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Sally Murphy, Australian author

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Five Minute Promo: Day 7

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Day seven of the five minute promo challenge means we are more than a quarter of of the way through. Thanks for coming back – and, if you’re new here, thanks for dropping by.

Today’s task is one which could be done in as little as five minutes, or could take a whole lot longer. But, because I promised that each task would be five minutes (or less), I did a test run to make sure it was possible. So, here goes:

5 Minute Promo #7: Make a Book Trailer

A book trailer is a short ‘film’ adverting your book – like a movie trailer, though usually much shorter. It can be as simple or as complex as you, your talents and/or your budget will allow, including sound effects, acting, voice overs, visuals and more. If you are going to do all that, it will likely take you much, much longer than five minutes, but, if you use a simple tool such as Photo Story, and images you already have on hand, it can take as little as five minutes. Here’s my five minute effort:

I like using Photostory because it’s free, very simple to use, and creates it’s own music, so there are no copyright issues. I use my own pictures or ones from my books, so that again there are no copyright issues – and, in this case, because I already had them, it only took me five minutes to arrange them, add text and music, and create the video. The end slide I created in Paint. If I had more time I would have made it longer and probably included a voice-over, which is simple to do in Photostory.  There is a good explanation of how to use Photostory here.

 

As I said earlier, if you want to take longer than five minutes, there is no end to what you can do. Here is a longer trailer I made several years ago (in fact, the very first book trailer I ever made):

And here is much cleverer Booktrailer made by a wonderful teacher:

( created by Julie Hembree and shared here with permission.)

Anyway, the timer is ticking, so off you go and make your own booktrailer. When you’re done, upload it to Youtube, then post it on your website, your Facebook page and Tweet the link. As always, if you leave a comment here, I will check out what you’ve done. Have fun!

Five Minute Promo: Day 6

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Set your timer and get ready for today’s 5 minute task, because I’m going to jump straight into it. Yesterday I promised the last day of getting you to sign up for social media platforms, so today I want to suggest you do something quick and easy – and it’s about signing something rather than signing up.

Day 6: Creating an Email  Sig Line

If you are like me you probably write and send dozens of emails every week. Some are writing related and others aren’t. But every one of those emails can bear an advertisement for your book or books. If you email your child’s teacher about her homework -and there’s a signature line? Your teacher learns about your book. If you forward a referral to your doctor? Your doctor learns about your book. If you send a query to a new ediotr? The editor learns about your previous book AND sees that you are willing to promote your work. It’s win win.

So, today’s task is to open up your email program and create a signature line which advertises your book (or books). Here’s a screenshot of mine:

EMail Sig Line

You can see mine has pictures, my name plus the URL of my website. You could use text instead of pictures, and you could add more links (for example to online bookstores). There’s lots of possibilities.

 

There’s a quick guide to creating a signature for Outlook: here. If you use a different program, use a search engine and you will find a similar guide.

So, what are you waiting for? Your five minutes starts now. As awlays, feel free to leave me a note, or tweet me and let me know how you go.

How (And Why) I’m Promoting My New Book

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Cover Sage Cookson 1This is going to be a quick post, so I’m going to skip straight to the why. I have a new book out, Sage Cookson’s Sweet Escape, and I’ve been busy promoting it online and in person. I am doing this because although my publisher is doing their best to promote it too – particularly through setting up a website dedicated to the series – they have lots of books to promote each month, while I have only one new book at a time, and so can give this one my special attention, at the same time promoting my back list.

So, on to some of the things I am doing to promote Sage Cookson’s Sweet Escape:

  1. Blogging (with posts like this one) about the book, about writing and about the writing life.
  2. Tweeting – directly about the book, and on subjects connected to the book, as well as about seemingly unconnected things, which hopefully keeps my followers engaged.
  3. Instagramming – photos with the book in, photos of things related to the book and, again, photos of seemingly unconnected things.
  4. Pinning – to my Sage Cookson Pinterest board and other boards, related and unrelated.
  5. Facebooking – adding content to my Facebook author page, again either related or unrelated to the book.
  6. The 5 Minute Promo Challenge – a challenge I set myself and invited other authors to play along with, whereby I set a five minute promotional task each day for myself to do, then blog, tweet, Instagram and facebook about it, as appropriate.
  7. Engaging with my followers on the above mentioned platforms, replying to tweets and comments, and checking out what they are doing, too.
  8. Providing content for the Sage Cookson website, which New Frontier have set up.
  9. Visiting schools, festivals and bookstores and talking about the book, or signing copies, or even (shhh don’t tell the booksellers) making sure the book is face out wherever possible.
  10. Word of mouth. Telling people about the book – friends and strangers. But only where appropriate and not overdoing it.
  11. Sage with chocPlaying with my doll. A doll purchased from Kmart has been used to pose as Sage in social media photos, particularly on Instagram. Other props I’ve bought include a chef’s hat which I can wear for promotional appearances.
  12. Ending every email with a signature line which includes the book’s cover and a link to my website.

If you have a new book to promote, there are lots of things in this list you can try, too – though tailor them to the topic or theme of your own book. Good luck.

5 Minute Promo: Day 9

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Good morning. It’s Day 9 of the 5 Minute Promo series and, if you’ve been following along, by now you should have your Facebook Page, Twitter , Instagram  and Pinterest accounts all set up and have started adding content, including two blog posts and other content. Today’s task is probably going to take you less than five minutes but at the same time it is going to save you time in the future AND help you find new content to share on your various social media platforms. What is it?

It's always good to know what's being said about you.

It’s always good to know what’s being said about you.

5 Minute Promo #9

Set up a Google Alert for your book.  Doing this will mean that any time your book gets mentioned online, you will get an email notification letting you know. Then, once you’ve checked it out and made sure you like what you’re reading <grin> you can share the link to a review, discussion, teaching idea or whatever via your Twitter account, or your Facebook page, or you can Pin the content to your Pinterest board.

I  have a number of these alerts – one for each new book (including, of course, Sage Cookson’s Sweet Escape) as well as more general alerts for topics including Sally Murphy Author (that’s me!).

If you’re not sure how to set up an alert, there is a simple guide here.

Enjoy – and drop back tomorrow for the next 5 minute task.

5 Minute Promo: Day 5

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Gosh. It’s Day 5 already. July is whizzing by. and, hopefully, if you’ve been following along, you’ve been busy spending a whopping 5 minutes of each day promoting your book(s).  If you haven’t, just twenty minutes (give or take a few) will bring you up to speed, ready to tackle day 5’s task which is (drumroll please)…

5 Minute Promo #5

Set up a Pinterest account. Yes, you’ve got it, I want you to join another social media platform. This is the last one, I promise (for now!). So, after you’ve read my few words, head over to Pinterest, sign up and you are ready to Pin. There’s simple instructions on how to get started here and instructions on how to set up a board and start pinning here. You might extend your five minutes and set up a board about your book. Here’s one I’ve set up for Sage Cookson’s Sweet Escape here.

Already on Pinterest? Your five minute task is to make sure your profile and account is up to date and, once that’s done, use the rest of your time to pin two new pictures to one of your exitsing boards. Easy peasy. Feel free to follow me, Sally Murphy Author, while you are there.

Pinning is easy and fun. Here is a sample of things I’ve pinned from this site:

Read a kids Book

A quote with photo – and, of course, my web address so people know to visit me.

And:

Looking at You 3

A poem I wrote, added to a photo I took and again with my URL and twitter handle.

 

 

5 Minute Promo: Day 4

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Welcome to Day 4! If you are following along at home, by now you have written a blog post, opened or updated your Twitter account and opened or updated your Instagram account. You’ll have noticed that so far all of the tasks I’m sharing are to online – because using social media and the internet is such a quick, free way of promotion. And today, I continue that trend.

5 Minute Promo #4

Create a Facebook Author Page.Assuming you are already a member of Facebook, it will take only a couple of minutes to start a page for you, the author. There’s a quick guide to starting a Page here.

I posted this pic on my Facebook page the day my author copies arrived.

I posted this pic on my Facebook page the day my author copies arrived.

An author page is different than your personal profile where you can post about your kids, your walks on the beach, or your dog. Instead, your Facebook page is about your brand as an author. Having said that,  not every post will be about selling your book. As a starting point, use your author photo (if you haven’t got one, it’s time to take one), a header picture which might be something from your website and add a cover photo of your book. Once you’ve posted something, invite your friends to like it.

Already have a Facebook page? Of course you do! Then your five minute task is to make sure your photo is up to date, and post something new. Then, because your five minutes won’t be up yet, invite the friends who haven’t yet liked your page to like it now.

Want to see what a Facebook author page looks like? Feel free to look at mine and follow it. I’ll do my best to entertain you with regular fresh content.

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