This week's video tips also looks at using Internet search skills to find marketing opportunities. In the video, we assume we have written a book on bottle cap collecting and then go out and try to unlock marketing opportunities by using our search skills. Part 1 examines using Google, Yahoo, and a metasearch engine called Dogpile. Part 2 examines using DMOZ, Wikipedia, Social Networking sites (using Facebook as our example), and Amazon.com. If you have not signed up for my free weekly Video Marketing Tips For Authors newsletter, you can do so by visiting http://www.marketingtipsforauthors.com/videotips.html You can even view a sample video there before signing up for the free newsletter.
When you are looking for marketing opportunities for your book, the Internet can be a place to help you uncover:
1. International Opportunities
2. Low Cost/No Cost Opportunities
3. Gems that often get overlooked by others
In essence, you can tailor your search activities to help you create a powerful Word Of Mouth marketing plan. Once you get the buzz going and people chattering about your book, then you will have publicity worth hundreds of times that of paid advertisement. The downside of this kind of marketing is that it takes perseverance, patience, and elbow grease. Ads, on the other hand, give you immediate exposure, cost money, and usually have someone else doing the work of getting your message in front of others.
When I start a search campaign, I usually do it with the goal of uncovering the contact information of someone who can influence others (ie, a blogger, author, business owner, etc). While I do work directly with reporters and editors, I try to find the people who have influence that others may overlook. For example, in the video tips where we published a fictitious bottle cap collection book, we found an international bottle cap collection society (honest, there is one), a small online wine and beer company that also sells books and bottle caps on the net, and many local bottle cap collector groups. Each of these, to varying degrees, will have people we can contact who can influence others about our book.
Once I have the contact information, I then contact the person and introduce myself. After a dialog is started, I let them know I would be thrilled to contribute an article or other resources to their members/customers. At this point, my main goal is to become a valuable resource to the person and hopefully get my name in front of their members/customers. If I do establish a relationship with the person, I treat their customers/members with velvet gloves. The highest honor someone can pay you is to introduce and recommended you to their followers. If you ever take advantage of that gift, you can do great harm to your reputation and image.
Here are some places I search, and how I use the results in my marketing efforts:
1. Search Engines- Everyone has their favorites. I generally use two to three to make sure I give myself the best possible results. You will always find some results that show up high in one search engine and not in the other. The three I use are Google, Yahoo, and Dogpile. Dogpile is interesting in that it's a metasearch engine. That means instead of searching the web for results, it searches other search engines. Dogpile, for example, returns search results from Google, Yahoo, Ask, and Live Search. Metasearch engines won't always return a deep selection of results, but they can give you a wonderful overview of the links out there for you to look at.
2. Directories- Directories are collection of links sorted by subject matter. They usually have a search feature to find and narrow the results your are looking for. In my opinion, the best directories are the Human Edited Directories. That means that when people submit links to be included in the directory, a human views the submission and approves or denies the request. This is a great way to keep spam out of the directory. Some of the best directories, in my opinion, are Yahoo's Directory and DMOZ (Google's directory is a re-branding of DMOZ.org).
3. Wikipedia- Wikipedia is an internet encyclopedia written by--you. Well, by anyone who wants to submit articles to it. There is a review of submitted articles before they go live, but none-the-less, anyone can sign up to be an editor for Wikipedia. It has a strong reputation, though you need to be aware that the information is as only good as the quality of the person submitting it. That said, you can find great marketing opportunities in Wikipedia by searching your topic and visiting the further reading, see also, and external links section at the bottom of each article.
4. Social Networking Sites- These include sites like Facebook, MySpace, Shelfari, GoodReads, etc... While you need to be careful on how you conduct marketing activities on these sites, there are some simple searches you can do to open some opportunities to you. Here is just one idea for you. Search the groups. Most of these sites have groups. When you find the ones that deal with your subject, introduce yourself to the group's creator. Let them know who you are and what expertise you have and then volunteer yourself as a resource to the group. This can be writing articles for the group or engaging in Q&A with the members. You can also post tools and resources to the membership, once you join the group. The secret here is really putting yourself out as a resource to the group and not as a salesperson trying to sell something to the members. By approaching social networking groups in the right way, you can have a powerful word of mouth campaign started for you.
5. Amazon.com- Here's one that authors often miss as a marketing opportunity. By searching Amazon.com, you can find authors who may be willing to co market their book with you. You may also find people selling non-book items. In many cases, these people have online businesses. By visiting their site, you can quickly see if they have a newsletter (marketing opportunity) or if they sell books on their site. You may be surprised at how many marketing opportunities open up to you by spending just a little time on Amazon.com and finding some non-traditional search results.
Parting Words
Well, this just scratches the surface on what you can do to use your Internet search skills to find some little marketing gems. Once you start thinking outside the box with your marketing activities, you will never lack ideas to pursue.
**NOTE** Tomorrow, we have a guest writer sharing his marketing ideas. Michael Balkind is the author of Sudden Death and will talk to us about his successful experience at using contests as a marketing activity. You won't want to miss what he has to say.
Tony Eldridge
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