Market Your Book Online

Duration: One day course: 9.30am - 5pm, including lunch.
Date: Thursday 15th September 
Venue: Reed Media offices, London
Tutor: Jon Reed

If you are an author, the truth is you will have to do much of your marketing yourself. Fortunately, this is easier than ever with the range of online and social media marketing tools available. This workshop shows you all you need to know to promote your book successfully online.

Includes a free copy of Jon Reed's book Get Up to Speed with Online Marketing.

Who is it for? This course is for all authors, whether traditionally published, self-published, or as yet unpublished - and whether you write fiction, non-fiction or academic books. You will come away with an online marketing plan for your book(s), and all the knowledge you need to use Amazon, blogs, Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter successfully. You will leave with a clear plan and the knowledge and confidence to put your marketing into action straight away.

What do you need? No prior experience of online marketing is required. You may bring a laptop if you wish (wi-fi is available), but it is not essential for this course.

Aims

A huge number of people buy books online – so they should be marketed there. Ebooks can only be bought online, so must be marketed there. The social media revolution offers powerful new tools for online marketing, and authors have an opportunity to connect with their online communities of interest by using them. In addition, many books today sell to the existing networks of authors – and these networks can be built and reached online. To be a successful author today, you need to be on Amazon, have your own website or blog, and also be on the social sites where people spend so much of their time, such as Facebook, YouTube and Twitter. This course takes you through the process of online marketing for authors in a logical, step-by-step way.

Course Outline

Principles of Online Marketing. Key concepts and principles of online marketing, why it works for authors, and how to use it effectively. We will also look at how social media integrates with email marketing to attract potential customers into your sales funnel.

Planning Your Online Marketing. It is tempting to jump in and start a blog, Facebook page or Twitter account. But your marketing will be more successful if you start with your aims and objectives. We will look at how to create an effective online marketing plan that keeps you focused on your aims, makes your 'calls to action' clear, and enables you to measure your results.

ACTIVITY: Writing your online book marketing plan

Making the Most of Amazon. Amazon is the most important place to be online. As an author, there is so much more you can do than simply link to your sales page. We will look at using Amazon Author Central, Amazon affiliate accounts, uploading videos and importing blogs. We shall also look at ways of integrating Amazon with your social media presence.

Author Blogging. WordPress is an incredibly powerful blogging platform and content management system that can be used to create both blogs and websites. Should you have a book blog, a personal blog, or both? We will look at the case for blogging, how to create one, what to write, and how to use it to drive book sales.

Podcasting. What is podcasting? How can it work for book marketing? Like blogging, audio can be used as a medium to deliver valuable content and information to your community of interest. It can be used to engage, inform and showcase your expertise. We will simplify what can seem a daunting medium, and present some quick wins for creating audio.

Video. YouTube is by far the largest video sharing site, but you should also use video on your Amazon page. The classic author video is an interview or piece to camera where you talk about your book. But the video 'book trailer' is becoming more important. Video can also be used to provide information or training in your niche area.

Goodreads. Goodreads is a social network build around reading. It is a useful place for authors to connect with their readers, publicize events and arrange Q&As and contests. You can even import your blog posts. We will look at best practice for using this site.

Facebook. There are over 600 million people on Facebook - and some of them will be your target readership. Simply by being findable on Facebook, you will make your book more visible. If you engage readers with useful content on your Facebook page, you will start to build a community of fans. We will look at incentivizing people to like your fan page, and creating customized pages.

LinkedIn. If your book is aimed at an academic or professional audience, LinkedIn is an essential place to be. You can also use it to promote your book on your profile, and import your book blog into a LinkedIn group. You can also use LinkedIn to find book professionals such as potential publishers for your work, or copy editors and designers for your self-published book.

Twitter. Twitter is now mainstream, with over 200 million users. It is one of the 'big three' social networks, and is great for promoting your book. Whether you use it to promote your book blog, share tips with your readers, host Q&As, run giveaways or promote special offers, Twitter helps you reach your readers in real time.

Wrap-Up. We will revisit your online book marketing plans, and finish the day with questions and discussion, and action points to take your social media marketing strategy forward after the session.

Follow-up Participants will have access to a secure area of the Reed Media website, where they will be able to download PDFs of resources, worksheets and slides. Follow-up questions relating to the session may be submitted via the online discussion board.

Learning Outcomes

This course combines presentation, online demonstrations, discussion and work on your own marketing plans. By the end of the session participants will:

• have an online book marketing plan
• understand how online marketing and social media can be used to promote their book(s)
• have the confidence to choose and use a range of social media marketing tools appropriately and effectively.
• be able to measure the results of their social media marketing efforts.

What previous workshop and conference delegates say:

Thank you so much for coming along to our conference and for your fantastic session. It sent people home, buzzing with ideas as to what they need to do next, which is exactly what we need for a conference session. Our feedback was extremely positive all round but yours was singled out... Marion Sinclair, Chief Executive, Publishing Scotland

The talk from Jon Reed of Reed Media on using social media to promote your business gave us lots of great ideas – thanks Jon! We’ll put some of these into action soon… Claire Squires, Stirling Centre for International Publishing and Communication

The small workshop format allowed for a good exchange of ideas and discussion of the practicalities of each option. It felt very targeted to our needs. It was an excellent event which has fired up my enthusiasm for social media. Julia Garvey, Marketing Manager, Rising Stars

A really useful and informative course - I came away with lots of new ideas. Shereen Muhyeddeen, Marketing Executive, Palgrave Macmillan

Very relevant, lots of extremely useful information - the speaker was obviously very well informed on the topic. Alex O'Loughlin, Wiley Publishing

The workshop was an excellent introduction into the burgeoning world of social media. Debbie Vaughan, Marketing Manager, Royal Society Publishing

Your Learning Package includes:

• one-day workshop
• FREE copy of Jon Reed's book Get Up to Speed with Online Marketing
• online access to PDFs of resources, worksheets and slides
• follow-up support via an online discussion board
• 20 pages of PDF handouts including "A-Z of Social Media" and "Social Media Toolkit"
• a Certificate of Attendance

About Jon Reed

Jon Reed has worked in social media for the last five years - since its earliest days. He runs the blog Publishing Talk which has over 120,000 followers on Twitter and is rated the 'most influential' in the publishing world by the Twitter directory WeFollow.

Jon has experience as both publisher and author. His book Get Up to Speed with Online Marketing: How to Use Websites, Blogs, Social Networking and Much More is published by FT Prentice Hall. He  previously worked in academic publishing for 10 years, including as publishing director for McGraw-Hill.

Jon lectures on social media on a number of university courses, including at Birkbeck, City, Brunel and Bath Spa universities, speaks at conferences and runs in-house training for large organanizations. See his speaking schedule for details.

Booking

Cost: £347 +VAT per participant. Includes:

• refreshments
• lunch
• PDFs of resources, worksheets and slides, which can be accessed online
• FREE follow-up support via the discussion board on the resource site
• FREE copy of Get Up to Speed with Online Marketing: How to Use Websites, Blogs, Social Networking and Much More.

The following discounts are available:

• 10% early-bird discount - for workshops that are booked before the early-bird deadline 
• 15% individual discount - for authors paying themselves rather than being sent on the course by their publisher

These discounts may be combined.

Get an extra 10% discount when you subscribe to our newsletter.

Places available: this workshop runs with a minimum of 6 and a maximum of 18 participants.

Cancellations: You can cancel 4 weeks or more before a workshop for a full refund. For cancellations of 1-4 weeks before a workshop, a charge of 50% of the course fee will apply unless we can re-fill the place or you can substitute a delegate. We cannot issue refunds for cancellations within 1 week of a workshop, and the full fee will apply. We reserve the right to cancel workshops at short notice if dates are under-subscribed, in which case you may opt for a full refund or a place on another workshop. Please check with us prior to making travel arrangements, unless we've confirmed the date by sending you a login to the workshop resource site.

This workshop can also be run as an in-house training course for publishers who want to provide training for a group of their own authors. Contact Jon for more information.