Publishing to Your Audience

From Denise Williams at Cassidar Ink, a primer on publishing TO the audience right for your book. The process of becoming a self promoting Author, is all about getting as much input as possible and making all you can out of what is good for you.

Your book is a reflection of your voice and that voice appeals to a specific set of ears. Your job is to define and reach the ears that most wish to hear your voice.

More from Denise.

http://cassidarink.com/
If you’ve written a book, an e-book, or an information product, you’ve probably been told that one of the best ways to sell it is to write articles and submit them online.
And if you’re like many of the authors who contact me for assistance, you may be wondering why your books aren’t selling, even though you’ve been writing and submitting articles to beat the band.
So, why aren’t your articles selling? Here are some possible reasons.
1.First of all, articles don’t actually sell. They PRE-sell, which is an important stage to get through before you can sell anyone anything. People buy from people they know and like. Pre-selling is making your visitors like you and want to know more about you. This is what articles do for you. They don’t sell your product. They build a relationship and invite your readers to visit your website to learn more about you.
2. Very rarely will people buy on the first visit to your website. If a reader clicks through to your website, and lands on a sales page for your book or info product, they probably won’t buy. Don’t worry, it’s not you. It’s them. They’re still getting to know you and aren’t ready to buy from you just yet. OK, it might be a little bit you, but the next item will help.
3. Instead of giving them the choice of buying your book or nothing, invite them to leave their email address instead, so you can stay in touch and get to know each other a little better. To get visitors to subscribe to your list, give away a cool gift that’s actually valuable to your readers, like a report, a quiz, or even a chapter of your book
4. Make sure your landing page isn’t scary. The landing page is the page of your website people land on when they click through the link in your author’s resource box. This is the page that has to sell, so it’s worth taking the time to learn copywriting or paying someone to write the page for you if you don’t know how.
5. Your articles must be relevant to topic of your book. Even if you don’t remember anything else I’ve listed here, this is something you absolutely must do. Let’s say you’ve written a book about dog grooming. You will want to write articles about dog grooming to attract people who are actually interested in the topic of your book. Articles on building bird feeders, for example, will not pre-sell your book, or pre-qualify your visitors.
Articles really are one of the best ways to sell your books or information products. If yours haven’t been getting the results you want, keep this cheat sheet handy before you submit your next article.