Tuesday, May 14, 2013

How To Keep Up With The Joneses...

Reason #5,673 why I can't wait to move to Washington: I'm constantly broke!

Living in Alaska is a bit expensive, especially in my small town. Don't get me wrong, I like this place. Except for the 6 months of snow... but it is not cheap to live here.

I was on Twitter, spending my few, precious moments that I have for promoting my book and saw a couple other authors saying that their giveaway of their book will commence once they hit 5K fans. They're like, a couple hundred away from that goal.

What the eff? I just want 200! Speaking of, if you would be so kind as to spread the word, go to my Smashwords page, click the 'Like' button. Once I hit 200, I'll give the e-book away for free! And Amazon now has my book in paperback.

I'm not an indie author, but sometimes I feel like I promote like one. But how do you market your book when you have no cash? Seriously? I read blog posts on what has worked for some people, but when I go to the link and check things out, these people want payment. Of course they do, you're buying their time, just like any other service in the industry. I'd want to get paid as well!

Don't get me wrong, this isn't me asking for a handout. This is me asking you for your suggestions on some ways to promote that don't cost. I realize, you get what you pay for.

Now keep in mind, I am on Twitter, FaceBook, Goodreads (which, I'm still trying to figure out along with Pintrest), I have this blog and a website (that is dusty as hell). What more can I do? Well, what more can I do without spending money?

Other things I am currently working on, is artwork for my book. I'm trying to do it myself. I'm an artist for pity's sake! I have the skills, the tools, I just need to get it done. Lots of that will be put up on Zazzle as t-shirts and the like. Once I get a good quality scan, which seems to be super difficult in my neck of the woods. I think I found a place, but have yet to check it out.

So what would you suggest/recommend? Did you set funds aside for promoting before your book was out? Who helped you?

5 comments:

Alex J. Cavanaugh said...

I've never spent money on promotions. Granted my publisher does some, but I've never had to spend money online. Certainly not on blog tours or anything. I just do guest posts and I'm involved online and I promote my friends.

Mark Means said...

As far as social media goes, have you given Google Plus a try?

For me, I find it much more active than Facebook and there's a huge writer community, as well.

Michael Offutt, Phantom Reader said...

Your writing is the best promotion.

Mel Chesley said...

@ Alex ~ I guess I'll have to bug more of my friends! xD

@ Mark ~ I have Google Plus, but haven't really spent much time on that either.

@ Michael ~ This is very true. You just want book two, don't you? :)

Unknown said...

Mark's got a good point - the G+ communities feature is a nice way to get involved with promotion and not have to pay a bean :)