Indie Authors Book Marketing Plan

reply with, go to your local book store with your books, but ask questions. The reason I say that is because there is a learning curve that you need to have at your side. I know that no one wants to be rejected. The most important questions to ask is; "Where did you buy these books? Who did you buy them from?" The next question to ask is, "How do I contact them, myself?" The average store owner, well, actually anyone loves to help when being asked for help. So start your question with "Could you help me?" You will find out many of them purchased the books from distributors and publishers.

Book distributors are one of the keys. In order to sell your books to a distributor you first need to know what they cost. This is not POD, purchase on demend cost but what they really cost to make your book. Believe me the price difference between POD and regular book printers is very far apart! The best way to start costing a book is to go to local book printers and ask, how many for what cost with all of the particulars. Price out a small quantity and then ask what if there are more. Every printer has price breaks for volume production and you want to know what they are. Write down the information in detail and be sure to know how long it takes to do what… Each printer has a certain amount that they are able to produce in a week and each printer has a lead time before they are able to print. This way you have an idea of delivery times.

Once you have priced out some local book printers then you might want to price out the cost of importing books from another country. When pricing out books from another country producing them you have to make sure that they will follow the country standards. That is important. There are ink and color regulations from one country to the next. Lead issues etc. Find out the lead time and the minimums along with price and shipping cost. I know it sounds involved it's not really hard to do. Write everything down. Try to have samples produced from everyone that you have worked with that you think are acceptable to you. Be sure everything is to your liking and you are comfortable with those you might end up working with. This applies especially with importing your books. Please note I did not say that you should buy books from anyone yet!

Now you are ready to knock on more doors and that should be with retail and distributor doors, again you are your best salesperson for your books. I know this might sound scary and guess what, it is at first, but you'll get the hang of it and find the right words to sale your books, the right face to put on when you are meeting a retailer or book distributor. That's how I sold 250,000 books of my first 6 titles. You can most certainly do the same.

Online indie author book marketing is completely different. You have to play by web rules and they are not what you think. You're one person and you don't have the time it takes there is not 72 hours to the day and it takes more than that for days and weeks and months even years. Sure you can sell some books but how many? How much book marketing does it take? That is the question. At Book-Spot.com {we are