Category: Run Our Company

Run Our Company

Run the Company [Poll]: Help Outskirts Press Choose the Next Book Marketing Option We Launch

Decisions, decisions … Sometimes we don’t relish making them, and other times (like now) we just enjoy bouncing ideas around. That’s why Outskirts Press is asking you for help making a very important decision: What new self-publishing book marketing option should we launch next?

In the past, your input has guided us to introduce things like our Amazon Featured Book-of-the-Week and iPad/iPhone Premium Edition. Once again, we need your feedback to determine what new product or service we might offer this year that is most valuable to you in your book marketing efforts.

Below are five options we have been asked by authors to add to our repertoire of book marketing services. Since every option Outskirts Press releases takes a great deal of time and resources to develop, test and administer, it would be difficult to launch them all at once. So tell us — which of these options do you think we should launch first? Read through them and submit your vote in the poll below.

  1. RTIR (Radio-TV-Interview Report) Ad Placement: Let Outskirts Press help you advance your book marketing efforts by getting your name in front of valuable media movers and shakers. RTIR is a subscription trade publication that goes to more than 4,000 radio and television producers across the United States and Canada three times each month. Each issue lists 100-150 authors and other spokespeople who are available for live and in-studio interviews. Your ad in RTIR will include a contact person and phone number interested radio/TV producers can use to arrange interviews. That kind of publicity can generate great interest in your book!
  2. Publishers Weekly Select: How would you like to have your book cover and synopsis appear in front of thousands of book-sellers, librarians, agents, publishers, film producers and production companies? With your inclusion in Publishers Weekly Select, this is exactly what will happen! Your book will be seen in Publishers Weekly’s print and digital edition, as well as the home page of PublishersWeekly.com and BookLife.com. This is a great way to stand out in a crowded market!
  3. US Review of Books: Receive a guaranteed review and get your book in front of 13,000+ professional book reviewers. Inclusion in the US Review of Books provides inexpensive access to professional book reviewers willing to give consideration to good books that might otherwise get overlooked. These thoughtful reviews provide you with a valuable tool in the subsequent marketing of your book
  4. Pinterest Board Creation: Pinterest has emerged as one of the most influential social media sites for authors. Authors can use Pins to reach out to their readers, to inspire and entertain, while growing their author brand. Outskirts Press will help build your social media presence by setting up/enhancing your existing Pinterest profile, then creating a Pinterest board that features your book cover and synopsis. We will optimize your board through the use of keywords in your profile, board titles and pin descriptions that will help drive traffic to your board.
  5. Goodreads Marketing Campaign: With more than 40 million members, Goodreads is the world’s largest community of readers, and at Outskirts Press, we want to help you connect with those readers. We will help you to claim your author profile on Goodreads and set up a book giveaway to generate awareness and reviews for your book. We will also create an ad on Goodreads that will be seen by readers searching for new books. Custom stats will be available so you can see how many views, clicks, and the number of Goodreads members who add your book. A comprehensive approach to reach Goodreads affluent and educated audience of book readers

It’s up to you now.

This poll closes on June 19, so give us your input before then!

Need help marketing that book?

Order Your Marketing Solutions Today!

Run Our Company, Survey Poll

Run the Company [Poll]: Help Outskirts Press Choose the Next Book Marketing Option We Launch

Decisions, decisions … Sometimes we don’t relish making them, and other times (like now) we just enjoy bouncing ideas around. That’s why Outskirts Press is asking you for help making a very important decision: What new self-publishing book marketing option should we launch next?

In the past, your input has guided us to introduce things like our Amazon Featured Book-of-the-Week and iPad/iPhone Premium Edition. Once again, we need your feedback to determine what new product or service we might offer this year that is most valuable to you in your book marketing efforts.

Below are five options we have been asked by authors to add to our repertoire of book marketing services. Since every option Outskirts Press releases takes a great deal of time and resources to develop, test and administer, it would be difficult to launch them all at once. So tell us — which of these options do you think we should launch first?  Read through them and submit your vote in the poll below.

  1. RTIR (Radio-TV-Interview Report) Ad Placement: Let Outskirts Press help you advance your book marketing efforts by getting your name in front of valuable media movers and shakers. RTIR is a subscription trade publication that goes to more than 4,000 radio and television producers across the United States and Canada three times each month. Each issue lists 100-150 authors and other spokespeople who are available for live and in-studio interviews. Your ad in RTIR will include a contact person and phone number interested radio/TV producers can use to arrange interviews. That kind of publicity can generate great interest in your book!
  2. Package of Paid Book Review Services: Getting a book review from a recognized source can be one of the biggest challenges for authors. Outskirts Press can get you not only one review with this option, but THREE (in a bundled package for 25% off the a-la-carte pricing). These are guaranteed reviews from renowned critics from Kirkus Reviews, Blue Ink Reviews and ForeWord Clarion Reviews.  These 3 publications will provide 100% honest feedback that you can use as either a promotional tool or to improve upon future writings.
  3. US Review of Books: Receive a guaranteed review and get your book in front of 13,000+ professional book reviewers. Inclusion in the US Review of Books provides inexpensive access to professional book reviewers willing to give consideration to good books that might otherwise get overlooked. These thoughtful reviews provide you with a valuable tool in the subsequent marketing of your book
  4. AudioBook Formats: Outskirts Press can get your book into yet another emerging segment of the publishing market with a professionally produced audio version for the “reader” on the go. AudioBooks bring your words to life, opening up new worlds for book buyers — and new revenue streams for you.
  5. Google Books Submission: This quickly growing Google service benefits authors and readers in a number of ways. First, submitting your book to Google Books opens up a new avenue for you to get your work in front of millions more book buyers and borrowers. But Google Books also allows authors to make previews or snippets of their books available to readers — enough to whet a reader’s appetite for more! Let Outskirts Press get you into this valuable, burgeoning book marketplace.

It’s up to you now. What option should we launch first? This poll closes on January 19th, so give us your input before then!

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Need help marketing that book?

Order Your Marketing Solutions Today!

Run Our Company, Survey Poll

Run our company Poll – Which new service option should we offer?

Last September we ran a poll asking you, our social community friends (who also happen to be our current, past, and future authors at Outskirts Press) what option you would like to see us offer to help you reach your writing, publishing, and marketing goals.  There were three choices:

  • Amazon Featured Book of the Week, which received 40% of the votes
  • Social Media Market Research, which received 50% of the votes
  • Author Apps, which received 10% of the votes

As a result of your votes, we launched both the Social Media Market Research option and the Amazon Featured Book-of-the-Week option.

So once again we are asking you to help us help you. With The Avengers already breaking records and movies like Men in Black 3, The Dark Knight Rises, and the Amazing Spider-Man just around the corner, we are about to experience one of the biggest blockbuster movie seasons ever.

We want to give authors an opportunity to experience that phenomenon from the inside, by helping you on the path to turning your book into a movie. To help in that quest, we are considering three new service options that focus on one particular step of getting your book from page to screen:

  • Hollywood Action Plan – We will submit your book to a Hollywood production company where a credited Hollywood producer will provide feedback for a 3-5 page “coverage” analysis — the industry term for determining if a book has potential for movie or television adaptation and if so, in what format.
  • Hollywood Treatment – We will submit your book to a Hollywood production company where a treatment writer and credited Hollywood producer collaborate on a 7-10 page Treatment for your book. Treatments are the documents Hollywood insiders use to make purchasing/optioning decisions because they touch upon the major factors (genre, audience, characters, plot) while being quicker to read than a screenplay.
  • Hollywood Screenplay – Using your book as adaptable material, a credited Hollywood producer and Hollywood screenwriter will ghost-write a Hollywood caliber screenplay for you in industry standard format and presentation. Screenplays vary in length depending upon format (movie/tv), genre, and content, but are typically 100-130 pages in length.

In all cases, exclusive efforts to option your material to Hollywood is immediately set into motion for your convenience.  Sound good?  Which option would you like to see first?

Run Our Company, Survey Poll

Run Our Company Poll: Do you want a new Book Translation option?

We need help with something, and as we’ve did last year, we’re turning to our valued family of published (and soon-to-be-published authors).

If we get enough interest, we are considering adding a new Book Translation option to our already expansive suite of writing, self-publishing, and book marketing services.

This option would allow participating authors to work with a specialist on translating their book into another language. This would allow you to tap into global markets in countries such as Spain, France, Italy, etc.

Help us determine if this is an option you would like added to the Outskirts Press list of writing services by answering this quick poll:

Thanks in advance for your participation.

Run Our Company

Run our company poll – pick the most helpful blog post

As promised, throughout the rest of the year, we are continuing our “Web 2.0” experiment at Outskirts Press. We are depending on our valuable author community to help us make some important decisions.

This time we need your help on choosing the most helpful format for presenting our best-selling marketing options.

Here are the options:

1) Top 10 List –  This lists the top 10 best-selling marketing options and provides an overall picture of what other self-publishing authors are purchasing.

Here’s an example: http://selfpublishingnews.com/2011/08/24/top-10-book-marketing-options-for-july-2011/.

2) Top 5 List – This list is similar to the top 10, but it is much more focused and includes options that you can possibly afford to purchase that same month.

Here’s an example: http://selfpublishingnews.com/2011/09/28/top-5-book-marketing-options-for-august-2011/.

So, which do you find most helpful?

 

Here’s another question with an easier answer… Why do so many authors choose to publish with Outskirts Press?

  • You keep 100% of your rights
  • You keep 100% of your royalties
  • You keep 100% of the control
  • You get to help make the decisions that affect you the most

Run Our Company

Run our company poll – Pick next month’s promotion

As promised last week in our poll where we asked you to pick our next option, throughout the rest of the year, we are continuing a “Web 2.0” experiment at Outskirts Press. We are depending on our valuable author community to help us deliver the options and promotions you want. After all, those decisions affect YOUR books – you should get a say in what we offer, right?

Now that we know the vast majority of you are interested in the Featured Book-of-the-Week and Social Media Market Research options, we need your help determining what promotion we should offer to authors who start publishing their books next month.  We wish that we can offer all three, but only the one you like the most will be chosen. Imagine that – if you’re planning on self-publishing a book, you can pretty much write your own ticket!

Here are brief summaries of the promotions we are thinking of offering next month (October). Tell us which one you want and it will be so.

1) Free Amazon Search Inside the Book and Barnes & Noble See Inside –  These two very popular marketing options help authors increase their sales potential by allowing online buyers to take a “sneak peek” into the book before they buy it. Readers get the convenience of buying online with the benefit of purchasing in the store, and with this promotion, you can offer all of that to your potential book buyers at no cost to you!

No need for extreme couponing
No need for "Extreme Couponing", we let you pick your promotion!

2) 10% Off Your Publishing Package – This promotion offers an instant 10% savings on our 3 most popular publishing packages (Diamond, Pearl, and Ruby). If you publish with the Diamond, you will also receive $300’s worth of additional options free, like an e-book edition and press release, among others.

3) Mad Money! – Everyone has to have their stash of mad money. New Outskirts Press authors are no different.  We will add a $300 credit to your account when you order your Diamond or Pearl publishing package. That $300 of “mad money” can be applied toward any available options purchased during the pre-production process, including our popular custom cover option or book marketing solutions.

So, what promotion should we run next month?

Here’s another question with an easier answer… Why do so many authors choose to publish with Outskirts Press?

  • You keep 100% of your rights
  • You keep 100% of your royalties
  • You keep 100% of the control
  • You get to help make the decisions that affect you the most