Now I'll talk more about the conference itself on Friday but for right now, I did want to share a little bit about my panel. Our panel was called "Book Bloggers Tell All."
Background on blog reviews:
-
Authors are increasingly being asked to do the
lion’s share of publicity for their books regardless if they are published by a
big publisher, a small press, or self-published.
-
Book bloggers are your friends when it comes to
getting great publicity for your books.
-
There are a lot of active, passionate book
bloggers out there ready to read and review your book. We’ll also talk about
how to make your pitch shine!
-
Meg Wessell will talk about how you can find the
right bloggers for your book and the ins and outs of pitching to bloggers.
We’ll also talk about how to make your pitch shine!
Why choose a blog to review your book?
-
Blogs can be more personal and intimate than
reviews by a big publication.
-
Book bloggers love books and passion can be
channeled into writing a thorough review.
How do you find bloggers to review your book?
-
There are sites that specialize in maintaining
lists of bloggers. You could “cold call” off of those lists OR
-
You could look for bloggers that have reviewed
other books that are similar to yours. They may be a good place to start.
-
The Historical Novel Society website also has a
membership listing where you can see which members blog about books and do book
reviews.
Before you pitch:
-
Review the blogger’s review policy. Many
bloggers will have a listing of things like genres they prefer, what format of
a book they prefer, how long it takes them to review a book, etc.
-
Being familiar with a blogger’s review policy
can help you make sure you’ve found the right blogger for your book.
Make your pitch shine!:
-
Honest reviews are always better than reviews
that are flavored. Making sure you mention that you are looking for a honest
review sets a great tone in a pitch.
-
A good pitch should include several things:
o A
synopsis of your book
o Whether
you are willing to offer a hard copy or a soft copy of your book for review
o Note:
Please, please, please do not ask a reviewer to buy a copy of your book to
review themselves. This will leave a bad taste in the reviewer’s mouth.
Remember: this is an exchange for services!
o When
you are looking for a review to be posted. Many bloggers schedule book reviews
weeks and sometimes months out so if you’re looking for a review in two weeks,
it is important for a blogger to know that off the bat.
o Personalization
when you can helps!
§
Send individual emails to
individual bloggers. Nothing turns a blogger off more than being on a mass email
to a bunch of other random bloggers.
§
If there is a specific reason that you feel the
blogger is the right one to review your book, mention it. Is it because of the
kinds of books they like? Is it because of a review that they wrote?
Being familiar with a blogger’s review policy can help you make sure you’ve found the right blogger for your book.
Thanks for sharing info from your HNS panel, sounds like an interesting session!
ReplyDeleteYes, it is vitally important that every author budget for a large number of copies to send out. It's time-consuming, and many authors unfortunately cannot afford the number of copies and costs that make such a thing effective. It is unfair. But I've never been able to figure out how to do that differently. It is part of the job. This applies across the board, no matter what category one's work falls into, fiction and non-fiction.
ReplyDelete