Your Writer Platform

Build your platform. Engage your fans. Sell more books.

How to Launch a Book With No Platform: Your Lean Launch Plan

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Having a solid platform and network in place before you launch your book gives you and your book a powerful advantage. 

Having a ready-made fan base will significantly increase the odds that your book launch will be successful—and that the goals you’ve set for yourself and your book will be reached or surpassed. 

Yet, despite this, many authors find themselves with the launch of their book imminent, and no platform or community in sight. 

With a book in hand (or nearly so), and no time for the long-term, slow-and-steady platform-building approach, what’s a panicked author to do? 

[Read more…]

Why Every Author Needs a Book Sales Funnel and How to Get Started Today

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author sales funnel

A book sales funnel is a series of steps carefully designed to guide readers toward your book, your brand, and ultimately toward making the decision to purchase from you. In this guest post, bestselling author and co-founder of BookAds.co, Brian Berni, shares his insights on why book sales funnels are a critical component to growing your book sales (while still allowing time to write).

Most writers got into the game to write, not spend every waking hour of the day promoting their books. 

However, there is a way to sell more books, reach new readers, and build your audience, all while giving you more time to write. 

It’s through building a book sales funnel.

Ultimately, the goal of a book sales funnel is to bring new readers into your world. A solid book sales funnel will help you get reader email addresses, so you can stay in touch, build a connection, and sell more books with ease.

Below you’ll learn how book funnels can help your author career, and the steps you can take to build a funnel today.

Why You Need a Book Sales Funnel

Imagine spending hours pouring over your new book. You’ve done rounds of editing, have the cover designed, book copy all finished up, now it’s time to launch your book to the world. 

[Read more…]

Book Marketing 101: The Crucial Basics of Promoting Your Book

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book marketing 101

Karen Ferreira’s creative agency specializes in providing high-quality, affordable illustration services for authors. 

As a keynote speaker at her annual conference, Children’s Book Mastery, Karen interviewed me about the crucial basics of promoting your book.

We explored the following:

  • What mindset should authors adopt when promoting their book?
  • What are the most crucial elements of promoting your book?
  • What are some creative and unusual ways to promote your book?
  • How can authors come up with their own marketing ideas?
  • How can an author create a promo kit for themselves?

Because book promotion is such an important – but challenging – topic, Karen generously provided a transcribed copy of our discussion to use here on the blog.

We wrapped up our chat with Karen asking me what my top tip is to help authors succeed. (You’ll have to scroll all the way to the bottom of the post to find my answer. ??)

[Read more…]

Launch Higher: How to Get Book Reviews Before Your Launch Date

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Launch Higher_ How to Get Book Reviews Before Your Launch Date _ YourWriterPlatform.com

We all know that reviews sell stuff. After all, when’s the last time you took a chance on buying something online, sight unseen, without checking the reviews? You want to know what other people who’ve already bought it think so that you can be sure you’re making the right choice.

That’s called social proof—when seeing that other people like something encourages you to try it yourself. And social proof isn’t just useful when buying a phone or a new pair of shoes. It sells books, too!

But reviews can feel like a chicken-and-egg situation sometimes. You need reviews to sell books…but you need people to buy your book in order to read and review it!

What’s a new author to do?

Get reviews before the book even comes out, of course!

You can get reviews even before your book launches—and doing so can help you launch your book higher, faster, because that social proof helps to snowball your exposure and your sales.

Let’s take a look at a few ways to start getting reviews to flood in before your book launches! [Read more…]

How to Confidently Plan and Execute a Successful Book Launch

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If done well, a book launch can create urgency, excitement, and unstoppable momentum for your book. It can also help you establish your brand, your message, and your presence on the web.

A launch will build your author business by increasing your email subscribers and social media followers. It will also expand your reach, your network, and may even present possible partnership opportunities with other authors, groups, and organizations.

Many authors struggle to find ways to promote and market their work, but your book itself is your marketing tool. You can use it to leverage multiple opportunities—like podcast and media interviews for example—especially during your launch.

And without question, a book launch is a celebration!

You deserve to highlight this amazing achievement. If you fail to reward yourself or acknowledge this significant milestone in your career as a writer it can be very disheartening. And remember, your enthusiasm for your new book is contagious—so it’s important to spread it around!

But here’s the thing, carefully preparing, timing, and executing just the right mix of launch activities to propel your new book out into the world is no simple task.

And although it may be difficult to nail down the exact return on investment you can expect to receive from your book launch, the real value is the attention you generate and the subsequent platform you build from your launch success.

[Read more…]

Authors with Platforms Sell Books.

It’s that simple.

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