Part 3: The Rules Of The Book Marketing Experiment

In which we explain our plan, while twirling our mustaches

By Michelle LaPointe

Rule 1: We’ll try just about anything that we think will work, including conventional marketing techniques, recommendations from the experiences of authors and publishers who want to share, and out-of-the-box ideas. As explained in Part 1, everything we try has to be measurable.

Rule 2: We’ll be transparent about results, good, bad, and indifferent, and share what happens for the benefit of other authors and book marketers.

Rule 3: We are not selling our services to the author community as content creators, strategists, coaches, or anything else. This experiment is purely for acquiring and sharing knowledge. For it to be useful, it has to be trustworthy. For it to be trustworthy, we can’t be asking for money from anyone in the book community while we’re doing this.

Becky and I are planning to get something out of this, of course. I still need to sell my novel(s). What we learn here is likely to find its way into the Book On Marketing that I’m writing (so-called so I can say that “I wrote The Book On Marketing.” Get it?) She wants case studies as she applies the successful strategies she’s developed for her digital advertising SMB (small-medium business) clients to other markets.

Rule 4: We welcome suggestions, especially if they’re backed by data or well-documented experience. We are open to collaborators. For example, we’re not experts on PR. If any PR pros in the book community want to participate, drop us a line.

Rule 5: If anyone tries to use this experiment to sell their services, for example, by pitching themselves in the comments, we will remove the comment, but probably not before we make fun of you. You have been warned. For purposes of this project, sharing is awesome. Selling is not. 

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Image and video credits: Stock images, SFX, and fire VFX: Envato Elements. Edits: Michelle LaPointe.