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A few weeks ago I went on about how I really don’t like book trailers (except for a few which have almost converted me to them). So it might come as a surprise that I actually made a video for the purposes of entertainment, but also obviously to market myself and my ideas.

But this is not a book trailer. I’m not trying to sell any one book by making it seem like a movie when it isn’t one. Instead, what I’m doing is selling ME. One of the most important rules of marketing in social media is that you are forming relationships and letting people get to know you.

Hopefully they will like you and check out what you have to offer.

As an indie author you can’t compete with the big dogs in the way they compete. You don’t have a massive marketing budget. You don’t have front table space at Barnes and Noble (or in fact, shelf space at all, most likely). You don’t have a giant, recognizable name.

So trying to compete toe to toe with Goliath is a little silly. You’ve got your little slingshot and a skinned knee and less than fashionable clothing. Play to that strength. People love David because he’s the underdog. He’s real. He’s brave. Be that. Don’t try to mimic Goliath.

When you have a small mom and pop type business, and let’s face it, self-publishing definitely fits in that category, then relationships are king. You have to compete on levels big New York publishing can’t: socializing, forming genuine connections, being accessible to your readers.

One way of connecting with readers is through video. I decided to start a cartoon video series (complete with robotic voices, whee!… everything is funnier with robots, trust me). The series is meant to be short, and funny. I’m poking fun at the publishing industry, romance, myself. (The material is endless here.)

The day after I posted it on Youtube, Barbara Vey posted about it on her Publisher’s Weekly blog.

I’m hoping that the series eventually goes viral and picks up some real steam. I decided to do a video series like this for a few different reasons:

1. “Being Indie” is a big part of my platform. I’m very loud and out there everywhere I go about being an indie author and it’s part of my marketing strategy.

2. I tend to be a bit argumentative. Something funny helps to soften those edges a little bit so I don’t come off as psychotically angry all the time. (Which I’m not. Text makes me sound angrier than I am. BUT robot voices make me sound funnier than I am, so win-win.)

What could you do a video series on? Unless you’re a big loud mouth in indie authorship, you probably shouldn’t copy me. What are you writing about? Maybe you could do a fun video series interviewing your characters. Or create mock interviews with yourself.

If you are writing on a specific topic, or are heavily involved with some kind of cause that you’ve been linking to your work, think about doing one on that.

If you want a lot of people to view and share your video here are a few pointers:

1. Keep it short. I ended up at 2 minutes and 37 seconds for the final cut of the first episode of Zoe Who? Some people think this is still too long, and I kind of agree, it’s pushing the length it needs to be to truly go viral. (In most cases… I’m about to show an exception.)

People have very short attention spans (and are also at work half the time when they watch these videos) so for future episodes I’ll try to keep it 2 minutes and under.

2. Humor. If you can be funny, be funny. The videos I’ve seen that have gone viral have either been funny or cute. Too “informative” or “preachy” just won’t cut it. Think about the videos you tweeted about and shared with others. They’re probably funny.

Here’s one I really loved and tweeted about. (Totally unrelated to publishing, to give you some idea of how this works outside of the self-publishing thing to maybe give you other ideas of types of videos you can make.)

I am far from Zoe Who? going viral, but the above link is an example of a video that has gone viral (It’s a little over 3 minutes. Right after I said don’t go over 2. This video is longer, but the rule is… the longer it is… the better it has to be to keep people’s interest and get them to share it with others.)

That video has also only been out a few weeks on Youtube. (I am SO jealous! Seriously.)

Viral or not, though, a video or preferably a series of videos is another way for you to plug in with an audience and get your name out there.

When I was going on my emo tirade about how books aren’t movies and I hate book trailers, in the back of my mind I was still thinking… Hmmm, yes, but maybe I need a youtube channel. Maybe there are more people to reach in new ways and I’m shutting down opportunities by not looking into it.

Zoe Winters writes and self-publishes both fiction and nonfiction under a few different names and imprints. She’s been called a “publishing geek” and loves all the minutiae of publishing just a little too much. She’s very passionate about the indie author movement and helping other authors who want to self-publish learn how to do it in the way that best suits them and their goals. To contact Zoe, visit her at: smartselfpublishing.com or http://www.zoewinters.org

Tags: book marketing, indie authorship, indie publishing, online marketing, publishing, self-publishing, video marketing, viral marketing, youtube marketing

This entry was posted on Monday, July 19th, 2010 at 1:56 pm and is filed under For authors. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.