23 Great ways to self-promote your book

The promotion of your self-published book is a task that can scare many new authors, but it’s something that can be fun and is not as elusive as you may thin, there are lots of ways that every indie author can ensure their book stands out in a very busy crowd.

Here we have comprised some great ideas to get you promoting and increase awareness of your book.

1. Have a promotional GIFs or video (for Youtube & your website) made
2. Use Facebook, blogs, forums and Twitter to comment on threads, you’ll build a reputation as an authority and can even post a few links to your website/sales page.
3. Use a Press Release, not as popular as they once were but still a viable way to self-promote.
4. Give your eBook version away for FREE (for a limited time) on KDP, this can help in gaining reviews and helps you to give the book away to friends and family too.
5. Get reviews from as many friends and family as possible, give them your eBook for free and ask for a great review.
6. Use the website Goodreads.com to promote your printed book in one of their giveaway promotions.
7. Create a business Facebook page for you as an Author or as the Book itself
8. Create an author Twitter page
9. Use Twitter to shout about it
10. Make sure all of your social media pages have similar banners and you use lots of images to promote your book (people tend to scroll past text alone).
11. If you’re promoting a non-fiction book create several videos for Youtube giving talks, demonstrations and information upon your subject, these basically act as an advert with the viewer wanting to find out more, ensure you have a link to your website and sale page in the description.
12. Use Google Plus, not as popular as the other social networks but as most people have a Gmail account they’ll also have a G+ page too.
13. Have a website, with the likes of Wix, Weebly and Wordpress (plus many more) it’s easy to get your own author’s website up and running in an afternoon.
14. Use your website to build an email list, you may need to give the first chapter of your new book away in order to get a viewer to subscribe, but a list is a great way to promote.
15. Create an advert on Facebook, Facebook will allow you to target your audience very specifically and gives you great control over your budget too.
16. Use forums like KBoards to create discussions, answer questions and build your presence, here you can also learn a great deal from other authors who are self-publishing too.
17. Guest post/blog, build links with other authors, bloggers and specialists within your genre/field and ask to write a guest post for their website or blog.
18. Create a series of books, they can be eBooks and they don’t have to be that long either, it’s normally the case that the more books you have as an author the easier it becomes with regards to selling upon Amazon.
19. Podcast, similar to having a blog, it will require some work but it’s another great way to help promote your book (you can also guest on someone else’s too).
20. Be charitable, promote your book that on one particular day all the profits from sales will go directly to a specific charity, shout about it online and get your followers involved.
21. Have something in your book which encourages your reader to visit your website and sign up for your newsletter, it could be the first few chapters of your next book etc.
22. Organize a book signing in a local bookstore, café or even bar, use social media, press releases, ads and posters to promote.
23. Go to book fairs, events and expo’s, here you can promote your book to people within the industry.

Of course there are other things you can do to help promote your book (be creative), but the more YOU do in self-promotion the more books you’ll sell.