Donna Galanti – founder YourAwesomeAuthorLife – gives you 20 ways populate your blog to engage readers
If you share your publishing journey and writer’s life now to connect with readers, they can become your built-in audience later once your book comes out – and faithfully follow you as you publish more books.
Blogging is an ideal way to connect with these potential readers. It can boost your website in search engines as you continue to post more content within it, encourages sharing of your content across social media platforms, and invites readers to engage with you in your own forum.
Here is the number one key I have found to engaging your readers through blogging: blog about what you are passionate about.
Check out 20 ways to engage readers:
- Conduct interviews with characters in your book.
- Do joint giveaways with other authors.
- Share favorite current books you’ve read and feature them.
- Write about your thoughts on topics in your book.
- Share your book research process.
- Share your publishing journey.
- Do an interview with similar authors to you.
- Share fun book trailers in your genre.
- Create a soundtrack for your book and share it.
- Clean out your bookshelves with books in your genre and do a book giveaway post.
- Write about a current event topic that you are passionate about or inspires debate (but decide how controversial you want to go).
- Feature the settings in your book. Are they real places? Use photos, too.
- Write a How-To post that explains how to do something related to being an author.
- Interview other authors in your genre or invite them to write a guest post on a topic of interest.
- Do an opinion post about a topic that is trending.
- Promote the peers who have influenced you most in your writing.
- Review things in the story-telling arena like books, movies, theater and especially ones that are timely in the media.
- Create a round-up of favorite authors, blogs, movies, or books that might interest your readers. Or it could be a roundup of your most popular posts since you began your blog.
- Take a survey of your audience on a topic of debate that may be an issue in your book.
- Give advice on how to do something your readers will be interested in.
GO THE EXTRA MILE WITH BLOGGING:
If you’re a debut author, search online for “debut author” and the “year your book comes out”. You could find a debut author group to join that cross-promotes each other as debuts and helps you gain new followers. Often, these groups have a co-op blog where all the debut members can share content. Here’s a recent example. You can also search Goodreads for books in your genre/audience with your same book release year and reach out to these authors to connect and form your own debut promotion group.
Another way to go the extra mile, is blogging with more “evergreen” topics. These are topics that remain relevant over time and inspire readers to continue to share your posts with this timeless content.
Your homework! Time to get out the pens (or laptops):
- List authors you know or want to connect to and invite them as a guest on your blog in an interview or guest post and feature their recent release.
- Look through your bookshelf and list like-new books that you can use as a giveaway. Make sure they are in the genre and audience you write for.
- List topics, themes, and issues in your book that you can write about.
- List authors you know that you could reach out to do a joint giveaway with to cross promote each other and build best-fit followers. One way is to join a blog hop to expand your followers. Here’s another joint giveaway example I did that had 12,770 entries and gained me several hundred followers across my subscriber list and social media platforms.
- What are some recent favorite reads, movies, or T.V. shows you’ve experienced? List them here to share your reviews.
- What are some current news items connected to your book that you could talk about? List them.
- What research did you conduct for your book? Talk about how you did it (travel, interviews, etc.)
- List any real settings in your book you can talk about and share your personal experience of them in person along with photos.
- What do you feel comfortable sharing about your writing and publishing journey? List these topics here.
Now, it’s time to start blogging and sharing your writer’s journey with your readers!
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Want to know more about how to connect with a reader audience?
Donna released her new online course this week, Launch Your Author Brand & Platform, a 10-Step Author Marketing System to Build Brand, Connect with Readers, and Sell Books. In this step-by-step marketing system, you will learn exactly how to plan, create, and launch your successful author brand and platform – even before your first book comes out.
There are no prerequisites to this course! This course is designed for debut authors, new authors looking to boost their platform, or any writer seeking publication. Get the full course details here.
What’s included in Launch Your Author Brand & Platform:
✓ 10 Step-By-Step Lessons
✓ 15+ Awesome Bonuses (video and downloadable PDFs)
✓ 7 “Bigger Than a Bonus” Meet the Experts (insider secrets to success from the Masters – other authors!) training on goodies like do’s and don’ts for new authors, agent advice, book club visits, public speaking and more
✓ Each lesson includes Rookie Mistakes to Avoid, Myth Busters, and How to Go the Extra Mile!
About Donna:
Donna Galanti is the author of the middle grade adventure Joshua and The Lightning Road, which the Midwest Book Review called, “A heart-pounding thrill ride full of unexpected twists and turns from start to finish”. She’s also the author of the follow up, Joshua and the Arrow Realm, is a contributing editor for International Thriller Writers the Big Thrill magazine, and a writing contest judge at nycmidnight.com.
She regularly presents as a guest author at schools and teaches at writing conferences on marketing and craft. When she’s not writing you can find her on Twitter or Facebook where she loves to share all things about her outdoor adventures and children’s books. Donna has lived from England as a child, to Hawaii as a U.S. Navy photographer, and has had a long career in corporate marketing. Visit her at donnagalanti.com or yourawesomeauthorlife.com.
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