Book Tours & Blogging Advice at Mediabistro Book Club

At last night’s Mediabistro Book Club event, we learned from authors that marketing books is tough, but an author should be doing it. And blogs and book tours can help.

Abigail Johnson Dodge, author of Desserts 4 Today–Desserts Made with Just FOUR Ingredients said that marketing is hard, but it is important if you want to sell books. “Writing the proposal is tough. Writing the book is an absolute breeze and a ton of fun. Marketing and putting it out there is damn hard work,” she said.

Melissa Ford, author of Life From Scratch, a blogger turned book author, talked about how having a digital platform can help sell books. She recommends blogging and making friends with allied blogs. “Don’t just go over there and look at it once and write come back to my blog and look at mine,” she said. “Read theirs too. It is something that you have to devote time to do. Go out and find your community.”

Thomas Chatterton Williams, author of Losing My Cool: How a Father’s Love and 15,000 Books Beat Hip-Hop Culture agrees that book tours, though not financially sound, are important to building confidence and meeting your audience and booksellers. “Something happens when you gain confidence by reading in public and you meet people who care about the book you write and you meet people who care about selling books,” he said. “It is a community of people and you realize that probably in our lifetimes at least, we won’t all just be reading iPads and Kindles. People still care about reading books.”

Alix Strauss, author of Based Upon Availability recommends asking publishers for what you want, and encourages authors to go on a book tour even if the publisher is not bankrolling it. “You have to be willing to do it on yourself and you have to believe in the project and you have to say, ‘you know what, I am going to enjoy every f*cking moment of this.’ As hard as it may be — it’s like a bad blind date — you just have to ride it out because the promotion is so important and every sale matters and every person you meet counts,” she said.

Strauss talked about her experience on the Morning Media Menu as well.

Launch a social media campaign that will build your brand and deliver results in our online Social Media Marketing Boot Camp starting June 7. Speakers include Abigail Cusick (Bravo Digital), Gregory Galant (Sawhorse Media), Alex Leo (Thomson Reuters Digital), Jim Tobin (Ignite Social Media), and many more. Read the reviews.