Welcome back to our comprehensive guide on book marketing for beginners. In this third installment, we dive into the crucial decision phase. If you're joining us mid-series, be sure to check out the previous posts (Step 1, Step 2) to understand how we've guided potential readers from awareness to interest. Now, let's help them make that pivotal decision to buy your book.
Allison Ortiz, La Mirada (California) Community Library Manager and winner of the 2017 County of Los Angeles Public Librarian award shares more library tools to help guide interested readers into making a decision to buy your book. These resources mentioned (or ones like them) are FREE from your local library.
Help a Reader Decide to Buy Your Book
Imagine doing a web search for food, and stumbling upon a delightful restaurant you're almost set on visiting. Just as you're about to decide, you notice another restaurant a few scrolls down with higher Allireviews. Naturally, your plans suddenly sway towards the better-reviewed option.
Choosing a book can be quite similar. Now that we've piqued interest in your book, how can you help potential buyers decide to make the purchase? Customers typically use three methods to make this decision: independently evaluating your book, comparing it with others, and checking reviews.
Create Enticing Formatting
During the interest phase, you created a knock-out cover for your book. The reader is so intrigued that they pick up your book. They’re about to evaluate for themselves whether buying this book is worth their hard-earned time and money. They open the book and… Womp, Womp.
Your text is written with Comic Sans font (yeah, you thought it was cute at the time); there’s a funky spacing issue on the right hand margin that you were never able to fix, and you forgot to add Running Heads (that bit of text at the top that tells the reader which chapter of which book they’re reading). Your potential reader politely replaces your book on the shelf.
Here’s how you can avoid this cringy scenario. Your local library may just have a resource called “Pressbooks.” It’s available through the Los Angeles County Library. Allison says,
It's an online software to help you format your ebook.
This service normally starts at $120/year but is free through the library. It’s an incredible value. A professionally formatted book will stand out and keep potential readers from dropping your book like a hot potato.
Make sure to use either this or other professional formatting resources to properly format your novel. Having a professionally formatted book is a simple, but necessary way to help potential buyers decide to buy.
Compare Your Book with Similar Titles
Have you ever purchased a book just because it was compared to something you loved? Potential readers often compare your book to similar titles.
One resource the library has that can help you find comparable titles is a digital resource called “NoveList” and “NoveList K-8.” Allison says,
This is a great way to find read-alikes.
If you’re just getting started, start wide and narrow in. Allison says, “You can either search by genre or you can type in a specific books.”
Highlight these comparisons on your marketing platforms by describing your book in relatable terms, like "If you love X, you'll dive right into Y," This is a great way to save your potential reader from having to do more research about your book (which, if we’re honest, might simply mean another of those gut-wrenching back-button clicks).
After finding comparable titles, take it one step further. Allison says,
It [NoveList] is also going to give you tags that I think are helpful. Every Patron loves books for different reasons. Some might like it because it's fast-paced. Some might like it because it's suspenseful. And so those keywords are noted on each book.
For example, a test search on NoveList for The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins turned up the following tags:
Themes: Too good to be true; Altered memories; Unreliable narrator
Character: Unlikeable
Storyline: Intricately plotted; Nonlinear
Pace: Fast-paced
Tone: Suspenseful
Writing Style: Compelling; Stylistically complex
Find the tags that go with your comparable titles, and make sure to incorporate those keywords into your marketing copy. This means using them in your book blurb, in whatever ads you are running, and as a description of your writing style under your “About” page on your author website.
Validate Your Book Through Reviews
When you’re about to buy something, you often want to know what other people think about it. Reviews can be the tipping point for whether you hit “buy” or walk away. If you’ve ever been drawn in by an enthusiastic review or put off by a harsh one, you know how much influence they hold.
While not a library exclusive resource, Allison mentions Goodreads as a great resource for this purpose. She says,
Goodreads does a really good job of putting things in lists, and then also the reviews as well.
If you don’t already have reviews on Goodreads, create an author profile, link your book(s), and start by getting family and friends to contribute reviews. Be sure to link your Goodreads page to your fancy new website (created in Step 2), so that new readers can easily rate your book once they’ve read it.
As a Goodreads member, you can create your own lists. Write and include your book on a few lists, along with other notable books in similar genres. This has the double benefit of curating valuable lists that the community will find useful, and providing new readers an opportunity of rating your book.
Conclusion
In wrapping up this third part of our series on book marketing, we’ve explored strategies to help readers decide to purchase your book. Use tools like Pressbooks for professional formatting and NoveList for finding comparable titles, along with gathering reviews on platforms like Goodreads. This can significantly influence a reader’s decision to buy your book.
Stay tuned as we continue to the next stage in the book marketing funnel, finding a permanent place on readers' shelves—Action.
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