Promoting POD books on the web

Where is the online point of sale? You could start by putting that in your signature line

You can start an add campaign on facebook, myspace, twitter

I use a myspace bot (shh! you're not supposed to) which I use to do things like send automated friend requests--which I personalize with a little note saying how I found them like, "Hi, this is a page for my book. Since we're both friends with XXX, I thought you might want to check it out." Also, I can send automated messages to everyone in my friendlist, etc.

My myspace about me section has info about the book and a link to buy it. (I'm always amazed at how many author's myspace pages I go to where I can't find a link to the book.)

Facebook fan pages make it easy to communicate with all of your fans, but really hard to actually get fans. (You can't send fan requests.)

I made a book trailer, which I submitted to as many blogs that post book trailers as I could.

I twitter. I blog about books and TV shows that I am a fan of and that are similar to my book, in the hope that a search engine will lead someone there and they'll be curious about my book.

There are also some blogs that do reviews of P.O.D. books like the LL Book Review. You might want to try submitting your books there.

Newguy1428 said:

Hi, I usually post in the kids section. I have four POD books at booklab.com and I want to know how to promote them on the web besides listing at craigslist and youtube.

Any good sites?

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See this book for ideas.
--Ken

Well...since I am providing the novel for free online, I haven't really sold that many books. About halfway through serializing it, I made the whole thing available in print, hoping that people would want to know what happens and buy the whole book.

I have, I estimate, about 300 readers online, and I think most of them have come from my myspace friend requests. I've also been able to make some contacts via myspace and been asked to do an interview.

I've sold 23 copies in print, 14 Kindle copies, and about 5 ebooks. This is since the beginning of July.

Am I getting rich? Have I even made back my initial investment? Absolutely not. But, you know, it's not like I didn't know that selling self-published fiction was a steep uphill battle when I went into this thing. Overall, I'm just doing this for fun, as a hobby, so I'm pretty satisfied with the results.

I think the first question is where the sale point is. I couldn't find an online point of sale for OP's book. If sales occur offline only that is a different ball game.

I don't think Eragon was POD. I'm pretty sure that the kids family printed up a bunch of copies of the books themselves (they owned a press or were printers or something). I don't think Eragon was sold primarily through the web, but rather by going on the road with the book. I think they toured schools, maybe...

Someone can set me straight on this, I'm sure.

Christopher Paolini's Eragon was printed through a standard offset print run and published through his family owned small publishers who lent considerable push to it by 'touring' it through colleges and schools.

You can argue the point about it being self published, but really it's not an ideal example, and as with many 'self publishing successes' it was picked up by a major publisher soon after its initial self publication.

Don't just bombard social networking sites, people resent it. A lot depends on what your point of sale looks like and what payment it accepts. Could you please link to it?

Newguy1428 said:

. . . RG, I was looking at the book's description, that you recommended and it was less than enticing, no offense. It just didn't seem to make any promises. If you know what I mean? . . . .

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FWIW, I have known the author for years and have heard her make presentations on the topic to writers groups. The book was good enough that, after she had launched it experimentally via Lulu.com, Quill Driver Press picked it up for a commercial edition (albeit retitled). If you want to learn about online book marketing, that is an excellent place to start. Perhaps you can find a copy in a library (via interlibrary loan, if need be), to save the cost of the book.

--Ken

Newguy1428 said:

I am curious to know what the spam was? By Karunesh Agrawal.

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He posted solicitations to buy his printing or publishing services in numerous AW threads, one after another.

--Ken

Newguy1428 said:

RG, I was looking at the book's description, that you recommended and it was less than enticing, no offense. It just didn't seem to make any promises. If you know what I mean? I haven't checked out the bookstore specifically on this topic. I found some interesting sites through Verla Kay, though.

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If any book makes promises, it's full of lies.

There's no easy way to publishing success. And hoping to just pick up a book and get all the answers isn't going to get you very far.

Research. Research. Research.

Good luck!

[Agrawal spammer]

Think I came across him somewhere else. He runs a printers based in India.

Hmm...in the actual copy of the book, is it easier to read the blocks of copy? On the screen, several of them are over the illustrations, and the black text is disappearing into the black parts of the pictures. I like the illustrations themselves. They're very cute.

Since you're publishing a kid's picture book (I seem to have glossed over that info up there), I'm thinking that you need to really think about your audience, which would be parents of young children. Where do these people hang out on the web? You need to figure that out, and then you need to be there, with links to your book.

You might also consider taking the plunge and getting a domain name. It's not that expensive, and it's much easier to direct people to a website that is yourname.com rather than the very long booklab address.

Best of luck!!

I went to what I presume is your point of sale link. I think it needs work. Before you put effort into getting people to that website you need a website that is clear, easy to use and will convert clicks into sales. The site you linked doesn't clearly explain what the book is, how to personalise it, how to buy it, or price.