Yes. Though I've never bought one because of a bookmark.
No, neither have I. I like bookmarks, I use them, but I don't think I've ever bought a book because of one.
Here's what Nicola has to say about postcards:
I recently conducted some modestly scientific research and I bring you the results: buying postcards in an attempt to support my books is a) far too expensive and b) utterly pointless if measured by ensuing book sales.
I agree with Nicola; but I'm also skeptical that the things you outlined are going to work any more effectively than the postcards Nicola is no longer going to buy.
As far as the other stuff, I'd like to do that stuff too, but I have no idea how to go about it. Heck, I'm not even sure what most of that is. How do I do email to advertise? I don't want to spam people. I was thinking of a newsletter, but who the heck would sign up for it as it's my first book.
Inbound marketing strategy? No clue.
Vince, I'm glad you said that. You're not the only one. I was hoping Gale would explain a little more, but he hasn't: perhaps he will now.
Gather round, children. I am about to tell you a story which appears to be all about me.
A long time ago, I was a marketing director for a small division of a huge company. Before I turned up, marketing there consisted mostly of buying ads in the magazines which reviewed the computer games the company published, sending out review copies, and arranging launch parties for the press who would then, it was hoped, review the games favourably because we'd given them an evening of free food and drink. It worked reasonably well, but no one could tell me what happened when we didn't do any of that stuff, or what else might be effective, or how to focus our efforts to reach more specific gamers.
I asked those questions and couldn't understand half of the answers I was given, because all those marketing types talked in jargon. This made it hard for anyone outside that jargon loop to understand what they were talking about; and it led to all sorts of confusion as people had different understandings of the various phrases used. And confusion is not good. Clarity is much better.
So I asked my staff to produce a very brief report--half a page, perhaps--on each activity they planned to do, before they did it, which spelled out how much it would cost, who they hoped it would reach, why those were the right people to be reaching for this title, and so on; and I asked them to use plain English, rather than jargon.
I also compared the launch party guest-lists to the resulting reviews, and discovered that the same four or five reviewers routinely gave our games good coverage, but that the other fifty or sixty people who attended those events did very little to help promote our games.
My staff didn't like my changes one bit. But they were really helpful, and they worked.
We stopped buying ads just because that's what had always been done; we stopped throwing parties for every title and instead took those four or five reviewers out for lunch or dinner every month or two, and gave them exclusive previews and exciting stuff. And we switched much of our marketing spend from trade events to more public events, so that we were focusing on the gamers directly.
How well did it work? One of the sales departments which I worked very closely with had an average monthly turnover of £5,000 when I joined the company. The third month after I joined its turnover was £250,000, and it maintained an average turnover of about £180,000 after that. I was quite pleased with that result, especially as I'd negotiated a commission based on a percentage of turnover. Ha!
All I did was look at what was being done, and see if it could be done more effectively. Which is what Nicola Morgan has done in the article I linked to above. We could all do that now, for our books. It's difficult if you're working alone and don't have much data to work with, but it can be done.
What is the book about? Have you considered email,
Emails from people I don't know get deleted unopened. I don't usually subscribe to newsletters and when I do, I rarely actually read them. And there's a whiff of spamminess from email selling which puts me off buying any books advertised this way.
using web banners where your demographic has high traffic,
I don't buy books because I see them in web banners. I can see how this might work for non-fiction; but when it comes to fiction I'll probably already be aware of forthcoming novels written by authors I know and like, and I'm certainly not going to buy novels from writers I don't know because of a web banner. It's just not going to happen. I discover new writers by browsing for them, not through online advertising.
or spending extra time on inbound marketing strategy?
Please clarify what you mean by this because while I could make a stab at it, I can't be sure I've got it right.
(I'm not assuming you haven't I'm just trying to help). Most of these options can be very affordable and will return your investment back to you if you spend enough time planning them well.
I'm interested to hear that most of these options will earn enough to return the original investment: do you have any sources or anecdotes which support this claim? I'm sure that many of our members could benefit from such help.
