My
seven-year-old daughter has shown great progress in becoming an independent
reader. One of the things I believe will
help her is for her to recognize more words by sight. I decided to buy some flashcards that help
her learn scores of words on one side, and then a chance to create new words on
the other side. It made me think that it
would be cool if we had flashcards for ideas, especially ones that help
authors to build up their book marketing and publicity skills. Maybe I’m onto something?
There
are many books, online courses, and seminars that profess to tell authors how
to promote themselves and their books.
This blog has done that for the past four years. But if we had to narrow down the core
elements that represent the foundation of PR building blocks, what would they
be?
Flashcards are usually quick reminders of things.
Children learn numbers, equations, letters, words, and images that help
them expand their minds. Teenagers and
even adults use them to prep for tests and to prepare for speeches. We associate many traits and ideas to a
single picture, phrase, or symbol.
Authors need their reminders and cues to jumpstart their book publicity.
I would
break the cards down into the core areas that they need to address:
·
Social
Media
·
Traditional
Media
·
Speaking
Appearances
·
Direct
Bulk Sales
·
Branding
·
Networking
·
Writing
Pitches
·
Press
Kit Development
·
Media
Coaching
·
Research
And Learning
·
Website
Launch/Revision
·
Bookstore
And Library Singings
·
Brainstorming
·
Creating
Marketing Materials
Of
course, there are other cards that could be created, but this is a quick-study
method, so let’s focus on the above.
Then break each of those 14 areas into subsets. For instance, traditional media would list
national/local/international TV, radio, and print (newspapers, magazines,
newsletters, newswires, trade publications).
Social media would be divided into content you generate blogging,
podcasting, via video, and on various platforms such as Facebook, LinkedIn,
Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, Google+ and YouTube. Then there’s getting coverage by others:
bloggers, podcasters, reviewers, and major media websites like The Huffington
Post.
So the
flashcards would identify the areas that need attention, post questions, and
give you food for thought so that you’ll spur your own ideas as to what you
should be doing.
The
questions for each area would revolve around the obvious. For instance, if the flashcard reads Twitter,
it may have these questions:
·
How
much time shall I designate towards it today?
·
How
many people will I seek to follow me today?
·
How
many people will I choose to follow today?
·
How
many tweets will I send today? What will
they say?
·
How
many retweets will I share today? What
will they say?
·
What
types of lists shall I create today?
·
Whose
tweets will I read today?
·
How
many people will I Direct Message or respond to today?
·
How
much time will I spend reading and learning about the profiles of Twitter
members?
·
What
leads can I find on twitter that lead to real-world contacts?
You get
the idea. It’s all very logical and
methodical. If only you had 240 hours in
a day!
If
flashcards are helping my little girl to read, they can help you promote and
market yourself and your book. Don’t
forget to create a flashcard that says: Read BookMarketingBuzzBlog!
DON’T MISS: ALL NEW RESOURCE OF THE YEAR
2015 Book PR &
Marketing Toolkit: All New
Brian Feinblum’s views,
opinions, and ideas expressed in this blog are his alone and not that of his
employer. You can follow him
on Twitter @theprexpert and email him at brianfeinblum@gmail.com. He feels
more important when discussed in the third-person. This is copyrighted by
BookMarketingBuzzBlog © 2015
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