The Ultimate Author Checklist To Selling More Books

THE ULTIMATE
AUTHOR
CHECKLIST
TO SELLING MORE BOOKS
by Talk+Tell
by Talk+Tell
By Talk + Tell
Welcome
I am glad that you’ve decided to take action in promoting your book by downloading
The Ultimate Author Checklist To Selling More Books.
I’m Lyda Mclallen and I provide self-publishing services and Book Marketing Services for
authors through Talk+Tell.
I started Talk+Tell after working for international companies for 8+years. I wanted to
leave the corporate world to help authors and small businesses achieve the same
marketing and PR results that I helped large corporations and international bestselling
authors gain. So far I have!
Not only have I helped publish over 80 books but also the authors I have worked with
have gone on cross-country book tours, worked with 100s of top influencers, been
featured in BBC, Vogue, Huffington Post, and more, sold 100,000s of books, attracted
15k in leads a month, and have become International bestsellers.
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My goal is to continue working
with new authors who want to
sell more books and achieve
success.
I've seen first hand (over and over) the power of how a good social media, PR, and
marketing strategy can completely transform a book’s success. Helping authors grow
their readership is what excites my team and me. Because who doesn’t love
discovering a brand new book?
Ultimate Author Checklist To Selling More Books' has some super simple
This '
nuggets of wisdom for you to implement. Remember your book is a product and you
need to treat your book as a business. The most profitable business is often the
simplest, so don’t get bombarded with trying to do #allthethings because it will never
get you to #allthemoney.
As an author, you can achieve success! By using PR and Digital marketing strategies,
you can sell more books, quit your day job, and become a full-time writer.
P.S. If you are looking for daily Book Marketing Tips then join my exclusive
Facebook Group for authors by
clicking here!
Putting Your Numbers Into
Action
Before we begin, we need to understand how many books you need to sell for you to quit
your day job, fund that sweet vacation, support the writing of your next book and/or
become a full-time writer. So how do you sell enough books to get there? Well, let’s
reverse engineer this.
(Or is your book a business card? Where your goal is to use your book as a strategy to gain
new clients? If that is the case, skip this part and contact me for a free consultation.)
1. How much does your book cost?
__________________________
2. How much do you want to make each month?
__________________________
3. How many books do you need to sell to reach your monthly income goal?
__________________________
4. How many books do you currently sell per month?
__________________________
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5. How many people do you currently have on your mailing list?
__________________________
6. How many subscribers on your mailing list convert into book sales per month?
__________________________
7. So to make $___ months, how many leads do you need to convert?
__________________________
8. Do you have enough people in your community and newsletter to make this
happen right now?
__________________________
9. So to summarize you need ________ book sales per month to make $________
months and for that you would need about ________ new people on your list each
and every month.
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Start Selling More Books
Checklist
1. Understand WHO Your Ideal Reader Is
Outline who your target reader is.
Make a list of social media channels your target reader is on.
Create messages and taglines that speak to your target reader.
2. Get Visible
Claim your Goodreads account.
Create an Author Central Account.
Create an Author Website.
Create author accounts on the social media channels your target reader is on.
Choose and outline a long term marketing strategy that will give you long term results.
3. Engage with Your Audience
Start connecting with your target reader on Social Media (through groups, forum, ads etc.)
Engage with your target reader by contributing to THEIR conversation.
Give your readers something of value. Like the first few chapters of your book or a live Q&A with you the
author.
Share new content everyday.
4. Grow Your Readership
Outline a content strategy.
Outline and implement a PR strategy that will help promote your book to mass readers.
Make a list of people that you would like a testimonial from and contact them.
Create a social media schedule.
Grow your email list by adding a call to action on your website that prompts your website traffic to give
you their email address.
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1
Understand WHO
Your Ideal Reader Is
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One of the primary reasons you use marketing strategies is to increase visibility. You
want to get your book (and yourself) in front of your ideal readers. So, to get visible,
you need to market your book.
Know Who You Are
Promoting Your Book To
Before you start promoting your book online, you need to first outline who your target
reader is, what online platforms they use, and what value does your book offer them.
To get you started, try answering these questions.
1. Who is your ideal reader?
2. What social networks do your readers frequent?
3. What motivates your readers to decide to buy your books?
4. What is your readers’ pain points and does your book offer a prescription?
5. What is your objective with your marketing?
6. Do you have a budget for marketing?
7. Are you committed to consistent efforts in your marketing and sales?
The answers to these questions will help you develop your messaging and overall
marketing strategy. It will also help you understand what genres and subgenres your
book fits under.
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Get
2 Visible
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Once you know who your audience is it is time to build and optimize all of the
platforms your book and author brand needs to be on.
There are three main platforms you MUST be on:
There are three main platforms you MUST be on:
Goodreads
As an author, you don’t need to use Goodreads extensively, unless it is part of your
marketing strategy. However, there are two things I recommend every author do on
Goodreads. These are quick, one-time tasks that you can do if you don’t want to
invest in yet another social network.
Claim Your Author Profile
The first thing you should do is claim your author profile. Just follow the instructions on
Goodreads and let them know that you are the author of your book. Setting up an
author profile is one more place online where readers can find you, and since your
author page is just one click away from your book’s page, it’d be great if there was
something there for your readers to find.
Make Sure Your Books Are In The Goodreads Database
The second thing you should do is make sure all of your books are listed on
Goodreads. Search the Goodreads site for each of your books, and if one isn’t listed,
go ahead and add it. It’s important to make sure your books are on Goodreads so
that when your readers want to add one of your books to their shelves, it’s there
waiting for them.
Amazon Author
Central
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It is incredible to me that most authors aren’t even aware that Amazon provides a
FREE author page to each and every author who has an ISBN. Amazon author central
is a great marketing tool to help authors, better market their books. The most
significant benefit is that it allows you to control your personal author page and
optimize your metadata to increase organic traffic to your book page.
Here is a list of the main things you can do through Amazon author central:
- Improve Your Amazon Search
- Track Your Sales
- Add More Books
- Connect With Readers
- Fix Technical Issues
Author Website
If you want to grow your readership, the first thing you need is an author website.
You’ll want that author website launched months before your book is available. Your
website acts as a resource and place where people can find everything there is to
know about you the author and your book.
Interested readers shouldn't have to fight to find out more about you and your books.
If they do end than you lost them as a reader. Having an author website is like having
a headquarters or an information center. It's a place to send people who want to
know more about what you're doing.
I recommend setting up a simple website. Your author website does not need to be
complicated.
With Squarespace, you can easily create a site that suits your needs. I recommend
starting with a home, about and contact page–as well as a page for each of your
novels. Once you have these pages established, you can then add a blog and/or
email list when you have the time to maintain it.
(P.S. I'm not getting paid by Squarespace in any way. I just really like them.)
Where To
Start?
When first starting out, don’t try and do all the things. If you do, nothing will get done.
Instead, focus on 1-3 social media platforms and/or campaigns to grow your
community. When choosing which platforms to work on think about where your target
audience hangs out and how they consume information. For example, if your reader is
not on Facebook, but they are on Pinterest- that means you don’t need a Facebook
page. Instead, you need to be super active on Pinterest.
The top social media platforms to be on for authors are:
1. Facebook
2. Instagram
3. Twitter
4. Pinterest
5. Youtube
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Visibility is a result of the type of marketing you do. To get the greatest results for your
efforts, look for marketing strategies that have a long shelf life. The more you focus on
the long-term, the greater your results.
Long shelf-life marketing strategies are where your efforts pay off for weeks, months,
even years down the road. A few of the ways you can create long-term results are by:
-Blogging regularly
-Guest blogging on other websites
-Doing a Book Blog tour
-Being Interviewed by Media
-Being interviewed on Podcast shows
-Building lead funnels
-Being active on Social Media by posting regularly and engaging with your audience
Ultimately, you market to sell books — the more visible your book, the more copies you
are bound to sell.
Selling books can lead to not just profit, but also
speaking opportunities, consulting contracts, interviews,
and joint venture partnerships.
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3
Engage
with
Your
Audience
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Once you know what platforms to use and have created them it is time to start
engaging with your audience. Building an active audience does not begin with
publishing a ‘buy now’ post.
Your future readers are not going to buy your book instantly if you tell them too. They
need to be nurtured towards making that purchase. Genuine interactions breed trust
and trust cultivates love. When you gain that love, sales will naturally roll right on in.
Why? Because when your readers love you, they can't wait to get their hands on your
latest work!
That's why building trust is absolutely pivotal to growing a devoted readership.
So how do you build trust? Don’t worry I have you covered with these four tactics to
employ as you interact and grow your readership:
Connect. Make an effort to connect with potential readers.
Engage. Treat your readers as friends. Reach out, ask questions.
Join the Facebook groups they are apart of and be apart of their
conversations.
Offer Quality. Always look to serve the reader first. Give them
something of value. Giving your target readers value will help you
build trust and online relationships.
Be personal. Let the reader inside your world. Not by posting
endless selfies or cat videos. But instead, share your writing journey.
Share the highs and lows. Be a real human that they can relate to.
If you employ these four tactics you will start to see
steady, quality growth.
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4
Grow Your
Readership
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Now let’s talk about what you really want to know: how to start growing your
readership! Whether you want to build a full-blown career as a novelist, bring in a few
extra bucks on the side, or you want to use your book as a business card, growing your
readership is pivotal to making sales.
There’s no magic involved in increasing readership. If you just release your book on
Amazon and do no marketing, I can promise that no readers will download your book.
(well maybe your mom will) If you want readers, you have to earn them.
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Here are some ways that authors can gain
a broader readership base:
1. Position your expertise with content marketing.
Content marketing is a must do in today’s industry. Your goal is to create content that
offers value to your ideal readers. The more value it offers the bigger the chance that
your audience will share it and trust you.
2. Use PR to get your brand out there fast!
Identify radio and podcast shows that are a great fit for your book. Media can give you
instant trust with your target audience. Why? Because people trust the media. Media
will also give you the opportunity to reach thousands of people at once. (and possibly
millions) If you are a new author who has never been interviewed before, don’t start by
pitching your book or expertise to national media. Instead, you will have a better
chance of being featured if you pitch to local or small-scale media.
There are hundreds of different PR campaigns that you can use to promote your book.
But not all of these campaigns will work for you. Focus on creating a PR strategy that is
tailored to your target audience. Remember, just because one campaign worked for
another author doesn’t mean it will work for you.
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3. Get Book Reviews and Testimonials.
Now I am not talking about asking people to write a review on your Amazon book
page. Instead ask high profile influencers, celebrities, journalists and people of
influencer to provide your book a review/testimonial.
A review from a high profile person gives you credibility. When you get these reviews,
you can add them to your website, share them on social media, add them to your
Amazon book page (under book description or your bio) and add them to your back
book cover or first few pages in your book.
If you are a new author, you have no symbolic capital. You are not yet known to
produce quality books that seduce readers. But book reviews and testimonials will help
you build symbolic capital and will help you create trust with your readers. For example,
if Oprah recommends your book who wouldn’t want to read it?
How do you get book reviews? By reaching out. Make a list of people that you would
like a testimonial from. These people can be Instagram influencers, professors, fellow
authors, politicians, journalists, etc. Once you have a list, send out an email to everyone
asking if they would like to review a copy of your book and provide you with a
testimonial. Make sure each email you send out is personalized.
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Here’s a sample request for an endorsement that
you can send out via e-mail:
Hi <>,
I loved your book <title> and found it enlightening because…<briefly explain>
I have a new book coming out this winter: <title>. It is about <brief description, just two
or three sentences>.
I am in the process of gathering endorsements for the jacket. Would you consider
providing a testimonial? I would be happy to send you sample chapters or the entire
manuscript for review—whatever you prefer.
Thanks very much for your consideration!
Warm wishes,
<your name>
Note that this email begins by complimenting the author’s work. This isn’t sucking up; it’s
demonstrating that you are a fan of their work and creates an instant rapport. Your
first sentence should show that you know who they are and you have done some
research about them. (flattery will get you everywhere!).
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4. Use Social Media To Your advantage
If your author's website is where you send readers, then social media is where you meet
them. Online, at least.
The key to using social media well is to start small. Choose one or two of your favorite
social media sites and begin rocking the heck out of those sites. Really work to make a
splash among the writing and reading communities there.
I know social media can be time-consuming, but it doesn't have to be. Just twenty
minutes a day can make a huge difference!
Social media is a great way for you to build visibility organically. Having a strong social
media presence will also help you get noticed by media. Plus it gives you the
opportunity to engage with your target readers authentically.
I actually have a complete guidebook to social media (that is over 20 pages). You can
access it here.
5. Grow Your Email List
Once you've created your author website and mastered your social media schedule,
you are going to want to start growing your email list. Each email subscriber you get is
a lead. And that lead can be converted into a sale by sending them nurturing emails.
To gain new email subscribers, you’ll want to add a call to action on your website that
prompts your website traffic to give you their email address. This call to action could
be in the form of offering a newsletter, or where you give the first few chapters of your
book for free in exchange for their email address.
Just remember that people will only give you their email address if you can offer them
something of value in return.
Creating a sign-up form and emailing your list on a regular basis is a great way to
remind your readership that 1) you exist and 2) you are awesome.
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Want More
Marketing
Tips?
It can be SUPER hard to do this on your own, but I don’t
want you to feel that way! Which is why I will be sending
weekly marketing tips and challenges to help you start
selling your book. If you are looking to jumpstart your
marketing efforts and want to know where you should
start then I would love to offer you a free 30 minute
consultation.
Send me an email at lyda.mclallen@talkplustell.com
to schedule a meeting.
In the meantime, if you have any questions, don't be
afraid to send me an email asking them.
You can also ask them in my new Facebook group,
Publishing & Marketing Your Book, by clicking here.
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