YAY! A publisher has accepted your manuscript, you've been assigned an editor. Are you ready for the hard work? Do you really, really love that manuscript? I hope you do because it is time to launch your book: you will be its biggest cheerleader, its biggest promoter, and you will be talking about it non-stop. A friend said doing her doctoral dissertation was easier than selling her first book: "At least I had the PhD after years of research and writing: I have been selling this book for THREE YEARS and everyone asks me when I'm going to write another one!"
I had a long list of suggestions prepared for authors preparing to launch books, but I discovered that I couldn't say it better than Michael Hyatt, who describes in detail not only how to launch a book, but How to Launch a Bestselling Book
The entire post (summarized below) is an excellent primer on working every angle to get your book not just noticed, but SELLING.
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Hyatt writes, " I can’t promise this will work for you. While I characterize this as a “formula,” I refer to it as my formula. This is what worked for me. Hopefully, you can personalize what I have done and build on it. This assumes you have a wow product. As I say in my Platform keynote speech (quoting from David Ogilvy), “Great marketing only makes a bad product fail faster.” Your book must meet a felt need, be well-written, and have the potential to reach a large enough segment of the population.
This (list) doesn’t include what the publisher did... I assumed personal responsibility. I wasn’t expecting the publishing company to make me famous or make my book successful. I’ve been in this business a long time, and that’s not how it works. If you expect this, you will be disappointed."
Hyatt's bullet points are:
- I set a specific goal.
- I engaged my tribe early. (Hyatt blogged parts of his book before publication)
- I secured endorsements.
- I formed a launch team.
- I focused the promotion.
- I created a can’t-say-no offer.
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