By Steve Parr
Congratulations, you listened to that inner voice of yours
and finally decided to write and publish your first book. Unless you were famous, you probably had to
have it self-published. In today’s world
a lot of first-time published authors will falsely rely upon social media and
the promise of being available on Amazon and Barnes and Noble to sell your
books.
Do not believe it.
First, know that over one million new books
are published yearly in the United States.
This is not a negative for you, a first-time author, to dwell on. It is, however, a reason for you to develop a
target audience and begin to cultivate your target base.
Let the passion of why and what you wrote carry over to the
next step of sustaining your activity as an author, by developing a marketing
plan. Email addresses announcing your
book and personal telephone calls letting friends and acquaintances know of
your efforts should be a first activity.
Second, download all the independent bookstores located within a one to
two-hour drive from where you live and on Saturday mornings visit the stores
introducing yourself and your book to the owners.
Always carry a box of 10 to 20 copies of your book in the trunk
of your car. Do not be shy even if you
are a shy person by nature. (This is how
John Grisham got started before he became a household name.)
1) Call the bookstore
a few days before a Saturday morning when you’re available to drive and ask for
the hours of operation;
2) Ask if the store
carries your book genre;
3) Ask for the
owner’s name and if he or she will be there on that date;
4) Be sure to visit the store on the date you were informed
would be open to you, promptness sells!
5) Let the visit “introduction” of your book to the
bookstore owner be as long or short as the owner dictates;
6) Leave a book with your author’s business card included;
7) Inquire about book signings, do they sponsor them?
8) If so, remember
you will be responsible for drumming up local support for people to come to the
date set for such a signing.
The more bookstores, libraries and clubs you visit or speak
to, the more you will become known, plus the more articles, interviews and
books you write will allow you to grow your audience. Remember emails and local telephone calls are
the easiest and cheapest way to get started.
Set a reasonable goal of one hundred books to sell for your first
book.
Remember passion will inspire
believing in yourself and your natural shyness to sell your book will fade as people
will respond to a friendly voice and a friendly face. All the owners and all your friends know that
you just want the minimum recognition for your efforts. Determine that you will write that second
book before you start selling the first and you will get your mindset correct. You are an author, you have something special
to say. Determine to enjoy meeting new
people by phone, email, in person and enjoy the exposure.
Start now, do a little at a time. Give yourself a genre to market your first
book. That could mean you have sent out
over 500 emails, made 300 telephone calls, visited one hundred bookstores and
had four to ten book signings. If you
can do this, you would have done more than most people are willing to do, but
you will have become a full-time author.
Congratulations on being a real professional!
_________________________________________________________________
Steve Parr is
originally from North Little Rock, Arkansas and has called Memphis, Tennessee
home for the past 38 years. He graduated from Vanderbilt University with a major
in business and East Asian history and earned an MBA from Emory University.
He worked for Goldman Sachs for 18 years and has
in past years been an entrepreneur, owning his own business. He has published one devotional book, the first in
a series of five, written in Haiku poetry style. The other four will be
published shortly.Steve is a prolific writer with an interest in
narrative writing, memoir and short stories in addition to his devotional
writing.
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