Authors – manners matter

Wait a moment while I fetch my soap box.

Saying thanks
I have just had an inspiring morning with the journalists who attend my monthly Journalists’ Support Group meetings. One of the group shared how she had been doing a number of reviews on new and interesting books and mentioning them on her blog. As all good bloggers do, she has then been tweeting about these books. As all good authors do, they have been retweeting her kind mentions. Some of them have also contacted my journalist directly and thanked her for her kindness.
Makes sense?

Of course it does.

The fact is that one of the best ways to grow your network of the nice, kind people (such as bloggers) who write about your books for free is to take the simple step of saying thank you. Saying thank you will show the nice, kind people (such as bloggers) that you are nice and kind too. And so a relationship starts to form between authors and bloggers.

The next thing that happens is that the nice, kind blogger is likely to write about your book A SECOND time.

You see …. you do business with people you like. And one way to make someone like you is to say thank you.

Authors need bloggers
If you are an author you NEED all the publicity and reviews you can get. One of the best ways to get this coverage is to make friends with bloggers, journalists and so on.
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Authors need to ensure that they spot every single mention your book receives. The easiest way to ensure you don’t miss any (and thus don’t miss the chance to thank the writer and start to build that all-important relationship) is to set up a Google Alert for the title of your book and another for your name. As soon as you spot you have been mentioned zoom on over there and say thanks.
Simple, isn’t it?

You see, the harsh reality is that IF (God forbid) you do forget to thank that nice, kind blogger, then that nice, kind blogger may do one of the following:

• Forget all about you and your book and never mention it or recommend it to anyone ever again
• Think you are a miserable and ungrateful so and so
• Write about your biggest competitor instead

And you would not want that to happen, now would you?

OK, rant over. I shall now put my soapbox away.