Blog Posting: An Effective eBook Marketing Strategy

Blog posting can be a great way to tell the online community about your new ebook.

Blog posting should not be ruled out if you're looking for an effective way to help market your new ebook.  Only recently, I have learned first-hand how to gain more traffic and views to my newly published ebook:  "Shut Up and Write!".  While I was so busy trying to drive traffic from a series of YouTube videos, I almost didn't realize how my blog stats were suddenly increasing.  I can't give the credit to the videos themselves, because the video views amounted to almost none.  However,I was actually posting the transcripts from the videos in my blog every day, so in a way, the credit really does belong to the video series.

As a result of the added exposure, I've seen some actual pre-orders on my Smashwords book page for "Shut Up and Write".  Although the book won't officially be available to read until April 9, 2016, readers can purchase the book right now on Smashwords and also on Amazon.  

This is only my first time taking advantage of setting up pre-orders, unlike previous times in the past, when I created my other ebooks.  I decided that since the videos take up quite a bit of time to record and provide visual graphics, the time I spend on them could be better served.  For that reason, my former video series will kind of pick up right here.  My blog is as good a place as any, to tell people about my ebooks, both the new and the old ones.  With that in mind, notice what I've done recently with two of my former titles.

TOXIC FRIENDS - eBook

My former relationship book:  "Toxic Friends and Other Friendships" now has a new subtitle.  Instead of calling it a Family & Relationship Guide, I'm calling it:  "A Candid Relationship Guide".  I decided that the second subtitle is more fitting, since the book revolves around friendships (both of the toxic and the genuine kind).  This thought provoking book about the true nature of friends is available at Smashwords and Amazon for only .99 cents.  Get this quick and easy read, and discover if you have toxic or genuine friends.

FRUITS AND VEGGIES - eBook

Another one of my former ebooks was re-released recently with a different cover, and some additional content was added.  This simple little self-help guide offers lots of useful advice on the proper care of fruits and vegetables.  The book was one that I created early in my self-publishing career, after I realized the importance of writing article series.  While it is not one that I market very much, I notice that I still manage to get sales for the book because it deals with such a practical topic.  Since I've upgraded my account status to "Publisher" at Smashwords, I decided to attribute some of my non-writing related non-fiction titles to simply "Just Charm Publishing".  

This year's revision of Quick and Easy Ways to Protect Your Fruits and Veggies includes a little something extra.  At the back of the book, I've added 10 Fruit and Vegetable Smoothie Recipes.  Hopefully, this will give the book even more appeal, and cause readers to want to buy it.  Make sure you're doing the right thing to protect your fruits and veggies.

Please take some time to visit any of my author pages and find a good ebook to purchase.  Thanks in advance for your support.

eBook Marketing: Promoting One eBook Effectively Can Benefit Your Other eBook Titles

eBook marketing and publishing issues are all connected, just like the related activities.

The number of marketing activities for Day 5 of the this series turned out to be far less than I originally planned, but the day still turned out to be productive.

This was the day that I came to realize how very important this video series is to me, and not in just one specific way.  So far, since starting this series, I've begun to take a  nice hard look at all of my current self-published titles.  After being far removed from the writing of those books for several years, it is much easier to be more objective about things.  While I don't believe there are flaws in the actual writing, I'm wondering if maybe my novel may need to be reassembled.  I've had an idea in mind for a while, and this video series has got me thinking seriously about following through on it.

I'll definitely keep the blog up-to-date with this particular idea, as well as any other thoughts related to the previously published ebooks.  I'm hoping to make some modifications that will prove to be effective, and I don't think it will take that long.  Until then, here is a brief rundown on my Day 5 ebook marketing activities. 

eBook Marketing Strategies 

video series. TRANSCRIPT Summary

Greetings YouTube followers and viewers.  This is Day 5 of the eBook Marketing Strategies video series.

Even though this is Day 5, I’m actually posting the video a day late.  I got behind yesterday because I was busy creating another video about problems with self-publishing your ebooks

The video took all day to script and record – the wifi was in and out, and I checked the stats on my blog, videos and website but there were no significant changes.  At first I felt disgusted because I had planned a full day of marketing activities and all I did was create an off topic video that I didn’t even get a chance to post.  Then later that night, as I gave it a lot of thought, I realized that the video about ebook publishing problems is just as important as the ebook marketing series.  Not only are they inter-related, but if it weren’t for the video marketing series, I would not have realized what the flaws were with my ebooks.

I told myself to stop worrying about posting my video on schedule for my “imagined” video viewers.  This series is for me to have a check and balance system in place and so I can improve my ebook marketing skills – for all my books!

Now, my main objective is to actually perform some type of marketing activities every day, and not worry so much about giving a blow by blow in the video.  The important thing is that I keep up with what I’m doing and why.  Sharing the details is just an insignificant part of the process.

I have tons of marketing activities scheduled for the week, including popping over to the Scrawl website and taking the required action so I can submit a book excerpt.

At the end of the day, the most important thing that I can do in this video series is to report not just my activities, but how I feel about what I’m doing.  This kind of constructive venting will help me to stay committed to posting on a regular basis. 

As always – you can find a summary, if not the full transcript of today’s video on my blog.  Feel free to visit the website and join my email if you want to get in on any of the ebook specials I’m currently running.

Be sure to visit me on SOCIAL MEDIA and wherever you see the name Charm Baker or Shut Up and Write!

Until tomorrow

Thanks for listening

 

eBook Marketing: Don't Let Setbacks in Your Routine Get You Down

Marketing activities can benefit you in more than one way.

Day 4 of the eBook Marketing Strategies video series got off to a good start in the earlier part of the day, but unfortunately, after a full am writing session, I experienced a minor setback.  But as you’ll see from the following information, all was not lost and I ended up finding an awesome writing resource.  Check it out in today’s transcript.

TRANSCRIPT:

eBook Marketing Strategies Video Series – DAY 4

Greetings YouTube viewers,

It’s Charm Baker, and today is DAY 4 of the eBook Marketing Strategies video series.  Today I jumped right into my regular daily activities, so I want to touch on what those are.  First, I took a peek at my Hub article that I posted yesterday, just in case there were any comments to respond to.  In the past, I would wait too long to return and do this, and find that several people had left comments and questions, but by then, it was too late to respond.  So I made a note to check my hub comments, and later on, I’ll even post a few myself.

Of course another one of the first activities I decided to do in the morning is to check my email religiously.  I did that today, in hopes of some responses to my discount coupon offers.  So far, nothing yet, so I guess I need to start pushing the coupon offer more. 

Anyway, after I didn’t receive any related mail, I clicked over and signed into my Google Analytics account.  I’m not really all that savvy when it comes to reading the reports, but I AM able to tell if I’m getting any kind of traffic at all to my website, and sort of determine where the traffic is coming from.  My website was only launched this year and I thus far, I haven’t really developed any kind of consistency to adding content, so my visitors are scarce.  But according to the analytics, at least I am getting a few daily visitors, so I need to do something to bump that up.

I do know that one good way to bump up your website traffic is through regular posting on your blog.  In the past, that has been one of my main obstacles to blogging – I just can’t seem to stay consistent.  If you’re like me, and you have that problem also, maybe you can use this video series to help you work on it. 

Since I’m posting the transcripts from the video to my blog, that means that I’ve committed to posting consistently for the next two months.  So maybe you might want to do the same thing, by following the video series daily, and posting any new information you might pick up along the way.  Of course, while you’re at it, I’d love a plug about my new ebook:  Shut Up and Write! as well as any of my other publications available at Smashwords.com.

While we’re on the subject of Smashwords, I want to mention another thing that I added to my “To Do” list for later in the week.  Since I opted out of having Smashwords distribute my new ebook to Amazon, that means I have to publish it on Amazon Kindle separately.  But here’s the thing you future authors need to keep in mind when you have a full length novel or non-fiction book that is eligible for print format.  It’s best to set up the print version first to make sure that your book cover will be the same as your Kindle cover.  On my novel:  “Experimenting with Murder,”I made the mistake of trying to format a cover at Createspace for the print version, after I had already published the ebook with a great looking cover.  It turned out to be a nightmare, and I finally had to enlist the help of my know-it-all son.

Createspace is one of the more popular free publishing formats for your self-published print books.  The upload process for your digital covers at Smashwords is much easier than creating one or uploading a book cover file to Createspace. Since Amazon and Createspace are joined, if you do your print book first, they will actually generate an ebook version and send it to Amazon for distribution. 

Okay, so I posted a note to myself to be sure and upload a file for a print version and I think I’ll let the book release date stay the same for Amazon and Createspace.  Amazon has a different policy when it comes to pre-releases, so I didn’t bother with it, but maybe I’ll try it for my next project. 

Several days ago, I came across some information about creating an author guest post about yourself and your ebook.  Somehow, I seemed to have save everything but the link to where to submit the post.  I can’t even remember for sure if it was on the Writer’s Digest website or Goodreads.  That same day I saw the information, I had been browsing both sites, one of which I was already signed up for.  Well today, after I spent the majority of the day writing the guest post according to the questions they supplied, I ended up not even being able to submit it.

Now if you’re anything like me, this is the kind of thing that could potentially make me have a setback.  After I spent about twenty minutes bouncing between the two sites looking for the link, I finally gave up.  So I currently have this awesome guest post with nowhere to post it.  I was really ticked off at myself and about to give up in defeat and stop working for the day.  But then I decided to view at least one writing related video before shutting down.  I came across one called:  “How I Wrote My First Book Self-Publishing Tips” I was curious about what the author had to say, so I checked it out.  As a result, I discovered an awesome website for authors called Scrawl.  You can visit my blog for a transcript of today’s video and you’ll see the link included.

I think that the Scrawl website might be just the thing that I need to try and get some feedback on my writing – not just “Shut Up and Write”, but for my novel:  “Experimenting With Murder.”  I’ve already did a little browsing to see what they have to offer, but tomorrow I’ll actually sign up and upload an excerpt from one or more books. 

That pretty much wraps up what activities I’ve been up to today, aside from the fact that I tried to check my mailbox at Fiverr.com to see if the provider completed my gig.  I selected someone who’s supposed to help get one of my promotional links out on social media.  Even if the $5 gig purchase helps drive just a little traffic, I think it’s worth it.  Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to log into Fiverr today due to yet another glitch.  I honestly don’t know what’s going on with Fiverr.com the past week or so.  Yesterday I solved the problem I was having with purchasing gigs with my debit card by simply funding my PayPal account and using it instead.  The payment went through fine, and I sent the requested details to the gig provider.  Now, today, I can’t even log in to check the results. 

As you can see, I’ve had a few minor setbacks today.  Even my blog page views went from 89 views yesterday to just 8 views today.  At least sharing my results in this video somehow, it makes it all not seem so bad. 

Okay, as always, I invite you to check out my website and feel free to click the Join List link if you’d like a discount ebook or any of my free promotions.

All you need to provide on the simple little form is your email address and choose one of the promotions I’m offering.  Then I’ll send you the coupon code and you can redeem it at Smashwords where my books are published.  Since my novel is currently exclusive to Amazon/Kindle, “Experimenting With Murder” is not part of the promotion.  Of course, if anyone is interested in a copy, just drop me an email and I’ll work something out for you.

Don’t forget, you can always follow me on social media so be sure to drop me a comment when you see the name Charm Baker.  If you want to specifically tweet a comment on this video series or my new ebook, just hashtag #shutupandwrite and I’ll be very appreciative.

Okay, that’s it folks.  Once again, thanks for listening everyone.  This is Charm Baker on the Just Charm YouTube channel.  Thanks for joining this eBook Marketing Strategies video series.

Talk to you tomorrow.

Scrawl website Link:

http://www.stwa.net/scrawl/publicpage.php

“How I Wrote My First Book Self-Publishing Tips” Video Link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yw3RBdNERzY

eBook Marketing Strategies - Getting the Video Series on Track

Daily marketing activities are easier to keep up with than to catch up to doing!

This is the third video transcript of my new video series, and although it is labeled as Day 2, it actually covers several days.  As the following information will bring out, I am finally getting this series on track.  It was a little shaky getting started.  But now that I'm caught up on posting the first few videos, along with the blog post transcripts, it should be a lot easier to keep up with things.  The last thing I want to do with this 60 day marketing experiment is to miss the whole point.  My focus needs to be on the actual marketing activities that I perform each day, NOT on spending time creating the videos.

For anyone who is just tuning in to this blog or the YouTube video series, please be sure to visit the following links and you can get up to speed.

VIDEO SERIES INTRODUCTION

eBook Marketing Strategies Introduction

VIDEO SERIES DAY 1

https://youtu.be/AaAHu1pqgH4

VIDEO SERIES DAY 2

https://youtu.be/Zny-37U9AYo

VIDEO TRANSCRIPT:

eBook Marketing Strategies (Video Series - DAY 2)

Since this is Day 2 of the 60 day video series, I assume everyone viewing has already listened to the Introduction video and also Day 1.  If not, I suggest you view both those videos if you plan to follow the series for the duration.  You should also check out the video Intro. to the ebook I’m trying to market so you’ll have a point of reference when I refer to something in it during this video series.  The ebook was created for new writers who need quick writing related income, but there  are some points that even new authors can benefit from.  Anyway, I’m not going to spend any more time on that, because those three videos say it all.

So let me jump right in to what I’ve been doing since the last video.

I want to explain something real quick about how the days are numbered.  I call this a 60 day series, because the series will consist of 60 different videos, summarizing my activities and results.  But so far, if you do the math, you’ll see that things are a bit off.  The book’s release date is April 9^th of this year.  I had planned to monitor the first 30 days before the release date, and the first 30 days after the release.  So my first day of this video series should have been on March 10th because March has 31 days in the month, and the last video should be on May 8^th instead of the 9^th.

Based on those figures, I should already be on Day 9 of the video series!  What happened was, I’ve been too busy getting caught up in how to format this series and make the content look interesting to view, as well as listen to.  The only problem is, it’s very time consuming trying to create nice visuals to read or look at, plus line them up with the audio.  I’d much rather be able to concentrate and focus on the main objective – discussing my ebook marketing activities.    

I decided that from this video onward, I plan to save all the commercials and anything else that I need to show you until the end.  Then, I’ll roll the credits and provide a quick text summary and all other information.   

So let me bring you up to speed on what I’ve actually been doing up until today, then I’ll still make the next video Day 3.  That will push the 60 day mark to May 17^th and no matter what, I plan to stay on track.  

*** The video concluded after a list of the following activities was briefly touched on ***

• Created a Smashwords 50% discount coupon for the "Shut Up and Write!" ebook and also coupons for free ebooks as a promotional lure. 

• Created a simple email signup form at Wufoo.com in order to capture emails of potential customers for future book sales.

• Created visual help aids and cheat sheets (such as keyword lists, names of resource websites, hashtag ideas for Twitter, etc...) and printed them out for posting around my work space.

• Set up social media accounts so automated shared posts will be generated after every tweet. Be sure to view the following video and read the related post about the IFTTT.com website 
  
  
  IFTTT Related Blog Post
  http://bit.ly/1VhH3pP
  
  
  IFTTT Related Video - PART 1
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZttSTpHRZ20)