February 19, 2009
You, Google, Oprah and Amazon
TABLE OF CONTENTS
1) What's New at the Shared Self Publishing Experience
Keep up with traffic figures. See what kind of audience a big, do-it-yourself site can draw.
2) Google's Not Calling...for the Same Reason Oprah's Not
Oprah doesn't promote a book to benefit the author; she does it to benefit her viewers. Similarly, Google doesn't rank a site highly to benefit a webmaster; they do it to benefit searchers.
So what benefit are you offering?
3) FEATURE ARTICLE:
Think About Your Book Website in a New Way: An Exercise
Use this exercise to think about your book as a part of a niche. What's YOUR niche? How can you reach it?
4) Books and Niches
Meet an author who KNOWS her book's niche.
5) New Pages on the Site
When you signed up for the newsletter, you were promised an update on new pages to the site. Here they are!
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1) What's New at the Shared Self Publishing Experience
In January, the site averaged 81 unique visitors per day.
- 37 from Google
- 5 from Yahoo
- 9 from msn/live
- Most of the rest from the site's 643 inbound links
You do know the value of inbound links, don't you? It isn't just about the traffic they deliver!
Check how many YOU have!
2) Google's Not Calling...for the Same Reason Oprah's Not!
I have a cousin who is a producer for Oprah. We share a last name. So you can imagine the calls and emails I get from writer acquaintances. They go something like this...
"Are you related to Jill Barancik? From Oprah? Do you think you could tell her about me/my book?"
Uh...no. (And please don't bother asking!)
I just searched and found 24 posts on the site that reference Oprah. It seems everyone's dreaming of Oprah propelling them and their book into the sales stratosphere.
Sorry, folks. There's only so much Oprah to go around.
Oprah and her show are a cultural phenomenon. The woman has HER PICK of stories - and books - to air. Yet 9 out of 10 people who approach me don't even think to suggest what they would be offering Oprah in the way of a great story.
Remember, Oprah doesn't sit there, on the air, reading your book aloud. Have you
- cured cancer?
- inspired the childless to adopt AIDS orphans?
- overcome a disfiguring illness?
In short, what makes your story the one that Oprah is going to ask millions of viewers to spend their time with?
Guess what
Google asks a very similar question: What makes your SITE the one Google is going to recommend at the top of its search rankings?
(Let's run with this metaphor, because even though there aren't any Baranciks working at Google - that I know of - I have a much better chance of getting you some attention from them than from Oprah.)
Okay: the first page of Google results for a search, that's equivalent to an Oprah guest spot. The next 10,000 pages? That's everyone who DIDN'T get a guest spot.
Please don't be one of those authors who thinks they deserve Google's spotlight just by virtue of existing! Google doesn't care about your book. Google serves people who are searching for online information. So...
Be a good source of online information. In the same way Oprah promotes people who make the world a better place, your site should make the internet a better place. Develop a site that does more than promote your book.
Promotion only occurs when there's an audience to promote to!
Your job: build a site that attracts an audience who will have a natural affinity for your book. Then you'll have a chance at that coveted Google "guest" spot!
Now read the next article for an exercise you can do right now to get yourself thinking along these lines!
3) FEATURE ARTICLE
Think About Your Book Website in a New Way
I'm going to give you an exercise. Here's a list of 500 successful websites. Open them in a new window. Look at their domain names. Pick one.
Now, imagine yourself the owner of this successful website. You're getting big-time traffic because you're offering good information to those in search of it. Now it's time to do something for yourself.
Visit Amazon
I'm imagining myself the owner of practical-home-theater-guide.com. At Amazon, I'm going to search BEST MOVIES, because what's the point of a home theater if you aren't going to watch some good flicks?
Wow! Lots of good books, including:
- The Best 1000 Movies Ever Made (my gosh, my movie
is in that one!)
- The Greatest Movies Ever
- The 100 Best Films to Rent You've Never Heard Of
I want to feature ALL those books on my site and make some juicy Amazon commissions when I sell them. But BEST MOVIES isn't the only search I can think of. I know that if I Amazon search
- Home Theater
- Sound Systems, and
- Video Technology...
I'll find tons of other books that might be of interest to my visitors. After all, it's easier to have a book by your side when you're setting up your home theater than a computer.
Now YOU do the exercise with a few different sites until you get the hang of it. See how many different angles you can think of to approach each site's particular audience with. Find the books that are likely to sell.
Really. Go do it. I'll wait here...
I see you're back
Okay, now that you're thinking like a marketer, let's turn the exercise inside out. Think about YOUR book. What audiences might it most likely appeal to? And...
...what are the names of the websites that would attract those audiences? Let's say you wrote the novel, "Murder at The Stardust," you'd likely find audiences with
- gambling-stories.com
- las-vegas-crime.com
- vegas-hotels.com
You see, 2900 people per month search GAMBLING STORIES, 6600 search LAS VEGAS CRIME, and 2,240,000 search VEGAS HOTELS.
Zero search MURDER STARDUST HOTEL. So can you see why murderatthestardust.com is kind of a waste of a site?
Search engine traffic is largely a function of two things
- Are you a good "guest of the internet," i.e. does your site offer good information?
- Is the information your site offers much sought after?
Most authors build sites that Google is never going to give credence too - sites that are negligible sources of information on unsearched subjects! Have I just described your site? And, if so, what are you going to do about it?
A To-Do List
Most authors find that attracting significant traffic requires a wholesale overhaul of their internet strategy and letting go of their hope that their existing site will suddenly take off. But let's start with something you can add to your existing site to boost traffic a bit...
To-Do #1: Build a Book List Page
Go back to Amazon. If your book is on Amazon, do a search that's likely to bring up your book AND other books. The most recent author who posted to the site wrote the book, "Mom, I Fired the Babysitter." That author might look up babysitter picture books.
Voila! What I recommend that this author do is pick a selection of these books and feature them ALL on a single page, along with her own book.
Why would an author recommend other people's books???
Because that new page is likely to rank highly for a Google search of babysitter picture books. Without that page, the site is UNlikely to rank at all. (Read about my book list strategy in more detail.)
To-Do #2: Think About Building a Niche Site
The make and model of television you own does not occupy its own niche. Panasonic does not create a separate website for its PV4682-1317. A single TV is part of a niche.
If your site is devoted to you and your book(s) and you want traffic, your problem is that you've overspecialized. That is, your site is about an item, while Google is interested in sites about niches.
So if traffic is your goal, you need to identify a niche that you and your book exist within.
Then you need to create a site that speaks to that niche.
Use the skills you've developed with this exercise to identify niches you occupy. Any search you do on Amazon that brings up your book - along with lots of other books - is a likely niche.
If you're open to creating a new site, the tools to build a niche site yourself are close at hand. If DIY isn't your thing, here are some real pros who can build a niche site for you.
Oprah might not be waiting, but Google is.
4) Books and Niches
Author Knows Nurse Niche
Since we're talking niches, this month I want to feature a new post from an author who has ID'd her best audience. Listen to what Kathleen McElligott says,
Another thing to think about is who your target audience will be, because lets face it, after you've sold copies to your friends and family, you will need to branch out.
Mine is nurses, specifically school nurses. I have sold books at the National Association of School Nurses National Convention, and also at state nursing conventions.
Kathleen certainly gets that niche marketing is the key to offline success. If she can figure out how to reach school nurses online, she'll have it made!
5) NEW PAGES ON THE SITE
When you signed up for this newsletter you were promised updates on new stories posted to The Shared Self Publishing Experience. Below you'll find the new pages added to the site since the last newsletter. Pages in bold are ones that I feel have at least one IMPORTANT insight.
Remember to read the comments! (Because when writers write back in response to my questions, sometimes that's where the best information is.) And please post your own comments as well!
Rolling Out a Book Marketing Plan
Marketing a Self Published Devotional
Pursuing Diet Book Sales Success
Publishing Cookbooks...with a Twist
Important New Post on Selecting a Book Cover Artist!
What a Book Cover Accomplishes
Building a Picture Books Site
WRAPPING UP
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THANK YOU
Thank you for subscribing to and reading this edition of Advanced Self Publishing. If you have any comments or suggestions, I hope you'll contact me.