O.C. Writers

By Kristy Tate // 

I recently read professional marketers suggest having five to ten promotional images per book. That means I have a ton of work to do! Because I don’t have a that many graphics, I just reused the ones I have.

I use Canva to make my graphics, but I believe there are many online sites that do the same thing. I like Canva, and it’s free. Check it out here: https://www.canva.com.

Which one do you like best? Why? Which do you think will be the most effective? Notice I made both Facebook and Twitter graphics.

I’m going to be really honest here. I enjoy making graphics, but when it comes time to actually posting the graphics on social media—I freeze. Don’t ask me why I struggle with this. It’s the easiest thing in the world, and yet, I balk. I’ve even thought of hiring someone to come and do it with me so it gets done.

Because I know I struggle with self-promotion, I decided to run an experiment. On Thursday, July 1, using the Kindle Unlimited program, I ran a free book promotion for The Billionaire’s Beagle without telling anyone. The next day, I ran a promotion for the Oblivious Billionaire, but this time I tweeted ten times and posted in ten Facebook groups.

It’s not a fair comparison, because they’re different books with different covers and blurbs. It obviously would have been a better experiment if I’d used the same book. (Maybe I’ll do that next time.)

I also resurrected an old blog post about Oblivious and shared it on Facebook. You can read the blog post here: https://kristystories.blogspot.com/2020/07/research-on-memory-loss-for-oblivious.html.

Plus, I mentioned it in my newsletter. You can read the newsletter here: https://preview.mailerlite.com/z7z5a0.

I also pinned the blog post on Pinterest. (I’m just getting my toes wet on Pinterest.) https://www.pinterest.com/kristytatebooks/pins.

Here are the Twitter hashtags I used:

• #romance
• #RomanceWriter
• #Romantic
• #RomanticSuspense
• #indieauthors
• #mustread
• #kindle
• #kindledeals
• #BookMarketing
• #freebooks

Below are the Facebook pages I used to promote my books:

• Sweet Romance Readers
• Romance Readers 17,901 members
• Marketing for Romance Writers (7,700 members). Authors and other members of the literary community can post promos, get/give advice, and support others.
• Romance Novels (1,600 members)
• Book Heaven (9,900 members). This is a great place to find good books to read and promote your romance book. You can post as much as you like and include links to your books, blog, website, etc.
• Pimp Your Books (13,609 members). This is a place to promote your books and discuss your favorite books and authors.
• Pimping Indie (9,900 members)
• There’s an eBook in the Room (19,000 members)
• Kindle & eBooks for Authors and Readers (15,000 members)
• Kindle Publishers eBook Promos Only (29,000 members)
• Kindle Book Club-Authors & Readers (21,000 members)

Conclusion

July 1 The Billionaire’s Beagle without any attention:

Giveaways: 18

July 2 The Oblivious Billionaire with promotion:

Giveaways: 68   

I think the conclusion is pretty obvious. The numbers speak for themselves. Once the graphics are made, tweeting and Facebook posting take very little time. Maybe most of the downloads came from my newsletter? The blog post? Pinterest? I don’t know, yet.

What do you think? Do you have any tips on how to make the most out of Kindle Unlimited promotions?

There are also a number of sites that will share freebies for free. I have access to those, but I didn’t use them. I’ll experiment with those and other email blasts providers this month and report on my findings in August.

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KRISTY TATE is the Social Media Director for O.C. Writers and a USA Today bestselling author. To date, her newsletter subscriber list is edging toward 15,000. www.KristyTate.com.