competition?
Research in bookstores and online, how many and which books will be comparable to the one you are writing. Check them out in libraries, on reader forums, such as Goodreads, Shelfari or Wattpad. Visit independent stores and go to big chains  research these books on all online stores, not only Amazon, find out what genres are they placed, what reviewers say, how their author pages are designed etc. to get a real picture of your competition – and your potential readers.
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Which Format For Your Book?
Books can be sold in many formats and also in many languages. Research at least these three popular formats:

• e-book format
• audio format
• Print format

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How Do You Plan to Promote Your Book?
You have lots of friends and you know people, hopefully lots of people. Online and off-line. And those people know people. Unless you can spend ten-thousands of dollars every months for advertising, you should plan now, before you write your book:

• our social networking,
• book events,
• gaining interviews,
• speaking engagements,
• seeking book reviews,
• attending book shows. 

Schedule all these activities in advance, add as many readers as possible to your current accounts on reader community sites, all social media sites – minimum are: Goodreads, Twitter, Google+, Pinterest and Facebook.
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What Are Your Marketing Strategies?
OK, your book is available on Amazon or in your local book store, but where else might it fit in perfectly? Other online retailers where you can sell your book? Stretch your mind and think creatively: Libraries, book clubs, foreign right sales … there are so many possible outlets for your book. Find out what’s their commissions are, and how much you would make on each sale of your book.

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Calculations & Pricing
Both, digital and print books need to be proof-read, edited and then formatted, not to forget a really fabulous, enticing cover.
Pricing on print books is largely based on the number of pages in the book and quality of binding, costs for cover design and book layout. Pricing is also dependent on making print books available for a wider distribution than just Amazon. Since a wider distribution is used, books must be priced
so that the other outlets will be offered wholesale pricing.

Turbulence in the rapidly changing eBook world should also be taken into consideration. Pricing may be subject to change based on sales, current pricing trends and need to create upward movement in Amazon rankings. Books may be discounted if it fits with marketing strategy and promotion.
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Don’t forget other expenses, such as webdesign and hosting, advertising, marketing expenses, phone and internet, travel cost etc.  The good news: you can deduct ALL these costs from your writers income!
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What is Your Timetable for Writing, Editing, Book Production, Marketing etc.?
After you have figured out your market, your reader audience, your competition and your sales planning, you will feel much better, having a clear vision of your writing / publishing career.  A business plan does not have to be scary, especially for a simple business such as your writing business. In fact, a business plan should be somewhat comforting. It spells out what you want to accomplish, in which time frame and how you plan to do it.

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Further reading:
http://www.spawn.org/editing/sevenpublishingmistakes.htm
http://selfpubauthors.com/category/business-plan/
http://www.aboutfreelancewriting.com/articles/business/writereality.htm
http://absolutewrite.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-32373.html

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If you would like to get help in all things publishing, have your book intensively promoted and learn how to navigate social media sites: We offer all this and more for only $159 for 3 months! Learn more about this individual book marketing help: http://www.111Publishing.com/Seminars
Or visit http://www.e-book-pr.com/book-promo/ to advertise your new book, specials or your KDP Select Free Days.

Please check out all previous posts of this blog (there are more than 940 of them : ) if you haven’t already. Why not sign up to receive them regularly by email? Just click on “Follow” in the upper line on each page – and then on “LIKE” next to it. There is also the “SHARE” button underneath each article where you can submit the article to Pinterest, Google+, Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr and StumpleUpon.

Thanks a lot for following:

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http://www.e-Book-PR.com/

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Your Benefit: Get More Time to Write!

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NEW: Introductory Price for Book Advertising & Social-Media-Promotion:
Some authors have already a great functioning platform with lots of followers and established their brand as a writer.  What they need:  time to write the next book, and a little help with Social Media promotion. Other writers plan their KDP Select FREE days or short-time reduced price for     their e-books, or the launch of a new novel.
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Exactly for these occasions we offer Advertising and Social Media Promotion:
Advertising and Social Media Promotion at a 50% lower, introductory price until
October 31, 2013.  For only $39  – and with only a three Five-Star-Requirement.*
This way, new books will get the same chances as established ones!

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Your Benefit for 3 months:

• Introduction of your book (1 page, incl. links) on four web sites (stays forever!)
• Posting of these articles (URL) on all our Social Media sites (see listing below)
• Sales campaigns & KDP FREE days are heavily promoted
• Your book will be on the front page for at least one week
• IF announced 10 DAYS in advance your books goes into the Newsletter to
  ten-thousands of readers

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SIGN UP now!
Take advantage of this great, one-time introduction price of $39, click on the Buy Now button at

• http://www.e-book-pr.com/book-promo/
• http://www.international-ebooks.com/book-promo

Use the secure PayPal ordering system! We will contact you by email (within 48 hrs) after signing up to get more info about your book and set up campaign dates.  PayPal – The safer, easier way to pay online!
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Why Should you Promote Your Books with Us?

• We are known for valuable help to authors / publishers
• We have a great ranking on Google and Alexa
• We have lots of hundred-thousands of readers/followers
• We are professionally-trained e-publishers/marketing specialists

You might have attended one of our Weekend Seminars or Publishing & Book Marketing Consulting
online. Many Readers, Writers and Author-Publishers also enjoy the almost 900 useful blog posts at http://SavvybookWriters.com, which have been read by 300,000 people, and which are mirrored now additionally in a new blog version. All these valuable blog post’s URL’s are submitted several times a day to many Social Media sites, such as Google+, Twitter, Pinterest, Tumblr, StumpleUpon, and to dozens of Google Communities as well as to Goodreads. Countless bloggers re-blog them to their sites as well.

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ALEXA Traffic Rank:
SavvyBookWriters: Our ALEXA Traffic Rank in the USA as of September 1, 2013 is at: 39,196 !!! out of of more than 500.000 sites, which means being in the top 8% in America. Our worldwide rank was 108,699  – out of almost 1 BILLION websites worldwide! SavvyBookWriters‘ ranking is in the top 1% of the world’s websites! This is only one of our websites / blogs. There are four more – plus all our Social Media sites. All these pages are connected with each other, which means your book and it’s cover will show up on dozens of places on the internet.

From http://www.freewebsitereport.org/
Savvybookwriters.com has ranked #114,726 in the world according to ALEXA.com website ranking, and has a Google page rank #3. Savvybookwriters.com receives 9,588 page views per day. The average page load time is 2.3 seconds, which is faster than 33% of sites around the world. Savvybookwriters.com has website back links from #331 websites.
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Our Social Media Presence 

• http://www.savvybookwriters.com
• http://www.e-book-PR.com
• http://www.international-ebooks.com/
• http://www.ebook-autoren.wordpress.com
• http://ebooksinternational.tumblr.com/
• http://www.111publishing.com/Seminar
• http://www.twitter.com/111publishing
• http://www.twitter.com/ebookPR
• http://pinterest.com/111publishing/
• http://www.stumbleupon.com/stumbler/111publishing
• http://www.savvybookwriters.wordpress.com
• http://on.fb.me/TvqDaK 111Publishing
• http://bit.ly/VmtVA 111Publishing @Google+
• http://bit.ly/13NFyBT ebookPR @Google+

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There is even more:  Online Publishing Seminar
If you would like to get help in all things publishing, have your book intensively promoted and learn how to navigate social media sites: We offer all this and more for only $ 159 for 3 months. Learn more about this individual book marketing help at: http://www.111Publishing.com/
Check out the benefits here http://bit.ly/1aKkpkK  – and to order the seminar, go to http://www.111Publishing.com/Seminars.

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*Sorry, no exceptions, three is the absolute minimum! Read our tips how to find reviewers:
Million Dollar Question: How to Get Book Reviews
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Please check out all previous posts of this blog (there are 880+ of them : ) if you haven’t already. Why not sign up to receive them regularly by email? Just click on “Follow” in the upper line on each page – and then on “LIKE” next to it. There is also the “SHARE” button underneath each article where you can submit the article to Pinterest, Google+, Twitter, Chime.in, Facebook, Tumblr and to StumpleUpon.

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Secret of a Successful Press Release

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A client emailed me recently:
“I received an offer: Promote your book to 1,000 websites, media outlets, and search engines. What do you think? Is there a realistic ROI (Return of Investment) for the $97.00 press release?”
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My reply:
“Do you really want an honest answer? It is terribly expensive for what you get! Their work-effort is five minutes maximum, these mass email costs them less than a dollar – and the rest is profit…
The recipients are not selected to the readership of your books genre. It goes out in a mass email to any websites, any media outlets (can be a lifestyle magazine or a Christian newspaper, or a garden / cooking magazine, a sports magazine, just about anything …).  Well, and you are in search engines listed anyway with your blog and your website.
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The one who writes the press release will be you! They just copy / paste it into an email form (images seems not to be included, as far as I can see) and off it goes by mass email. NOT to your potential
readers! ROI (Return of Investment) with this kind of mass email? No way!”
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You might have read two former blog posts: 7 Errors To Avoid When Dealing With the Media and How to Write a Press Release for Your Book

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No time to read thousands of emails every day
Journalist, reporters and editors are under constant time pressure and overwhelmed with emails, they don’t even read them anymore, and for sure they are not reading mass emails with press releases that were not directly sent to their name, rather were sent to their newspaper office.
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Statement from a journalist:
“Why do companies and PR’s still target these useless muppets to waste journalists’ time, bombarding them with irrelevant stories. Do your homework properly, build up your own media contacts list and deal with them directly.”
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Make sure you email the right person.
Put together a file of hand-picked contact people at newspapers, radio stations, TV stations and other organizations that would be a good fit for your niche. The days of… blind copying everybody and hoping somebody picks up your press release is really over. Reporters and editors just get annoyed.
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If you want to receive great results from a promotional campaign, it must go to a target audience. To promote your book, you need to find journalists who are writing about books, and convince them that your work stands out among thousands in the same genre – and that it is useful / interesting for their readers. Having a great story is just not enough anymore. You need to know how to get reporters to listen. A successful press release campaign needs to be well planned:

• research of recipients
• research of key words
• research of benefits for readers
• creating a compelling headline
• get stunning photos
• write a catchy text
• editing, editing, editing
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As with everything you learn as an aspiring author-publisher-entrepreneur: When you do it the first time, it is a bit of en effort, but from the second Press Release on the learning curve is very steep, you have already a prototype, you have your checklist, and a number of journalists, reporters and bloggers coordinates in your files. Now you just need a brilliant photo or two, and to craft the article, which should be a breeze. After all you are a writer, right?

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If you would like to get help in all things publishing, have your book intensively promoted and learn how to navigate social media sites: We offer all this and more for only $ 159 for 3 months. Learn more about this individual book marketing help: http://www.111Publishing.com/ Once you are on this website, click on Seminar to register.

Please feel free to check out all previous posts of this blog (there are 830+ of them : ) if you haven’t already. Why not sign up to receive them regularly by email? Just click on “Follow” in the upper line on each page – and then on “LIKE” next to it. There is also the “SHARE” button underneath each article where you can submit the article to Pinterest, Google+, Twitter, Chime.in, Facebook, Tumblr and to StumpleUpon.

Thanks a lot for following:

@111publishing
http://on.fb.me/TvqDaK
http://bit.ly/VmtVAS 111Publishing @ Google+

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Book Promotion: Lots of Added Value For You

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Photo credit Allposters.ca

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As a reader of our blog you found already a treasure trove of book marketing tips and you might have realized the immense possibilities to promote your books. But there is more you can get from us:  We can consult you in all things publishing (digital and print), evaluate your marketing plans, promote your book intensively and show you how to navigate social media sites.  Act now! Take advantage of our engaging, professional help, we have studied business, marketing and e-publishing and have 30 years publishing experience.
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You are a very talented author who has written a fantastic book, or even several – but the publishing / promoting process is an adventure and it can take up quite some of your valuable writing time. So it is smart to get professional help, especially when it is so easy and inexpensive, and when you can learn a lot about publishing and publicizing your future books. Let us show you how you can save lots of time in your book promotion, and also, how to use your manuscript and research to write articles you can sell too..

We certainly customize our Book Publishing and Marketing Support
directly to YOUR book and your needs!
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Online Seminar / Consulting

• Unlimited book marketing consultations by email for up to three months
• Unlimited social media help for up to three months
• Three hours of one-on-one Book Marketing Online Seminar phone-consultations
• Instructions / checklist / links for you to use for your book promotions
• Author interview on our blog website – this article stays there forever!
• Free e-book for you: “Book Marketing on a Shoestring” launch Winter 2013
• Plus one surprise gift we will reveal once you signed up!
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Promotion of your book

• Introduction of your books on dozens of reader communities with a 50,000+ audience
• Advertising of your two books on free days /promotions with Amazon KDP to over 365.000+ readers
• Blog posts including cover image/author bio/books description on both, blog & our websites
• “Book of the Month” individual email recommendation to more than 2,900 readers on Goodreads etc.
• Book posts/tweets/ads several times/week for 3 months on all sites to over 400.000+ readers
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Even more book marketing possibilities:
Additional book promotion websites:
http://www.international-ebooks.com/book-promo/ and
http://www.e-book-PR.com/book-promo/  will also promote the articles about your books and about you as a writer. These new sites will be dedicated to publicize our customers’ books, and will be heavily promote to a readership of several hundred thousand followers on all our Social Media sites and blogs at WordPress, Hubpages, Squidoo, Blogger etc.
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We offer all this and more for only $ 179 for a three-months package. Take advantage of this great offer! Book Publicity firms usually charge more than $2,500 for much less service, than we offer!
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What former clients said:

• ”Thank you so much. You are amazing, so helpful to all of us who are starting down the road of self publishing. I just printed that blog post off this morning and will start to act on it today. You are an inspiration. Thanks again for everything.”
• “Your advice all along the way has been so very valuable to help me make those importantdecisions, thank you so much for that.”
• “Boy, you really provide a service. If you ever need a reference, count me in. Anything I can do to promote you back. You rock.”
• “I am so happy with 111Publishing for helping me out. If ANYONE is self-publishing a book I highly recommend using her for consulting. Thank you Doris for saving me $3700.”

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Learn more about this individual book marketing help at http://www.111Publishing.com/seminars,
email us your questions via 111publishing a t gmail d o t com, or skype us.

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Thanks a lot for following:

@111publishing

http://on.fb.me/TvqDaK
http://bit.ly/VmtVAS 111Publishing @ Google+

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How to Plan your Publishing Business

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Before you explore author-publishing possibilities in this series, lets first have a look at your business plans as an author and the most important question: Why are you writing?  Are you creating for yourself (as a hobby, just for the fun of writing) – or for an audience?
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Can you answer these questions: how many books with the same topic / the same genre are on the market? What is the sales ranking of these works? How are these books priced? What is the social media ranking of the most successful writers in this genre? Where are these books sold on- and off-line? The advise you read here is based on the assumption that you want to entertain, inform, increase your audience and eventually earn some money with your writing.
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If you’re producing work for an audience, it means:

• playing by at least some rules of the industry
• caring what others think of your work
• establishing an authors platform from which to communicate
• interacting with your audience and being available to them
• doing things not for your art, but out of service to your audience
• putting on a performance, or adopting some kind of “brand”
• marketing your work and being visible

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If you’re creating for yourself, it means:
Writing is worthwhile for you, regardless of who sees your work.

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Why should authors have a business plan?
Unfortunately many writers first create their work – and ask questions later.  Any author can write a book, but only a successful author knows she/he is now in business.  Again: “Writing is an art – publishing is a business!”  A serious business!
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There’s no point to go without some kind of strategy in place if your objectives really are in building a writing career. It’s never too early to treat your writing as a business – no one would open a brick&mortar business without a plan!

A business plan can help new (and established) authors to clarify the proper publishing path for their works. A business plan serves as a road map, helping to keep the project and related endeavors like marketing and platform-building on schedule and for the author to track the results of his or her efforts.

The business plan starts when you start thinking about writing a book, it covers all aspects of your future work. At the moment you begin a novel or non-fiction book, you must already have a clear vision of the message, the audience and even the venues where it can be sold.

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Traditional business plans have these components:

• Executive summary
• Business description
• Market strategies
• Competitive analysis
• Design and development plan
• Operations and management plan
• Financial factors

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Sounds a bit theoretical? OK, here is the version for author-publishing:

• The topic of your work fiction / non-fiction
• You target audience / readers
• Your competition online and in book stores
• The likely contents, length, format etc. of the book
• Your marketing and promotional strategies
• The expenses you face for publishing and promotions.

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It is vital to have a business plan because your books and you are the products to be sold. It makes some writers uneasy, but without a plan, you can’t truly figure out a way for your book to sell itself. Think of it as a map, guiding you from starving writer to successful author.
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What makes your book so special?
No point in writing a book if you don’t know why or if it’s special. Many writers write books they’d love to read, many write books who’s marketing studies show readers are buying, some write books because the subject is risky or has never been explored before. Know why you and your book is special – and most important: what is the readers benefit of buying your novel or non-fiction book.
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Who will want to buy your work?
Jot down all those people who likely will want your book, why they’ll want it and how effective they will be at getting more people to want it. Know who your readership target is. Do you have enough (at least 2,000 on each social media outlet) contacts to spread the word about your book? And with contacts I don’t mean other writers, I mean READERS, bookworms, book lovers, book clubs, avid readers, reviewers! That’s the type of audience you will want to look for.
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Competition
Research in bookstores and online, how many and which books will be comparable to the one you are writing. Check them out in libraries, on reader forums, such as Goodreads, Shelfari or Wattpad. Visit independent stores and go to big chains  research these books on all online stores, not only Amazon, find out what genres are they placed, what reviewers say, how their author pages are designed etc. to get a real picture of your competition – and your potential readers.
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Format of your book?
Books can be sold in many formats and also in many languages. Research at least these three popular formats:

• e-book format
• audio format
• Print format

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How do you plan to promote your product?
You know people, hopefully lots of people. Online and off-line. And those people know people. Unless you can spend ten-thousands of dollars every months for advertising, you should plan now, before you write your book social networking, book events, gaining interviews, speaking engagements, seeking book reviews and attending book shows. Schedule all these activities in advance, add as many readers as possible to your current accounts on reader community sites, all social media sites – minimum are: Goodreads, Twitter, Google+, Pinterest and Facebook.
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What are your marketing strategies?
OK, your book is available on Amazon or in your local book store, but where else might it fit in perfectly? Other online retailers where you can sell your book? Stretch your mind and think creatively: Libraries, book clubs, foreign right sales … there are so many possible outlets for your book. Find out what’s their commissions are, and how much you would make on each sale of your book.

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Calculations & Pricing
Both, digital and print books need to be proof-read, edited and then formatted, not to forget a really fabulous, enticing cover.
Pricing on print books is largely based on the number of pages in the book and quality of binding, costs for cover design and book layout. Pricing is also dependent on making print books available for a wider distribution than just Amazon. Since a wider distribution is used, books must be priced
so that the other outlets will be offered wholesale pricing.

Turbulence in the rapidly changing eBook world should also be taken into consideration. Pricing may be subject to change based on sales, current pricing trends and need to create upward movement in Amazon rankings. Books may be discounted if it fits with marketing strategy and promotion.
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Don’t forget other expenses, such as webdesign and hosting, advertising, marketing expenses, phone and internet, travel cost etc.  The good news: you can deduct them from your writers income.
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What is your timetable for writing, editing, book production, marketing etc.?
After you have figured out your market, your reader audience, your competition and your sales planning, you will feel much better, having a clear vision of your writing / publishing career.  A business plan does not have to be scary, especially for a simple business such as your writing business. In fact, a business plan should be somewhat comforting. It spells out what you want to accomplish, in which time frame and how you plan to do it.

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Further reading:
http://www.spawn.org/editing/sevenpublishingmistakes.htm
http://selfpubauthors.com/category/business-plan/
http://www.aboutfreelancewriting.com/articles/business/writereality.htm
http://absolutewrite.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-32373.html

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If you would like to get help in all things publishing, have your book heavily promoted and learn how to navigate social media sites: We offer all this and more for only a “token” of $1 / day for 3 months. Learn more about this individual book marketing help: http://www.111Publishing.com/seminar

If you enjoyed this blog post, please feel free to check out all previous posts of this blog (there are more than 710 of them : ) if you haven’t already. Why not sign up to receive them regularly by email? Just click on “Follow” in the upper line on each page – and then on “LIKE” next to it. There is also the “SHARE” button underneath each article where you can submit the article to Pinterest, Google+, Twitter, Chime.in, Facebook, Tumblr and StumpleUpon.

Thanks a lot for following:

@111publishing

http://on.fb.me/TvqDaK
http://bit.ly/VmtVAS 111Publishing @ Google+

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Writing is an Art – Publishing is a Business!

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British Columbia, Canada

You might belong to these talented authors who have written a fantastic book – or several, but you just don’t have the sales numbers your book(s) deserves.

You realized that selling and marketing is a completely different process to writing and publishing your book. And you are not alone:

Very few writers have a degree in marketing / business or experience in publishing and selling on- and offline.

Barely any author is really planning their book and its promotion. Only when frustration sets in, they think about getting help.

However, throwing lots of money into advertising is very costly and in the best case, might be only a rather short-term solution.

Creating a brand long-term, and a platform from where you can communicate with your readers is more efficient, almost free and a solid base for future books and their sales numbers.

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The Internet is full of bogus stories.
Writers claim to have sold hundred-thousands of their books in short time or claim bestseller status, and cash in on these stories.  When you look behind the scenes, they have either paid for hundreds of reviews or a service company bought ten-thousands of their own books (which these authors had to advance), catapulting them to New York Times bestseller status.  All this false hype brings writers to think their book is a failure if not showing up in bestseller lists. Wrong!
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Becoming an author-publisher is a long-term commitment and requires hundreds of small steps on the path to success!
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An increasing number of authors gets book marketing help from us. You might already know that we

• offer weekend classes, 
• individual, yet very inexpensive online seminars, targeted to your needs, 
• help authors with ads for KDP FREE days, Countdown Deals and Goodreads Giveaways
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What is included in this marketing training and help?
You might have seen the long list of support URL , we give authors. But what really is included in the marketing planning, the creation of a platform and your brand as an author? There is so much behind the scenes what’s involved, have a closer look at some of what we do:

We evaluate your current publishing situation:

• What is the market for your book, your competition, your audience? Is it a popular genre, or more of a niche? Is your book in the right genre? Did you tap the full potential of categories – which can be boon or bust for your book?
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• What is your publishing situation: traditional publishing, author-publishing or God forbid, vanity publishing or contracting with an aggregator? Do you own your ISBN, do you have access to your online retailers’ publishing account? How long lasts your publishing contract?
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• Did you create separate author/book pages on Goodreads, Google+, Pinterest, Facebook and other communities? Does your author page at online retailers need improvement?
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• What was your previous marketing strategy? What worked, what not? Did you have a book launch, re-launch, any special promotions? How often and how well was your book reviewed? In which promotion did your publisher invest? Is it positioned properly?
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• What is your following on social media – and your involvement? Do you have at least 1,000 Goodreads friends, 2,000 twitter followers and the same on Google+, 500 Facebook friends and did you add your book to your Pinterest account? These might be numbers only, but did you choose the right keywords to find quality followers, such as readers, reading, book lovers, bookworms?
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• Do you show off your writing skills? Are you writing regularly blogs? Does your website have a prominent button to your sales pages? Did you write guest blogs on influential book bloggers pages?
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• What are your activities in getting book reviews? Have you sent out press releases in order to get interviews, radio / TV appearances or features in magazines / newspapers?
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• How do you approach reviewers? And have you joined reader / writer communities on Goodreads or made friends with their most popular book reviewers?
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• What are your long-term goals? Where will you be as a writer in 3 years? What will be your author brand and how will you be different from other authors in your genre?

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Getting a clear picture about your situation as an author
and that of your books, we can meet you by phone / skype and discuss details, including publishing possibilities, if your book is not yet finished, before we start customized promotion of your book through a series of articles, interviews and book recommendations.
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An important focus will be on support for Social Media communication:
Where and how can your presence be improved? How can you get more followers? How to implement your blog posts? This includes also lots of individual tips and links for your book project, explained in person or emailed to you regularly.

We certainly help you through our very well-established social media presence on all major sites to get the word out about your book and you as an author – as well as support for free KDP Select days and other promotions. Which means we tweet to our 40,000+ followers on these days, we place additional articles on social media sites and do everything for your book’s success

Most important:

Advertising your books, as well as the article and the interview we did with you and all the postings on our Social Media sites stay there FOREVER! This way it will have a long-term effect on your book sales. More details in a blog post or on http://www.111Publishing.com/seminar.
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And this is what former clients say:

“This was the best choice I have ever made! I have learned so very much from a person that has 30 years of experience in the book publishing industry!”
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“I’ve gotten more than my money’s worth with the great publicity you’ve already given me. I cannot stress enough just how grateful I am – I don’t think too many service providers are anywhere near as diligent as you are.”
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“This service is truly a one-on-one feature in that she works directly with the client, fine-tuning your social media platform contributing to the success of your business.”
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“Thank you so much. You are amazing, so helpful to all of us who are starting down the road of self publishing. I just printed that blog post off this morning and will start to act on it today. You are an inspiration.” Thanks again for everything.”
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“If ANYONE is self-publishing a book, I highly recommend using her for consulting. Thank you Doris for saving me $3,700”
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“Boy, you really provide a service. If you ever need a reference, count me in. Anything I can do to promote you back. You rock.
J. H.”
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“Doris “Thank you so much. You are amazing, so helpful to all of us who are starting down the road of self publishing. I just printed that blog post off this morning and will start to act on it today. You are an inspiration. Thanks again for everything.”

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We will show you how to market your book on a consistent and ongoing basis – for only a token fee of $159 for three months – less than $2 per day.  As you can see from the amount of time we invest for every author, we are not making money, rather see it as a service for like-minded folks. How can we help you as an author of a marvelous book – and hopefully many more to come?

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Even if You Landed a Publishing Deal…

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In my last post I explained the reasons why I created an individual online Book Marketing seminar for authors, using one-on-one instruction. To get help in promoting a book is not only important for self-publishers, but also in case you landed a publishing deal.  Your publisher will NOT place ads in the NY Times, book promotion is up to YOU!  The first questions a literary agent or a publisher will ask you: What is your platform? Who are your target readers? How will you promote your book?
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Are you one of those writers, hiding behind your laptop, terrified at the thought of “marketing”, because your skill is writing – not marketing? Authors need BOOK PROMOTION, but don’t want to appear like a “used car salesman”.  However remember: “Nobody ever made money writing a book – only by selling it”.
The Most Valuable Book Marketing Help You Can Get ! 

Individual training and customized marketing consultations for your book at an amazing offer!!! Register now to get started on your road to success: Book now, in November or December, and get 3 months of individual marketing training & promotion for your book – for only $59.00.   Regular price after December 31, 2012 will be $98.00.
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This extensive training / consulting package which gives you:

• Three hours of one-on-one “Book Marketing Training” phone-consultations (all topics regarding publishing, promotion, platform & branding, social media, learn about free book marketing possibilities etc.)
• Unlimited book marketing consultations by email for three months
• Unlimited social media help by email for three months
• Instructions / Checklist / Hundreds of links for you to use for your free book promotions
• Free e-book: “Book Marketing on a Shoestring” (launch late November)
• Blog post including cover image/bio/book description on both, blog and our websites
• Plus one surprise gift we will reveal once you sign up!

During the last 18 months more than 90,000 readers appreciated useful, free tips for authors here on this blog.  Get more in-dept help while taking this online book marketing training.  I will take you under “my wings” and help you promote your book for a very affordable price.

Get more info about the steps we take together on my website, where you can book your individual book marketing training..
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PART 2 – 45 More Websites to Promote Your Book

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PART TWO “Advertise” your Book for FREE
See the first 50 websites here

Forums / Networks / Book Communities / Book Bloggers – all this means free Promotion for your book!

For your book to sell, you need to create the demand. You need an audience, a platform – which you will get when your book is showing up on many websites and forums, visible to readers.

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1.        http://www.bookjetty.com
2.        http://worldliterarycafe.com/
3.        http://www.independentauthornetwork.com
4.        http://www.bookcrossing.com
5.        http://www.shelfari.com
6.        http://www.bookmesh.com
7.        http://www.whatsonmybookshelf.com
8.        http://www.revish.com
9.        http://www.online-literature.com/forums
10.        http://www.writing.com
11.        http://forums.onlinebookclub.org
12.        http://www.bookandreader.com/forums/
13.        http://www.canadianbookclubs.com/forums
14.        http://www.ebookforum.info
15.        http://www.friends4brandt.com
16.        http://www.bookgrouponline.com/forum
17.        http://www.kindleboards.com
18.        http://www.memyshelfandi.com/p/review-policy.html
19.        http://thebookmarketingnetwork.com/
20.        http://writersbreak.com
21.        http://www.writersmarket.com
22.        http://weread.com/
23.        http://www.lindsayburoker.com
24.        http://www.thepassivevoice.com
25.        http://davidgaughran.wordpress.com
26.        http://www.goodbookideas.com/
27.        http://www.reading-forum.co.uk/forum
28.        http://www.online-literature.com/forums
29.        http://www.writing.com
30.        http://www.whowrotewhat.net/
31.        http://www.bookreportradio.com/
32.        http://www.timgreatonforum.blogspot.ca/
33.        http://www.figment.com
34.        http://forums.onlinebookclub.org
35.        http://www.bookandreader.com/forums/
36.        http://www.ebookforum.info
37.        http://www.friends4brandt.com
38.        http://www.bookgrouponline.com/forum
39.        http://mariefostino.weebly.com/books.html
40.        http://independentauthorsinternational.org/iAi/Authors.html
41.        http://addictivestory.wordpress.com/indie-book-promotions/
42.        http://www.canadianbookclubs.com/forum
43.        http://www.bowkerlink.com/corrections/common/home.asp
44.        http://ebooksalon.blogspot.co.at/ (German)
45.        https://savvybookwriters.wordpress.com/2012/10/23/authors-want-pr-for-your-book/

More Websites and hundreds of tips how to promote your book in the upcoming book “Book Marketing  on a Shoestring”.  It will be launched at the end of November.

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If you enjoyed this blog post, please feel free to check out all previous posts of this blog (there are almost 570 of them : ) if you haven’t already. Why not sign up to receive them regularly by email? Just click on “Follow” in the upper line on each page – and then on “LIKE” next to it. There is also the “SHARE” button underneath each article where you can submit the article to Pinterest, Google+, Twitter, Tumblr and StumpleUpon.

Follow on Twitter: @111publishing

And don’t forget to spread the word on other social networking sites of your choice for other writers who might also enjoy this blog and find it useful. Thanks, Doris
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