Marketing My Self Published Book: A first-time author’s journey

Part One

After spending years writing KINGSLEY, I felt like everyone knew everything about my novel.  Family and friends had heard about it, read excerpts, and even backed my Kickstarter campaign to push KINGSLEY through the final steps of publication.

A month before KINGSLEY launched, I contacted a local book store to host the launch party.  The date was set, invitations sent, menu planned.  About 50 people attended, filling the small bookstore.

Certainly by now, everyone in the world had heard about KINGSLEY, right?

All I had to do was watch the sales numbers to learn the truth.

Over my next few posts, I will lead you through my meandering marketing of KINGSLEY.  My failures, my successes, and what I learned along the way.

Let’s start at the beginning.   I decided to publish KINGSLEY through Amazon (eBook) and Create Space (an Amazon company that prints paperbacks.)  I found both easy to use and cost effective.  Their websites are clear and their technical support is great.  Need help in a hurry?   Create Space gives you the option to input your phone number on their help page and receive an immediate call back.

The upside to using Amazon and Create Space is obvious.  Amazon is the largest book seller in the world!  This meant I could market my novel to the entire world.

Theoretically…

Good luck with that.  It’s hard enough getting people in your town to buy your book, let alone readers in France or Japan to purchase an unknown book by an obscure author written in English.  But at least by using Amazon, readers in other countries have the opportunity to buy my book.

The downside of using Create Space to print your book is that some bookstores, including Barnes and Noble, won’t work with Create Space.   Amazon is their competitor. If you find a way to make a deal with Walmart, Barnes and Noble, or Costco please let me know and I will pass it along!

Now that I’ve told you what you can’t do, stay tuned for ideas on how and where to sell your self-published book.