- We turn away close to 75% of books
that come to us for a marketing only service.
The reason?
The five things that really need to be in place
to ensure your book is successful
need to be in place well before
you start spending on marketing.
If you're working on a book right now
or thinking about starting a book,
this video is for you.
(upbeat music)
Hey there, I'm Julie The Book Broad,
founder of Book Launchers,
a fantastic supportive company
that will help you write, publish, and promote
a business or brand-boosting nonfiction book,
and most of the clients we work with
come to us with an idea to develop
or a finished first draft of a manuscript.
We accept very few clients later in the process
because most authors, even well-meaning authors
who have hired editors to work on their book
haven't thought enough about marketing
early enough in their book creation process.
So here are the five criteria
that will set your book up for better book marketing
when it launches.
Number one, your hook.
I know, I know, I talk about this all the time.
This video, for example, and this video as another example,
but picture yourself getting the opportunity
to tell the executive producer of Ellen's show
about your book.
This happened to one of our clients
and her book was good enough that the EP said,
send me your book and marketing materials
and we'll look at it for an upcoming show.
So picture yourself chatting with someone about your book.
What do you say your book is about?
Here's where most people go wrong, right at number one.
They'll say, my book is about strategy
for marketing your business.
Hey, sorry, fell asleep there for a minute.
That's not exciting.
Your hook has to be juicy,
it's gotta be a little different and definitely interesting,
and it's about the reader
and what they're getting out of this book.
What's the emotional experience of reading the book
or the core benefit of reading the book?
The marketing strategies your biggest competitors
are too afraid to suggest to their bosses
and how to implement them in 30 days
to triple your business.
That's a juicy hook.
Why plants, lights, and pictures in your office
are costing you money,
and 12 ways to change the space in your office
and double your business profits.
I'm just making these things up,
but, and so they're not perfect,
might not even be right,
but hopefully you get the idea
of what would make a much better hook.
Number two, your hook will be better
the more you know about your ideal reader.
Here are two biggest hints I can give you.
Your book is not for everyone,
and your book also isn't for women aged 40 to 50
who wanna lose weight.
The best example I can give you
is from my second book, The New Brand You.
I told a story about selling solution
to get men's hair to grow back.
Your market is not every bald man.
My dad, for example, is bald,
and does not care if he has hair anymore.
Your market is the guy who lacks confidence
because he's lacking hair,
or he feels his hair is holding him back
from getting dates, raises,
or something else big he cares about.
They don't care about their hair,
they care about what not having hair is costing them
or what they believe having hair will give them.
That's your ideal person,
and by the way, that's also a really key idea
to get you to your hook.
Number three, knowing number one and two,
position your entire book to hit that hook hard
and connect with the ideal reader.
It's not that easy to create a good hook,
but once you've got it, it's very easy
to get sidetracked and just tell stories
that you like to tell.
This happened to me.
Our writing coach, Tim,
was reading part of the book I'm working on,
and he said, that story right here,
it's a great story, but why did you make me read it?
He was right.
I shared the story because I liked the story,
but the book isn't for me,
it's for that ideal reader,
and that ideal reader did not need that story
to get the point of what I needed to cover.
Number four, a fabulous title and cover.
These go hand-in-hand and must be excellent.
A lot of people think they have a great title,
but they don't.
Getting a great title is really, really hard,
and we've talked about getting book covers here.
I'll make sure you've got links down below.
The best advice I can give you
is to see how your possible book cover looks
against the top 20 in your category.
So take a screen shot of the top 20
and put your little book image in there
and see if it stand out.
You could compare it to some of these awesome covers
we've worked on lately.
Number five, the table of contents solidifies the fact
that your book is unique, interesting, and benefit-filled.
Watch the video on table of contents
to make sure your book has a killer table of contents.
But really, you're going for either
a curiosity-creating title, a promise or benefit,
or something proprietary
that you could even trademark
or turn into a talk or a course if you want.
Of course there's more to book marketing than this,
but if these elements are not in place,
it is so much more challenging
to change once your book is done,
and, I mean, other than things
like keywords book descriptions
that are changeable after-the-fact,
getting these five elements right
or at least doing a great job
on four out of five of them
will set you up to get a much stronger return
on effort and investment
for any marketing you decide to do for your book.
Like this video, smash that thumbs up button.
Go ahead, try it, it feels good,
and while you're here,
make sure you subscribe to the channel
so you know when the next video is out.
Because when you comment the day a video is released,
you will be entered to win some fabulous
Book Launchers swag.
And, new videos come out every Tuesday and Friday
except in the summer.
Now, here is a really fabulous video
you should watch next,
but if you've seen it,
well, I recommend this one to.
What are you waiting for?
I'm waiting for you over here, or over here.
So go ahead, click it.
(upbeat music)