Nine Big Reasons to Learn to Love Amazon

By Carolyn Howard-Johnson, 
author of the multi award-winning HowToDoItFrugallySeries of books for writers

 

Remember the little greeting card girl who looked like Pipi Longstockings? She put her hands on her hips, stamped her little foot, glowered out of the card at her audience and said “Get Over It!” That’s a little like I feel when I hear an author complain about Amazon. Not that I don’t understand their complaints, even sometimes agree with them. What worries me is that sometimes these authors resort to boycotting Amazon which leads to their selling their books out of their garages…or worse. Though what you might have heard about Amazon may be true but we authors still need to just take the advice of Pipi’s look alike and “get over it.” For the good of our books. If you are one of those authors, here’s why Amazon is good for your book and by extension, good for your peace of mind, and, yes, good for your book sales: 

 

1.     Amazon sells far and away more books than any other online 
bookstore. And far and away more books than all traditional bookstores in the US combined.

2.     Amazon provides easily accessed associate sites from Japan to the UK that let you sell your books overseas—even if you haven’t sold foreign rights to your book.

3.     Amazon provides a search engine arguably second only to Google’s—especially if you view this statistic from the standpoint of an author or publisher. Your prospective reader can find you by typing your name, title, or important key words like your genre into the search window.

4.     Promotion packages like Amazon’s Vine Program are available for getting reviewed by their top reviewers. Some are free, some are costly, but they all work.

5.     Amazon offers an author profile. You can even feed your blog and Twitter stream to it and so your readers know more about you instantly. If you don’t have a profile page, go to AuthorCentral.com and explore how you can add all your books to it and a knock-out biography, too.

 

Tip: I include a shortened URL in my e-mail signature that takes my contacts directly to my Amazon author profile.

 

6.     Amazon offers all kinds of ways to promote your book on a dedicated buy page where your readers get to buy your book, often with one click. That page includes:

o    Add-on features that let you highlight your credentials by choosing the best categories and subcategories for Amazon’s logarithms to find and rate your sales numbers against other similar books. (To make the most of these, the author must promote bestselling ratings when they achieve them—perhaps on Twitter.)

o    A new feature is available on your Kindle buy page. It is called “Amazon Plus.” Either the author of a book or its publisher may add five enticing quotations from your book and illustrate each with an arresting image of your choice for entry. Find the A+ entries my publisher (Modern History Press) added for the Kindle version of The Frugal Editor or any of the other books in my HowToDoItFrugally series to get ideas for your own book(s). (It works equally well for books of fiction.)

o    There is a place on your buy page to install an author- or book- related video.

o    The “What other customers buy after they’ve reviewed this item…” feature may feel uncomfortably competitive, but it connects your book to other top sellers on Amazon as well as others’ books to yours.

 

7.    Amazon’s Kindle Select marketing program is free if you can see your way to committing your book as an Amazon exclusive for ninety days. After that period is up, you can publish at Smashwords or anywhere else you want to and you can make marketing hay with the Select program when your book is released.

8.    Amazon offers an annual contest for e-books in partnership with some of the biggest names in publishing.

9.    When you publish new editions, Amazon offers a widget (gadget) for your backlist book’s buy page that directs readers to your new editions. See how one leads you from the second edition of my The Frugal Editorto the new third edition at my buy page. (Find it a little below the title of the book at the top of the page.

 

Tip: You may enter some typical “back of the book” features on your buy page yourself. That includes the more about the author, your favorite review, and more. Do watch this important page for changes. Amazon adds features to it and also taketh away. (It’s also the place that lists your book sales ratings. 

 

Don’t Forget: When your book becomes a bestseller in the ratings (or highly rated in its genre!) that news can become highly convincing marketing material for your book. You’ll find a screen shot of one of the ratings Modern History Press recently made for me during the release of the third edition of The Frugal Editor at the top of this blog page.

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About the SharingwithWriters blogger: 

 

Cover image supplied by Amazon on their new Series Page

 

Carolyn Howard-Johnson is a frequent contributor to this #WritersontheMove blog. Her The Frugal Editorwas just released in its third edition from Modern History Press. It is the second multi award-winning book in her multi award-winning HowToDoItFrugally Series of books for writers. Find it on Amazon in paper, hard cover, or as an e-book at the new Amazon page especially for series . (That’s a new Amazon feature, too!) This new edition has been fully updated including a chapter on how backmatter can be extended to both help readers and jumpstart book sales.

One of my my Frugal Book Promotion Tips About Calendars and Your Marketing

Some days I just can't resist sending my FB friends one of my #FrugalBookPromoterTips:

So, What’s a calendar for? To list world-wide and national days of celebration for inexpensive (frugal!) ways to promote, of course! Just a few steps required:

1. Enter whatever date might be related to your product or business (Like National Writers Day!) on your calendar once.

2. Set the annual alert for a few days before.

3. Make the entry recur every year.

When you get an alert each year, socially network My favorite is #EarthDay and related environmental days (there are at least three other major ones!) for the poetry book Sublime Planet (http://bit.ly/SublimePlanet) by Magdalena Ball and me. You could work your posts around a discount, a contest, a giveaway or just your altruistic self.

 

More About the Blogger

 Howard-Johnson is the multi award-wining author of fiction, creative nonfiction, and poetry. She is also a marketing consultant, editor, and author of the multi award-winning HowToDoItFrugally Series of books for writers including the multi award-winning The Frugal Book Promoter (http://bit.ly/FrugalBookPromoIII), now offered by Modern History Press in its third edition. Carolyn's latest is in the #HowToDoItFrugally Series of books for writers is How to Get Great Book Reviews Frugally and Ethically. Learn more on her Amazon profile page (http://bit.ly/CarolynsAmznProfile). Great Little Last Minute Editing Tips for Writers (http://bit.ly/Last-MinuteEditing) is one of her booklets--perfect for inexpensive gift giving--and, another booklet, The Great First Impression Book Proposal (http://bit.ly/BookProposalsII) helps writers who want to be traditionally published. The Frugal Editor (http://bit.ly/FrugalEditor), now in its second edition, is the winningest book in the series. Carolyn also has three frugal books for retailers including one she encourages authors to read because it will help them convince retailers to host their workshops, presentations, and signings. It is A Retailer’s Guide to Frugal In-Store Promotions: How To Increase Profits and Spit in the Eyes of Economic Downturns with Thrifty Events and Sales Techniques (http://bit.ly/RetailersGuide). In addition to this blog, Carolyn helps writers extend the exposure of their favorite reviews at TheNewBookReview.blogspot.com. She also blogs at all things editing--grammar, formatting and more--at The Frugal, Smart, and Tuned-In Editor (http://TheFrugalEditor.blogspot.com)

Quick Tip: Checking Online Bookstores

Have you done a search on the Walmart site for your 

book? 

Authors are telling me that their Createspace-

printed books have been appearing there with no 

extra effort on their part. In the past—even before 

Createspace—I found my books magically appearing 

on sites as varied as Harvard’s bookstore and 

Costco.com. 

If you find your book on one of these sites, check to 

see if your book's buy page needs any special 

attention from you—like the addition of reader 

reviews and utilizing other benefits

offered to writers and the publishing industry as 

suggested in the newest book in my 

#HowToDoItFrugally Series of books for writers, 

How to Get Great Book Reviews Frugally and 

Ethically. 

MORE ABOUT THE BLOGGER

 Howard-Johnson is the author of fiction, creative nonfiction, and poetry. She is also a marketing consultant, editor, and author of the multi award-winning HowToDoItFrugally Series of books for writers including the award-winning second editions of The Frugal Book Promoter and The Frugal Editor. Her latest is in the series is How to Get Great Book Reviews Frugally and Ethically. Learn more on her Amazon profile page, http://bit.ly/CarolynsAmznProfile. Great Little Last Minute Editing Tips for Writers is one of her booklets--perfect for inexpensive gift giving--and, another booklet, The Great First Impression Book Proposal helps writers who want to be traditionally published. She has three FRUGAL books for retailers including one she encourages authors to read because it will help them convince retailers to host their workshops, presentations, and signings. It is A Retailer’s Guide to Frugal In-Store Promotions: How To Increase Profits and Spit in the Eyes of Economic Downturns with Thrifty Events and Sales Techniques. In addition to this blog, she helps writers extend the exposure of their favorite reviews at TheNewBookReview.blogspot.com. She also blogs at all things editing--grammar, formatting and more--at The Frugal, Smart, and Tuned-In Editor (http://TheFrugalEditor.blogspot.com )

Off to a Great Book Marketing Start in 2017

Here is something directly from my #SharingwithWriters newsletter to get your book marketing year off to a great start. In that letter I include articles, letters-to-the-editor, Q&As a la Ann Landers, resources like opportunities and accessible contests and a whole lot more. It's also interactive--meaning subscribers can contribute and get credited with their author name, title, and links to their books. They help other writers and get a little exposure for doing so! Win, Win!  And it's free.

"Tip: When you mail a book —to editors, your readers, your reviewers—enclose a flier that give them more information on your other books or other services. This flier might include a request for a review or endorsement, a link to your Amazon profile page which showcases your all of your books, your blogs, your social networks. (If your profile page doesn’t do this, don’t lose a minute before you update it using Author Connect!) Not to worry! This idea is well rooted in publishing tradition. Big publishers do it with a flier commonly known as a sell sheet."

So, the next issue of SharingwithWriters will soon coming to an e-mail box--perhaps yours. If you aren't already subscribed, send me an e-mail with HoJoNews at AOL dot com and I'll do it for you or go to http://howtodoitfrugally.com.  There are subscription boxes in the top right corner of every page of the site. 

Back to shipping enclosures or sell sheets:  My New Year's gift to you will get you started using them in the New year. It is a copy of a professionally produced sell sheet for you to use as a guideline for your own sell sheet. Just e-mail me at HoJoNews at AOL dot com with SELL SHEET in the subject line and include your address. I'll send it to you in the mail. (I promise to delete and never use your address again!)  

MORE ABOUT THE BLOGGER

Carolyn Howard-Johnson, author of This Is the Place; Harkening: A Collection of Stories Remembered; Tracings, a chapbook of poetry; and how to books for writers including the award-winning second edition of, The Frugal Book Promoter: How to get nearly free publicity on your own or by partnering with your publisher; The multi award-winning second edition of The Frugal Editor; and How to Get Great Book Reviews Frugally and Ethically.  Great Little Last Minute Editing Tips for Writers is one of her booklets--perfect for inexpensive gift giving. The Great First Impression Book Proposal, another booklet,  helps writers who want to be traditionally published.. She has three FRUGAL books for retailers including A Retailer’s Guide to Frugal In-Store Promotions: How To Increase Profits and Spit in the Eyes of Economic Downturns with Thrifty Events and Sales Techniques. Some of her other blogs are TheNewBookReview.blogspot.com, a blog where authors can recycle their favorite reviews. She also blogs at all things editing, grammar, formatting and more at The Frugal, Smart and Tuned-In Editor .