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Book Marketing Workbook, Checklist, and Media Kit for Your Book Launch

In today’s post, we talk about creating a media kit for your book launch. A media kit is a set of tools that you use for your launch. It makes the launch more efficient and easier to manage.

1. Build Your Author Platform
2. Create an Author Blog/Website, Your Online Home, 5 Essential Pages
3. Create a Media Kit for Your Book
4. Book Marketing Workbook/Checklist

One of the most common questions I see from new authors is what to do once they have published their book on Amazon. All their work went into writing and getting the book published. It is on Amazon, and now what? How do we get people to buy it? This workbook/checklist gives you some steps for today.

 

Book Marketing Workbook/Checklist

 

Book Marketing Checklist, Media Kit Workbook and Book Selling Checklist

 

Click Here Download the Free Book Marketing Checklist, Media Kit Workbook
and the Book Selling Checklist PDF

Steps to Do Before Your Book Release

Edit your book and have a final copy proofread, twice if possible. Nothing will create a critical review on Amazon more than poor grammar and spelling.

____ Edited your book

____ Proofread your book

____ One of my best tips is to take a PDF of your book to your local office supply store and have a proof copy printed out. Use the self-serve copy machines. Take it over to the graphics area and have them add a plastic cover to the front and back and then add a spiral binding. You will see issues in paper that you will never see on the computer.

Book Title ______________________________________________________

Book Subtitle ___________________________________________________

Research your title and subtitle. Do your readers know what the book is about? Don’t fall in love with your title, it might be wrong.

___ Run the “Don’t Make Me Think” test on your title.

___ Run the Google, YouTube and Amazon search test on your book title.

___ Create a good descriptive table of contents, these are your book’s major benefits. These can be used for part of your Amazon description and the back cover bullet points.

Book Description, You can have up to 4,000 characters in the Amazon book description. I also include the Table of Contents in my descriptions. TOCs are great for keyword searching on Amazon. I add it to the bottom of the description.

Several key bullet points about your book. Mix these into the description:

______________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________

 

Book Description

______________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________

 

___ If you have a website, add the URL on the book’s title page, near the bottom. If you are making a Kindle e-book, make it a live HTTP link. You can also add your Amazon Author Central address if you have one.

Your Amazon Author Central Website URL ___________________________

___ Front Cover: Have a good, clear cover designed. Make sure the cover is readable at thumbnail size. This is the size we usually see when we search for books on Amazon. Elements should include a title, subtitle, and author name. You can also include a short quote or benefits. And of course, good cover art.

___ Back Cover: If releasing a paperback book, have an effective back cover. E-books don’t have back covers. Elements include a title, description, and several benefits. Your benefits come from your Table of Contents. A couple of quotes, an author picture and bio. Also include contact info, website, and room for a ISBN number.

___ If possible publish both a print and e-book. Once you have done one, the other is easy to create.

___ Paperback. ___ E-Book

 

___ Start building your author platform. Your platform is all the people you know and connect to. Includes, friends, family, organizations, email list, and social media.

___ Set up your social media accounts. There are six popular ones,

___ Facebook ___ YouTube ___ Pinterest

___ LinkedIn ___ Instagram ___ Twitter.
Be where your audience is.

___ Using social media, start releasing content around your subject. Use the content in your book as early as you can. Pick 1-3 social media sites to focus on. Start building some awareness and buzz for the book.
___ If you have a blog/website, start posting about your book writing journey. You are building awareness and getting indexed by Google.

Your Website URL __________________________________________

 

___ Try and line up some video interviews, podcasts and blog posts for launch day.
___ Purchase a copy of your book so you have something to hold up for the launch. Great for photos, interviews, or just showing friends and family.

 

Building a Media Kit for Your Book

A media kit will give you a library of basic elements that you can use when you launch your book. Have them ready to go for the launch.
___ Build a basic media kit. You will use this for promotion, social media, and interviews. You can store this on your computer. You can also post it on your website for other people who might need it.

___ Create several jpg cover images for your book. These are for marketing and posting. 2”, 4”, and 6”, at 72dpi and 300dpi will work. Ask your cover designer to give you these. Make it part of the cover project contract.

___ Have someone take pictures of you holding your book. Have the book near your head, this can be as simple as a selfie.

___ Prepare several 50-150-word author bios and book descriptions. Include details. Have this ready for promotion, interviews, and blog posts.

___ Have the Amazon book link ready so it is easy to find and use in posts when you launch.

___ Have several book launch social media posts pre-written, included the book links.

 

Sample Post
Learn how to successfully market your book with J. Bruce Jones’ new book, How to Sell Your Book, How I Made $322,650 and Sold 34,605 Books on Amazon, The Inside Secrets. Available today on Amazon in paperback and Kindle e-book. Click here to buy Add the Amazon link

___ Pre-write several blog posts, with images ready for posting on launch day. Announce the book is coming and then the book is here.
___ Develop several interview questions for anyone who might be interviewing you. The basic who, what, why.

 

Book Trailer Video

___ Create a book trailer video, can be as simple as your holding your book and talking about it using your smartphone. Give a call to action to buy at the end.
Your book trailer video should cover these points

1. What you have – who you are and your new book.

2. What it will do for the reader – the benefits, list them out. You can pick several from the table of contents.

3. What you want people to do next – the call to action, go buy the book. Please leave a review, it helps the author.

Sample of a Simple 1:00 Minute Book Trailer Video Script

Using your smartphone and a tripod or a steady hand you can create your own book trailer videos. Keep them short and to the point. Be sure you have good lighting. The mic in your smartphone will work fine if you keep the phone pretty close. Turn off any background noise. The video can be you talking on camera. Remember to show our book. You can also create a video slide show. When finished, upload your video to YouTube and spread it around on your social media platforms.

1. What you have – who you are and your new book.
Hi, my name is Bruce Jones and I am proud to announce the release of my new book, How to Sell Your Book, How I Made $322,605 and Sold 34,605 Books on Amazon, The Inside Secrets.

2. What it will do for the reader – the story, or the benefits, list them out. You can pick several from the table of contents.
In this book you will learn about how to use your book’s content to market and sell your book online. How to create and spread noise and awareness about your book so readers can find it. And third, selling your book, making it easy to buy. The book is filled with practical tips, steps, and examples you can use today to market and sell your book.

3. What you want people to do next – the call to action, go buy the book. Available at Amazon. Please leave a review, it helps the author.
My book is available on Amazon in paperback and e-book and at 
BruceJonesDesign.com in PDF. Links are around this video, above or below. Oh and when you buy the book, I would love a review, it helps authors sell their books. Thank you very much, be sure to check it out.

 

Media Kit Worksheet

Author Bio (create a short and long bio)

______________________________________________________________

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Author Pen Name (if any) _______________________________________

____ Author Headshot Photos, with and without the book cover

Contact Details, Phone, Email, Website URL

______________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________

 

Additional Contributors

Illustrator Name __________________________________________________

Photographer Name, add more as you need ________________________________

 

Your Social Media Connections

______________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________

Book Marketing Checklist, Media Kit Workbook and Book Selling Checklist

 

Click Here Download the Free Book Marketing Checklist, Media Kit Workbook
and the Book Selling Checklist PDF

Amazon Author Central URL ______________________________________

 

Book Title______________________________________________________

Book Subtitle____________________________________________________

Book Series Name, Amazon loves and promotes series

Edition Volume #_________________________________________________

Book Language ____ English ____ Spanish Other

Genre ________________________________________________________

Publisher ______________________________________________________

Publication Date _________________________________________________

Launch Date ___________________________________________________

Print ___ Black & White ___ Color

Trim Size ____________

Number of Pages ________

Book Price ________

Formats ___ Paperback ___ Hardcover ___ E-Book ___ PDF ___ Audio

ISBN for Print. Amazon Kindle e-books do not have ISBNs. But other publishers do. 
Choose either the free one supplied by Amazon or purchase one from Bowker.com,

https://www.myidentifiers.com/

Publishing Rights, your copyright

 

Book URL Links
Print __________________________________________________________

E-book _________________________________________________________

PDF ___________________________________________________________

 

Book Description

You can have up to 4,000 characters in the Amazon book description. I also include the Table of Contents in my descriptions. TOCs are great for keyword searching on Amazon. I add it to the bottom of the description. Create both a short and long book description.

______________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________

 

Book Cover Graphics
____ Thumbnails Images
____ 3D Book Cover Images
____ Book Cover in Environment Images
____ Book Cover Image w/Tablet or Kindle

____ Book Trailer Video, YouTube URL Link

Book Categories, Choose two categories for your book.

______________________________________________________________

Keywords, 7 keywords or phrases that describe your book.

______________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________

____ Sample Chapter PDF (include the Table of Contents in the PDF)
Sample Interview Questions, To get you started
Question 1. ______________________________________________________

Question 2. ______________________________________________________

Question 3. ______________________________________________________

____ Swipe Text for Sales and Promotion
____ Press Release

 

Sample Media Kit Images

Pull together several book images that you can use for posting on social media on launch day. I used MockUpShots.com to create the 3D and the two images at the bottom. I used my iPhone to take pictures with my head and the book.

Samples from my How to Sell Your Book Media Kit

Releasing Your Book, Launch Day

___ Pre-announce that you have a book coming out on your social media platforms. If you have an email lists, then pre-announce on there as well. Be sure you can hit the release date. Do this for the month or so before release. You are building awareness for the book.
___ Announce a release date for your book on your social media platforms. Picking a date helps give you focus. Your release date does not have to be the date your publish your book. It can be later so you have time to set your marketing up.

 

Book Marketing Checklist, Media Kit Workbook and Book Selling Checklist

 

Click Here Download the Free Book Marketing Checklist, Media Kit Workbook
and the Book Selling Checklist PDF

 

Your Books Release Date __________________________________________

___ Announce the actual book release on your social media platforms. Include live URL links to the Amazon sales page. Your book should already be live on Amazon when you do this.
___ Post that your book is live on Amazon. Use your media kit elements for your posts. Talk about how excited you are.
___ Ask buyers to give you a book review. Let buys know how important a review is to help authors sell their books.
___ Reach out to everyone on your platform, let them know your book is live.

List some friends or key people that should know about your book

______________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________

 

___Update all your bios on your social media and websites. Use your current book information; include links to Amazon for your book if possible.

Your New Social Media Bio
Author Name, the author of XYZ Book, is the…

___ Sign up and fill out your Amazon Author Central Account.
https://author.amazon.com/home
___ Link your book in your Author Central Page. Add images. Connect your blog.

 

Elements to include for your Author Central Page

• Author Name
• Author Bio, social media and website URL
• Author Photos, head shot and others
• Claim all of your books. Search in Author Central and connect them
• Author Blog, you can post the feed
• Author Videos, add an interview video, book trailer video
• Add Editorial Reviews
• Set up your international Author Pages

 

Steps to Do After Releasing Your Book

___ Look at your Amazon book rankings in the Product Details and see where you got to. If you have driven enough traffic you might even get a #1 Amazon Category Best Seller ranking.

___ Use the Amazon sales page social media links to post about your book.

___ Ask readers who have purchased your book to give you a review on Amazon.

___ Continue to post about your book on social media. Post about what a great day this has been. Talk about your book, talk about parts of the book. Create and post several videos of you with your book.

___ Continue to ask buyers to give you a book review. Let buyers know how important a review is to help authors sell books.

___ Add your book title and link to your e-mail signature line.

___ Update all your social media bios that you are now a published author. Review Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, and your website

___ Let every company, organization, or association you are part of know about your new book. If they have a newsletter or a “What’s New” section on their website take advantage of your connections. Media and associations love new author success stories.

___ Continue to post about your book. Be sure to have a live URL link back to Amazon so followers can buy.

___ Thank everyone who bought your book at the launch.

 

1/4. Build Your Author Platform
2/4. Create an Author Blog/Website, Your Online Home, 5 Essential Pages
3/4. Create a Media Kit for Your Book
4/4. Book Marketing Workbook/Checklist

More to Come…

 

How to Sell Your Book, How i made $322,650 and soldd 34,605 books on amazonExcerpt from How to Sell Your Book, How I Made $322,650 and Sold 34,605 Books on Amazon, The Inside Secrets, by J. Bruce Jones. Bruce is the author of over 50 books on music, geography, children’s, coloring, and publishing. His latest book is available at Amazon and as a Downloadable PDF with bonus videos.

Available at Amazon: Paperback or eBook

Available as a Downloadable PDF with bonus videos

 

 

 

 

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