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Great post Rachel. I particularly like your ‘Easy Button’. So many hopeful authors seem to think that book marketing is only about looking for this non-existent magic button. Very few understand the concept of research and hard work.
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HI Derek, my friend! So great to see you here on my blog.
gosh, isn’t that the case. Even more unrealistic is that so many think that blasting ‘buy my book’ tweets will do it. or that any ONE social media channel is the answer to magical book sales. I’m just one tiny voice in the massive crowd who is trying to help them, but meh, they’ll learn at some point. Or they won’t — they’ll give up and say ‘my books just don’t sell, I don’t know why!’ and that’s that.
Smart businesspeople (because that’s what authors must be) will spend that time and research. Otherwise, they’re in for a long, hard empty sales road.
Reply You and I have been around the block, Rachel. But we still get surprised. I got a Tweet message yesterday on my publishing advice blog, asking if I could give the author advice on self-publishing. Um, like, sure, I can help you sell millions of copies in 140 characters. But really, obviously you can’t be f**ing bothered reading my over 300 publishing advice posts, can you? Yep. I only want the magic button. lol
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Absolutely. I read all these posts looking for the ‘easy button’. Just in case I missed it. But I haven’t. I think it also helps if you have a great ‘product’ and are a kinda extrovert personality. BUT despite everything you have written, there are still writers (I know penty) who shun social media, yet still have booming sales….weird isn’t it?
Reply We never know what will work, and it truly does depend on the quality of the writing when you come down to it. A horrible book will only sell on a ‘name’ for so long – until the 1-star review overtake it.
As for extroverts vs. introverts: I’m an introvert at heart. Social media is great for introverts, because we can hide behind our screens LOL. I do like picking and choosing who I can interact with, and when. If I’m just not up for it, I shut it down and write (and work). I like having that option of not being ON all the time — it’s exhausting.
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Thank you for the eye opening post. YouTube! I don’t have any clue how to use YouTube properly other than book trailers, but what about as a visual, talking head Blog?
Reply I know, right? yes, that’s why I mention John Green, a talking head (who’s also very entertaining).
Other entertaining talking heads I watch regularly are Mario Forlio, Jenna Moreci, and a few others (if you click around) you’ll find many who suit your own tastes. Again, this chart is not specific to AUTHORS, but the sales funnel overall by social network. Still, good info.
Reply Thank you. I’ll check them out. I’m thinking the best YouTube format would be a talking head who doesn’t talk just about his books but about topics linked to his books. For instance, my iLookChina.net blog focuses on everything about China and the Chinese because my first novel is historical fiction set in China about a real person, and I think that paid off. I launched that Blog in 2010 and ended that year with more than 1,000 posts and 2,375 sales for the novel. In 2009, only 341 copies sold without the blog. In 2011, sales leaped to 4,641 copies as long as I kept publishing at least one post a day. When I eventually cut back to 2 Blog posts a week, sales started to drop off along with Blog traffic.
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[…] Thompson shares which social media channel sells the most books, while Jason Matthews suggests checking on Scribd for a pleasant […]
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This is such a useful and informative post. I will definitely be bookmarking this for future use.
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Great article!! What tips do you have for creating a sales funnel utilizing social media? In the future, I plan on launching a YouTube Channel which will hopefully lead to me selling a book eventually. I hear sales funnel all of the time and don’t know where to get started with that. Thanks again!
Reply Hi KJ! great question.
It depends on the goal of your services or blog. If you want to bring people to your blog (or site) for the purposes of selling them something, then you need to gear your landing page and content for that purpose. Sign them up for your newsletter, or take them to an information page where they can then purchase services (and more info only available by purchase) — or consulting or services, etc…
Here are some great examples of sales funnels from Petovera.com which I refer clients to frequently. Decide which model works best for you! Hope that helps 🙂
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Great article. Thanks for sharing information that others charge big $$$ for. Now we must apply what we learn and do the work.
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I love your comment about the tweets about buy my books/DMs. Oh how they get on my nerves! Pinterest is still vastly underestimated in my opinion. #MondayBlogs
Reply […] social media is great for connecting and building relationships with readers and influencers, but not so great for sales. This is why I implore you not to have that automated direct message (autoDM) that says “Hey, […]
Reply […] social media, […]
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Hi Rachel, I realize that I’m late to this party. However I couldn’t help but notice how GoodReads.com was not even considered as a social media channel for selling books.
Please note that I have no connection to that site (other than being an author who is attempting to increase my audience there).
It simply sparked my curiosity as to why GoodReads – with millions of monthly book reader visits, and direct-buying links to major online retailers on every book – would be any less germane than Twitter or YouTube vis-a-vis this article.
Your thoughts?
Reply Hi Mark, and great question! Goodreads is not listed on the chart above, so I didn’t include it in my post. Additionally, I only went into the specifics of the data available via Pew Research, which doesn’t include Goodreads.
However, Goodreads IS a great platform to connect with readers, book bloggers and book reviewers IF you don’t spam your book. Here’s a great article by Barb Drozdowich (reviewer, book blogger, and author) Goodreads for Authors | Self-Publishing Advice Center http://ow.ly/bdib30c3aSO by @sugarbeatbc which covers the top ways to interact with readers. Hope this helps!
Reply Hope it’s okay if I jump in here too.
Goodreads was a social media site for readers and where authors could connect with readers that might want to read what they write before Amazon bought the site back in 2013. Today you can buy advertising through Goodreads but from what I know about the advertising Amazon offers through Goodreads, it, like BookBub, isn’t cheap.
https://www.goodreads.com/advertisers
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Thank you Rachel for the fast and helpful reply. I appreciate the link to Barb Drozdowich’s Goodreads article. It contained several ideas that I hadn’t thought of yet.
I am still debating whether to make GoodReads on of my three key social media properties, as part of my online marketing strategy. The intent would be to engage potential readers with discussions surrounding the primary themes I am tackling in my debut novel. Keeping the process organic and mutually interesting is paramount.
By the way, I love how you freely share your experienced advice with us newbie indies! Keep up the great work. 🙂
Reply […] Rachel Thompson is a bestselling author, and a social media and author marketing/branding consultant (BadRedheadMedia). She writes for several sites, including Huffington Post, Medium, Mogul, Feminine Collective, Pronoun, Blue Ink Review and Indie Reader. This post was originally published on her blog. […]
Reply […] Many experts have done the math for you. Bad Redhead shows it all here: http://badredheadmedia.com/2016/05/04/which-social-media-channel-sells-the-most-books/ […]
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Great, informative post, especially for indie authors. Thank you!
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