BookBub
If you ever have a marketing and PR question, feel free to email me – am@getredpr.com – or drop a comment in the Writer Unboxed Facebook Group and tag me @Ann-Marie Nieves. I’ll do my best to answer in future posts. This question was posed by Leslie Budewitz last week and it’s a great one. Let’s unpack.
For my last post in April 2022 I asked a few authors at different stages in their careers, what did they learn about book marketing and PR which was surprising. The feedback I received from writers was that these little nuggets of book marketing communications wisdom really hit home. So, I’m at it again with advice from five savvy authors.
The Differences Between PR and Marketing
“I think I didn’t realize at first that book marketing and PR were two completely different entities! In the beginning, before someone explained it to me, I thought PR and marketing were all the same thing. believing it all came under the umbrella of any kind of exposure for your book. It wasn’t until a dear friend explained that marketing “cost the publisher money” to ensure a novel was “seen” by potential readers with promotions like advertisements and blog tours, did I fully understand it was something that was guaranteed because it was paid for by the publisher. –Alyson Richman is the USA Today bestselling and #1 international bestselling author of several historical novels including The Secret of Clouds and the forthcoming The Thread Collectors with Shaunna Edwards.
A Holistic Approach
I originally thought that the objective of marketing and PR was to get my book sold. Period. What I’ve learned is that marketing and publicity create channels to reach readers via influencers, podcasters, bloggers, traditional media, etc., who then serve as conduits directly to readers. The more channels you employ to draw attention to your book, the better because this is an extremely competitive industry in terms of getting your pages onto the eyes of readers. It’s also imperative to collaborate on the marketing and publicity of your book and to not assume you can sit back and let your publicist and/or marketing professional do all the work. Yes, they understand the business of pitching and positioning your book. But, you know your story better than anyone, so when you have an idea or an angle that you feel can influence readership, go with it. Or, at least, run it by your publicist; she’s a wonderful resource.-Eileen Brill has written professionally for the restaurant, hotel, and commercial real estate industries. A Letter in the Wall is her first novel.
PUBLICITY BASICS 101: Get to Know Your Publicist
Okay, so you have been working with your wonderful editor on this precious book of yours for a long, long, long time. You feel that you now know your editor as well as you know your husband or parents or child and your editor most likely feels the same way about you.
But what do you know about your publicist?
Most likely she or he is a total blank in your mind. So although I’m saying get to know your publicist, you really want them to get to know you in a way that your editor might not know you— or at least they don’t know what you feel is important about your book in terms of connecting with the marketplace. A slight footnote here: Editors don’t really like the word ‘market’ or market place—it’s too coarse for them I’ve discovered. Too transactional, etc. The vulgarity of the terms […]
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If there’s one topic I love talking about with fellow writers, it’s women’s empowerment in fiction. For this reason, I was thrilled in late January to see that Publishers Weekly had run a fabulous piece on exactly this subject, titled “Is Women’s Empowerment Coming to Publishing?” The article was from the perspective of big players in the industry like marketing and sales managers, executive editors, and editorial directors, and it outlined what publishers are seeking in the women’s empowerment space. It also covered the impact of recent political changes on women’s fiction and popular sub-genres related to women’s empowerment.
While I enjoyed the article, I felt that something was missing—more precisely, a perspective was missing: booksellers! After all, booksellers are the ones with “boots on the ground,” the people interacting every day with readers. They are closest to the discussions about what readers are seeking when they step into a store to browse. Publishing professionals may utilize industry trends and data to derive their own conclusions, but is there any replacement for approaching a reader and asking, “what are you looking for?”
I think not.
So, I set out several weeks ago to fill the gap and seek this missing perspective. I am thrilled now to share the feedback from a half-dozen booksellers about what their readers are seeking in the women’s empowerment space, and why such titles are important to their readers.
I also invited each bookseller to suggest several titles in the genre. There are some fabulous recommendations here!
Question: Why do you feel women’s empowerment in fiction is important to your readers today?
“Although we have made great strides, it is still not an easy road for women. Speaking for myself, when I see strong women making changes in the books I read, I feel a personal sense of empowerment. I am sure it is the same for many of my readers.” –Mary Webber O’Malley, Skylark Bookshop
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The author before and after learning how to use a semicolon
I get approached from time to time by aspiring new writers, asking for advice on how to get started. The longer I’ve been doing this, the harder it gets to answer them. At this point I’ve been in the game nearly 20 years, so how do I condense what I’ve learned into a quick conversation or a brief email? And what if they are interested in a completely different type of writing than the kind that has made me as rich and famous as I currently am? (Hmmm – now that I think about it, that wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing. But I digress…)
So how to advise them? Do I lecture them on the ever-changing industry? Warn them of the dangers of reading the works of Clive Cussler? Or simply hand them a dog-eared copy of The Elements of Style and turn around and run? Depending on who asks, it’s hard to determine which advice would be the most useful.
When in doubt, fire up the time machine!
I’ve been binge-watching the old Stargate SG-1 TV series recently, and several of the stories focus on time travel, a concept that has always fascinated me. In a couple of episodes, the main characters manage to pass messages to versions of themselves who are living in a different time.
This got me to thinking: what kind of messages would Current-Day Keith send to Past Keith?
After considering obvious nuggets like “buy stock in Amazon” and “don’t enroll in Trump University,” I started thinking about what I would tell Keith The Writer From The Past (or, KTWFTP). Since SG-1 episodes usually incorporate a ticking clock or some other increasingly urgent complications, I decided to ramp up the pressure, and limit myself to five pieces of advice. Here’s what I came up with to share with the younger (and yes, hairier) Keith.
1. Know your genre – and its conventions.
Probably the biggest – and hardest – lesson I’ve learned as a writer is that genre matters. Historically the genre of a book just wasn’t something I thought or cared about – as a reader or as a writer. But after writing one hard-to-categorize manuscript after another, the first message I would pass on to KTWFTP is to pick a damn genre already. It will make things SO much simpler.
Why? Genre simplifies things by setting expectations. It helps an agent sell your book. It helps a publisher market your book. It helps a reader choose your book.
And if you’re self-publishing, it helps YOU market your book, which is utterly crucial. In an era when anybody can publish anything, you need a way to make your book stand out to your potential readers.
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If you missed Part 1 of my interview with BookBub’s Industry Marketing Manager–or if you have no idea what BookBub is–click HERE, then come back. Today I’ll wrap my two-part interview with BookBub’s Diana Urban.
But first… Something unexpected and fortuitous happened on the way to seeing this interview published. My publisher, Crown, decided to run a BookBub on my second novel, The Moon Sisters, and initiated a temporary price drop. That BookBub goes live today, so I orchestrated things here at WU so this post could go live today, too.
‘Show don’t tell,’ right?
Below is a screen capture of stats for The Moon Sisters on Amazon, taken on 9/17, the day before the BookBub. Just so you have all of the facts, my Amazon rank before the e-book was put on sale on 9/13 was 240,000. It dropped to about 6,000 after the sale began and I ran a BookSends promotion. I’ve also promoted over social media, but nothing too extravagant or repetitive.
This is where things stood on Barnes and Noble as of 9/17:
This is the second time Random House has run a BookBub for The Moon Sisters. The first time was very succesful–the eBook reached #10 in Nook books at Barnes and Noble, and #1 in the Mothers and Children fiction category on Amazon and #116 overall. If you’d like to follow along today, you’ll see for yourself what happens to a book’s numbers on the day of a BookBub; you can watch The Moon Sisters’ pages at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. BookBub’s daily email usually lands around 10-10:30 EST, and the effect is not immediate but, well, you’ll know it when you see it.
Numbers update (9/19), for interested followers:
Within 24 hours of the BookBub for The Moon Sisters, the book reached #61 in Kindle books on Amazon (an increase of over 22,000%). It was again #1 in the Mother’s and Children fiction category, #3 in Psychological Thrillers, #3 in Coming of Age fiction, and #5 in Family Life fiction. It reached #13 at Barnes & Noble in Nook books, #13 in Kobo, and #49 in iBooks.
Without further ado, the second part of my interview with Diana Urban. Enjoy!
The Writer Unboxed / BookBub Interview, Pt 2
TW – Q16: In terms of author sales following a BookBub, is there a point where a given book, series, or author starts to experience diminishing returns with BookBub promos, and if so how can that be avoided?
BB: Each genre has anywhere from hundreds of thousands to millions of subscribers. Books sent to these massive and highly engaged lists typically experience a significant spike in downloads and revenue within the span of a few days. This often leads to increased retailer rankings, better performance in recommendation algorithms, and even hits on major bestseller lists like The New York Times or USA Today. This increased visibility usually gives rise to even more downloads from readers who find the title through these other outlets. These extra sales beyond those generated by BookBub subscribers are what we call the “halo effect.”
Independent author Cheryl Kaye Tardiff is a great example of this. Here is a graph showing book sales of her thriller […]
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Whether you know what BookBub is or you don’t, whether you have a book for sale now or are still working on a draft, whether you’re independently or traditionally published, you’re going to want to read this Q&A. First, for anyone who doesn’t know what BookBub is about, BookBub is a company that promotes quality e-books with temporarily–and drastically–slashed prices, via a daily newsletter and web updates. They are good at what they do. Very, very good. In a world where we as authors can’t be sure what will or what will not sell books, this seems one sure thing: A BookBub promotion means sales and lots of them.
How to use BookBub is something that stymies many authors I know, though, so when I noticed BookBub’s star presence at this year’s Book Expo America, I approached. That’s when I met Diana Urban, BookBub’s Industry Marketing Manager. I told her my publisher, Random House, had run a BookBub for my second novel, The Moon Sisters, which went exceptionally well. (As I revealed in an essay for BookCountry, sales for the eBook of The Moon Sisters had never really taken off. But the day after my BookBub, the eBook of The Moon Sisters was ranked #10 in Nook books at Barnes and Noble, and #1 in the Mothers and Children fiction category on Amazon.) We chatted for a bit, and then I asked if she’d be interested in doing an interview with me for Writer Unboxed. Happily, she agreed.
[pullquote]Bio Box: Who is Diana Urban? Diana is the Industry Marketing Manager at BookBub, where she regularly publishes content on book marketing, self-publishing tips, and publishing insights at the BookBub Partners Blog. She was previously the Head of Conversion Marketing at HubSpot and is an expert in inbound marketing, content marketing, and lead generation. Diana is also the author of two Young Adult thrillers, and is writing her third novel. Follow her on Twitter at @DianaUrban.[/pullquote]
I recently asked the Writer Unboxed community–mostly through our Facebook group–to chime in with any questions they had about BookBub, and many of those questions are reflected here. So let’s get to it–part 1 of a two-part interview.
The Writer Unboxed / BookBub Interview, Pt 1
TW – Q1: It’s the prevailing opinion that BookBub is unique among a pool of book-promotion services, in that it seems to move the needle in a much more significant way and have a lasting sales impact on the books that are promoted. Why do you think that’s the case?
BB: One of our core goals has always been to provide authors and publishers with a way to run book marketing campaigns that drive real, measurable results. We’re a data-driven company, so every decision we make — from the categories we launch to the new members we acquire — is based on the results of rigorous testing and analysis, which helps us ensure that BookBub continues to be effective at moving the needle for our partners.
BookBub is also unique in that we’re providing curated recommendations to millions of loyal power readers who have specifically opted into genres they’re interested in reading. Our partners […]
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