cold calling list

A Cold Calling List is a database of potential customers’ contact details used by businesses to reach out and promote products or services. These lists help sales teams connect with new leads, increase conversions, and expand customer bases.

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Book Marketing Buzz Author Interview: Camille Marchetta

Camille Marchetta, author of the new literary novel, The River, By Moonlight, was kind enough to answer a few questions about book marketing, virtual book tours and other facets of book marketing in general.

Her credits include: Staff Writer for the television series Dallas, producer of Nurse and Dynasty, co-executive-producer of Falcon Crest, and story consultant on the television series, Central Park West.

Welcome, Camille. I am very impressed with your television credits. How did you land those fantastic writing positions?

That’s nice of you to say

Honestly, I do feel very lucky to fax lists been associated with so many of television’s landmark shows. Looking back, it can all seem easy enough, but the truth is that two years after I arrived in Los Angeles wanting to write, I had only one assignment to my credit, and a lot of projects getting nowhere fast. I was working temp jobs to earn money. But then a producer, who was hoping to make one of my spec scripts into a film, introduced me to an agent named Lynn Pleshette, an untiring powerhouse of a person, and still a good friend.

At the time, she represented (and still does, I believe) a writer named David Jacobs to whom she sent a sample script of mine. David wasn’t able to get me a job on the show he was then story-editing, but he promised that as soon as he could, he would hire me. And he came through on that promise, big time. Soon after, he created the series, Dallas, and gave me a script assignment for the mini-series. Then, in the first full season, I joined the staff of the show as a story-editor. Dallas was such a huge hit. My career was launched. The other work just followed naturally in its wake.

I remember, as the rest

Watching the final season of Dallas in which everyone was glued to their sets to find out Who Shot JR? Did you have people trying to get you to tell you who really shot JR before the rest of the world found out?

It’s hard to keep track, but that episode was actually the last in the second season (the show lasted 13). And all of us – the cast, the crew, the production staff – had people trying to pry the answer out of us. Friends were calling me from London, where the bookies were taking odds, begging me to tell them who’d done it. Our offices were broken into. Scripts were stolen. Bribes were offered. But we’d had the foresight to write (and film) different endings. Only a handful of us knew which was the real one. And none of us told. Not even those of us who could really have used a little extra money. I’ve always thought that was amazing, and a real tribute to the spirit of the show.

The least rewarding?

I suppose the most rewarding was watching first Dallas and then Dynasty climb to #1 in the ratings while I was working on them. Success is very thrilling. As for the least rewarding, well, failure really hurts. I wrote a couple of pilots for series that I thought had great potential, and when the networks didn’t agree, I was crushed. I still think they were wrong.

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Did you ever think about hiring a publicist to help you promote your book?

I did, and I do. I’m using Pump Up Your Book Promotion. Also, I was in Greece this past summer and met a Brit who was in PR in London, and he is exploring ways to get noticed in the UK market. Frankly, I didn’t want to spend a lot of money on promoting the book until I was convinced there was at least a reasonable hope of return on the investment. There’s a whole lot of product out there – and I think the initial New York reaction to the book scared me. But the more attention the book gets, the more interested I get in putting money behind it.

Why did you decide on a virtual book tour to help promote your book?

I had no interest in physically running around the country doing book signings and selling three or four books a shot. That sounds exhausting, expensive job function email database generally unproductive, particularly for a self-published author. I talked to my local Barnes & Noble, which very kindly agreed to stock the book but told me not to bother with a book signing because nobody comes. But I am beginning to learn what the web can do, and what I can do on the web. The idea of a virtual tour intrigued me. I hope it works, and I hope I can take things further from there.

I remember when you queried me, I took a look at what your book was about and, I don’t know if you remember, but I wrote, “..it’s about the other side. No, we don’t want to hear about it because we’re pissed. Nothing they could do, say or feel will make up for what they did to us. But…if we can understand why they did what they did through reading about their feelings and their thoughts before the fact, I think the country as a whole could really benefit from something like that and I know that’s why you wrote this…”

Isn’t that the sole purpose of this book?

No, not at all. What I most wanted to do was to write a great read – a book you couldn’t put down. Aram, I read where there were a lot of books that were put on the back burner because it’s still too fresh in everyone’s minds; yours isn’t the only one. People want to push this under the rug because of the hurt and the pain. I went to New York six months after the tragedy and I saw the spot where the Trade Centers went down. I smelled the smoke still lingering after all that time. I felt a presence there…a haunting presence as if the spirits of those who had perished were still with us. No one wants to talk about it, especially since it’s a book focusing on the ones who did it. But, we have to hear their side of the story. Of course, we can’t hear their side because they are among the dead, too.

Even though you have fictionalized it, I really feel you have done exceedingly well in focusing on what kind of people they were and why they did what they did, even though it seems that no matter who they are or why they did it, we can never forgive them. Aram, my question to you is, since you have researched the faith, the country, the mannerisms, and the lifestyles of these people, how can America heal from this? What steps do Americans need to take in order for something like this to not happen again?

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Is this the reason you wrote your book?

No. I had no personal issues with 9/11. I researched the book because I needed to understand why 9/11 had happened, and what kind of people had done it. I wrote the book because as a result of my research I felt the details and the plot flow of the story would make great fiction, and because I felt that, in order to do everything necessary to make sure that another 9/11 never came, we all needed to understand the reasons it did happen. There are far more of those than the rather simplified or simple-minded explanations we’ve gotten from politics and much of the press. I wouldn’t vote for Ron Paul, but he is right on this one: 9/11 has as much to do with what America and the West has done as it has with what jihadists have done and are doing. But I want it to be clear that I assign no blame to America, and I don’t try to excuse the hijackers. I just want America to be clear-headed about 9/11.

How long did it take to write your book?

About a year. Research started with books on the history of the Middle East, on Islam, on Afghanistan, on al Qaeda. After I had what I felt was a basic c level executive list of what happened, I fleshed out the details on the internet – mostly in press investigations after the fact. This was in 2002, well before the 9/11 Commission, so I didn’t have the benefit of their work, but the press – and particularly the Florida press, because so many of the story’s events happened in Florida, gave me much of the color and detail of the settings and the characters. After it was written, who was the first publisher that you submitted it to? What was their response?

I don’t remember who it was, and I don’t particularly want to remember. Whoever it was was in New York. I have the rejection letter somewhere, but I don’t want to look at it.

What research was involved?

Did you try other publishers (before you published it with Author House) or agents? What were their reactions? I had an agent then – John Ware, whom I thank for his great help in editing this book. He picked the houses the book went to. The submissions were in 2003. New York was still grieving, and the publishers were outraged that I was trying to peddle a book about 9/11 – never mind that it was written (more or less) from the perspective of a hijacker. They said I was trying to profit from their misery. We tried to explain why the book was important – even necessary. They didn’t want to hear it.

How did you hear of Author House?

On the web. I was somehow aware of print-on-demand – that it was a new way to get a book out while keeping the costs down to the necessary. I was also aware that the web was becoming a great publicity tool, and that it had become an incredible source of research material. If it had not been for the internet and new technologies, I could not have written this book, or gotten it into print, or made anyone aware of it. Actually, putting the book out in print was the last step in my plan. I had heard about podcasting – which is putting audio up on the web for download to iPods and mp3 players. I used to be a musician, so I knew how to handle the recording process. And I loved the theater, so I loved to play with sound effects and background tracks, etc. I’ve always mourned the loss of radio theater, and podcasting fiction looked like a way to get that experience back. So I did that with Marwan, serialized chapter by chapter, and developed an audience. Since I had the audio, the next thing I did was put it on Amazon and as an audiobook. Realizing that the audience for audiobooks is still limited – and the audience for podcasts is even smaller – I finally decided to get the book into print.

Have they helped you in any way to publicize the book or are you basically on your own?

AuthorHouse has been great. They’ve kept to deadlines and done everything they promised to. They offer a myriad of ways to publicize and market a book. They can develop marketing tools like bookmarks, posters, etc. They will do press releases, and send them out. They will maximize your presence on Amazon. They’ll give you a personal publicist to work the book. Etc etc. I decided not to use any of that. They’re not cheap. I wrote my own press releases and emailed them, until I realized they accomplished nothing. Maybe AuthorHouse could have written a better press release, but I’m convinced that whether or not the press pays attention to your book has far more to do with who you know than what’s inside the book. I got a great review from a Florida newspaper because I had attended a book seminar the reviewer had run, and he remembered me. It wasn’t until I had that review that I felt I had something I could use for marketing. I learned how to maximize Amazon myself – you know, search inside, converting the book for Mobipocket and Kindle, tagging the book, etc.

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Side of the Story: Exclusive Interview with Aram Schefrin

The odds of getting a book published by a NY publisher are astronomical for a new author. Even for the seasoned author or one who already has NY contracts, it’s much the same. For the lucky ones who make it, they’ll tell you it’s a battle to keep their slots on these publishers’ wish lists, but for the new author, the hurdles are thrown at them at mind-boggling force. But, the dream is still with them and, instead of giving up, they aim for other resources to publish their book.

Aram Schefrin is no quitter, but because of the content of his book, he was turned down by NY – especially since his book dealt with a subject that was too close to home.

On September 11, 2001, Americans awoke to find out that their native turf had been violated. Suicidal bombers flew planes into the Twin Towers in New York and were aiming toward the Pentagon. War was declared and America mourned their losses.

Two years later, a writer

NY wasn’t ready to read a book b2b email list about a tragedy that affected thousands of citizens – whether they were the victims that were killed as a result or the families of those who perished. It wouldn’t sell, they told him. If they even gave him the time of day.

Aram had no other choice but to choose a publisher who used print-on-demand technology to publish their books – Author House.

The sad thing about this story is that I have read this book. Many, many books have come across my desk – whether they are my clients at Pump Up or from those requesting reviews – and never have I read a book that is so intense, so well-written and definitely NY material. But because of the nature of his book, no one in New York wanted to be reminded and especially, since it was written from the terrorists’ point of view.

In preparing for Aram’s virtual

I began to read his book and I really understood why this book needed to be written and needed to be in everyone’s hands.

Aram chose to write this book from their point of view because America, as well as the rest of the world, needs to understand why 911 happened. Sure, we’re still grieving. Nothing will take that away. But, we need to understand because understanding will prevent future events that happened on 911 from happening in the future, or at least give us the foresight to understand why it happened in the first place so that we can make changes before it occurs again. If we are so close-minded to think it won’t happen again; think again.

I interviewed Aram for Book Marketing Buzz because I want my readers to hear his side of the story because his story needs to be told.

Welcome to Book Marketing

Tell me, where were you the morning of September 11, 2001? What were you doing at the time you heard of the tragedy in New York? In bed in Wellington.

Did you have anyone personally affected by 911 and how did it affect you personally?

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Barry Eva (aka Storyheart) talks online marketing on The Tony Kay Show

Goodness gracious, this blogging thing is addictive. I was going to take the weekend off and darn if one of my authors who will be touring next month didn’t send me a link to a radio show he appeared on recently and I thought I bet this would be of some importance to you guys.

What makes this radio interview most interesting is that Barry Eva (that’s the author’s name) or rather, Storyheart which he likes to be called and is adorned on the front of his latest book, a young adult romance novel called Across the Pond, has just gotten a taste of online book marketing. In fact, and you’ll see this when you listen to his interview, it’s so refreshing to feel the enthusiasm he expresses over the thought of promoting his book over the Internet. And, you’ll love this, he has an accent you’ll die for!

Across-the-pondHis interview

ArtistFirst Radio Network and country email list by Tony Kay whose pleasant “radio voice” just sets this whole interview off to a new level. I can’t express thanks enough to Tony for letting Barry talk about his upcoming virtual book tour, so a needed plug for him is graciously added!

If you’d like to listen to Barry Eva’s (aka Storyheart) interview on The Tony Kay Show, you’ll need Windows Media Player, which most of you already have anyway.

Then, all you have to do is click here!

Enjoy the show and thank you, Barry, for mentioning Pump Up Your Book Promotion and thank you Tony for having Barry on your show! And if you’d like to buy a copy of Barry’s…oops, Storyheart’s…new young adult romance novel, Across the Pond, click here! Healing is probably not possible – anymore than we have healed from Vietnam, or our Civil War. But Americans need to develop some perspective on this. 9/11 was a horrible tragedy, but its effects on America have been far more debilitating than they needed to be. Too many politicians and people with economic interests in keeping the fear of 9/11 alive have been using 9/11 for their own purposes. The odds of any of us actually being killed by terrorists are far lower than the odds of being hit by lightning. Israelis – who really are threatened daily – have learned to live with terrorism.

The Brits learned to live with the Blitz

We have had to live with far less, and we are far more terrified. That’s our weakness. We do not have to be terrified. The best way to get away from that terror is to understand that jihadists are not some sort of supernatural religious devils who are determined to kill us personally – and have the power to do it. They are people. Their culture leads them to be more brutal than we – what we would call less civilized – but they are driven by the same motivations that push other people. We need to understand those human motivations – both to defend ourselves against them and to make some attempt to change the way they think and act – or (maybe more importantly, and more easily done) to change the way we think and act towards them.

We need to realize that they simply

At least, not yet. (They have done us a lot of psychological and economic damage, but that is mostly because of who we are, not who they are or what they did.) But if we don’t deal with them as people – with intelligence and maturity – and at least look honestly at the issues they raise, then we will continue to feed their anger and their hate, not to mention their numbers. And then we may face something we really do need to fear.

I thank you for answering my questions, Aram. Where can people pick up a copy of your book?

The book is available at all the usual online booksellers. I list them on my website, (Readers will find it very helpful to keep that website available as they go through the book, because it provides a lot of information on what the book discusses and the facts on which the book is based. It’s like a series of footnotes.) But frankly I’d rather people went to their local bookstores and ordered the book from them – and, while they were at it, insisted the book got on their shelves.

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Historical Fiction Author Douglas W. Jacobson Talks Virtual Book Tours

Douglas W. Jacobson is an engineer, business owner and WW2 history enthusiast who has traveled extensively in Europe researching the courage of common people caught up in the greatest catastrophe of the twentieth century. Doug’s first book, Night of Flames: A Novel of World War Two was published in 2007. Doug has also written numerous articles on WW2 resistance organizations and is finishing up his second historical novel focusing on one of the most notorious war crimes in history.

Douglas Jacobson will be on a virtual book tour with Pump Up Your Book Promotion Virtual Book Tours in September and October ‘09 and is here with us today to give his impression of virtual book tours and online book marketing.

Night of Flames Thank you for this interview

Can we start out by having you tell us briefly what your new book is about? Douglas: Night of Flames is a buy bulk sms service of courage. It is a story about common people caught up in unimaginable circumstances who find the strength and determination to survive. The main characters are a university professor in Krakow, Poland and her husband, a cavalry officer, who are separated on the first day of the war. For the next five years they struggle to survive and preserve their humanity while searching for each other across war-torn Europe.

More and more authors are realizing the potential for sales that derives from virtual book tours. Can you tell us your personal reasons why you chose a virtual book tour to help get the word out about your new book?

Douglas: I am a member of the Historical Novel Society and through contacts with other authors in this genre I have learned of the success many of them have had with virtual book tours.

Is this the first time you have heard of them?

Douglas: I have heard about them several times over the past year or so, but at the recent HNS conference in Chicago many authors discussed their experiences with virtual book tours.

What do you hope to achieve through promoting your book through a virtual book tour?

Douglas: Obviously I hope to increase book sales but I also want to establish a niche for my future writing as a historical novelist specializing in the WW2 period.

Do you promote online through other means?

Douglas: I have contacted book clubs through Reader’s Circle and other similar sites. Do you promote through Twitter and Facebook? What are your links there? Douglas: I am only just beginning to learn about Facebook and Twitter. What are your experiences with offline booksignings? Which do you prefer – online or offline and can you give us the reasons why?

Douglas: I have not done many off-line book signings as such, and the ones I have done have been marginal. I’ve had much more success as a speaker to service clubs and other organization and coupling those with book signings following the event. I’m looking forward to my first experience with an on-line book tour.

Here’s a fun question

Douglas: I’d donate a hundred thousand dollars to Oprah’s favorite charity. Thank you for this interview, Doug. Do you have any final words? Douglas: I’m looking forward to discussing Night of Flames with readers on-line and sharing with them my enthusiasm and admiration for the real people who endured the largest conflict in world history.

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Summer Beach Reading Giveaway!

Heading to the beach with nothing to read? Now you can head out in style with a book from one (or more!) of your favorite authors!

Pump Up Your Book Promotion is hosting our very first Summer Beach Reading Giveaway. Four great authors with 4 chances to win! All you have to do is head on out to one of the blogs listed below and follow directions to win. It’s that easy! Second Chance at Your DreamAs the Pages Turn is giving away a copy of Dorothea Hover-Kramer’s Second Chance at Your Dream!

This is the first book to apply the breakthrough insights of Energy Psychology to healthy aging. Energy Psychology is an exciting new healing method that changes the vibrational patterns in the energy fields to produce rapid emotional healing and a sense of well-being. With the help of the over fifty exercises for rebalancing yourself offered in this book, you can face the challenges and opportunities of later life to create a time of energy, abundance and joy. You can visit Dorothea online.

Click here to enter!

Thirteen bloodlines, The Brotherhood, fanatically loyal to their gods, the Anunnaki, have telegram data the planet since his-story was written. In 1925 Stefano Vasco Terenzio, head of the Terenzio crime family makes a deal with the Anunnaki to solidify his control over the American Mafia. Clever and manipulative, Stefano’s true goal was to put his family in a position so one day they would be able to turn on their masters. Two generations later, the shockwave he ignited was still being felt. Now, as the world inches closer to 2012, time is running out. The only thing in the Brotherhoods way is Terenzio, a family now divided as a truly epic battle begins that will determine whether mankind continues existing in a world of lies, or shatters the chains that have held it prisoner since his-story was written. Shocking yet hopeful, Synarchy slowly unravels the tightly laced reality we have created for ourselves. Blending the metaphysical with conspiracy, fact with fiction, debut author DCS has opened up a world that will force you to rethink everything you believe about your own. The knowledge within provokes the question; do you really want to know? You can visit DCS on the web.

Living Like You Mean It

So many of us long to feel more alive, connected, and secure in our lives, particularly now, in these challenging and difficult times. Why is it so hard? Part of the problem, says Dr. Ronald J. Frederick, has to do with a fear of our feelings—a feelings‐phobia—and the consequences of expressing our feelings to others. It’s this fear that keeps us stuck, detached from the wisdom inside us and distanced from the people around us. And yet positive emotional experiences can actually “rewire” our brain and free us up to experience ourselves and our lives more fully. LIVING LIKE YOU MEAN IT: Use the Wisdom and Power of Your Emotions to Get the Life You Really Want by Ronald J. Frederick, shows how we can overcome our feelings phobia in order to enjoy more satisfying lives.

Zensanity is giving away a copy of Richard Aaron’s Gauntlet!

Six hundred sixty tons of Semtex is detonated in a massive explosion in Libya – the last of a deadly stockpile. The operation seems to have gone smoothly, but within minutes of the explosion, CIA agent Richard Lawrence discovers that one shipment of the explosive was hijacked en route to the destruction point. Days later, a glory-seeking “Emir” broadcasts to the world that he is planning a massive terrorist strike against a major U.S. landmark. And he gives a timeline of one month.

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The Devil in Merrivale by Cozy Mystery Author Jackie Griffey

Jackie Griffey, author of the cozy mystery novel, The Devil in Merrivale, will be giving away a free electronic copy of her book from now until 11 p.m. tonight.

When she’s not reading one, Jackie Griffey is more than likely working on a cozy mystery or a romance-suspense novel. She and her family live in Arkansas and she loves to meet and hear from readers and fellow writers. Her web is www.jackiegriffey.com and her blog, Breaktime With Jackie is jjgbreaktimewithjackie.blogspot.com.

About The Devil in Merrivale

Murder isn’t the usual order of special lead in the little town of Merrivale, Tennessee, so the brutal stabbing death of popular high school student Denise Davis sends a shock through the community. Sheriff Cas Larkin is determined to find the killer, and the last thing he needs is distractions like the increasing reports of missing cattle and other livestock.

But as he digs deeper, Cas uncovers another mystery–a strange “club” the members are afraid to talk about, and for good reason. One of the recruits is brutally beaten when he refuses to take the club’s activities seriously. He also refuses to talk about those activities–until they turn turn deadly.

There’s something dark and sinister going on in Merrivale, and if Cas can’t figure out what it is and put a stop to it, there’ll be the devil to pay.

Jonny Bowden, PhD, CNS

A board-certified nutrition specialist with a master’s degree in psychology, is a nationally known expert on weight loss, nutrition, and health. A popular speaker and a former personal trainer with six national certifications in exercise, he was the acclaimed “Weight Loss Coach” on iVillage for twelve years, and is now a regular contributor to AOL, a columnist for Better Nutrition and Clean Eating magazines and a member of the Editorial Advisory Board of Men’s Health. He’s also the nutritionist for the popular website, www.eatdrinkordie.com, where his entertaining videos on food and nutrition can be seen daily.

His books have been acclaimed by a virtual who’s who in the field of nutritional medicine, garnering endorsements by Christiane Northrup, MD, Mehmet Oz, MD, Barry Sears, PhD. (who calls him “one of the best”), Ann Louise Gittleman, PhD (who calls him “the personal health coach I would want in my corner no matter what”), and many others. His book, Living Low Carb: Controlled Carbohydrate Eating for Long-Term Weight Loss has more than 100,000 copies in print. He is also the author of the Amazon best-seller, The 150 Healthiest Foods on Earth: The Surprising Truth About What to Eat as well as The Healthiest Meals on Earth and The Most Effective Natural Cures on Earth and The 150 Most Effective Ways to Boost Your Energy.

He has been featured

The New York Times, The New York Post, Chicago Sun Times, Chicago Tribune, Time, GQ, Cosmopolitan, Oxygen, Remedy, Family Circle, Self, Fitness, Allure, Essence, Men’s Health, Pilates Style, Prevention, Woman’s World, In Style, Fitness, Natural Health and Shape and has appeared on Fox News, CNN, MSNBC, ABC, NBC and CBS as an expert on nutrition, weight loss, and health..

Dr. Bowden is a member of the American Society for Nutrition and the American College of Nutrition and is adjunct faculty for Clayton College of Natural Health. He lives in the Topanga Canyon area of Southern California with his three dogs, Woodstock, Emily and Lucy.

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How to Promote Your Books with YA Fantasy Author Marcus Dino

When I first published Fifi, Anything Goes in the Double Os back in 2003 with Iuniverse, I thought “Wow, the hard part, the writing of the book, was done. I’ll just do a little publicity online and offline for Fifi and the book will sell like hotcakes. After Fifi became a New York Times bestseller I would personally send letters back to the all those literary agents and publishers who rejected my query letters and tell them “See this is the opportunity you missed when you rejected me.” I mean I would advertise at a relatively low cost on a medium that reaches a world wide audience of over a billion. I lived in a metropolitan area that has hundreds and hundreds of small independent and major chain bookstores and I would call up the bookstore buyers and they would all jump up for joy when they read Fifi and display the book in front of the store for everyone because the book was so interesting? What could go wrong? Selling Fifi would be gravy compared to the years I struggled writing and editing the book right?

Now six years later

I realize that promoting a phone number library is a far tougher job than writing it for practically any author except for the minute handful of big name celebrity authors who sell their books strictly because of their name recognition. For 99.9% of the rest of us, you need to work your tail off and you need to shell out a few bucks for publicity expenses to get your book to sell. Even ‘big name’ publishing companies are scaling down on their publicity budgets and only do publicity for their ‘superstar’ authors. The rest of the authors have to fend for themselves in promoting their books. The sad fact is the average ‘traditionally published’ author only sells around 2000 books while self published authors who use Print on Demand sell an average of only 200 books, mostly to people they know. After deducting bookseller discounts and printing costs, the royalty payments on 200 books rarely even recoup the costs for publishing expenses charged by the POD publisher.

So yes even though recently and only very recently have I experienced sales success with Fifi it did come without a lot of hard work and expense in terms of setting up a budget for publicity expenses.

So anyways from my experience

Fifi and now my current book Diary of a Mad gen Yer I have set aside funds for a realistic publicity budget. I budget a certain amount of money per month for publicity expenses. Face it the old adage ‘you cannot make money without spending money’ is true especially for unknown authors trying to sell books, I don’t care how well written or interesting the book is, there’s just too much competition out there. Over a million books were published last year in the US alone, a million. There are just so many people who are writing books today and face it because of the internet and POD it’s become even more competitive for authors trying to sell books today than say twenty years ago.

All right after you have set up a monthly budget for publicity you need to ‘game plan.’ Spend a certain amount of your publicity on ‘online’ promotions and spend a certain amount of ‘offline promotions.’ I am currently doing this with Diary. For instance this month I have set up a budget for this virtual blogging tour and I am also some of my publicity funds on going to some of the local book festivals such as the Children’s Book Festival in Orange County next month.

Getting a state of the art website

With both the Summertime Productions website and Authors Den website I want to make Fifi Larouche and other characters from both Fifi and Diary as interesting as possible to the readers. That’s where my illustrations come from, that’s where blogs like Fifi’s Thoughts come from. You want to get those visitors to look at your book. From my own experience under no conditions should you consider paying services that ‘target people’ to your website, these are generally scam artists who send visitors who are not real. Like anything else you have to work to get real visitors to your website. One method to make your website more popular is to do reciprocal linking with other websites. For instance with my books I do reciprocal links with websites that deal with Hollywood and acting.

Book tours are also very very important

I am currently doing this virtual blog tour and guess what? More blogs leads to more visitors to my websites. Of course I have done traditional bookstore signings with large chain stores such as Hastings. Who is going to know about your book unless you do a book tour? I am finding that I can reach a larger audience by doing a virtual book tour than I can with on a real book tour. However if you can budget time and money for both then do both.

Free email newsletters to potential readers are also another excellent way of promoting your book. I ask on my Authors Den website if they would like to receive a free email newsletter, perhaps later on the visitor will like what I write and this will lead to a book sale. Contacting radio and TV stations is another method to promoting your books as these stations are always looking for authors to interview.

Finally spending a few of your publicity bucks on business cards, book marks, small postcard flyers, and other promotional items advertising your book is a very efficient and inexpensive way to market your book. Recently I have imprinted Fifi’s image on small cups and they have sold well. You can find people who make these promotional items and printers either locally or on the internet. Take these promotional items wherever you go. Again word of mouth is going to be the best way to get people to know about your book.

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How to Promote Your Books with Liara M. Covert, Ph.D.

In 2007, I started the Dreambuilders Australia Blog. This initiative continues to expand into videos, spiritual teaching, e-books and workshops. Before I completed the Self-Disclosure book, I learned to allow energy to flow, to write ideas as they flow. As a person learns increasing self-acceptance, he learns everything extends from how he thinks and feels. Self-promotion is conscious and unconscious. Being yourself resonates a certain energy that encourages and reinforces integrity. The book encourages self honesty. It only makes sense that I would become what I write about. Many people say they want to write, but many also find ways to convince themselves why they can’t, so they don’t. My books continue to write themselves as I get out of my own way, so to speak. The information flows and I choose to harness that energy and share it.

An earlier version of the now published

Self-Disclosure book whatsapp number list another title. In 2006, three U.S. publishers expressed interest. At that stage, I had an agent. Negotiations seemed to be going well. Yet, for some reason, the three publishers shifted gears and decided against the project. It was initially disappointing. That result led me to consult an outside review to guide a revision of ideas. I put the project on the back-burner, then wrote two other manuscripts inspired by unexpected challenges unfolding in my life. I talked about the book I was going to publish, then stopped for a period of time.

The turning point that changed everything

I had some life-transforming wake-up calls. These are explained in the Self-Disclosure book. In essence, I had a lot of growing up to do. I discovered ego controlled me more than I had realized. My sense of legitimacy was wrapped up in the idea of being a successful author. Looking back, I sense initial publishing opportunities vanished because my unconscious thoughts and intention were misplaced. Part of the growth process involves learning that writing or whatever feels right to you has intrinsic value and purpose for what it is. This requires no external approval or materialistic motivation. In my case, turning inward and offering to serve people in different capacities created higher vibrations that have created additional, related opportunities. One attracts what one thinks about on many more levels that are consciously realized. Choosing to think with the heart changes everything.

Blogging is an exercise in self-discovery

Even those people not interested in publishing books can benefit from rediscovering what they are motivated to write about and why. Journaling is how the mind and spirit communicate passions and awaken you to what you already know about yourself but temporarily forget. I created the Dreambuilders Australia Blog to narrow my writing focus, get to know myself and offer information to create a cyber audience. This provided impetus for me to revise a previously completed manuscript. The publishing experience has been very different this time around. I also learned that blogging is a service people offer others as a way to simultaneously awaken inner self. It is a process to portray a blog as a trusted source of reliable insight and stories.

Self-promotion takes you wherever you choose. You learn throughout the journey. It is not about contacting one person, doing one interview, sending a few emails or end up being job with regular hours. Creating a profile and sharing that is itself a means to get-to-know yourself differently. I learn that interacting on-line sends out energy vibrations and invites like-minded thinkers to find you. Awakening is occurring on many levels. A person begins to notice opportunities always exist yet one chooses to notice certain ones when ready. I am excited about getting more involved radio show and publishing additional books that all arise out of the process of learning about how I can serve others.

[coldcallinglistsblog]

Kaye O’Doughtery on Promoting with Virtual Book Tours

Right now, we’re on a two-month virtual tour with our book, Football is for Lovers. Jaime McDougall, who is orchestrating our tour for Dorothy Thompson’s Pump Up Your Book Promotion Virtual Book Tours, has been keeping us busy with writing assignments – articles, interviews, stuff like that. Since we’ve always worked collaboratively, we appreciate the different perspectives you can only get by working with other people, so the variety of interview questions from all you bloggers has left us positively grinning!

Before this, though, we were not wholly unconscious of the need for promotion. We had taught ourselves some basic HTML coding, created a website, and gotten into search engine optimization. Interesting stuff. It’s a challenge to play around with words and phrases to see which ones will get you to the top of the search results on Google.

And then, being writers, creating ezine articles

But it didn’t take us long to phone number list that none of this would be enough to really get our book out and about. Since we couldn’t afford a half-time commercial during the Super Bowl (definitely our first choice for promoting Football is for Lovers), we began to look around for other options. What became increasingly clear to us was that the people we thought would be most interested in our book could best be reached through social networking. Trouble is, it had taken us quite some time to become even marginally adequate at HTML and SEO and all that jazz. We were not born into the computer age, so everything we attempt on a computer requires a sort of mental translation. For those of you who were born into the computer age, it’s the language you speak. But it’s like learning Greek or Mandarin or whatever when you don’t start until you’re an adult: you’re never quite as fluent as you would have been if you’d spoken the language from childhood.

So we figured that, if we tried to master social networking (having already failed at our attempt to set up a FaceBook page), we wouldn’t be able to speak to potential readers about our book, let alone through our book, until some time beyond the next millennium.

What to do?

As fate would have it, we had just gotten a snail mail solicitation from a publicity agency, so we decided to check it out. When our Google research revealed that they appeared to be scam artists, we just kept Googling on to see what else was out there. Which is how we came upon Pump Up Your book Promotion Virtual Book Tours. It sounded like exactly what we were looking for: fun, affordable, targeted to our market. But best of all, skipping that daunting learning curve has left us free to concentrate on our next book, He’s Not the Guy (God Didn’t Do It!). Look: we accept that promotion is necessary. But writing is our hearts. So thanks, Jaime and Dorothy, for setting us free!

[coldcallinglistsblog]

How to Promote Your Books with Myrna Shiboleth

Imagine a typical “Jewish American Princess” finding herself, inadvertently and to her own astonishment, a “pioneer” in Israel. From a comfortable upper middle class metropolitan life, she is transplanted to living in a modern day wilderness, without electricity or telephone, trying to make a living working with dogs, horses, and other animals (not a particularly respected or profitable profession in this part of the world), and to cope with the very foreign Middle-Eastern mentality. That girl was me, and I (apparently a masochist through and through) am still in Israel, after years of struggle, smiles, tears, and adventures, telling the story of my attempts to survive life in Israel under conditions totally different from any I had experienced before or from anything I might have expected. The only things that enabled me to survive were an invincible stubbornness and a sense of humor.

Actually, I wrote this book for myself

I wanted to preserve all the adventures I have had over the years, and thought that writing them down would be the best way. Then I could pass the stories on to my grandchildren. Once I started writing and re-reading what I had written, and letting friends read parts of it, I realized that it actually was pretty good and quite funny, and that maybe I could become the James Herriot of Israel. Who knows?

I naively thought that cold calling list a book was the hardest part. I quickly discovered how wrong I was. Getting the book published took considerably longer than writing it, and was considerably more stressful. I was told that no publisher will look at a book that is not represented by an agent. So I started looking for an agent, getting lists from the numerous books and websites that are out there to help the naïve and inexperienced. After being ignored by many and turned down by the rest, I finally found an agency that was enthusiastic about my book – what joy!

After two years or so of paying them various small fees, which added up in total to not such a small amount, and receiving in return lists of publishers that had supposedly turned the book down (“But we think so-and-so will be interested and we will submit again…”), I discovered that this agency was a total fraud. Being incurably stubborn, I did not despair totally from this debacle, and finally did manage to find a publisher.

Okay, so now the book was published

I was holding a tangible copy in my trembling hands, so now all the hard work was over, wasn’t it? I soon discovered that Oprah was not about to come knocking on my door, and neither was the book reviewer of the New York Times. There are a lot of books out there, in just about any genre that you choose, and for people to read your book, you have to find a way to show them that it exists and that they will enjoy reading it.

Promoting Tails of Shaar

Hagai is still something that I am learning. Living in Israel, I am far from most of my prospective markets, so can’t make use of some of the more standard promotion routes such as book signings and appearances in local media. But we do have a fantastic tool for getting to people, the internet, although knowing how to use it effectively is not easy. I have made use of various lists, clubs, and groups I belong to, including Facebook, sending out descriptions of the book, reviews, and excerpts. But it is important to find the right channels to get to the best market, and for this I have decided that it is worth going to the professionals. I have started doing the Blog Blitz of Pump Up Your Book Promotions, which I hope will bring me exposure in the right places. I am hoping this will be a big step in the right direction for promoting Tails of Shaar Hagai.