Facebook is often an enigma to many authors when it comes to online marketing. I’ve talked before about social media and how it works for selling books, but I want to use this article to narrow in on Facebook and talk about how authors can take full advantage of it.
- Use Facebook as the top of the funnel, not the bottom. Over and over the numbers show that Facebook is an awful place to directly sell your books. However, it can be a really great place to engage potential readers. Instead of trying to get them to spend money, invite them to visit your blog or join your email list.
- Put Facebook into a bigger marketing system. Getting more fans or friends isn’t the point, selling books is the point. Come up with a plan to move people from finding you on Facebook to visiting your platform and then buying a book.
- Harness other people’s fans and friends. It’s much easier to get 10 people with 1000 fans/friends each to promote your book, blog post, etc than to build your own base of 10,000. Focus on building relationships with a small group of people that will gladly promote on your behalf.
- Connect to other authors and influencers. If email or other forms of connecting fail, I’ve often been able to get people to respond to me on Facebook and then a followup email has a much better chance of success.
Marketing on Facebook is a tricky thing but follow these guidelines to get the most out of your efforts on this social media platform.
Image by bfishadow.
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