Last week I wrote about how technology has changed the way a novel is put together.
This week, I want to write about how a book gets marketed.
The first thing to note is that the road to sales isn’t necessarily through selling books to friends and family (although everyone interested in the book, is of course welcome to get a copy).
In fact what the publisher wants is to get the word out through reviews.
As the book reaches its preorder period (in the case of this novel, between March 8th and April 19th) if a large number of reviews accumulate, this helps the novel land on lists of books that are trending and spurs interest in readers around the world to pick up a copy.
So where do those reviews come from?
The answer is a three letter word…ARC.
ARC stands for Advanced Reader Copy.
An Advanced Reader Copy is a free advance copy of the book that is provided to bloggers, reviewers, and yes, even friends so that they can read the book before anyone else and post a review.
The goal is to get a minimum of fifty reviews, and hopefully over one hundred reviews prior to the release of the book.
There are of course, rules attached to being provided with an ARC
*The reader must commit to reading the book within 2 weeks of receiving the ARC
*The reader has to commit to putting up a review on Goodreads that includes a star rating and a few sentences (literally just a few sentences) about the book.
*The review must be honest. It doesn’t matter if it is a 1 star review, a 3 star review or a 5 star review. The publisher wants volume of reviews that show diversity of opinion…not that I’m encouraging a bad review. But a string of 5 star reviews published by friends may also flag the book. A large number of reviews WITH comments that range from 3 to 5 stars makes the book look desirable to read.
*The review shouldn’t contain spoilers
*Readers that receive an ARC, must commit to the fact that it is copyrighted material and that the reader can not in any way share the book with another person or distribute it in any way. (Some people put them up on a website, and then people can access the whole book for free. That is illegal).
SO, here’s where joining this blog offers you your first big perk.
If you want to be one of the first to read The Woodcarver’s Model and can commit to the above rules, I can provide the first 25 readers who express interest with an ARC authorized by the publisher.
In order to leave a review, it will require you to open a Goodreads account (which is free and simply involves putting in your email and a password you create).
If you are interested, contact me at peterefenton@gmail.com and I will send you out the file. If you have an e-reader, the file can be sent as an Epub file or a mobi file. Or I can send it as a PDF.
And just because you get an advanced copy, doesn’t mean that down the road you can’t pick up a copy of the book.
This is simply a way for you to get a first peek at the The Woodcarver’s Model and start the process of getting those valuable reviews onto the Goodreads page.
This offer is only available to current subscribers to the blog.
So let me know … and if you want to wait … I’ll be letting you know more about the preorder process which begins on March 8th.
Best Regards,
Peter E. Fenton
Peter E. Fenton 