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“My consulting revenue has grown by 6 figures after my book was published.  I was able to get more leads, close more business and increase my fees because I am an author.”
—Michael Griego author of “42 Rules to Increase Sales Effectiveness”

If you are an entrepreneur, consultant, professional speaker or coach you spend a great deal of time marketing your products and services.  Your goal is to get your message to as many potential customers as possible.  But each year it becomes more difficult to differentiate yourself when so many of your competitors are trying to do the same thing.

You can become the recognized expert in your field and build a thriving business by writing a non-fiction book.  A book isn’t just a book… it’s probably the most effective marketing tool out there for independent professionals.  Your book is the platform from which you build your brand and your business.  Here is a list of just a few of the ways our authors use their books to build their business:

Build a brand.  Use your book as a branding tool.  Create paid products and services on the same topic as the book.  For example, your book could become an e-course, an audio book, a series of podcasts or radio shows, special reports, part of a book series, a teleclass, webinar or DVD.

Get more clients.  There’s nothing like giving a book you wrote to a prospective client.  In the “old days” we created expensive printed proposals with all sorts of graphics but a printed book is far more impressive and shows your potential client that you are an expert in your field.  Close more deals by including a free book for every team member you will work with on the project.

Get free media coverage.  Media outlets like newspapers, magazines, television, radio shows and blogs need a constant stream of new stories to keep readers engaged.  Pitch your book to journalists for review and offer yourself as an interview subject.  Chances are you, as an author, will receive much more coverage than someone without a book.

Make money.  Sell your books on your website, bookstores and online book retailers.  Take them to speaking engagements and sell them at the back of the room.  Package your book with other products.  Build an affiliate program and have your affiliates sell your book for you.

Increase your search engine rankings.  The number one way to increase your search engine rankings is to have incoming links from a variety of reputable websites.  Get these links by offering your book for free to online book reviewers and ask them to include a link to your website in the review.

The possibilities are endless when it comes to using a book to build your business.  A good book can be used as a marketing tool for many years as long as it is relevant.  Now that you know a book is the best marketing tool you can have what’s stopping you from writing one?

©2012, 42Rules, a Division of Impact Marketing Group.  Reprints welcomed so long as the article is reprinted intact and all links are made live.

Author Laura Lowell is the creator and Executive Editor of the 42Rules™ book series.  The 42Rules™ book series is founded on the belief that most subjects can be summarized into 42 distinct areas that capture a topic’s essence.  Learn more about how you can become a 42Rules™ author by visiting http://42rules.com/write/ and follow our publishing blog for writers at http://42rules.com/blog/.

Readers prefer writing that is concise and to the point.  Our 42Rules™ book series is founded on the idea that most subjects can be summarized into 42 distinct areas that capture the essence of a topic.  Follow our lead and write concisely by avoiding jargon, write short sentences and paragraphs, use simple language and keep on point.

Even a book by a bestselling author won’t sell if it’s poorly edited.   Self published books are no different.  When you self publish you already have more work to do without the support of a publisher so it becomes even more important to have your book edited professionally.  Kirkus Reviews has launched an editing division for self published authors but there are many other options available if you search online.

The New York Journal of Books is an online repository of book reviews.  If you are an author or publisher you can submit your book for review.  They do want the book four weeks before publication so this is not an opportunity for already published books. To read the guidelines click here.

My Shelf is a popular book review site looking for current books to review. Submit your favorite 42Rules title Your review request will be circulated to volunteer reviewers and if someone is interested they will contact you. You can find out more at My Shelf.

The 16th annual Independent Publisher Book Awards, honoring the year’s best independently published titles, is now accepting entries until March 15th, 2012 for books with 2011 and 2012 copyrights or that are released in 2011 or early 2012.

42Rules are submitting the following titles for consideration –42 Rules for a Web Presence that Wins and 42 Rules for Your New Leadership Role.

The “IPPY” Awards were conceived as a broad-based, unaffiliated awards program open to all members of the independent publishing industry, and are open to authors and publishers worldwide who produce books written in English and intended for the North American market. We define “independent” as 1) independently owned and operated; 2) operated by a foundation or university; or 3) long-time independents that became incorporated but operate autonomously and publish fewer than 50 titles a year. To learn more click here.

Amazon.com entered the publishing industry by purchasing a self publishing company and allowing authors to publish their titles on-demand with them. Due to changes in agreements Amazon.com has with other publishers Barnes & Nobles announced in February, 2012 that it will only carry Amazon.com published titles online and not in their brick stores. How this decision will affect Barnes& Noble’s sales remains to be seen. What effect, if any, will this have on your purchasing decisions?

Publishers Weekly has a great article “Looking for the 50{6d2d557e9d00bd0668d81f1c684edf6bee4f94716c136688ced4e9a613f7f134} Solution” that covers the impact the digital revolution in books is going to affect publishing houses. Independent publishers are typically more prepared to cope with this change but the large publishing houses have to prepare in advance. To find out what executives from nine publishers have to say read the article here.

More important to us is….What do you think?

Is such a bold claim true?  We at 42Rules don’t know for sure but it does seem like many of our colleagues and friends are toting around the Kindle’s they received for the holidays!  What we do know for sure is that all of the 42Rules books come in a version for Kindle and all of the other e-readers as well.  However, if you want an e-reader to read your 42Rules books and you love the Amazon.com catalog then you should consider a Kindle!

A popular phrase in marketing is “Return On Investment” or ROI.  We always want to know the ROI of the marketing tactics we use and this is sometimes easy to determine.  Where it gets murky is when it comes to social media.  There isn’t a way to monitor social media impact at present because social media is not meant to be a marketing or sales channel.  Social media is the opportunity to build relationships with present and future customers, build your brand and create a positive reputation.  Most of this can’t be quantified.

In my opinion the best practices in social media include:

1.  Build relationships.  Tweeting a couple of times a week or posting to your Facebook profile or Fan Page once in a while isn’t going to build relationships.  You need to monitor your accounts for visitor response at least twice a week if you’re just starting out and more often when you become more experienced.  Answer questions, “like” responses and thank people for commenting.  If you have the time check out the profile of your most vocal fans and follow them as well.

2.  Don’t start a flame war.  Build your reputation by responding positively and constructively to criticism.  Show enthusiasm for suggestions even if they aren’t spot on.  Move potentially destructive conversations off social media and on to e-mail or telephone.   Do feel free to remove comments that are spammy or inappropriate and report people who continuously spam you.  Building your reputation doesn’t mean you have to be a doormat and you have the right to protect your brand.

3.  Monitor conversations about you or your book.  People may be talking about you in a positive or negative manner on their own social media accounts so it’s important that you search for mentions of your book title and respond appropriately.  You can setup Google Alerts to monitor some of this but you must also manually search social media sites proactively.  You’ll be surprised at what you learn and much of it will be positive.

4.  Use social media to promote but not sell.  No one wants to follow someone on Twitter just to hear over and over again “Buy my book. Buy my book.  Buy my book.” It is permissible, however, to mention a product discreetly.

If you get frustrated with the time you spend on social media remind yourself that you are building relationships and no one can put a price on that!