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Here’s a brilliant idea we had for promoting fiction books.  There are so many fiction authors out there and more joining the market daily that it makes one wonder how can you stand out from the crowd?

Certainly there are many marketing tasks you should be doing, and we cover many of them in this blog, but aside from marketing how can you give your potential readers a taste of your writing?  Give them a taste by giving them a taste.  Write a short story or two featuring the characters of your book and give it away to potential readers.  There are so many places on the web where you can post your short stories for free that we won’t list them all there but Wattpad is a good place to start.

Your short story may be a prequel to your novel or perhaps a sequel.  It could be an expansion on a plot device in your novel or it could introduce a new character.  Use your innate creativity to create this short story and then promote the heck out of it.  This is a great way to grab the attention of potential readers by giving them a “taste” for free!

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Thanks to a brilliant post on the Warrior Forum we got to thinking about the flexibility we have when publishing e-books for Kindle, Nook, etc.  When you publish an e-book and it isn’t selling you can change the title, cover, description, etc.  If something isn’t working then don’t keep doing it.  That is the definition of insanity.

If you have a published e-book then consider making some changes.  Here is what people on the Warrior Forum recommended changing:

• Title
• Cover
• Author Name
• Description
• Keywords
• Categories
• Price

If you would like to read the thread yourself visit The Warrior Forum.

Addicted To E-Books offers e-book authors two ways to promote your book.  If you are running a free promotion on Amazon.com or Smashwords you can submit the free promotion here.  If your e-book is priced at $5.99 or less you can submit it to be featured on the home page.

The rules:  you must create an account to post your book and each book can only be listed once.  There are many books on the list so be patient.  No Erotica or offensive material will be accepted as this is a family friendly site.  Be sure to submit only books that have at least 5 reviews on Amazon.com.  To submit a book to this promotion click here.

Online Book Club for Readers is a site about books by book lovers.  Included in the site are a discussion forum, polls, reviews and recommendations.  This site offers another chance for authors to get their e-book(s) reviewed for free.

To get your e-book reviewed you’ll need to fill out a rather lengthy form but this should not bother you.  Getting a fair review is the trade off.  The review will be posted on the book club site but it is at the discretion of the reviewer to post it elsewhere.  You should be able to use the review to add to your editorial information on your Author Central account on Amazon.com!

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We love a good bookmark.  Who doesn’t?  Bookmarks are something that we take for granted but when we don’t have one at hand we scrounge around the house to find something, anything to put between the pages of our book.

Authors should take advantage of the fact that everyone needs a bookmark, or more specifically, several bookmarks.  Get custom made bookmarks that match the cover of your book and include details on where the book can be purchased.  This will work for e-books too.

Before your book is even published setup your book for pre-order on your website and start giving away the bookmarks.  Some ideas for spreading the word about your book:

• Ask your local librarian if you can leave a bookmarks at the checkout counter for people to pick up before they leave.
• Check with all your local bookstores and see if they will give them away with a purchase.
• Leave your bookmark inside books in the library that are in the same genre as your book.
• Leave behind a bookmark at coffee shops, restaurants or anywhere you people can sit at a table.
• Ask friends and family to pass out your bookmarks and be sure to send a bookmark to everyone who has purchased a book!

If you are struggling to get your book marketing campaigns off the ground check out Book Marketing Mojo!

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Book giveaways are an essential part of book marketing and it’s best if you set them up before the book is even published.  Our favorite two places to setup a giveaway is GoodReads and LibraryThing.  GoodReads is now owned by Amazon.com and they allow giveaways only for physical books.  LibraryThing is independently owned and allows giveaways for physical and e-books. It sounds strange but giving away a few books helps sales by exposing your book to more potential readers who may purchase when they don’t win.  Check both of these sites out to see if they will work for your books!

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On social media like Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc. you get asked to create a handle, page name, account name…  If you are going to use a different account for each book or series use the same handle and page name and relate it to your books.  For our book series we use 42Rules for our social media accounts.  Make sure you keep track of your handles and passwords because it’s easy to get confused!

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Using press releases to promote your book is a good idea.  Finding those sites is back breaking, tedious work so we’ve found a list for you.  The links are live as of this posting but we can’t guarantee they will stay that way!

Press Release Sites

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Sandra Beckwith has created a short video that tells you how to get your book price on a ribbon across your book image on Pinterest.  This is a nifty trick that we’ve never seen before so we are going to try it out!  Watch the video to learn the trick yourself.

Need reviews?  Here is a list of book bloggers you can approach to have your book reviewed.  Remember to ask nicely, act graciously if they refuse and thank them appropriately if they accept.  Always offer to promote the review on your own social media sites with a link back to the review.

Books Like Breathing – Reading Preferences:Romance (all kinds), YA (esp the paranormal romance kind), Fiction, Chick Lit, some Non-Fiction.

Dear Author – Looks like they review romances and chick lit mostly!

Everything To Do With Books – Reviews all genres.  Use the contact page to ask for a review.

Got Fiction – Reviews Contemporary Romance, Historical Romance, Paranormal Romance, Erotic Romance, Historical PNR, &; Urban Fantasy.

I Heart Reading – Reviews just about any genre.

Indie Book Blogger – Reviews self published books in any genre.

Kindle Obsessed – Reviews Kindle books exclusively.