I have read and seen a lot of self-published novels and have published two myself. The whole process can be very rewarding. But one thing I have noticed about self-published authors is that they tend to skip over the marketing aspects of their book. It is true that you are a writer, but if you are a self-published writer you have to be more than just a writer. You also have to be a marketer. No doubt you already know this. But did you know that your book itself is a valuable marketing tool you can use to sell your other books or writing?
Okay, so what should you put on the last page of your novel?
You need to put on your marketer’s hat and do a little marketing of yourself to your reader. Do you have another book coming out? Have you previously published a book? Do you have a website or a blog? Put information about all these things at the back of your book. Your reader has purchased your book and will probably be very interested in finding more of your material. Make it easy for him or her to find more! And make it easy for your reader to recommend you to his or her friends. A website url is free and very easy for your reader to pass along to a colleague or friend.
I recommend you spend a significant amount of time on this. And ideally you should have at least five or six pages of information about your projects, yourself, and anything related to learning more about you. I would even go as far as putting your email address there too. (Of course, you need to be confident that you will be keeping the same email account for the next several years.)
Why should you do this?
There are two very important rules of marketing, and putting sales materials in the back of your book is a good way to take advantage of the second rule. The first rule is that a first time sale is very difficult to get. And the second rule is that a repeat customer is very easy to get. Making the sale of your book to someone was a difficult thing. You had to somehow find the people that were interested in your particular book and this is a challenge. Then you had to convince them to purchase it. And this was even harder. But after all that work you have come up with a group of people who have bought your book. Don’t let these people disappear! They are highly interested customers and are very likely to purchase more of your writing. But you don’t need to go through the process of finding them all over again. You already have them and they already have your marketing materials in their hands –your book.
Help your reader become an advocate for you!
People can be very passionate about the books they read; and discovering a new author is something few readers can resist telling their friends about. Make it easy for your reader to spread the word about you. The conversation would go something like this: “I just finished this great novel. You have got to check this author out. His website is in the back of the book. Let me get the url for you.”
Writing a book is a challenge. But as a self-published author you will not be able to publish the book and then wait for the world to discover it. You have to take an aggressive approach to marketing it. And once the book is sold don’t let that be the end of the marketing. If you have lots of materials and resources about you and your writing in the back of your book. It will act as a tool to continue your marketing efforts for years to come without any added effort on your part.
I have lots more articles on writing fantasy here
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