Tips for Promoting Your Book Offline

This article is a follow up to Tips for promoting your book online. Online promotion is a huge part of promoting your book and yourself as an author, but you can't forget the offline promotion part of marketing your book.

There are a ton of things you can do to promote your book offline.

Flyers: It doesn't take much to print up a nice, eye catching flyer advertising your work. Make sure it has the book cover, your name, a blurb for the book, and little tear off tabs at the bottom with your website on it. Tack them up all over town and don't forget the libraries!

News Papers: A press release is always a great way to advertise a new book, but you can also buy ad space in the local paper. We live in a small town and when I had an event they did an ad for free because it was a community event.

Announcement Cards: Announcement cards are an amazing marketing tool. When I got mine done it was a postcard sized card, with my picture, my book cover, and the announcement of my book, including my website. On the back was the blurb for the book. I got these from Vista Print and they were not very expensive at all. They came with envelopes so you can mail them to everyone you know, you can leave them on tables at doctors' offices and other such places. Announcement cards are also great for bulletin boards and tucking into other books at libraries and bookstores.

Have a Party: Whether it is a book launch for a new release, or just a celebration of your time as an author, a party is a great way to get the word out about your work. You can also use the tips above for your party. For great tips on how to throw a successful book launch party, check out this article.

Book Signings: Of course book signings are a great way to market your book and get some sales. Most people worry that they can't afford to buy a lot of books to do this with. Don't worry about that, most book signings don't sell a ton of books, but the promotion involved is worth it.

To get book signings just go into every single book store, coffee shop, and even grocery stores (if you live in a small town) and ask if you can do a signing or if they will carry your book. I did this and the outcome was amazing.

Donate: Donate your book to the local libraries, this will allow people to read it and talk about it, thus recommending it to other people in the long run. Also, you can donate to causes like auctions or sales where the proceeds go to the cause. I donated to an auction for animal rescue this year and the people who donate are usually put in the paper so there is some advertisement…and you are helping a good cause.

Lastly…

Talk about your book: It is not bad form to talk about yourself. You wrote a freaking book! Now go sell it. I talk about my book everywhere I go and it's normally met with interest. Also, a lot of people are excited because they met someone "famous." This is absolutely all right to do. You earned it.

Hopefully these tips were helpful. Yes, I know some were very obvious, but sometimes authors are new to the show are looking for suggestions.