How to optimize a book for effective promotions

Jack A. Crow

Attract, engage, and inspire your customers with an "Optimize and Socialize" content marketing strategy. Include a list of all your titles in each of your books’ back matter. Update this back matter whenever you launch a new release.

In the back matter, include an extract. Authors who provide an extract find the most growth in their promoted book's sales. Include the first chapter of the book you're promoting right after the acknowledgements. End the excerpt with a link to the book's purchase page.

In the back matter, include a link to your mailing list. Encourage readers to join your email list on your "About the Author" page. You'll be able to contact them whenever you want to promote your backlist titles, new releases, freebies, price specials, and so on if they sign up.

Improve the description of your book. According to BookBub's A/B testing, descriptions including author quotations, awards, and wording tailored to your target demographic (e.g., "If you like thrillers, don't miss this action-packed book!") have better engagement rates.

On product pages, use target keywords. Make a list of 5-7 keywords that your target audience frequently searches for, and then include them in the headline, description copy, and keyword sections of each store product page.

On retailer websites, look for suitable category. This can boost your chances of appearing on a retailer's bestseller list for a given category, potentially resulting in larger sales volume. You'll also avoid letting down readers who were hoping for something different.

Connect different editions of a book. Different authors and platforms utilize different systems, but they all manage to link a print edition to an eBooks, an audiobook, and an international edition. Visitors to the product page will be able to easily purchase the format they prefer as a result of this.

By naming the books in a series, you may link them together. Create a master name for your book series and include it in the product title on retailer sites if you've published a book series. This will aid store sites in making automated series suggestions, as well as assisting readers in finding new books in the series to read.

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