Authors are no strangers to doing lengthy research when it comes to writing their books, but research is something authors should also do when it comes to selling their books!
Today is all about blogging! I’ve been a blogger since 2006. I started my first blog missmakeamovie back then to promote and share my experiences while working on my romance novel documentary, Who’s Afraid of Happy Endings. It changed over the years to become the thepopculturedivas and morphed into a group blog that has seen many bloggers come and go! A few of our Lachesis Publishing authors currently write for the thepopculturedivas – including Alison E. Bruce (soon to be releasing a romantic suspense with us) and Christine Mazurk who is the author of the women’s fiction Passion’s Race and the novella Identity in the women’s fiction/romance Sisters of Spirit. I think group blogs are a great idea. If you don’t already blog then I suggest you either start your own group blog with authors who write in the same genre as you or find a group blog to join. The great thing about a group blog is that it is easier to maintain since you don’t have to post every day, and it increases your visibility through the other bloggers in the group.
I am a big advocate of blogging. I think it’s a great way to get your message out there without being limited by characters or anything else. And you can promote your blog posts on your different social media sites. If you don’t have a blog, I suggest that you set one up either through your own web site or on wordpress. The great thing about wordpress is that the more often you blog, the more often they will add you to the daily stream and the more readers and followers you will get. It takes time to build a following on a blog and there are many ways to do it – including telling all of your facebook friends or twitter friends but you can find new followers on the actual blog sites. I’ve done that with my blog therevolvingbook.com. The other thing is make sure you buy the domain name for your blog. It’s not expensive and it just looks better and more professional. And if you don’t buy it, someone else will! You don’t want that to happen, especially if you have a great blog name. BTW I always promote our daily blog posts on all of my social media sites and my blogs: thepopculturedivas and therevolvingbook.com.
Blog Tours: The other aspect of blogging is the blog tour. I am a big fan of this as well because it gets you out in front of lots of potential readers. It takes a while to convince someone to buy your book, you have to be out there on a regular basis for people to get to know you and what you have to offer. In fact, I’ll be doing one for Lachesis Publishing very soon! I’ll keep you posted about that. Here’s a great article I found online that lists some of the better blog tour outfits out there. The article is: 7 Top E-book Blog Tour Sites. The article appears on The Book Designer blog. The Book Designer is a great web site that offers lots of tips about blogging and publishing.
Hyperlinks: What are hyperlinks and why are they important? Hyperlinks make your blog interactive and come alive. They also help you promote content within your blog and on other sites. If you post an article on your own blog and you want to let readers know about your facebook page and your twitter page then include a hyperlink. You copy the url link of your facebook page and then link the words follow me on facebook on your blog (you don’t have to use those exact words. 😉 I also like to make my hyperlinks bold! You always want to make it as easy as possible for people to follow you and buy your books. When you mention your book title in a blog post (or anyone’s book title) Always hyperlink the title to amazon and Lachesis Publishing or the web site of the author you are writing about, or their publisher’s site or any other site where the books you mention are sold. So important!
Tags: I cannot tell you how much I love tags! Make sure you always tag your blog posts. Tags are key words that define your blog posts. They are also key words that people out there google when they are searching. For example, the key words for this post will include, blogging, blog tours, book promotion, promoting your book, Christine Mazurk and Alison E. Bruce. Why? Because when someone out there googles Christine Mazurk there will be a lot more links for her because I have hyperlinked and tagged her right here! Try googling your own name and see. I’ve been doing this since we started the Lachesis Publishing Daily Blog. Always hyperlink and tag!! You want lots and lots of pages with your name to appear on google so it’s easier for people to find you. And because it gives your name more online real estate and therefore more visibility.
More on blogging in future posts. But for now, get blogging! 🙂
Joanna D’Angelo is Editor in Chief at Lachesis Publishing. She loves Cinnamon Dolce Lattes, a good book and blogging!
therevolvingbook 