Marketing your Book Across the Social Web - Angela Connor

I am thrilled to introduce you to this week's guest blogger. I met Angela Connor through a friend and colleague. She is the author of "18 Rules of Community Engagement: A Guide to Building Relationships and Connecting With Customers Online" and the creator of a great online blog entitled, "Online Community Strategist." Today, Angela will speak to us about how to use the social web to market your book.

Before we get to Angela's post, I have a quick announcement. Chapter 8 of The Samson Effect has been released this week. If you haven't started the action/adventure book that NY Times best selling author Clive Cussler calls a "first rate thriller brimming with intrigue and adventure," you can start right at Chapter 1 by visiting the Table of Contents.

Now, on to Angela's post.


Marketing your Book Across the Social Web
By Angela Connor

As a new author, I am absorbing all of the information I can find about book marketing. Some methods seem tried and true, and others hit or miss, but much of what I am coming across doesn't seem to incorporate the advantages of the web, particularly the social web.

I will tell you right now that I am not averse to trying the unconventional when it comes to spreading the word and generating buzz about my book: "18 Rules of Community Engagement: A Guide to Building Relationships and Connecting With Customers Online". In fact, my approach has been anything but conventional. I have found that my social networks are a lifeline, and the connections made well before I was in the position to offer a product of this magnitude matter a great deal. The trusted relationships and networks built before your book is published can and will serve you in many ways. It just takes a bit of creativity and commitment to going beyond the obvious.

If you think about it, social networking is about sharing, and we all want people to share information about us and most importantly our books. And with all of the social platforms available, we must find ways to tailor our message to fit as many as possible. So without further adieu, here are a few ideas you might want to consider to put your book marketing into overdrive and jumpstart your quest to build a presence across the social web. All it requires is an open mind and willingness to take action.

Turn your media kit into a slideshow

I am a big fan of SlideShare. It suddenly occurred to me one day as I was uploading a presentation that I could easily upload other content. With that in mind, I created a media kit and posted it on SlideShare. It makes your information immediately available for sharing, embedding on blogs and provides a URL you can share with anyone interested. As of this writing, my media kit slideshow has been viewed 418 times and saved as a favorite three times. You can read more about the benefits of SlideShare in this post on my blog.

Write a guest post on an interesting blog

That is exactly what I'm doing here. It is always a good idea to introduce yourself and your book to a new audience. Cathy Stucker has created a business matching up bloggers with guest bloggers with BloggerLinkUp. I contacted Cathy for this post and asked her why she created the service. "I always see more site visitors, more subscribers and more sales when I actively place my content on other people's sites. The problem has always been finding the sites that not only have the right audience, but are open to receiving submissions. That is why I created BloggerLinkUp.com--to make that process easier for everyone." I have made one connection with BloggerLinkUp so far and would encourage you to give it a try.

Sponsor an event

Sponsorships are not only for corporations with deep pockets. Look for conferences coming to your area, especially those related to any aspects of social media and become a sponsor. You'd be surprised at the cost of some of the lower tier sponsorships. I was recently a sponsor for WordCampRDU, (a popular conference for bloggers who use Wordpress) and that gave me the opportunity to place postcards promoting my book into 100 gift bags and provide a few books as giveaways, all for the $75.

These are just a few ideas to get you going. I have at least ten more but Tony welcomed me as a guest here on his blog and I don't want to overstay my welcome. So, I will leave you with this: If you have not yet built much of a social media presence, it's never too late to start. If you have an idea, run with it. Be like Nike, and just do it. Who cares if it's never been done. That's all the more reason to jump in head-first. I may be new to book marketing but I am in no way intimidated. I bring a new perspective to the craft and I will try every avenue available to me and then some. Won't you join me?

Angela Connor is the author of 18 Rules of Community Engagement: A Guide for Building Relationships and Connecting With Customers Online. She is a multimedia journalist and community manager and writes the highly read blog, "Online Community Strategist." You can find Angela on Twitter as @communitygirl, and contact her via e-mail at Angela-at-AngelaConnor-dot-com.