I attended the Florida Writer’s Association 2013 Conference this weekend and came away with a long list of informative notes to share with anyone looking to use social media to help market and sell their books. This list is from the best presentation I attended on Saturday: “How to Network and Sell Your Book” by Dawn Michelle Frederick.
The workshop focused on finding social media outlets that would help identify potential readers and market books for authors. Here are a few new sites that I’ve never heard of, along with pros and cons of each, which may be helpful to some who have the inclination to review them and incorporate them into their networking/marketing toolbox:
Bookish: run by the big six traditional publishing companies
Pros: reviews are easy
Cons: no author promotion tools, run by the big 6
Book Country: join writing groups and get constructive criticism in a writing community
Pros: critiques to improve writing, publishes ebooks, free
Cons: 100% participation
Booktalk Nation: for authors to use to set up live thirty-minute satellite interviews through independent bookstores for readers to follow
Pros: free to use, independent bookstores benefit
Cons: there are no strings attached
Stumbleupon: a collection of website pages created by choosing your interests and allowing the site to suggest other sites that fit your interests
Pros: simple to use, visually appealing, helps identify readers of your book topics
Cons: time intensive
How much help these are to authors depends on the author’s ability to use these sites to their fullest advantage. If you are like me, however, you may want to spend your time writing the books you’d need to have to be able to use these sites most effectively.