I made it through Oktoberfest alive, but need time to recover so to speak. Please enjoy the final guest post in this series. How do you promote your book in this complicated indie author world? Join me for the latest research on indie author trends while I also provide up-to-the-minute indie book marketing advice. As any good marketer knows, you must build your strategy based on what is going on in the market. The e-book market has exploded in the last few years and the latest research shows some fascinating trends.

Still confused? I’ll use myself as an example. My brand can be summarized as follows: Author, humorous, water lover, with an intelligent and friendly demeanor. The brand covers my novel that a time travel thriller set during a hurricane. My social media posts reflect the brand. Just today on Facebook I posted an article on Time Travel based on Stephen Hawking’s research, a few funny posts, and my favorite watery pics from Instagram. My blog provides writing samples about my water adventures infused with humor, and I try to have people get the tactile sensations of being in the water with me. It’s how I write my novel as well, you will feel what my characters feel. My overall brand is consistent across my media outlets. Where ever my potential readers find me they will see the same message consistently.

How does this translate to book sales? Your brand is what people feel when they think of you. You are selling your personality. If they like your brand, or can relate to it on some important key level in their world, and you make a connection when you post your book links they’re likely to support your efforts. When they see your tweet on their feed your goal is to evoke certain feelings of kindred spirit or joyousness, (or whatever your brand strategy is) and they will RT, share, and support your cause, if you’ve done your job correctly, because you’ve created an emotional connection with them.

If you’ve only pushed your book at them without building the relationship they’re more likely to ignore your posts, and even worse, have bad feelings when they see you online. That is a failed brand. Whatever you do don’t tarnish your brand by being petty or arguing on-line. You may enjoy stirring the pot but be sure it is worth the bad-will you’re creating with that person, and the numbers of others who see the interaction who don’t comment. Your brilliance may have won the argument, but in the end if you’ve lost potential customers and that is a shallow (and counterproductive) victory.

#5: Grab Them With Your Cover

You are competing with every author out there, including those with massive budgets. The first thing any reader sees of your book is the cover. High quality covers that hit your target market are a crucial element to your sales. If your cover sucks, all of your other marketing efforts will be hampered because people do judge a book by its cover. Your book cover must: capture the reader’s attention, evoke emotions, hint at the story without being cluttered, be visually pleasing, and be simple. For more on these points, click  here.

#6: Distribute the Hell Out of it!

You can’t just put your book on your website and think you’re done. You need a strategy for distribution as well. Amazon Kindle is the most popular avenue but by all means it is not the only one. What other channels have you used for your success? Barnes and Noble and other e-book outlets are important as well. Will you print your book and sell it at book fairs and local book stores? I recommend as many different avenues as you can get into. I would love to hear about what other outlets you’ve used with success.

I hope you have found a few kernels of wisdom here. Thank you to Jeri for providing me with the opportunity to guest post again, it has been an honor and a privilege to join this great group of bloggers, writers and followers. I look forward to connecting with you on my social media sites.

What indie book marketing trends have you tried or been impressed by?

KJ Waters is an Indie author working on her first novel called Stealing Time, a time travel thriller set during Hurricane Charley. It will be out fall of 2014 on Amazon and other outlets. Her award winning blog, Blondie in the Water, features various water adventures and information about Stealing Time. KJ has a BS in Business and a Masters of Business Administration (MBA). If you know her then you also know the BS part is clearly true. She is the founder and CEO of Blondie’s Custom Book Covers specializing in affordable book cover design for indie authors. Working with a professional photographer, Blondie’s Custom Book Covers can create an attention grabbing cover to help pull readers in and sell your book. Previously she was the Director of Marketing and Communication for a national behavioral health care company. Before than she was the Director of Marketing for a spin-off start up company focusing on prescription drugs and behavioral health management tracking. She developed branding, logos, marketing materials, trade-show presence, web sites, proposals, and pretty much anything else required, but not coffee.