Thanks for sharing! My book came out in 2021, after 10 years of struggles. The biggest game changer was when I started working with a book coach to get the book finished and then as you write about, marketing and awareness is whole other world. The best money I ever spent was putting my book on net galley, where early readers happily exchanged a free ebook for honest reviews. I also found success asking friends to upvote my book on niche lists on Goodreads, to this day the SEO of those lists are very helpful for awareness.
Oh, tell me more. I just got a BookFunnel account and I'm excited about the new possibilities there to share my work when it doesn't fit my Substack page.
I resisted self-publishing for a long time but now I'm all in. And I like the way you said marketing reminds readers about us. So many of us think it's all about sales.
Thanks for sharing this interview! I’m wondering what worked the best with marketing—I saw some social media mentioned. Was that effective or were other methods more effective?
I'll pop Holly a message to ask her to come over and share her thoughts, but I have definitely watched Holly use social media to great effect, both in terms of sharing bits about her writing, talking about the book when it's coming out / out, and then later on promoting the book - she's great on Tiktok, if you need any ideas!
Hi Maria, social media has definitely been the best tool for me, but there are no quick wins sadly it's just plugging away, looking at trends, and figuring out how to adapt those to your book. It's been a bit of a learning curve because often (especially on tiktok) I'm sharing key parts of the story that feel a little spoilery, but those are the realy hooky parts that make readers want to read it immediately.
This was so helpful to read! I am at the beginning of embarking on a self publishing journey and sometimes it all feels very overwhelming but this soothed some of those worries!
There is so much good stuff here that I'm learning as well as I work on my finishing my second indie publishing venture. It's crushing when friends and family don't support our writing, but I also have to admit that I'm not everyone's cup of tea. I'm finding that venturing into new ways to share my work for free (both on and off of Substack) is giving me hope for expanding my audience without worrying about how much attention people are paying to me on social media. Right now I'm really leaning into new ways that I can use BookFunnel with both my first book and my next book and possibly my new venture into short story writing.
I paid for feature ad placement once, but not sure I remember it being that helpful. The net galley community of reader's felt very committed to supporting authors. There were so many posts on social and reviews added to Amazon when book was released.
I needed to read this, thank you 🙏 I'm trying to find my tribe - the people that might be interested either in the writing journey itself or the content (why women should contract) - because there are zero ripples of excitement among family and friends (as you alluded to). And that's fine. This book is my passion, my dream, and if it helps just one person, that's kudos enough for me 🥳
I used KDP for my first book and then decided to unlist it and relist it with a new ISBN number so I could list through both KDP and IngramSpark. Doing so allowed my book to be purchased by my local library and IS just started a new direct sell program. I'm in the process of finishing my second book and I will be listing in both places again. Instead of using Kindle Unlimited I'm going to lean into my new BookFunnel account and look for giveaways I can participate into get my book into more hands and get more reviews.
Oh that's really helpful context. I attended a webinar recently where they suggested using outfits like IngramSpark for that broader exposure. Will check out Bookfunnel. Let us know how it goes!
I've also entered a giveaway through Crave Books that launches on Wednesday. I figure, this is advertising that actually gives me potential email subscribers and gets my book into people's hands so that they will potentially give me good reviews and be interested in more of my work. I'm finally figuring out how to "give it away" while driving people to be inspired to also spend money.
I'm working on short story writing now and I'm hoping that will provide me with some lead magnets (for the first time in my life) that will actually lead to more subscribers. I will be using BookFunnel for that as well.
I'm not an author, just an author marketer, but Holly's books are all in the Kindle Unlimited programme, meaning they are published completely through Amazon. However, if you want to chat to other authors about self-publishing and get their suggestions, definitely recommend joining The Empowered Author facebook group, where there are heaps of authors from every background who I'm sure would give you their thoughts: https://www.facebook.com/groups/EmpoweredAuthor
Oh that's super, thanks Katie. I began the process of filling out a proposal to publish with Kogan Page and they want me to do a shed load of research, understand my social reach and credentials and suggest three experts to validate my credibility. Jog on mister, I thought to myself.
Thanks for sharing! My book came out in 2021, after 10 years of struggles. The biggest game changer was when I started working with a book coach to get the book finished and then as you write about, marketing and awareness is whole other world. The best money I ever spent was putting my book on net galley, where early readers happily exchanged a free ebook for honest reviews. I also found success asking friends to upvote my book on niche lists on Goodreads, to this day the SEO of those lists are very helpful for awareness.
That's so interesting to know - did you pay for any of the promotional aspects Netgalley offers, or just put it up on the site?
Oh, tell me more. I just got a BookFunnel account and I'm excited about the new possibilities there to share my work when it doesn't fit my Substack page.
I resisted self-publishing for a long time but now I'm all in. And I like the way you said marketing reminds readers about us. So many of us think it's all about sales.
Thank you for sharing! I’m thinking of self publishing my first novel and this was very insightful!
Good luck with it!
Thanks for sharing this interview! I’m wondering what worked the best with marketing—I saw some social media mentioned. Was that effective or were other methods more effective?
I'll pop Holly a message to ask her to come over and share her thoughts, but I have definitely watched Holly use social media to great effect, both in terms of sharing bits about her writing, talking about the book when it's coming out / out, and then later on promoting the book - she's great on Tiktok, if you need any ideas!
Hi Maria, social media has definitely been the best tool for me, but there are no quick wins sadly it's just plugging away, looking at trends, and figuring out how to adapt those to your book. It's been a bit of a learning curve because often (especially on tiktok) I'm sharing key parts of the story that feel a little spoilery, but those are the realy hooky parts that make readers want to read it immediately.
This was so helpful to read! I am at the beginning of embarking on a self publishing journey and sometimes it all feels very overwhelming but this soothed some of those worries!
There is so much good stuff here that I'm learning as well as I work on my finishing my second indie publishing venture. It's crushing when friends and family don't support our writing, but I also have to admit that I'm not everyone's cup of tea. I'm finding that venturing into new ways to share my work for free (both on and off of Substack) is giving me hope for expanding my audience without worrying about how much attention people are paying to me on social media. Right now I'm really leaning into new ways that I can use BookFunnel with both my first book and my next book and possibly my new venture into short story writing.
I paid for feature ad placement once, but not sure I remember it being that helpful. The net galley community of reader's felt very committed to supporting authors. There were so many posts on social and reviews added to Amazon when book was released.
Thanks for sharing your journey, it looks like you’re having a lovely time! 😃👏👏
This was good Katie, thanks for posting.
I needed to read this, thank you 🙏 I'm trying to find my tribe - the people that might be interested either in the writing journey itself or the content (why women should contract) - because there are zero ripples of excitement among family and friends (as you alluded to). And that's fine. This book is my passion, my dream, and if it helps just one person, that's kudos enough for me 🥳
I'm so glad it helped you! Do share a little bit about your book / Substack here in case it reaches the right people in the comments :)
Here is the link to my Substack for anyone wanting to contract or in the mood for a career pivot:
https://open.substack.com/pub/womenthatcontract?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=23kt5b
Thanks Katie, that's really kind. Can I also ask whether you used Ingram Spark or Jericho to self publish?
I used KDP for my first book and then decided to unlist it and relist it with a new ISBN number so I could list through both KDP and IngramSpark. Doing so allowed my book to be purchased by my local library and IS just started a new direct sell program. I'm in the process of finishing my second book and I will be listing in both places again. Instead of using Kindle Unlimited I'm going to lean into my new BookFunnel account and look for giveaways I can participate into get my book into more hands and get more reviews.
Oh that's really helpful context. I attended a webinar recently where they suggested using outfits like IngramSpark for that broader exposure. Will check out Bookfunnel. Let us know how it goes!
I ended my KU membership a month ago, which allowed me to enter this giveaway through The Storygraph: https://app.thestorygraph.com/giveaways/7cffe412-9e39-4ac0-860e-16fbe4096e09
I've also entered a giveaway through Crave Books that launches on Wednesday. I figure, this is advertising that actually gives me potential email subscribers and gets my book into people's hands so that they will potentially give me good reviews and be interested in more of my work. I'm finally figuring out how to "give it away" while driving people to be inspired to also spend money.
I'm working on short story writing now and I'm hoping that will provide me with some lead magnets (for the first time in my life) that will actually lead to more subscribers. I will be using BookFunnel for that as well.
I'm not an author, just an author marketer, but Holly's books are all in the Kindle Unlimited programme, meaning they are published completely through Amazon. However, if you want to chat to other authors about self-publishing and get their suggestions, definitely recommend joining The Empowered Author facebook group, where there are heaps of authors from every background who I'm sure would give you their thoughts: https://www.facebook.com/groups/EmpoweredAuthor
Oh that's super, thanks Katie. I began the process of filling out a proposal to publish with Kogan Page and they want me to do a shed load of research, understand my social reach and credentials and suggest three experts to validate my credibility. Jog on mister, I thought to myself.