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15 tips for writers from Guy Kawasaki

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Writing a book is a huge undertaking and knowing what to do next is daunting. Guy Kawasaki and Shawn Welch wrote APE: Author, Publisher, Entrepreneur – How to Publish a Book to help other authors through the self-publishing maze after working on What the Plus! which was Guy's first self-published book. I've worked with them on the social media marketing of the book for the past year. We recently had a Google+ Hangout to celebrate the anniversary of the publication of APE. Here are the tips we shared:

Guyโ€™s tips

1. Many people donโ€™t know that you donโ€™t need a Kindle tablet to read Kindle books.

2. Lightning Source is a poor choice for print on demand. Create Space has worked better.

3. No matter how many people copyedit your book, there are still errors.

4. Amazon (Kindle and CreateSpace) rocks for authors.

5. Donโ€™t try to save yourself into success. Invest in a copy editor and cover designer.

Shawnโ€™s tips

6. Test your ebooks and then test them again on as many platforms and readers as you can.

7. Giving away your book is almost always a good marketing investment.

8. The best way to get reviews is to get readers. Engage your readers and donโ€™t be afraid to ask for reviews.

9. Don't worry about SEO. Write good shiitake, and SEO will take care of it self. Google “How to Publish a book” for proof.

10. Build a great team to fill the spots that you canโ€™t cover like marketing, PR, editing or whatever skills that you canโ€™t cover yourself.

My tips

11. Use Pinterest to help get the word out about your book.

12. Experiment with your social-media marketingโ€”for example, try different services, different types of content, repeating posts on Twitter, and scheduling.

13. Balance your book promotion with other content. Donโ€™t promote only your book on your social media account. Share other peopleโ€™s content.

14. Market your book as long as you want to sell it.

15. Find the resources you need to become the APE that you want to be.

Thank you for your support of APE and it's been a great year! You can watch the whole video below.

ย To say thank you, Guy and Shawn are giving away FREE copies of APE for a limited time. You can download it here.ย 

Photo credit: Big Stock Photos

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3 Comments

  1. Hi Peg,

    Great tips! A friend sent them to me and they came in handy because I just launched my book last week.

    Anyway, it’s a relief to know that some mistakes are sort of expected. I must have proofed each chapter 15 times (3x after it was in layout form). And that was AFTER the professional editor. Each time I kept finding mistakes, albeit less and less. I’m more afraid that in one of my revisions, I ended up accidentally hacking off an entire chapter or something.

    I did use CreateSpace, so that was good. I did take advantage of the free Kindle 5-day promo. So a lot of what you’re suggesting, I have heard this good advice being confirmed in other places. Now – off to pin this article. (And my book. Which I hadn’t thought to do).

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