- Hey author, I'm sure you already know
that you need reviews for your book,
but did you know there's different kinds
of reviews that you need?
If you don't know about editorial reviews,
why you need them, how to get them
and what to do with them,
then stick around, this video is for you.
(upbeat music)
Hey there, I'm Julie, The Book Broad, from Book Launchers.
We're your professional self-publishing team,
helping you write, publish and promote a nonfiction book
that will help you have a huge impact on your readers,
and done right, will help you grow your brand,
build your business and make you money.
The best part, you keep all rights and royalties.
So reviews are the lifeblood of your marketing as an author,
especially on Amazon,
but it's not just consumer reviews
that are useful when selling on Amazon,
editorial reviews are also very valuable.
"What are editorial reviews," you ask,
I'm so glad you did.
Check out these editorial reviews
on Dr. Lanae St. John's book page, "Read Me."
This is actually one of my go-to books
to give friends with young kids, by the way.
Love this book, funny and thoughtful
to help you handle all those situations
and questions around sex.
As you can see here,
she has a nice assortment of editorial reviews.
An editorial book review is different
from a consumer reviewer
in that it's usually from a recognized review site,
or a media, or a fellow author,
or an expert in the field.
You see this one on her page
with credentials beside the reviewer's name,
that's really important.
(key dinging) The key thing, besides,
of course, being an unbiased reader-focused review
of your published or soon to be published book,
is that these folks have credibility.
In the case of editorial reviews,
even more so than the review itself,
is who is writing the review.
You would never post a review to your editorial reviews
that just says, "This book is awesome," Mike Hird.
(laughing) Mike Hird is an awesome YouTube bestie
at Book Launchers.
Watch, he's gonna comment on this video, I promise.
But saying Mike Hird wrote the review isn't enough,
no matter how awesome he is,
you have to add all his illustrious credentials
and hopefully they're relevant
to the book's subject matter.
Lanae's page was such a great example
because she has editorial reviews
from critic review sites, like Midwest Reviews,
or she had other reviews that had clear credentials.
Credentials that will matter are relevant to the reader,
so author of the book related to the book you've written,
if there's actual sales info,
like, "Number one New York Times bestselling author,"
absolutely add that,
or some other qualifier,
like their title and the organization they worked for.
Shelley Buck, co-author of "Leave Your Light On,"
has some phenomenal editorial reviews,
check these out.
These aren't critics or authors,
but having the CEO of Disney
write a review is pretty great,
even Kristen Bell wrote a review for her.
But just in case you're wondering
if it was that Kristen Bell,
"Actress," was added to the title.
Speaking of her, have you seen "The Good Place?"
(laughing) If you haven't,
that's some good binge watching, my friends.
CEO, COO, famous names,
those are all great qualifiers.
Think about it, does it even really matter
what the review says
when you see a CEO of Disney wrote a review?
That's interesting and impressive,
it makes you curious.
Okay, but now I know you're thinking,
"Julie, I'm not connected to anybody famous
so how do I get those kinds of reviews?"
Reach out to some of the authors in your niche
that you respect. (children applauding)
Hopefully you've already been networking with some of them.
If you're looking for cover endorsements,
then the ones you don't use for your cover
could be used as editorial reviews.
But if they're an author in your niche or genre,
they would qualify as an editorial reviewer.
Watch for media that feature your book,
if they say anything cool about your book,
then you can include that as an editorial review.
Critics or reviews written on blogs can be used.
We often land these for clients
through services like NetGalley,
which I'll link to a video about that at the end
because that's a great one to know about.
We also submit authors to Readers' Choice,
Midwest Reviews and some other programs.
There are paid professional review services as well,
some legit, some less so.
Definitely a topic I need to cover in a future video.
Just right now, I'll note,
because it will come up,
review sites are created to professionally review books
or a blog where an author writes book reviews.
They can be for fee while other times it's for free,
paying is not against Amazon
because they're going into the editorial review section,
not the customer review section.
You can use their words in your editorial review section
even if you paid for it.
I know you're gonna have more questions about this,
so next video shoot, I'll do a section on this,
and maybe I'll get our book marketing manager, Sarah Bean,
to cover this with me.
Once you've got that editorial review,
you wanna post it on your Amazon book page.
When you post it, there's a couple things you should do
to make it look right.
My recommendation is to italicize the review portion
and then bold the reviewer and qualifier.
If that's bolded, it makes the potential buyer
stop and read the name of the qualifier,
like, "CEO of Disney."
Use HTML, if you use Publisher Rocket,
they have a new feature on their desktop site
that will let you do that in a really easy way.
So check that out,
I'll link to Publisher Rocket below
if you're not familiar with it,
but you can also ask Google
how to create italics and bold HTML,
it's not that hard,
but I do recommend you take the extra step to do that.
To set up your editorial review section
and enter your editorial reviews,
you have to use your Amazon Author Central account,
and yes, I've got instructions on that in another video,
which I'll link to at the end
and in the description below.
Essentially, you're gonna log into your account,
go to Books, select the book,
and then select Editorial Review and click Add.
You'll be given a text box to add reviews
and general guidelines for adding them
according to Amazon's specifications, voila,
okay, save changes first, that's important,
then voila, editorial review posted.
Editorial reviews, according to Amazon,
cannot include anything that talks
about price, time-sensitive issues,
promotional materials, contact information
like phone numbers or addresses,
profanity or distasteful content.
You won't just use your editorial reviews
on your Amazon page,
although it's one of the primary placements,
we also update our authors' media kits,
websites, and promotional materials
to include those great editorial reviews.
Also, we recommend creating nice social media imagery,
and using that.
We share some of the editorial wins on our social media,
so you can always connect with us on Instagram,
or Book Launchers on the IG,
and see examples of what that looks like.
Your number one priority as an author,
marketing a book should still be
to get as many consumer reviews as you can,
but editorial reviews are an important piece
of that book marketing puzzle
and getting five to 10 really amazing editorial reviews
to add to your Amazon book page
and use in your marketing materials
can really give your credibility and book sales a boost.
What do you think of editorial reviews,
do you work hard to get them,
do you read them?
Let's chat about it in the comments below,
and when you comment the day a video is released,
you'll be entered to win
some sweet #NoBoringBooks swag,
like our No Boring Books mug,
or our oh-so soft journal.
(bell dinging) We have new videos
every Tuesday and Friday.
As promised, here's the video on NetGalley,
which is part of what we do to get editorial reviews.
And this one right here
is the updated one on Amazon Author Central,
which is where you're gonna need to go
to add your editorial reviews to your page.
If you're a Book Launchers client,
you may think they magically appear on your Amazon page,
(laughing) but we've actually put them there for you.
Both videos are pretty important,
so click on over to the next one you need to see
and I'll be waiting for you with tea or coffee.
See you there. (upbeat music)