Amazon: A 24/7 Cash Register

The Publicity Hound’s
Tips of the Week
Issue #670 Dec. 8, 2012

Publisher: Joan Stewart

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“Tips, Tricks and Tools for Free Publicity”

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In This Issue
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1. Amazon: A 24/7 Cash Register

2. Use Music in Your Promotions

3. New Posts at My Blog

4. Hound Video of the Week

This Weekend in the Hound House:

I’m whipping up another batch of pita pockets, loaded with sesame and flax seeds, using a recipe from a vegetarian cookbook. The dough has to rise three times, so Sunday afternoon will be shot. But these things are as big as elephant ears and so good that they make the store-bought kind taste like cardboard.

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1. Amazon: A 24/7 Cash Register
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Authors love to grouse about Amazon.com and how little they make from every book sale.

Smart authors don’t bother complaining. They’re too busy concentrating on the best categories in which to place their books. They’re spying to find out what their competitors are doing that’s working. And they’re researching keywords and tagging their books, so that people using Amazon’s search box can find the books more easily.

Publicist Penny Sansevieri says there’s pure cold buried within Amazon. But you have to know where to look for it and how to use the dozens of tools that Amazon puts right at your fingertips.

Spend some time tracking down Amazon’s star reviewers and send them a great pitch to review your book. Or understand how the category system works and how your book can rank high. If you can get to #1 within your category, Amazon will increase your promotion.

Penny says all authors should learn about Amazon’s Author Central and everything it offers.

“Everyone has access to their Author Central page but you won’t get the enhanced features if the page isn’t claimed,” Penny says.

During a webinar I hosted with her on Thursday, Penny said she chose seven authors who allowed her to log into their Amazon accounts and check to see how they offerd their books for sale. She was shocked to find that not one of them tagged their books with keywords that could have been found by Amazon’s search engine.

What a missed opportunity!

She also explained that she devotes much more time teaching her author clients how to promote their books online instead of trying to get onto big radio and TV shows. Why? Because online promotion sells more books.

The authors who attended the webinar “How to Launch a Book, Promote It and Sell a Truckload–Without an Expensive Publicist” were blown away. Everyone who registered will be able to access the video replay and the huge package of bonuses sometime Sunday night.

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2. Use Music in Your Promotions
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I’ll bet you seldom think of using music in promotional packages for your books, speaking engagements, special events, podcasts, videos or product launches.

I seldom do.

That’s why I was intrigued when Asbjoern Andersen, a Danish composer, suggested a guest blog post about how to use music to cut through the publicity noise. He says music doesn’t have to cost you a fortune. It doesn’t have to cost you anything, actually.

Royalty-free music sites don’t just carry background music. You can find thousands of sound logos, too.

Read what he wrote about music and start thinking of ways you can incorporate music into your PR campaign.

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3. New Posts at My Blog
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Authors: 9 things to do when you can’t afford a publicist

Use music to cut through the publicity noise

Dog Tweets: How to create a corporate blogging team

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4. Hound Video of the Week
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The video about the dogs that were trained to drive a car went viral this week. In case you haven’t seen it, enjoy.