Mark Coker, founder of Smashwords and owner of Dovetail Public Relations has a free ebook on marketing for self-published authors. Surprisingly, it is called Smashwords Book Marketing Guide. Go figure!
Definitely, this is an excellent read full of meaty, juice information for po’ little authors like me. http://www.smashwords.com/books/download/305/1/latest/0/0/smashwords-book-marketing-guide.pdf
He pointed out an important fact: Your webpage shows up in searches based on its links to other sites and other sites’ links to it, as well as how many people travel there. One big goal is to increase traffic and therefore increase visibility in an exponential way.
Here is my new list of things to do after reading his guide:
- Update my email signature to include my web addresses (His reasoning is that we all send lots of emails and replies and should use that to our advantage. He suggests your blog site, any sites where your book is sold, and a webpage if you have one.)
- Add the community pages I use to include my web addresses
- Updste myTtwitter profile to include my web addresses
- Update my Smashwords profile to include my Twitter address (There is a special list on Smashwords of Twitter users with increased visibility)
- Write a press release (Scary!)
- Participate in HARO (Help a Reporter Online) with my particular expertise (Aliens in the future…yeah…)
- Hold a limited coupon promotion on one or more sites: on Smashwords (garnered 200 buys in his example), on the blog, on http://kindleboards.com, or other promotion sites.
- Include the promotion on these sites (good links!) www.freeonlinenovels.com , http://online-novels.blogspot.com , www.getfreebooks.com , http://blog.booksontheknob.org , http://ereader.freebies.blogspot.com , www.bookbarista.com
Thank you, Mark for your fabulous advice, since I can’t use your promotion services! I’m passing it on because marketing tips to authors (poor) should be free!
Oh. Now I have to DO all these. Gah!
Kate Policani 
Hi Kate, I read your “About Me” on blogger and knew I had to come over here and meet you. Thanks for following me. Good luck with your self publishing venture. You sound very together. I never heard of advertising on Craig’s List, but guess what I’ll be doing tomorrow–writing a Craig’s List ad. Thanks for all the good marketing info. If I can be of help in any way do not hesitate to reach out to me.
-E
Thanks Erich! I’m just figuring all this out and thought it would be a good idea to journal my experiences online. I’m checking out your page now!