Authors Joining Together For Marketing Help

A couple of the writers in my critique group are published authors in the cozy mystery and paranormal romance genres. They're both actively writing and publishing a series of books and getting connected with other writers in their genre through social media. These connections are helping them market their books in new and innovative ways. Although, working in author groups isn't that new of a concept.

I remember the Three Silly Chicks (picture book writers), who were three picture book writers who had a successful blog reviewing silly picture books about six years ago. But I'm noticing it more and more with published writers I know, especially in genre writing, and so here are three ways authors are joining together to market their books and gain new readers. The key, in my opinion, is to find authors that write for the same audience that you do.

1. Facebook groups/pages: Many authors for adult readers are joining together on Facebook and creating groups, pages, and parties, where they are attempting to connect readers with writers. The hope is that readers and writers can interact and connect on these pages because readers are invited by an author they already love, and they will find another author or two in the same genre to love also.

So for example, if you love to read mysteries, trust me--there are Facebook groups that will connect writers and readers together. The same is true if you write them! Many of these you have to request to join because they're trying to keep spammers at bay; but usually, if you are legit, you will not be turned down.

2. Anthologies: Some writers in the same genre or for the same audience (like YA) are joining together and publishing anthologies. Again, the hope is that one author's fans will buy the book, read all the stories or poems, and discover other authors of the same genre to check out their books. So if you are asked to join an anthology, find out who else will be in it. If any of the writers have a good following, it is in your best interest to write a fantastic story for those readers and include a bio with links to your social media and titles of your books for sale.

3. Contests: Recently I entered a contest where several authors (in the same genre--are you tired of me saying that yet?) joined together to offer a great prize (like a Kindle) and sent the announcement to each of their mailing lists and advertised it on their social media pages. To enter to win the Kindle, interested readers needed to sign up for at least one new newsletter and then they also received extra entries for checking out other authors from the list.

Be smart with this kind of promotion. It may cost you some dollars to help buy the prize, but make your Facebook page engaging, your blog active, and your newsletter helpful if you get new subscribers because of the contest. Let them know about you and your books to hopefully gain some new readers out of people trying to win the big prize!

Have you been a part of an author group like this? What did you do to join together?

Join my new marketing class! says Margo Dill, who wrote this blog post! Margo's marketing class will help authors in all genres figure out individualized plans and learn from working authors in the trenches marketing their books. Editors with their own businesses will also benefit from the class. Check it out here--it's being offered in July and September.  

photo above by thomasbrightbill on Flickr.com 

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