3 out of 4 stars
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This is the official review for “10 Step Plan to Promote Your Book Online: Book Marketing on Any Budget” by Scott Hughes.
This is a non-fiction book, targeted to an audience who would like to learn effective ways of marketing their book. This book provides clear, concise and pragmatic steps to do that. The scope of the book is limited to the current years as the subject of marketing books and the related technology are changing dramatically fast. The author narrates on how the books landscape has changed drastically over the past 10 years. There were no smart phones and tablets 10 years back, and book marketing was done by big publishers. Today’s scenario is totally different, with new authors who are not shy to try self-publishing, competing with the big publishers.
Once the author establishes the ubiquity of the current day authors and their books, he goes on to convince us that in such a scenario, the only way to be successful in selling a book is to write a fantastic book and paying attention to the details like proofreading, which would create a great first impression on the readers when they read it. “Good is not good enough” is the quote from the author. It sure enough is a great advice. It underlines the value system and the thought process which went behind the starting of his book club website. The author also mentions the eternal truth of time-money constraint, which makes business sense not only for marketing a book, but also for anything that one aspires to produce and market – to do it by oneself or pay someone else to do it. The author leaves the decision to the reader on how to balance the spending of time and money on producing a book, depending on their resources, capabilities and inclinations.
Then the author explains the 10 steps (it is quite good that the author sequences the actions in the order in which they need to be done, especially when the later steps refer back to the earlier steps which should have been completed already).
Producing a great book, sufficient proofreading of the content are stressed upon in detail. The importance of getting the manuscript reviewed by a professional editor is elaborated. The quote of the tip from Kristi Hudecek-Ashwill about using text-to-speech software and repeatedly listening to the software read the text aloud is very good. It does show the commitment that one needs to have in proofreading the content. The mention about the last thing done to complete the book (proofreading to eliminate spelling mistakes and grammar errors) is the first thing that the readers would see if they are not done effectively, is also quite good.
The author explains the importance of getting the book reviewed from trustworthy sources like KirKus. The mention about which social media platforms are apt for promoting a book, including the notes about the most recommended one and the least recommended one is pretty good. The quote of advice from Carrie Rubin that the best way to promote a book is through one’s blog and the engagements and interactions therein is a good tip, but I am not sure if everyone will like or will have the motivation to own a blog, maintain it, and market through it.
It is interesting and true that most people get their book reviewed only by their close circles like friends and relatives, which leads to a few 5-star reviews when the book is launched and then no reviews by the general public after that. The author spells out ways of how to avoid this and get many honest reviews from unknown people. Several tips are provided on how to use the social media right to market one’s book.
Guest blogging, author interviews, becoming active in the reading community and book clubs are all great tips to go with other necessities of marketing, and the author does a pretty good job of explaining about how to go about them. The last tip about how much money from the money earned by selling the book should be used in further advertising gives the business perspective of things.
The writing style of the author in this book is slightly different from his previous two books that I reviewed. This book has clear formatting and does not contain many single sentences as a series of thoughts. Probably it is because of the type of content that is being discussed about, but still I found myself relieved to be able to read better than the two other books in which I had to tolerate with the writing style. I am able to understand and appreciate the content in this book. There are some colorful words like ‘freaking’ in the book, but they are used to stress the importance of writing a great book, apt in the context and pardonable.
To summarize, it is a very good book for people who are looking for ways and methods of promoting their book. I sincerely appreciate the author’s intention and hard work in bringing about a book for the current day new budding authors on how to promote a book. I am pretty sure that the intended readers will find this book as a stepping stone in their writing career, not just for promoting their book, but also to write well itself.
Just out of curiosity, I checked Amazon to see if there are similar books on the subject, and I could find only two. One was free in Kindle, but never had been reviewed even once, and the other one had only a few 5-star reviews and had a pretty low Amazon seller ranking.
The quality and appropriateness of the suggestions made by the author to market a book, the writing style, author’s familiarity and command over the subject because of being an author and a book reviewer for the past many years, the fact that I want many aspiring authors to read this book, and the fact that I cannot give a 4 star as the subject is ever evolving, makes me give 3 out of 4 for this. Great job!
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10 Step Plan to Promote Your Book
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