I recently completed a 10-day virtual tour for my new book, Sins of the Father. The tour, hosted by Tywebbin Creations Blog Tours, consisted of seven Internet radio interviews and 27 blog stops. The blog stops yielded six interviews and eight book reviews. The remaining 13 stops each posted a book description and an excerpt.
Was the tour effective? I really don’t know. I never know how to measure the success of Internet promotion activities. What I do know is that as of today there have been over 2500 views of the Sins of the Father excerpt provided by Tywebbin Creations to the tour hosts. Is that a good number? I have no clue, but I felt pretty good about it. I also felt pretty good that the traffic to my website increased by about 75 percent during the tour.
Have I sold any books as a result? Who knows? I do know that I’ve gotten new Facebook friends, folks who said they heard me on one of the Internet radio shows. I also know that several of the book reviews from the tour have shown up on Amazon. In addition, I know that my Amazon ranking improved, but I have no idea if that can be attributed to the tour.
So would I do a virtual tour again? Yes, but I’d do some things differently.
1. I didn’t do a contest with this tour like I have in the past. The only difference I can see is that I ended up with fewer comments at each tour stop than previously. That said, my traffic increased more than it did last time. Would a contest have gotten me more traffic or just more comments? I don’t know. If I could come up with a really good contest, I’d do one. Giving away gift certificates and books don’t work for me anymore. That said, I’ve started to think about contests for my next book. If I come up with something interesting, I’ll do one. If not, I won’t. I’m open to ideas, so if you have one, please share.
2. I had 34 events over a 10-day period. That’s too much, I think. The number of Internet radio interviews was about right, but doing more than one blog stop a day is a bit much. I say that because the value of the stop is being able to interact with the folks who come by. It’s hard to effectively engage readers at three different sites on the same day. In the future, I plan to limit blog stops to one per day, making each stop unique so there is a reason to visit. I think a blog stop and an Internet radio interview is more than enough for one day.
3. Not all blog stops are the same and that’s okay. But it’s important to know when you’re planning the tour what the stops are going to be. I put them in three categories: announcement stops, review stops and interview stops. The value of review and interview stops is clear. I’m still weighing the value of announcement stops. I was fortunate to have folks announce Sins of the Father on their blogs because they thought it sounded interesting, even though they hadn’t received a copy of the book. I appreciate that, but my expectation is higher (and so is my publisher’s) when the publisher sends the blog host a book. The expectation is that a review will be provided during the tour or sometime shortly thereafter. Is that expectation too high? I’d really love to hear from readers and blog hosts on this one.
4. I scheduled my blog tour during the week of my book’s release. This made it a challenge to get each participating tour host a copy of the book in time for their stop. In the future, I’ll have to hold back copies of my ARCs until the tour is confirmed OR delay the tour until a week or so after the book releases. The latter might be best. It’s unrealistic to expect tour hosts to provide book reviews if they don’t have enough time to read the book.
Virtual tours are blessings for those of us with day jobs. I appreciate Tywebbin who planned my tour, the bloggers who hosted me, the radio show hosts who interviewed me, and the readers who joined along the way. I have to give a special shout-out to the Internet radio show hosts who participated in my tour. Oprah had better watch her back. She has nothing on these folks. They were absolutely wonderful!
–
Angela Benson
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http://www.angelabenson.com/
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Angela Benson
Get my latest newsletter by joining my mailing list at
http://www.angelabenson.com/
Blog with me at http://angelabensonblog.com
13 Responses to “Online Promotion – Valuable or Not?”
Comments (13)
Angela,
I would have to put my marketing hat on and say that based on the increased website traffic alone that your tour was extremely effective. Promotion is publicity and people can't buy what they don't exist.
I can imagine three stops a day would be alot, but I think the alternative is to stretch the tour out longer. I think I'd rather work real hard for a shorter period of time. A longer tour would be too much. I remember you did a month long tour with one of your books. Maybe the Amen Sisters.
I'm glad you mentioned the content issue. I'm currently planning my own blog tour for November and have been wondering about the value of just doing an announcement. I too think more thoughtful content would make the tour better, but the work!
I'll be using TyWebbin for a 2nd tour I have planned in February and look forward to working with her. She does such a great job.
I forgot, on the issue of tour stops reading the book for review. Absolutely unreasonable. I mean unless someone is a reviewer I think not. My TBR pile is a mountain. It's piled with books that "Rhonda" wants to read and I can hardly get to it. So reading for a blog tour is like work. I get paid to work. (LOL) That's why I completely understand the reading fee that some of the larger bloggers are starting to charge. (Although I'd have to say I wouldn't pay it.)
However, I'm loving Sins of the Father. Almost done.
Lots of useful information in this post, Angela. Appreciate it!
Rhonda, I'm not sure I can contribute that full jump to the tour. I started doing some other things on the blog as well that month so let's say a 45% jump, which is still nothing to sneeze at.
Also, I feel you on reading the books for the blog tour. My TBR list is overly long right now. In fact, I'm probably never going to get around to some of the books on the list.
Question for everybody, not just you: Would you host someone's tour if they didn't give you a book?
You're welcome, Lori.
Angela,
Thank you so much for the fantastic post. Very helpful.
Peace
Dee
Thanks for the thoughts about the blog tour. This was really helpful to me. In late November I will be disappearing until the end of the year so I can evaluate the 2009 tours.
Two areas I plan to work on in 2010.
1) Content.
One of the reasons why I started doing blog tours is I wanted to present uniqueness to each stop. That's something I saw on other blog tours that I didn't like.
Unfortunately, pulling content for authors when they are already busy or working on deadlines has been a challenge. So, I will be looking at some different methods.
I did notice authors who worked around a "theme" or also provide a giveaway received more traffic.
2) Books.
I don't think I want to do blog tours around book releases anymore. This has been another challenge. I had a friend tell me I should let the book be out for awhile.
Bloggers want books.
I can't tell you how many times I get emailed when someone does not get a book. I think it's not necessary to have a blog tour full of book reviews, but I think authors should provide bloggers with a book. They are endorsing your book when they feature you on their blog.
I will email bloggers up to 30 days after the tour to gather as many book reviews as I can. I can track who posted a review or who didn't because I have a record of who received a book.
Angela, I will keep in mind about the number of bloggers per day. People who work with me know I like to give them their money's worth. But… going back to the content part above. The more bloggers I have … the more content needs to be provided.
If you want to do a blog tour, I would definitely consider any articles, special events, social issues in your book, etc. Anything that can make your tour unique – plan it ahead of time.
Angela -
I do not need a book to be a part of the blog tour unless the author is self-published. Because my blog is specifically for the Christian Fiction genre I have to be careful about orthodoxy. The term "Christian Fiction" means different things to different people and one man's Christian Fiction is another man's smut. Most mainstream publishers have guidelines. Self-published work is not filtered in that way, so I do require a book or a recommendation from an author/reader that I can trust.
Ty -
You said a mouth full. Readers want want original content, but authors really struggle with having time to create it. I'm working on content now for my November and February tours. I'm hoping if I do it little by little it won't be an overwhelming task when the time comes.
Another thing is authors really need tours at release. The first 90 days of a books shelf life is critical to it's sales success. Many stores will only stock the book that long and reorders aren't happening without really great initial sales, so we need all the help we can get.
You've been doing a wonderful job with the tours. Reflection is always a good step. Keep up the hard work!
Ty, I really liked that you gave me a hundred thousand questions to answer before the tour. Okay, I exaggerate. I really hated answering those questions, but you gave me sufficient time to get them done. I didn't value doing them though until I was asked to during the tour to answer more. My brain went on lockdown and it literally took me a day or so to make sense of the questions . It really helps to have all the interview questions answered before the tour. It gives you more time for participating at the blog stops and more energy for the Internet radio interviews.
Ty, the fewer stops you have the less difficult it will be to get original content for each stop. And I believe you'll end up with more traffic at that stop. But then that will lead to another problem. You won't need as many bloggers and you may have to start asking folks about their traffic before including them. I'm not sure how that would go over.
What a liked about your tour Angela, you stopped by each site and answered questions, and left comments. That’s what I hope from a blog tour, but most people don’t do that. You post their information and you’re lucky if you get a thank you three months later.
My suggestion for blog tours:
Treat them like a live book tour.
Be interactive – Let the blog host know you plan on checking the post through out the day for questions or comments. Then they can let their readers know you are actually going to participate. This is isn’t an announcement tour.
Contests do well, I find people like winning prizes. The prizes don’t have to be books. Give out fancy bookmarks (simplysaid) does some great bookthongs. Give out little journals (you can find them at the dollar stores). Get creative with ideas from your book. ( you could give out a dvd from one of your favorite movie or show – entertainment)
Include a link that brings the reader back to a particular spot on your site. (maybe for an excerpt or short story you wrote) You can use a counter to see who visits.
Do a contest for new members only for your facebook page. Sign up during the tour for a chance to win.
Don’t expect a review unless you give the reviewer at least two months to read the book. The week before the tour isn’t going to work. I’m so behind on books I need six months. LOL.
Post something different at each sites. Some of us like to follow the tour and learn more about you. I agree with everyone content is important. Don’t wait until the tour to try to get your content together. You should be working on this as you get a release date. That way you have it when you need it. Content can be articles on writing, articles on the business of writing. Funny essays, themes featured in your book etc.
These are just a few ideas off the top of my head.
I enjoyed your blog tour Angela. Ty does a fantastic job with her tours and I highly recommend her to anyone who wants to do a good blog tour.
I finished your book this weekend, so I actually might have a review up before the end of the month.
THanks for you comments, LaShaunda. I had fun on the tour myself, but it was tiring. I think it's wrong to think virtual tours will require less energy. They require a LOT of energy.
Angela you rock! Ty, you are awesome. Tyora, I hope to be setting up a blog tour with you myself, sometime next year.
I was happy to host Angela on her Sins of the Father Blog tour.
Angela even commented twice on my blog, in one day. This was appreciated, as I know how busy she is and was. Interaction is key.
As far as hosting a blog tour, I don't require a book to do so. I do take a cautious approach though, as my site is mainly Christian/Inspirational.
Thanks for this informative post, and your transparancy, Angela.
Ty, keep up the great work!
I remember e-mailing you Angela and asking you what tour company you went through. I was impressed with the quality of your tour and I'm glad in your post you pointed out the things you would do differently. Thanks for your honesty and I'll keep that in mind when planning my tour this summer.