Saturday, October 22, 2011

Giving Away Books: independent-publishing bliss

 
Now that my new fantasy novel, The Stone Dragon, is published and available through Amazon (paper and Kindle), Barnes and Noble (paper and Nook), and Smashwords (many ebook formats), I can move to marketing. And the first and best part? Giving away books.
  • First, the gifts go to those who helped the book become a published reality--love and support, ideas, editing, technical support.
  • Next, to family and my "book-loving" community
  • Finally, "soft-marketing" to those who are involved in the book industry or who have contacts with the book or media entertainment industry.
This isn't just a bibliophile's love-fest. Books cost money to create, publish, print, and ship. In all honesty, though, part of the strategy has to be celebration, the celebration and recognition of the fulfillment of completing the process of making the dream tangible.

Today I gave some books away--some of them to people who weren't expecting them. To hear their oooh's and aaah's was a joy, especially since they were sincere and not just polite noises (at least I choose to view it that way).

Now comes the more strenuous part--the actual marketing to the online readers and reviewers. I have no doubt I'll receive more oooh's and aaah's--along with some catcalls and raspberries. It takes all kinds, and I'll try to be kind to them all.

Copyright 2011 by Thomas L. Kepler, all rights reserved

2 comments:

  1. I'd be very interested to be kept informed of the success of your strategy, Tom.

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  2. @Rosanne DingliMy "strategy," Rosanne, is to provide books to people that 1) helped me publish, and 2) to people who have connections that might help the novel's success. So far, I've just had some fun--and that's not bad!

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