NOTICE: You DO NOT Have the Right to Reprint or Resell this Report! You Also MAY NOT Give Away, Sell, or Share the Content Herein

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2 NOTICE: You DO NOT Have the Right to Reprint or Resell this Report! You Also MAY NOT Give Away, Sell, or Share the Content Herein Copyright Amy Harrop ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. No part of this report may be reproduced or transmitted in any form whatsoever, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any informational storage or retrieval system without express written, dated and signed permission from the author. DISCLAIMER AND/OR LEGAL NOTICES: The information presented in this report represents the views of the publisher as of the date of publication. The publisher reserves the rights to alter and update their opinions based on new conditions. This report is for informational purposes only. The author and the publisher do not accept any responsibilities for any liabilities resulting from the use of this information. While every attempt has been made to verify the information provided here, the author and the publisher cannot assume any responsibility for errors, inaccuracies or omissions. Any similarities with people or facts are unintentional. AFFILIATE DISCLAIMER: Amy Harrop may receive compensation from some of the entities listed in this report for referrals, as their thank you for sending you their way. However, Amy Harrop never recommends any service or product solely for the reason of receiving commissions (and neither should you) Amy Harrop knows her reputation is on the line. 2

3 Table of Contents Introduction... 4 Looks Matter Your E-book... 5 Welcome to Amazon... 6 How to Use Your Blog for E-book Promotions... 8 How to Promote your E-Book with Blog Posts... 9 Writing Tips, Keywords and Optimizing your Blog Posts Promote to Your List Increase Sales with Free Bonuses Friends and the Path to Accessing Other Lists Offer Free Copies for Review The Twitter Effect Facebook Influence Guest Blogging Get on the Interview Circuit Publish a Press Release Host a Teleseminar Review, Adjust, Implement and Repeat!

4 Want To Know A Clever Way To Ramp Up Your Traffic and Sales on Kindle That Most People Will Never Know About? Introducing the Simple Software Solution That Makes Promoting Your Kindle Books Easy! NO paid traffic required NO Endless article writing NO risky SEO strategies NO social media to manage Just click and submit and you re done! Click here to find out how it works! Introduction * * * * * Making More Sales With Kindle There was a time when becoming a published author was something that only happened to a very few lucky individuals. Today that has all changed thanks to the creation of e-books, self-publishing tools and the Amazon Kindle e-book reader. The combination of an inexpensive production format (no paper costs) and a massive and equally inexpensive distribution network Amazon.com has created an enormous opportunity for good writers to become the successful authors they have always dreamed of becoming. 4

5 Once you ve written that e-book with content that is appealing to a particular market in need of that information, you re half-way there to a successful outcome. The other critically important half of this plan is the promotional piece. The fact that e-books are so affordable to produce also means that the competition is huge. There are thousands and thousands of e-books being produced every day. In order to make your e- book noticed by your market you have to implement an effective promotional plan to sell your publication. Even though there are thousands of e-books in the marketplace competing for the attention of your potential customers and implementing a successful marketing strategy is not something every publisher will do or even do well. With this guide you have access to the insight and proven strategic tactics that can raise the profile of your e-book and improve your chances of realizing financial success with your e-book. Looks Matter Your E-book This guide will provide you with strategies that will attract audiences to your e-book on Amazon. Part of the attracting strategy involves ensuring that the e-book is in fact attractive. An e-book is not like a hardcover or paperback publication that has pages, texture and physical presence to attract readers. Everything you can see and read about your ebook takes on huge significance in the online marketplace. Cover The e-book cover is the face of your publication and what will grab the attention of potential buyers. When a visitor lands on the Amazon website in search of a book, what grabs their attention when look at several books in a category is the book s cover. If the color, text and layout on your e-book cover help the reader to feel as if this is the book that has the content they need or desire, the work needed to close a sale is that much easier from that point onward. Remember, you re not there to help sell the book, and the potential customer can t pick up the book, turn it around, thumb through and do all the traditional things book buyers might do determine whether or not this book is for them. A few tips to keep in mind when designing your e-book cover is to use bright color, clear graphics, few words and a layout that avoids crowding. 5

6 Title When choosing the title for your e-book you should ensure that it contains your keywords. A title with your keywords will appear more frequently in relevant search results. Welcome to Amazon What really helped to turn e-books into an opportunity for independent publishers was the decision by Amazon to facilitate the reading of e-books with its Kindle reader. The Kindle reader makes it possible for users to shop for, download and read e-books, magazines, newspapers, blogs and other digital media wirelessly using Wi-Fi or Amazon s own (3G) network. Gone are the days when the fastest way to get your favorite book was to make a trip to the bookstore or possibly wait 2 or 3 days for a delivery. With e-books customers can get access to the books they purchase instantly, once the transaction is completed and payment confirmed. Creating an Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing Account Once you ve created your e-book you can tap into the far-reaching network of customers provided through Amazon.com by opening up a Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) account at this URL: Once you ve signed up KDP provides you with information on uploading and setting your price. Keep in mind that while becoming a part of the KDP/Amazon network will cost you nothing, Amazon will take a percentage of each sale and the percentage they take depends on the price that you have set for your book. Author s Page Not only does the book have to be promoted to help increase sales but the author does as well too. For many books what makes a book popular is the profile of the author. The author s expertise, experience and knowledge of the subject matter, awards and other recognitions, all help to make an e-book more enticing to a potential buyer. As an e-book publisher for the Kindle Amazon provides you with a FREE listing and an Author s page to help you promote your book. On your author s page you can provide visitors with a picture of yourself, tell readers about your expertise and even display posts from your blog feed. 6

7 Optimize Your Author s Page: Make the most of your author s page with Amazon s Author Central resource. With Author Central you can personalize the information that is on your Author Page. Once you ve set up your Author Central account information you provide there should appear on your Author Page within 30 minutes. Through your Author Central account you can provide the following information to optimize your Author s Page and help customers to get to know you and become a fan of your publications: Biography Photos Blog Feeds Events Videos Product Description Once a viewer sees your e-book cover the next thing they ll look for is some description to confirm that this publication may be the one to meet their needs. On the product description section of the Amazon page where your Kindle e-book is listed, audiences expected to learn more about what this e-book has to offer. To convince readers your e-book will meet expectations, you need to hook them with a description that doesn t re-create your e-book but rather entices them with well-written ad copy. If selling isn t something you feel comfortable doing remember that s the only way you ll be able to get your e-book into the hands of your audience. Your audience is expecting to be convinced of the value of your publication, but they will only give you a few seconds so your copy has to be attention getting at the outset. Rather than being intimidated by the task of creating copy that sells, think about the factors that convince you to purchase any particular book. You might consider: What other readers have to say about the writer and his/her books testimonials are powerful! The expertise of the writer and any industry or literary awards the writer has received 7

8 The experience of the writer in the particular subject area explored in the book you are about to buy Those three areas of consideration listed above offer the kinds of information that influence a great number of people when it comes to purchasing books. That s why when you look on the back of hardcover or paperback book you often see quotes from famous authors and experts in support of the book. Potential buyers are more likely to purchase a book that has been endorsed by respected and influential individuals in that niche. With this in mind, create a product description that starts right off with short, exciting and punchy testimonials from readers or influential voices in your niche. Feel free to list anywhere from 1 3 short quotes at the start of your product description. This will help to grab the attention of your audience and encourage them to read on. In the next section of your product description you ll want to briefly describe your e-book in terms that will make the viewer want to read more by purchasing the book. In order to optimize your product description for search engines you will want to use relevant keywords in your copy. Ensure, however, that the copy is not written for a person and not a search engine. There is a difference. Sometimes when writers try to incorporate keywords into copy they can go too far resulting in copy that is difficult to read. You want to engage and attract your audience with your product description and provide just enough keywords to help your product description to show in search returns for your keywords. How to Use Your Blog for E-book Promotions One of the best ways to promote you Kindle e-book is to generate buzz online about your publication. What buzz generally means is that many people are talking about your book and clicking on links to your product page on Amazon. When this happens search engines take notice and will begin to rank relevant keywords for your e-book. The more extensive the buzz around your e-book, the higher your rankings on search engines and the higher your rankings on search engines, the higher the volume of traffic to your product page which will directly influence your volume of sales! If you haven t already set up a blog for your business or niche topic, now would be the time to do so as blogs are uniquely able to attract website traffic. Unlike a traditional website, a blog is structured in such a way that 8

9 it can be easily updated on a regular basis. If you provide regular posts on your blog your blog becomes more relevant to search engines search engines love fresh content! Additionally, blog posts are arranged chronologically and that is a feature that enables search engines to more readily recognize fresh content. The more often search engines return to your website to index fresh content, the greater the likelihood of your blog receiving a higher rank in search engine search results for your keywords. Blog Platforms: After deciding on a name for your website and registering that name with a domain register your next job is to obtain web hosting for your new blog. There are many web hosting companies to choose from including Hostgator.com and BlueHost.com. Choose whichever service provider you prefer but ensure that they offer they offer blogging platform software including one of the most popular blogging platforms WordPress. WordPress is offered free of charge. Directions for setting up your website with WordPress are readily available from many web hosting companies. As an option, you might consider outsourcing the set-up of your blog to a service provider specializing in this work. Many virtual assistants provide this kind of service. Check with your local Chamber of Commerce or various online business forums to seek out recommendations for virtual assistants who specialize in website/blog creation services. How to Promote your E-Book with Blog Posts A blog is almost like a newspaper as the most successful and popular blogs provide daily or semi-weekly updates on a topic that is interesting to a particular market. What happens with a successful blog is that the audience comes to expect certain types of information, insight and even recommendation and advice from the blogger. They begin to trust that blogger s opinions and become very loyal to that blog. This is an ideal situation for an e-book publisher with an e-book that reflects the topics and interests shared on a blog especially the publisher s blog! If your audience comes to respect and value what you write on your blog they are going to be very enthusiastic about an e-book filled with more in depth content on the subject matter. Your blog provides an opportunity for you to build anticipation, support and sales for you book 9

10 Your Blog Strategy Build anticipation: The interesting thing about a blog is that the more personal your tone the more readers appreciate it. A blog is in fact like a journal and audiences appreciate the authenticity that is associated with blog that reads like journal. So don t why not invite your readers into the process of developing your e-book. You don t have to share boring details but you can share exciting high points like the day in which you decide to publish an e-book on a particular topic you know your audience will love. Here s a suggested sequence of topics that you can highlight in your blog to build anticipation about your e- book: The circumstances surrounding your decision to publish an e- book For example: you might write a post that spells out your decision to respond to many questions you ve received on Topic X by writing an e-book all about Topic X). The people and topics that you are researching/interviewing hints about the content being developed will definitely build anticipation! The day you complete your book! Who wouldn t love to be part of the creation of something great and nothing is more satisfying than reaching completion! A post about this momentous day will definitely help to build your audience. Include excerpts from your book in your posts give your readers a taste of your e-book with strategically chosen excerpts that don t give away your content but serve to draw your audience in so they will want more. Of course once you ve got their attention make it easy for them to get more by providing your Amazon link to your e-book. Writing Tips, Keywords and Optimizing your Blog Posts One of the important things to remember about writing on the web is that your pages should be optimized to make it easy for your audience to find. For example while you may have let s say 1000 loyal visitors on your 10

11 website every day, there may be 5,000 more loyal visitors that you could attract as new loyal readers with a little strategic optimization. Optimizing a page to promote your e-book has a lot to do with keyword phrases. Keyword phrases are those key words that your target market is using to search out topics related to the e-book you ve produced. In order to know what your keyword phrases are you ll need to conduct research using a keyword research tool like WordTracker or Google AdWords Keyword Research Tool. What you ll be looking for are keywords related to your topic that generate enough searches each month to support a healthy volume of traffic to your website. Be careful that you do not select a keyword in your niche that is too popular as it will be difficult for you to get to the top of search results especially if your brand/name/blog/public profile is relatively new or relatively unknown. Just imagine you decided to become a beverage manufacturer and you wanted to be the leading seller of carbonated beverages in the country. Your competition would likely be Coke a product with a multi-million dollar advertising budget and hundreds of millions of customers. It would take an enormous budget to compete with Coke in all the forums they compete including television, Internet and print. So unless you had a monster sized budget you wouldn t choose to compete with Coke. This is the same train of thought you should apply when you determine your keywords. Choose a keyword with just the right amount of competition that your promotional strategy can handle to increase your chances of turning up on Page 1 of search returns for that keyword. How to optimize your blog posts to draw more potential e-book purchasers: 1. Identify the keyword phrase that you want to optimize. This should be the keyword phrase that s most relevant for your e-book. 2. Write your e-book promotional post using that keyword phrase sparingly but building your content around that keyword phrase as much as possible. 3. Many SEO (Search Engine Optimization) experts will tell you that your post title is the most important component of your blog post. This is because the post tile becomes your page title which is a leading indicator search engines use to index pages. Make sure your title is engaging and interesting the words in your title are 11

12 likely what will attract the attention of readers and compel them to click through to read more. The more clicks to your page, means the higher the potential of sales! 4. Most people like picture so include an attractive picture with your post. The image might even be your engaging e-book cover! 5. Call to Action remember this initiative is all about promoting your e-book so you can increase your sales and earn a living! Make sure you invite your readers to purchase your e-book and get almost immediate access to the benefits you ve outlined. Promote to Your List If you ve collected the names and addresses of your blog followers, past customers and prospective customers you likely have a list of people or subscribers that will form a significant part of your business. Just take a look at any loyalty program today whether it s frequent flyer miles or any retail outlet points program in the marketplace you ll see the consistent efforts of businesses to develop a loyal following of customers with perks and incentives to keep them coming back. Based on a 2012 report put out by Inc. magazine it costs a business anywhere from 5-10 times more to acquire a new customer than it does to sell to an existing one. Current customers will spend 67% more of their money with vendor they have already done business with than a new one. These facts underscore the importance of doing your best to nurture a relationship you re your current and prospective customers and one of the most convenient and cost efficient ways to do this is with marketing. If you re just starting out, having a blog is an excellent way to start building your list and developing a relationship with the people on that list through regular, quality content on your blog and consistent communications with them delivered through . To get things set-up what you ll need is an marketing service provider and among the most popular are Aweber, ConstantContact and MailChimp. These services will provide you with software that you can use to set up an inviting form on your website that you can use to collect the names and addresses of your site visitors. The management of the list will be handled by the service. All you need to do is to get the form on your website/blog (ideally on each page) and follow the instructions they provide for setting up and sending out s. 12

13 With an effective marketing strategy you will enhance your relationship with the hundreds and hopefully thousands of people that you will have or will eventually have on your list by sharing with them useful and interesting information that you know appeals to your particular market. Your daily or weekly s shouldn t be long but should be well written and be of value to your readers, otherwise you risk losing the trust that you ve built up with your audience. It is that sense of trust that will help boost your e-book sales. Your e-book represents a wonderful benefit to your readers. It represents a concentrated format reflecting your insight and knowledge, your voice, your expertise essentially many of the things that likely attracted your audience to your blog and/or previous publications, products or presentations. The more you provide your audience with this kind of content, the more you reinforce their trust and confidence in what you have to share and SELL. For example, if you are a business coach and your blog provides daily bits of advice and inspiration for entrepreneurs, your e-book may offer pages and pages of more in-depth advice and strategies all in one place that can be easily accessed and viewed using the convenient Kindle reader. Everything listed in the paragraph above is what you want to convey in various s to your readers. Your e-book is the answer to your audience s problems and immediate needs and with a smart marketing strategy consisting of regular communications with your list via , you can deliver that message effectively and personably. Not only that, you can make it easy for YOUR list to access your valuable e-book by providing a convenient link to purchase in your . You can also offer an incentive to purchase that you can explain is only available to your subscribers and customers. This is how you communicate value and benefit and demonstrate your appreciation to your list for allowing you to send information to their private inbox day after day, week after week. That s the thing about list communications or marketing - when your intended recipient opens their they are experiencing one to one communications with you. Of course you re not drafting 500, 1000 or 10,000 separate s to everyone on your list you ll be using your marketing service which will allow you to format one anyway you like and then will send that to everyone on your list. 13

14 From the recipient s perspective, however, that can appear very personable. This is very much unlike your blog which though personable in tone is not very personable in format. With a blog you are speaking to readers on the Internet which is ohhh so public! When a person on your list opens your it is from you (and should look that way when you set up your marketing format). In your marketing message you want to let your intended recipient know that you appreciate their loyalty as a subscriber to your list or as a valued customer. Keep in mind that you can have several lists based on forms your audience completes. One form may collect blog subscribers; another form may be more detailed and actually be part of your shopping cart check-out process (that s how you ll develop a list of people you know have purchased your product this will be your valuable customer list). As you set up your marketing system ensure that you are aware of the various segments of your audience and tailor your message accordingly. Increase Sales with Free Bonuses One of the tried and true sales strategies that customers appreciate are value added bonuses. How excited are you when you purchase a product like a bathroom cleanser and the manufacturer includes and extra can of cleanser as a free bonus! Obviously this doesn t happen often but it is done every now and again to raise the profile on the product and encourage sales! The same concept can apply to your e-book promotion but with a slightly different twist. If you offer a relevant and valuable bonus like a guide, or free coaching or a subscription to a magazine or something else your market will instantly see how the cost of your e-book begins to look like an investment in value and benefits for them. If you re wondering how purchasing another product that you will then give away to your list when they purchase your e-book can be profitable the answer is Joint Ventures. You don t have to provide the bonus yourself but you can ask someone else to provide that free bonus to you. Why another business owner would agree to give you one of their products as a give-away to YOUR has to do with the agreement that you will create with this partner. 14

15 A Joint Venture (JV) basically means that you will enter into an agreement with someone else usually a business colleague or friend for a certain and finite period of time and during that period of time both of you will contribute some degree of equity to support an outcome that benefits both of you. What you contribute could be time and knowledge or a product or service or simply promotional exposure to each other s lists - essentially anything that may be considered valuable. So in the case of your e-book, let s say you ve been blogging for a while or you have a profile that is known and you have generated a large and loyal following of subscribers who have shared their address with you and are now part of your list of subscribers. There will be others in your niche or in other related niches who would love nothing better than to have exposure to your valuable list. Usually when promoting the freebie you will include the company owner s name and the product itself may include contact information about that company. Essentially your JV partner will receive valuable exposure to the market represented by the people on your list simply by providing a free product that you can package as a bonus and offer to those purchasing your e-book. To illustrate let s say you ve published an e-book about caring for your pet poodle and you have a friend or business colleague who is willing to throw in a guide that profiles leading vacation destinations in the country that allow and cater to pets. This is the kind of guide that might be of great interest to the poodle pet-owner market. So when members of your list receive an from their trusted pet poodle author/expert with an offer to purchase your newest book on poodle care and receive as part of that purchase the ADDED bonus of a free guide all about pet-friendly vacation places in their region, your e- book becomes an increasingly desirable item for purchase. Keep in mind a list of subscribers who trust and value the business/personality they ve subscribed to via a website are more likely to purchase from that business/personality anyway the added bonus serves as a reward for their loyalty. This is why online business owners consider their subscriber lists among their most valuable assets. One to such a group could generate hundreds or thousands of dollars in sales depending on the size of the list and the product/service being promoted. Don t worry about the size of your List: Even if you think your list is small or you re relatively new to the market and don t believe you d be able to attract a Joint Venture partner, think again as there may be much 15

16 you actually can offer if you dig a little deeper. For even if you are a brand new e-book author with no previous publications and a brand new website, you might have skills that a potential Joint Venture partner would appreciate. For example, in addition to being an author you might be an expert copywriter. Consider offering your copywriting services to support this initiative. So if we continue this pet care example, and assume your JV partner is also an expert speaker on the topic of vacationing with your pets you could offer your copywriting services and develop a sales page to promote a webinar your JV partner is hosting to promote his new pet vacation guide. If you combine these ideas and promote them together as pet care promotion for the market you can and will generate the kind of buzz and potential profits not likely possible on your own. Remember your Joint Venture Partner has a List too: Don t forget to encourage your Joint Venture partners to send an about your e- book to their lists you might even throw in your own free bonus if you have one to entice your JV partner s list to buy your e-book. Essentially the decision is up to you how you ll negotiate with friends and business colleagues to come up with a bonus for your list and even access to your JV partner s list. The important thing to remember is that you should search out opportunities to leverage your assets and drive up sales. Friends and the Path to Accessing Other Lists Another way to increase your sales is to actively reach other segments of the marketplace through your network of friends and colleagues. One of the most affordable ways to reach new segments of the marketplace you haven t reached is to gain access to other subscriber lists. This is why networking online and offline is so important. Asking someone if they would mind promoting your e-book to their list is a lot easier to do if you already know that person. If you are a member of a mentorship group or an online forum for your particular niche or industry or even a member of your local chamber of commerce, take the time to get to know the people in these groups. Learn about other group member s products and services and try to offer advice or helpful information whenever the opportunity avails itself. Being open to learning more about your business colleagues and friends can actually be 16

17 very educational and interesting. The more you learn about the business practices and customer behaviors of others in and outside your niche, the more opportunity you have to discover new insights about your own business. When it comes time to identify opportunities to widen your market in support of your e-book promotions and sales, you ll find it much easier to ask a network of friends and people whose businesses you really understand. You ll likely be pleasantly surprised by the responses as people generally like to help others especially those that have taken the time to get to know them in times when they don t necessarily want or need something. To make it easy for your friends to tell their friends and the people on their own subscriber lists about your e-book, offer to provide written copy that can be included in their s and that will clearly articulate the value and benefit of your e-book for their lists. Make sure the is concise and conversational in tone. Offer Free Copies for Review One of the reasons Amazon has become so popular over the years is that customers have confidence in the purchase process and this is because Amazon offers the kind of product proof customers today value. That proof is demonstrated primarily in the following two ways: 1. Customer reviews 2. Customer purchases Not only does Amazon make it easy for your prospective customers to see what other customers have to say about your book in the Customer Reviews section of your product page, but they also provide proof that the people who purchase your books are not just fluke purchasers but actually reflective of a real demographic of people with similar interests to the prospective customer. The example below features the Customer Reviews section on an Amazon.com product page for a popular e-book. 17

18 How that proof is demonstrated is with the scrolling horizontal bar located below the product description on your Amazon product page. This bar highlights the various books purchased by your customers. Book choices made by customers who have purchased your e-book will have an impact on the confidence levels of those prospective customers trying to determine if your book is ideally for them. The more they see books in this scrolling bar that are reflective of their interests the more confident they will feel that your e-book will be the right book for them as well. The example below features a Kindle e-book product description and the scrolling bar that highlights other books purchased by customers who have purchased the product for this page (The 10X Rule). 18

19 To achieve high sales goals for your e-book you therefore need to generate positive reviews to generate interest and anticipation about your e-book. As for that scrolling horizontal bar on the product page that shows other books purchased by your customers, you ll need to increase sales to ensure that bar is not sparse or empty! Remember that any person who leaves a review must state if they received a free copy within their Amazon review.t for your e-book. 1. Participate in online forum discussions and offer free copies of your e-book in return for reviews. Now don t just show up one day and announce your need for reviews of your e-book. As you re writing your e-book do your research and determine those online forums where you can get the kind insight and support from influential leaders in your niche or industry. A positive review from a leader in your market or in some complementary niche is HIGHLY valuable to you in the promotion of your e-book. Get to know market leaders well ahead of your e-book launch date. Participate in discussions that they may raise in your online forums and let them know of your plans to launch an e-book. Once your ebook is completed announce this in the forums where you have been active. In addition to asking forum members to 19

20 review free copies of your e-book send direct messages to those influential members with large lists or popular blogs and don t be intimidated by their stature in the industry. They weren t always industry leaders and likely benefited from the support of others. Many market leaders will welcome the opportunity to review an e- book especially with a friendly and sincere invitation. Remember to provide the link to your product page on Amazon to make it as easy as possible for your reviewers to submit their reviews for your e-book. 2. Enroll in Amazon s Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) Select program the KDP Select Program is specifically for Amazon s e-book publishing program. When you enrol in the KDP program it allows you to lend your book through the Kindle Owners Lending Library to anyone who has an Amazon Prime membership. Why this would interest an e-book publisher is that publishers enrolled in this program can earn money each time their e-book is borrowed by someone in the Lending Program. Another one of the really attractive features of the KDP Select Program is that you can offer your book for free on Amazon for 5 days every 90 days. Outside of this program you cannot offer our e-book for free on Amazon. In addition to the huge reach extended to you by the Kindle Owners Lending program providing your e-book for free for 5 days means the potential for multiple downloads and multiple reviews! Reaching a larger audience not only means more reviews and the potential for receiving higher rankings on Amazon s bestseller list but you ll also show up in the scrolling bar on the product page highlighting Customers also bought this. Again, this listing offers tremendous marketing exposure and is well regarded by target markets. 20

21 Direct traffic to your Amazon listing during this free period by promoting this short-term freebie to your list, in your favorite online forums, on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and any other networks where you have the ability to promote this opportunity to your target market. NOTE of caution: if you do choose to enroll in the Kindle Direct Publishing program you can not sell your e-book anywhere else. You can sell other formats of your book (e.g. hard cover, paperback, etc.). The Twitter Effect Social media is fast and effective way to promote your e-book and one of the most dynamic social media platforms for promotions and sales is Twitter. Of course if you haven t been active on Twitter you have some work to do but it s definitely doable. If you have already have a strong following into the hundreds or thousands you re well on your way to using Twitter to drive your sales figures up! You ll first need to assess your Twitter following. Are you following all your friends and business contacts on Twitter? Are you following key media contacts for your niche or industry? Are you following major thought leaders and influencers in your niche or complementary niches? Essentially what you want to do is to ensure that you can reach with your Tweets (messages on Twitter) 1. People who have the following and ability to effectively promote your message about your e-book 2. People who might be or are interested in the topic you explore in your e-book Just like you did with your blog, you want to build anticipation among your Twitter followers about the release of your e-book. Consider creating messages for Twitter that contain titillating excerpts from your e-book. You want to entice your followers to learn more about your publication. If you re struggling to find the right excerpt that would be short enough for Twitter, consider leaking chapter introductions or title. Share updates that 21

22 shed some insights into your writing and publication process. There is a certain mystique about the life of a writer (even if it s temporary) that appeals to a wide cross section of people. If you are providing free copies (to generate reviews and increase your rankings) share links that will take Twitter users back to your blog and then invite them to sign up for your list in order to receive their free copies. Monitor Twitter discussion to identify points in conversations where a free copy of your e-book might be fitting or appreciated by those involved in the conversation. Remember the most effective way to attract followers is to engage in twoway conversations on Twitter. As a whole people are less interested in someone who is only interested in promoting their ware. Just like in real life, people like to be listened to and if you are engaged in two-way conversations with others, you re a listener. To help you find those two-way conversations try setting up a search on your book title in HootSuite or TweetDeck. These platforms will set up columns for tweets that reference your specified search item (your e- book). This wonderful feature makes it much easier for you to see whenever mention of your e-book is made on Twitter. Twitter users who have their Twitter account connected to their Kindle account may sometimes publish a tweet about a book they are reading or a book that they have just read. Should you have the good fortune to observe one of these tweets as a result of your monitoring strategy, you should consider following up with those individuals. Contact them directly with a friendly tweet asking them what they thought of your e-book. If the response is positive you can then (in a non-pushy way) encourage them to kindly leave a review. Make sure they know how much you appreciate their feedback. Facebook Influence Facebook is the other social media platform that has a mammoth share of the social media networking marketplace. There are now 1 billion users on Facebook and the number is rising. Of course when it comes to Facebook users it is all about personal connections - so you don t really have access to all 1 billion users or even a significant percentage of that billion unless you gain access, one friend at a time (or unless you purchase Facebook advertising). 22

23 The average user on Facebook has around 200 friends and most power users have between 2,000-5,000 friends. If you plan to use this social media network to support your business outcomes you d be well advised to increase the number of friends you connect to on your personal profile page. Now I ll repeat if you are focused on using social media as much as possible to support your business outcomes, you shouldn t be using Facebook to share personal details you would not normally share with business associates and general strangers. There is also strictly business option called Facebook Fan Pages that we will discuss a little later on. Facebook gives you an opportunity to share messages that reinforce your business message or the focus of your e-book(s). The reason why you should be less concerned about protecting Facebook for personal reasons only is that you would be missing out on a huge opportunity to tap into the various networks each of your Facebook friends brings to your page. If the average Facebook user has around 200 friends and you work diligently to get your Facebook friends list up to say 1000 you have the potential of reaching 200,000 people or more, depending on your ability to engage your followers. Creating engagement on Facebook begins with regular posting and sharing of good content that can inform, entertain and inspire your Facebook friends. Of course you don t want to make everything be about business and your sales so it s helpful to mix up your posts a little bit. Perhaps you might kick off your morning with an inspirational post, followed an hour later with a headline from the news. Ideally some of your followers may comment on your posts so you ll want to monitor closely enough so that you can respond and have the kind of two-way dialogue we spoke about during our review of Twitter. Of course you will want to eventually post about your e-book but consider including in some posts a call to action that isn t just about buying your book but about some of the insight you ve shared in your e-book or about your heartfelt responses to some of the reviews you ve read. If you are participating in the Kindle Direct Publishing program and taking advantage of the opportunity to list your Kindle for free for 5 days, sharing a link to free e-book that you and others have boasted about to your friends on Facebook is all GOOD! Given that you likely have more bona fide relationships with colleagues and friends on Facebook than you do 23

24 on Twitter offering a free book is the kind of friendly behavior that will help to cement more relationships for you on Facebook and enhance your profile as a considerate and successful writer/publisher/business owner. Facebook Fan Pages: In addition to your Facebook Profile Page you can also set up a Facebook Fan Page for business purposes. The difference between a Facebook Fan page for your business and your Facebook Profile that you use with business purposes in mind is that you do not have to approve each and every person that wants to start following your updates on your Facebook Fan page. This is why Facebook Fan pages can easily have thousands of likes in no time at all. All visitors to your Facebook Fan page have to do is click on the Like icon on your page and they will have access to your Fan Page updates on their daily news feed. You ll want your posts to appear on the daily news feed of your Facebook friends and Fan Page followers as that makes it easier for your audiences to see your posts. The great thing about Facebook is that when you include a link in your post your viewers can view a snapshot of the website along with the website or blog post description (you can edit that description as soon as you add the link to the post (but before you publish to Facebook). So when you re ready to promote your e-book you can post a status update with a link to your Amazon.com product page both on your Facebook Fan Page and on your personal profile page. You don t necessarily want to have duplicate content on both pages, since you ll likely have a lot of your Facebook Friends as fans of your Facebook Fan Page. Consider discussing about one aspect of your book on your personal profile page or maybe even share a blog post about your book on your personal Facebook page and share the Amazon link on your Facebook Fan Page. Don t forget to include an interesting comment with every post never simply post a bare link without your comment to go along with it. Guest Blogging One of the most effective ways to reach a wider audience and enhance your rankings on the search engines is to write a guest post on someone else s blog ideally a high profile blogger with great reach into your target market. The combination of wider market reach and higher rankings on search returns are of course the ideal combo for making more money with 24

25 Kindle! But let s step back a minute and assess what it takes to secure a guest blogging opportunity. First of all you need to do your research to identify the right blogs for your market. Who you want to reach are buyers so you want to make very sure that the blogs you hope to write for will in fact reach the kind of audiences that would be interested in your e-book. For example, if we take our pet care e-book example again, the ideal guest blogger for that publication might be a leading dog trainer perhaps someone who is an also an author and has developed a loyal following readers and fans who rely on his dog training advice and respect his recommendations. Even though a blogger may not provide you with a recommendation or review for your e-book the very fact that they agree to allow you to share insights as a guest blogger on their site is a kind of an endorsement of you as a thought leader on your topic. So the challenge you re left with after identifying say half a dozen prospective guest blogging opportunities is the challenge of receiving the answer yes to your request to be a guest blogger on their site. To help ensure the most favorable outcomes you ll want to do the following: 1. Make sure you take the time to learn about the blogger s background, the focus of his/her work/business, any recent awards or acknowledgements he/she has received and anything the blogger might have said or written about your e-book already! 2. Be able to articulate in your communication to the blogger your understanding of the focus of his/her blog, the interests and preference of the readership and anything else that would indicate your ability to write a suitable guest blog post. 3. Send your request to the blogger in the most appropriate way likely an or direct message on a social media site if he/she is active with you in that kind of a forum Once you get the approval to write a guest blog post make sure you focus on the needs of the audience as well as your e-book. You do want to achieve sales but you don t want to seem to salesman-like especially on 25

26 someone else s blog. Your goal is, as always, to provide quality content that can be of value and benefit to the reader. Ensure that your guest blog includes interesting details about your e-book and make the connection between your e-book and the needs of this new audience. Remember if all goes well you ll be attracting some members of this audience to your own blog and hopefully to your Kindle page on Amazon as well! Once your post has been published you will now have a valuable backlink to your website. Search engines place great value on back-links. These back-links indicate just how popular your website is and essentially make your site more relevant to search engines like Google and others. The more back-links out there on the Internet pointing to your website the more important your site becomes to Google (and other search engines). Becoming an important website to Google and other search engines means that your website will start to raise in the rankings for your keywords keywords that you ve established to direct visitors to your product page on Amazon. This is why earlier on in this guide you were encouraged to ensure that you include your keywords in your product description, in your author profile, in your blog posts and in your blog post title. Your product page on Amazon and your blog where you promote your e-book are all places where you want to draw your market to as they search for books like yours using the search engines. Get on the Interview Circuit Many of the online content marketing gurus recommend that content writers and bloggers consider interviews when they are at a lost for new or fresh content for their online properties. This is good news for you because one of the best ways to drive sales for your Kindle e-book is to be interviewed by various bloggers and media outlets. You don t have to limit your interviews to the written word even on the Internet. Podcasts are very popular especially because of great podcast syndication tools like itunes. The best strategy is to secure a mix of interviews that include interviews by: Bloggers Main stream media (e.g. reporters who cover a news beat that includes your area of expertise/focus) Podcasters 26

27 Seminar Hosts Webinar Hosts Twitter Chats Blogger Interviews Do your research and identify those bloggers who cover topics in your niche or specialty. Offer to be interviewed by them over the phone or over Skype. Alternatively what you both might find easier to do is if the blogger submits questions to you about your e-book that you can then answer and send back to the blogger to be posted on his/her website. If you re interested in getting interviewed by a fairly popular blogger you might also offer to provide a hard copy of your book (if available) as a gift that the blogger can give away to readers as part of the promotion for your book (and to drive up subscribers to his website!). Main Stream Media Interviews Do your research to identify those reporters, radio hosts and editors who cover topics related to your niche/area of specialty. Write a pitch letter to try to secure an interview. A pitch letter is essentially a letter that contains a story idea that you are pitching to the reporter. In that letter you might make a connection between what is in your e-book and some issue or controversy in the news (if that s possible). Or you might make a connection between your e-book and some local event or activity. Essentially you want to explain in a couple of short paragraphs why your e-book is newsworthy and why it would be worth the time of this reporter or editor to spend a few minutes interviewing you for their newspaper, magazine, radio or TV program. Podcasters Podcasters are like radio programs for the Internet. Some may have advertisements, some may not. Some may be 60 minutes in length, some may be only 15 minutes in length it all depends on the preferences of the podcaster. You ll need to do your research in your niche/sector and identify podcasters who reach your target market with their programs. Send a pitch letter to your preferred podcasters one that is similar to the one you might have written for the main stream media. Just ensure your letter reflects an understanding of the podcaster s program and focus. 27

28 Seminar Hosts / Webinar Hosts Many business seminars and online webinars include in their programing an interview with an expert or an author or some kind of specialist. Who they interview really depends on the focus of the seminar/webinar and the needs of the target audience. So instead of following the rule of narrowing your research for interview opportunities to people who target your niche market, when it comes to seminars and webinars you might want to work with whatever hosts contacts you with an opportunity as long as the interview and seminar/webinar itself is not distasteful or inappropriate in some way for you. The thing to remember here is that the seminar/webinar host may want to host an interview that provides an opportunity for seminar/webinar participants to learn about publishing e-books online. And these event participants may have nothing to do with your niche. They could be, for instance engineers. In that case you might be invited to talk not so much about your niche specialty but about the process you followed to publish your Kindle e-book. This can be a good opportunity even though it may not be readily apparent. While engineers may not be your direct target group they may have friends that are or your seminar interview might go so well that the seminar/webinar recording is sold and shared in various communities both online and offline. When that happens markets may cross and you may very well be reaching your target market...eventually. Twitter Chats A Twitter Chat is a conversation lead by a topic leader that takes place on Twitter. By using hashtags a feature of Twitter that helps to aggregate terms with the use of the pound sign (#) followed by a topic or name (e.g. #petcare or #smallbiz, etc.) Twitter users can easily follow a conversation directly on Twitter or using any number of Chat Client tools that allow Twitter Chat participants to view only those tweets in the conversation while facilitating the use of set hashtags to post questions and updates. Though fast and furious in pace, this format is ideal for interviews. An expert or author like yourself is invited to answer questions about your area of specialty. The host will ask you questions on Twitter that you will then answer using the set hashtag of course. Twitter Chat participants will also ask questions but just as importantly will re-tweet your messages. 28

29 So as you discuss topics related to your e-book you can benefit by the retweets of participants. Hopefully after the Twitter Chat you ll not only have many new followers but also new sales. You ll want to ensure you share a link to your e-book product page at least once and definitely ensure that that link is included in your Twitter profile. FYI: Social Media Today reports that a recent 45-minute chat they hosted with a publishing partner reached 39,000 Twitter accounts and generated 93,000 impressions. This apparently generated 100 new followers and exposure for the conference that Social Media Today was reporting. These are all very good reasons for you to search out Twitter Chat opportunities for your next interview. Publish a Press Release A press release is usually a one page document that explains why something important to a company, association, community group, government or other entity is worthy of news coverage. Traditionally a press release served the primary purpose of telling the media about something you wanted to have covered in the news. That coverage was a lot less expensive than advertising and more effective. Press releases are still written for that reason but with the advent of the Internet they now also serve another purpose and that is to generate valuable back-links to your website. How this happens is that press releases issued on the Internet are often picked up by various website publishers who may find the news being announced rather newsworthy for their own audiences so they publish the release to their website. If you included your link in the press release many web publishers will keep it in there thus providing you with great back-link juice to help boost your search engine rankings. The release of your e-book is an IDEAL time to write and issue a press release. Not only can you benefit from the back-link juice of those website publishers who pick up your release and publish it as is on their websites, but the launch of an interesting new e-book is news for many main stream media outlets. So unlike the bulk of press releases that are produced every day and thrown out by journalists, you actually may have a truly newsworthy press release. It s worth your while to craft a press release and issue to secure free promotion for your e-book. 29

30 Your press release should have the following components: Contact information place your name or the name of your media relations consultant along with contact information at the top of the press release (left or right hand corner). Title (use keywords to optimize your press release for search engines) Introduction Lead: quickly but effectively cover the who, what, when, where, why and how of your announcement. Body Content elaborate a little on your experience don t be tempted to include testimonials or sales language many press release distribution services, like PRWeb will not send out your press release if it sounds like a sales pitch. Bio end with a short paragraph that provides a profile on you or your company. This should really be no more than a 2-sentence, short wrap up. Ending the usually symbol to mark the end of a press release is ###. Your final step is to send your press release out to the media. If you have your own media list you can send it to reporters, editors, producers and freelancers yourself or you can use a combination of your own targeted lists and a wide reaching press release distribution service. One of the most affordable and respected press release distribution services especially for online distribution is PRWeb.com 30

31 Host a Teleseminar A Teleseminar is basically a seminar where you have one or more speakers who can lead discussions on a certain topic. The key difference between a Teleseminar and a regular in-person Seminar is that the speaker and audience are not in the same place. With a Teleseminar the speaker might be in Seattle and participants might be located in every corner of the country. Of course the other major difference between the two types of events is that with a Teleseminar everyone is connected to the seminar by their telephones (or something like Skype) hence the term Tele -seminar. Teleseminars are very popular today because they allow you to participate from the comfort of your own home or office something that is considered a huge benefit for busy people today. For this reason you might want to consider holding such an event because it offers a very powerful and credible platform for you to promote your knowledge, expertise and leadership. These are all attributes that will go a long way towards enhancing the value of the e-book you authored and will be able to sell at some point during your Teleseminar. Hosting a teleseminar can be a little overwhelming if you ve never planned and produced one before but overall the process is pretty straight forward. You can (and likely should) outsource a lot of the logistical and technical aspects and focus on developing an interesting program that features either just yourself or other speakers in your niche or related niche. You ll also need to be the key person involved in marketing the seminar to various audiences. The benefit of having other speakers involved in your teleseminar is that they will attract their own loyal fans and this will serve to widen your reach and exposure. Your e-book should not be the focus of the teleseminar but rather something you will ideally generate great interest and desire for based on your ability to talk about related topics and issues of importance to your target market (who should be in your audience). Offering your audience the opportunity to buy your e-book at the end of a successful teleseminar is a great way to increase sales as an impressed audience will want more of what you have to offer and the immediate access and affordability of an e-book is a very easy sell in that situation. 31

32 The sale will rest on your ability to lead a Teleseminar that offers quality content and information for your audience. Review, Adjust, Implement and Repeat! We ve just reviewed several different ways to promote your e-book and generate more sales. Review these strategies, adjust to your preferences and circumstances, implement and repeat and you ll be well on your way to making more money with Kindle! Want To Know A Clever Way To Ramp Up Your Traffic and Sales on Kindle That Most People Will Never Know About? Introducing the Simple Software Solution That Makes Promoting Your Kindle Books Easy! NO paid traffic required NO Endless article writing NO risky SEO strategies NO social media to manage Just click and submit and you re done! Click here to find out how it works! 32