Following up with my blog post topic from yesterday about online reviews and the impact these have on consumer purchasing decisions, today I would like to share a case study on how to promote and sell your book online. Kyle Lacy, CEO of Brandswag, recently finished his book, Twitter Marketing for Dummies. With a tight timeline this was not a task he could complete alone so he called in fellow social media practitioner Erik Deckers, who has been published in nine weekly newspapers through Indiana.
After a lot of hard work, last week Kyle announced that the book was available for order on Amazon.com. This is a huge accomplishment for Kyle and Erik. I know many people involved in the Indianapolis social media scene are very happy to see this success. Both Kyle and Erik are always looking to reach out to help others and this book is right up there with sites like SmallerIndiana.com as far as efforts that are really putting Indiana and more specifically Indianapolis on the map when it comes to big ideas/social media marketing. Ironically enough, social media marketing tools like Twitter have played and will play a big role in the success of this book. Kyle has done a great job of promoting this book and today I would like to take a closer look on how he is doing it:
- First off, the lead with Wiley Publishing to be considered as an author of the book came from a participant in a social media class about using tools like Facebook and Twitter. A class which was promoted using social media among other things.
- Kyle frequently posted Twitter, Blog and Facebook updates about his progress asking for feedback and suggestions in some cases.
- He even posted a blog entitled Help with Twitter Marketing for Dummies Book where he gave everyone that read his post and tweets an opportunity to get published in the book by submitting Twitter marketing thoughts in 140 characters or less. Simply put, this was a chance to have your Twitter thought and username go out to everyone that will be reading this book.
- Now that the book is available for purchase he is doing something that I think is huge – offering 100 free copies of the new book in exchange for a commitment to publish a review. The 100 copies will be split between people with a good network, or large following on social media, the Internet or their community and reviewers in magazines/newspapers. This is the perfect way to potentially have 100 different people (assuming everyone follows through) telling all of their friends, followers, business partners, etc. about your book. This has viral marketing written all over it.
Kyle has consistently reached out to help me in getting me personal blog started. He has also contributed in helping to promote Fusework Studios on Twitter and other social media tools. His reputation and eagerness to help make me sure that this book will be a success. I know I am looking forward to receiving my copy! Please join me in congratulating Kyle and Erik on this great accomplishment!
