1 Book Marketing Tactic Every Author Can Do

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I have 14+ years experience as a book marketing consultant. I've put dozens of books on the New York Times_, _Wall Street Journal_, _USA Today and others bestsellers lists. I've also written the perennial bestselling book marketing book _Your First 1000 Copies_.
In this video, I tell you the one tactic that any author can use to start marketing their book right away. This is something responsible for making books huge bestsellers.
My name is Tim Grahl, I'm the CEO of Story Grid and I'm the author _The Shithead_, _Running Down a Dream_, and _Your First 1000 Copies_. My partner Shawn Coyne is the creator and founder of Story Grid and he's a writer and editor with over 30 years of experience.
Here's the Neil Gaiman interview I referenced: • Gaiman on Copyright Pi...
🧰 Additional Resources
• The 1 Thing All Great Stories Have in Common: • The 1 Thing All Great ...
• How to Write a Well Rounded Story: • How to Write a Well-Ro...
• Narrative Device: • Narrative Device: 3-Pa...
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[@TheEccentricRaven]

This! I noticed a long time ago that the key to successful books is word of mouth. In fact, back when they were brand new, I first learned about Harry Potter, Twilight, and the Hunger Games by word of mouth. I think the best attitude that a writer can have is the desire to write a book that is worthy of being loved and talked about by readers.

[@courtneyfetters1989]

I've had success joining a large group promo, which I marked my 4th book free. I've seen consistent sales on the series for 3 weeks now.

[@FCSchaefer]

Giving away free copies is fine, but I've heard for years that if you do so, most of the time, they'll be snatched up by book hoarders, and never read.

[@hugoleonardoamaral586]

In my experience, this is what happens most of the time.

[@johnbrennick8738]

I joined a “stuff your kindle” and will never ever understand no circumstances do that again.

[@fporretto]

That's unfortunately true. I've held a lot of giveaways, mostly through Amazon, and while the number of copies downloaded has often been heartening, the subsequent feedback and sales have not. To download a free eBook is a no-risk proposition. Reading it? That takes time and commitment...things not everyone is willing to devote to an unknown writer.

[@miggseye]

I love this idea. Being one of the of your advanced readers (I’m still in the middle of the book and will probably finish over the weekend) I get the drive to read the book because 1.) I’m familiar with you and your work through this channel and Story Grid and 2.) you gave me a specific day to complete it and submit a review by. This 2nd part helps, as I recall I got a e-copy of a book a friend who gave it to me and asked for an honest review. But they never gave me deadline date as part of the agreement. So as a result, I never finished the book, and I never wrote the review. So I’d think, in addition to handing out free copies to people you think would read the book, it’s probably important to set a deadline for them to submit a review in exchange. Wondering how that works with Amazon’s review policy. (Actually, I just realized I don’t know exactly where you asked us to submit reviews. I’m guessing it was Amazon. But maybe it was somewhere else?) Also, I’m wondering the criteria you use to hone in on who are the real people who would read your book are, so you are not just giving books away willy nilly with no plan or strategy. Can you go into more detail sometime about this strategy? How to find advanced copy readers up in the thousands if need be. Ultimately, it would be great to hear how your figures go for THE SHITHEAD. How many did you give away. How many did you receive reviews back. How many you sold as a result. As you are as much of a teacher as you are an author and book marketer-seeing the transparency of how that works will be so educational for beginning authors.

[@TheLadyWrites]

Free has always been my favorite marketing method.

[@EllenSmyth]

Brandon Sanderson has been giving the first 25% of his books away pre-publication, which when your books are 460,000 per book is the size of a book itself. On his previous book, not only did he publish the first quarter online, but he published the first quarter of the audiobook on KZbin as a playlist, chapter by chapter, as we got closer to the release date. It was epic!!! And I told my eldest, who reads with me, that he should absolutely do that for the first in the series to introduce newcomers and get them hooked. And then he did exactly that! Sanderson has epic business acumen. I think I will steal that tactic. I am definitely hoping to make videos for the first six chapters because much of that content is the best in the book and because Chapter 4 is the chapter I most want everyone to know. I want Chapter 4's message to be free.

[@shebreathesingold8043]

Great concept. Would you mind sharing how your sales go based on this strategy? I'd love a realistic view of how many copies were given vs. sales, for instance.

[@hornbeam7131]

I think this is great advice, and I was already thinking about this for my first novel. My problem is who to give it to. As far as I can see there are three overlapping target groups. 1 - People who will actually read it and generate word of mouth even if it's only to one other person, 2 - People who would like to be ARC readers, and 3 - People who will read it and take the time to leave reviews (on Amazon or Good Reads perhaps) But it all starts with that group 1. How do I find them?

[@TiyanaMarieWrites]

Really enjoying your videos on book marketing! They're so helpful. 😊 Hoping you'll make more!

[@Ebube_Daniels]

I love writing and am currently writing my first book and I need all the help and advice I can get … thanks

[@maver1cs384]

I'm doing exactly as you advised. I'm sharing my pre-print copy of Hammerhead, a collection of short stories, with my network. The feedback has been encouraging and is certainly helping me with my next novel. The challenge I have is that the readers within my network are well aware of the subject matter. The book is, however, meant for those who are not aware of it. So, how do you break through the bubbles and echo chambers that permeate the online world? By the way, I'm loving your book the Shithead, it resonates so well.

[@dukeofdenver]

Make video content online

[@barlasomay7404]

I've already tried this tactic with my first book. Yes it is effective but have down side. It is sometimes hard to make people read your book because they dont have time, they have other books on the list etc etc. But among all the marketing tactics, this one is good I'll admit that. Thanks for the video!

[@iota2jot]

Skip to 6:48 after the intro. As usual, this is very longwinded.

[@bruceryba5740]

What a fascinating subject!

[@DrMaddy-YT]

I will try this advice! My first book sold really well due to marketing efforts of my publisher. But the second book was not pushed as much and you can see it in the sales. For the second book I used story grid as well as a story grid editor and I looove how the book turned out. However, my publisher expected a purely non-fiction book like the first one and not a "big idea book". So I was very sad to see that the sales were way behind the first book although the second book is much better written. I am excited to order more copies and send them out into the world to get things moving :) Thanks Tim for all your valuable work!

[@JoelCrumbleyAuthor]

Don't you think the sales were from the organizations, buying them to give them away? Great idea though, and I've seen this work too!

[@gregorwalton]

If you're infamous it's easy to get people to buy your book. The more horrific your reputation, the bigger the sales

[@toweypat]

"Infamous" means "more than famous", right?

[@gregorwalton]

@@toweypat infamous meaning being famous for something bad

[@rbowdenscipio3408]

I'd love to read and compare your two books, but does this new one have a lot of curse words in it? I'm pretty turned off by the title and am afraid it's a hint of what awaits in the text.

[@StoryGrid]

Yes, it's an adult book with plenty of adult words. I don't think it crosses the gratuitous line but you may disagree. - Tim

[@rbowdenscipio3408]

@@StoryGrid Thank you, Tim. I'll ask my local library to get a copy and check it out that way - plus, it's still a sale for you!

[@mturra81]

This video was super helpful, thanks! I self publish children's books and would be very interested in giving away free copies, especially to schools, libraries, etc. Do you have advice on where I should look for businesses/organizations that promote or spread word of mouth info about books authors donate?

[@paulinedawber3306]

Thank you very much, super informative 🙏

[@JeremyHelm]

i'm surprised not hearing or seeing any reference about Cory Doctorow in this conversation

[@MoBunnell1]

Fantastic!!

[@mariavalente6304]

Do more videos about this!

[@mariavalente6304]

Should I give to libraries?

[@MRBRADART]

Anybody think this would also work for selling art prints??

[@jowilliam991]

While I am curious at how this worked out so well. I have tried the give it away strat, and it doesn't work. People have been doing the give away shit since Amazon first started letting authors give ebooks away. I have heard over and over and over in the industry how that doesn't work, and there are years of experience behind a lot of people who have tried and failed. I think this is a rare fluke, not a stable idea. This will, once again, put a financial burden on new authors as they throw their money at various ideas on how to sell their book, which will ultimately fail.

[@CrystalBreakfast]

Do I seriously hafta be the first one in the comments to ask why you didn't drop us some free copies of The Shithead at the end of the video? Come on Tim, you can trust us, we promise we'll read 'em real good. Just a few thousand copies, and to keep things fair, we'll all send you free copies of our books, of course. Who wouldn't want a few thousand struggling writers' novels, hm?

[@StoryGrid]

Ha, yeah I should have done that in this video. I did it in my last one, but here's the link if you want an advance copy: storygrid.com/shithead - Tim

[@CrystalBreakfast]

@@StoryGrid Nice! Well that's what I get for missing a video. XD Will check it out, been curious.

[@svene.3856]

I'm skeptical of which publisher hands out so many copies (=money) for free? Without any guarantee, so as far as I would guess, regarding that they are most often very conservative, you'd need much luck to find one to do that. But the idea in itself I find worth a try, I just think it wouldn't work for any setting/genre, let's say western, because the market isn't that big a priori.

[@StoryGrid]

Many traditional publishers won't do this, but it's short sighted not to. Most books can be printed for ~$3 a piece so it's much cheaper than other forms of advertising. And, of course, ebooks are free. And I've seen it work for lot's of different genres so don't write it off so quickly. - Tim

[@svene.3856]

​@@StoryGridThanks for the reply. I'm going to memorize it when time comes because it makes great sense. I hope the time will be this and next year. I'll just need to find an American publisher (I'm German) at best. How hard can that be? 😂

[@gabrielthomas9732]

Question: how do you give away digital copies of a book without someone else taking the digital copy and selling it themselves, or even printing it and selling it themselves?... Sorry, this might be sort of a layman question, but what is the process of giving away free digital copies?

[@StoryGrid]

I use Bookfunnel.com for this. I also just send people PDF and EPUB files. As for worrying about people printing/selling copies... see the part of my video about piracy. - Tim

[@gabrielthomas9732]

@@StoryGrid Thanks, Tim. I realized that part of the question was idiotic after I wrote it, but I hit the button anyway. My bad. Thank you for the link.

[@toweypat]

That's not a dumb question at all.

[@SashaZarustin]

Great, let's make our books freebies - a mad dash to turn our time, sweat, and tears into shit that people won't see any value in. The new norm, huh?

[@StoryGrid]

Did you miss the part where it turns into 10X sales? You give the book away because that turns into lots of people paying money for the book. - Tim

[@SashaZarustin]

@@StoryGrid I didn't miss it. What I'm saying is that today it's 10x, in 6 months it's 7x and three years from now it's 1.2X because everyone is assuming that books got to be free. We're essentially devaluing our craft by making it free.

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