Few skills are more important for an author than knowing how to hire a book publicist. With over 300,000 books releasing each year, the competition for readers has never been keener. After your craft is honed and the manuscript is edited, how does an author stand out in the marketplace? Authors who stand out have a book publicist who is focused on promoting their release.

What a Book Publicist Does

The book publicist is the caboose of the publishing process, the person who pushes the finished book into the marketplace. Although a book publicist may be the last professional an author hires, publicity begins six to 12 months prior to release date. For this reason, it is advantageous to hire a book publicist at least seven months prior to publication date.

Book Marketing Services

Book publicist services include writing an author platform, assembling a media kit, submitting galleys for book review, and scheduling media. A media kit today is usually digital, i.e. a page on the author’s website.  This webpage may contain the author’s downloadable headshot, front cover, text interview, and other content for the press.

Providers of book marketing services specialize by genre. Genre specialties include all varieties of fiction and nonfiction subgenres like how-to, history, career, self help, historical fiction, memoir/autobiography, biography, and body mind spirit. A book publicist may be employed directly by a publisher or may freelance for publishers and authors. Some publishers include a small amount of pre-pub book marketing in their contracts. However, most book promotion falls to the author to execute.

Virtual Book Tour

Promoting a book may involve hosting a virtual tour with stops at book blogs and frequently updated websites that promote your book. Blog tours are especially effective for fiction and incorporate a variety of online book promotions. Types of content include author interviews, excerpts, author videos, book trailers, podcasts, reviews, endorsements, cover art, headshots, candids, author essays, articles, book giveaways and guest blog posts.

Book Promotion Ideas

Book promotion ideas might derive from an element in a media kit or a stop on a blog tour. Publicity may arise from events that other authors or book stores are hosting. Being a guest at events is advantageous because someone else’s following is made available to the author for free. Working with a book publicist prior to the launch of a first book is a smart move because the author learns how to market early on in her career, making her well positioned to promote subsequent releases.

Even when one title is as good as another, the book with the extra marketing push is the one that will sell better in the marketplace. Book publicity is just as essential as the four types of editing to a book’s success.