Here at BookBub, we love helping authors and publishers sell more books, so we regularly publish actionable book marketing tips and publishing insights on the BookBub Partners Blog. We hope these real-life case studies and marketing ideas inspire our readers and help them achieve their own promotional goals!
This year we published dozens of articles — including many by wonderful guest contributors — on a variety of topics. Want to make sure you didn’t miss any of the most valuable content? Here’s a list of our top 10 book marketing articles from 2021!
P.S. You can get our latest book marketing tips delivered to your inbox in 2022 by subscribing to the blog here:
1. How I Make Six Figures as a Self-Published Author
Indie author Ines Johnson openly admits to making a lot of mistakes on her publishing journey, from author branding to setting reader expectations. But each stumble taught her something and brought her closer to the eventual path to success: she now makes six figures as a self-published author. In this guest post, Ines outlined the top lessons she’s learned during her author career, so you can learn from her mistakes and get a leg up on your leap to six figures.
2. 9 Reasons a Book Was Rejected for a BookBub Featured Deal
BookBub editors get on average 300 Featured Deal submissions per day and are only able to accept a small percentage of them for promotions. In this post, we revealed some of the most common reasons why a book is rejected for a BookBub Featured Deal, from unmet minimum requirements to cover design issues and other common pitfalls. We also provided tips on how to make a book more likely to get selected!
3. Bookstagrams of Ebooks: 38 Stunning Examples You Must See
Are you a self-published author who mainly sells books in digital formats? Or a traditionally published author or book blogger trying to promote a preorder without print ARCs (as many are during the pandemic)? There are many ways to beautifully display ebooks in your social media posts and digital marketing campaigns. To provide some inspiration, we compiled 38 stunning bookstagrams of ebooks on Instagram from authors, publishers, and book bloggers who’ve amassed demonstrably high levels of engagement for these posts.
4. 6 Mistakes to Avoid in Your BookBub Ads Targeting
With BookBub Ads, you can target BookBub and Chirp members by their preferred reading formats, book categories, retailers, regions, and authors. One key to a successful BookBub Ads campaign is nailing your targeting, but with BookBub Ads, you can target by so many different variables. While it’s up to you to identify ideal readers and research targets for the particular books you’re promoting, in this post we aimed to help you avoid some of the most common mistakes we see advertisers make with their BookBub Ads targeting!
5. 5 Buzz-Building Tips from an Instant NYT Bestselling Debut
Launching a book into the world is equally exhilarating and terrifying. And according to debut author J.Elle, there’s no magic formula to make sure your pre-launch efforts land the way you intend. But early in 2021, her novel Wings of Ebony debuted as an instant New York Times and Indie bestseller! In this guest post, she shared her publishing journey along with five proactive ways to market and buzz-build your book (based on strategies she used to promote hers!). And you’ll be shocked to find they’re not as daunting as you might think.
6. Authors on Social Media: Choosing Platforms & Avoiding Burnout
Thanks to the rapid rise of TikTok, as well as new features on existing platforms like Instagram and Twitter, we often hear from authors wondering how many social media platforms they should be using — and who feel like they can’t keep up. So which social media platforms should you choose to build your author brand? In this post, we explained the primary social media platforms authors tend to use most, linking to resources where you can learn more, as well as six tips on how to pick the best fits for you, your books, and your audience.
7. 6 Outside-the-Box Book Marketing Ideas You HAVE to See
Catching readers’ attention can be challenging in such a crowded book marketplace. You may know the tried-and-true book marketing strategies for generating sales, such as discounting backlist titles, sending email newsletters, and running display advertising campaigns. But sometimes an outside-the-box approach can make an author stand out and generate buzz for a book. To help you brainstorm some outside-the-box book marketing ideas, we shared a few inventive promotions we’d recently seen.
8. 21 Authors on TikTok to Follow for Book Promo Ideas (& LOLs)
BookTok has helped revitalize backlist books and send debut authors to bestseller lists — it’s a valuable resource for both traditionally published and independent authors alike. If you want to experiment with TikTok to see if it can help you reach your audience, it can be overwhelming to think up what kinds of videos to create. So in this post, we compiled a list of authors who are creating TikToks to connect with their audiences and even boost sales!
9. How to Market Your Book to Get Worldwide Exposure
With growing book sales and millions of readers — the global ebook market was valued at $18.13 billion in 2020, and is expected to reach $23.12 billion by 2026 — international markets can be attractive targets for authors and publishers looking to expand their potential readership. So how can you market a book to get worldwide exposure? If you have international rights to a book, there are strategic promotional tactics you can use to gain exposure within each region where the book is available, and in this post we covered several proven, effective strategies.
10. 17 Instagram Book Promotion Ideas from Publishers
Instagram is a popular channel for authors to promote their books, and according to Rival IQ, brands have a 13.5x higher median engagement rate on Instagram than on Facebook, and 27x higher than on Twitter. If you want to use Instagram to promote your books but aren’t sure what to post, take a look at what publishers are doing — we compiled some great ideas here thanks to their stunning posts!
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