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By clearly knowing your target audience, you reach your readers more efficiently and save your resources in terms of time and money.

Success and book sales usually do not come by themselves but require activity and planning. The most important thing, though, is getting the right person to find, read, and love your book. Then have them talk about your book with others to spread interest.

It may sound cumbersome and tedious to talk about your target group when talking about something as beautiful as an excellent book, but if you want to do it right then, it is imperative.

Not sure which target group is right for you?

WE HAVE COMPILED 3 IMPORTANT QUESTIONS TO HELP YOU ALONG THE WAY.

What does a target audience mean, and why is it so important?

Your target audience is a defined group of people that you want to reach through your marketing. The target group may have one or more common demographic characteristics, the same psychographic characteristics, similar lifestyle or life situation, etc.

Some factors that matter are: gender, age, family type, income, occupation, personality, reader’s perception of equal values ​​, etc. Analyze who can Be interested in the content and topic of your book.

What interests do they have? What do they do when they are not reading?

It becomes more effective if you target the right target group and require fewer resources in terms of both time and money. You reach more potential readers with less effort.

Based on your target audience, you choose channels, communication, and style in your ad campaign.

Now that you know who your target audience is, what channels should you use for your communication?

Where does your target group hang out? Are they active in social media such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, blogs, web pages, or maybe more in printed journals, events, events, organizations, courses, libraries, clubs, and associations?

Do they use to buy books online or rather directly in the bookstore? Do they perhaps have direct contact with various associations and institutions? It is crucial to analyze how to reach them.

If you have published a book on special diets and vegan food, your potential readers may be interested in animal rights, healthy lifestyles, yoga, the environment, and nature conservation. Remember, though: If you use too many different channels, you will reach many, but you may also miss your potential readers.

How should you communicate with your potential readers to arouse their interest?

You should find out where they get their information so that you know how to plan your communications, ads, and possible campaigns. How do you think your target group appealed, and who do they trust? Do you want to be a funny and naughty children’s book writer or a serious and professional book writer?

Customize your communication, your way of writing, and expressing to arouse interest and build conviction and confidence. If you target young people, they may find it more fun and exciting if you connect the communication with them by using “their” language, choice of words, tone of voice, or a “younger” communication style with more modern terms.

Selling personal brand is essential, but it is vital not just to focus on oneself. The risk is that the reader may find it uninteresting, “advertising,” and without credibility. Try to be as clear, simple, and concrete in your content as possible. It makes it easy for the recipient to access the information.

Planning your communication also allows you to decide which image you want to give to your target audience. It is vital to building your author’s name as a brand.

Content marketing is about creating and reaching out with as relevant and valuable content as possible. Content that benefits a specific group of people. If you succeed in this, it will simultaneously strengthen your brand and build a relationship with the readers. Well spent work in other words!

Melissa Mayer

Especially in connection with self-publishing, it has become increasingly popular to involve readers in creating the book. Whether it’s about the content or the book’s title: When you work with your readers, you get the best possible way to publish a book that appeals to your target audience.

In a survey on self-publishing – which was carried out at the beginning of 2016 – as many as 36% of participants indicated that they involve their readers in the publishing process. Most (83%) created some of the content together with their readers, a quarter got help with the cover design and for a quarter of the authors the book title was decided by the readers.

DEVELOPMENT OF CONTENT

The author writes the manuscript, but it can be helpful and essential to hear what the genre’s readers think and prefer when it comes to details or changes. For example, you can ask them about the names of characters, places where events are played out, and options to choose from when it comes to how a chapter should end. Possibilities are endless.

For you as a self-publisher, the advantage is that you get a special relationship with your readers, have direct contact with them, get to know what they expect and discuss and receive direct feedback on your book. Building such a relationship can take time, but it is certainly worth it: When you have certain level of relationship, you have probably also got a loyal readership that wait for your next book and can give you positive reviews.

Start by thinking about where you can reach the readers you want to involve. For example, you can use social platforms, online portals and groups related to your genre/niche, contact book bloggers who write about your genre and find Facebook groups that your target group are members.

THE CHOICE OF COVER DESIGN

We cannot emphasize this often enough: The cover is the first thing the reader sees of your book and is therefore extremely important for the purchase decision. A cover must be well-planned, link to the content, stand out of the crowd and have a little extra for the reader to get stuck for it. Think about what you want to say with the cover: The book’s theme, genre, any feeling or maybe something else?

The cover is a wonderful tool to work with when you want to engage your readers. It shows how many would even click on it in the online bookstore.  The material may be as good as it can be, but if the package around is unattractive, no one will ever give it a try.

One way to get readers’ opinions on the cover is to choose a short excerpt from your manuscript or the book description as a basis for open cover design suggestions. It can either apply to the entire cover or smaller parts of it at a time: the image, the style, the colors, fonts, the placement, etc. Once the color and image have been determined, the creation can continue with the first completed steps as a base.

Another way – which is a little easier for readers and gives them a starting point – is to produce a few different variations for voting. It may not mean that you are bound to the cover that gets the most votes, but it can help you in the choice and maybe you also get useful feedback.

THE BOOK’S TITLE

Book title is as important as cover design, description and part of overall package. When the book has a title, it becomes “for real” – a real, understandable piece of work you’ve created! Here, however, also lies the difficulty. It simply has to feel right and be a name that you will enjoy forever. But a little help can never hurt and the choice of the title can be a good chance to involve readers in the process.

Easiest way is to share title options together including some excerpts with your readers on social media and collect enough feedback to make an informed decision.

Sandy Kohen

Images can be used in many types of books.

When I wrote the text, I mainly had autobiographies in mind, but pictures can be used for many kinds of books.

In children’s books, pictures are often a supporting element, especially in textbooks. In some children’s books, photos are used, but illustrations are often used. Gift books or coffee table books are the equivalent of the adult world to the textbooks to the extent that the photos and the book’s design can be as important as the text (sometimes more important).

In many non-fiction books, illustrations are important for explaining, conveying and supporting the book’s content. This applies to everything from tables to drawings of flowers in a flora. In travel literature, especially travel guides, inspiring pictures and show what is there to see on the site.

Most fiction books are published without pictures, but some bestsellers are published in illustrated special editions. In memoirs, images can give both the reader’s authenticity and recognition.

In some books, images are as important as the text and the illustrator or photographer’s name is on the front of the book, the same size as the author. In other books, they are an optional supplement.

The advantages of including images in, for example, an autobiography are that it increases the book’s value to the reader, which means that you can charge a higher price if you want to sell it. Pictures also fill in if you are unable to write so much text but still want the book’s proper size.

The disadvantage of pictures is that it is more expensive and more complicated to publish the book. Most people who are familiar with their word processing program can write and design a textbook to keep the printable quality. The same does not apply to books with pictures in.

Melissa Mayer

It has never been such a good time as now to write a book that you have long dreamed of. This has always been true, but it has an extra vibration of the spring of 2020 when this is written. Whether you are retired in isolation, quarantined or fully healthy but laid off, it is perfect for taking the opportunity and using the extra time to write. You also make a social contribution by reducing the spread of infection when sitting at home with your computer or pen. There is plenty of genres to go with, but many writers start their careers by writing about something self-experienced. Write your life and publish your memoirs.

1-START WRITING NOW!

Are you one of those who are thinking about writing a book about your life but hesitate? Stop immediately postponing the idea to tomorrow. Take care and write while you can. It is only you who can do it. Everyone has a story to tell. Write to preserve your experiences for the afterlife, as therapy or for fun. Write for the drawer box, for your grandchildren or for a wider audience. Get started and write today!

2-INSPIRED BY OTHERS

The first step to holding your book in your hands is to decide to write it. The second is to think about what kind of book to write. Should it be a fiction book loosely based on a few episodes from your life or an overview of your entire life? You do not need to decide in advance, but this may be something you have in mind while collecting material. In this chapter of the book, it’s time for you to read and analyze books that others have written.

3-COLLECT MATERIALS

It’s time for the phase that is often the most fun part of a book project: to do research! At this stage you do not have to make any tough decisions and do not limit yourself but can have fun. 

If you are so lucky to have written diaries during your life, it is time to pick them up now. Invent your own memory, browse old calendars and look up old letters. Listen to others who were “at that time” and gather everything you think is interesting. Save selection for later. Also, don’t worry if it gets a little thin in some subjects. You will both come up with new ideas and iron out during the work.

In this chapter we have some common tips and exercises like using pictures from places where you lived and drawing a family tree. We will provide you with tools to travel back in time through questions that you can answer yourself or by interviewing other people.

4-ALLOW TIME TO WRITE 

Whether you dream of starting writing or are a seasoned writer, it is always challenging to finish your book. The challenge can be divided into several parts. The first is about time. Writing an entire book is time-consuming and you need to spend the time required. Then it is essential to spend time on the right things and not get stuck. Some perfectionists pill for eternity with small details and, therefore, never get ready. The second extreme is that the first draft is sufficient to publish, although the text is so full of typos that it is barely legible, is also not successful. It is also common to experience writers block, know that it is common for writers to get stuck sometimes.

5-PLANNNIG YOUR JOURNEY

You have decided to write a book and you have collected a lot of material on your subject. You have analyzed other books. You have a plan for how and when to write. Maybe you’ve even started writing? Or are you wondering how to start? In this phase, a synopsis can be helpful. A synopsis is a summary of the major features of your book. It is suggested that you also include other aspects and make a project plan before you start writing. Failing to plan is a plan for failure.

6-DEVELOP YOUR STORY

Have you written a synopsis or first draft now? Good work! Now we will continue to work. We will spice up your story with emotion, add local color and make sure you bring the reader to your world. 

The reader should be able to follow through with your eyes when the events happened. The reader should see the same obstacles as you did and feel the same feelings as you did then. This means that if you write an anecdote from your school years, you will not have the same experience or language as you have after fifty. You were not born omniscient. Every event you select should be a scene in the book. 

Just as in a fiction book, you need to describe details and activate the readers’ emotions. It is this that determines how readable your book becomes. The more common your selected events are, the higher your demands on how you describe them. If you have been cannibal or lived on the moon, the reader may forgive a stylish language and non-existent narrative, to tell you about such unusual events.

This does not mean that only people who have lived a particularly dramatic life can write their memoirs. All lives are worth documenting, then the size of the audience varies depending on the content and presentation.

7-EDIT YOUR TEXT

We have now come to edit the text itself. It is a common novice mistake to worry about the language too soon. Many writers spend a lot of time hunting for the perfect first sentence when they have to solve puzzles with life events. Others focus on finding synonyms or proofreading even before the story has fallen into its place. It is almost always better to leave those details at last. 

There are a few exceptions. It may make sense to determine verb forms and perspectives early. It is a big job to change from a first perspective to a third-person perspective in an entire book if you get it for yourself (probably a bad idea since autobiographies are usually written in first person form). Same thing with verb forms.

8-TAKE HELP 

Does the whole project start to feel overwhelming? Calm, just calm. There is a long line of people who can help you along the way. You can get help from loved ones or various experts. There are author coaches, writing courses and study circles where you can get help if you get stuck. There are lecturers, editors and proofreaders who can help you improve the text. You don’t need to write a word yourself, but you can hire a ghostwriter who writes the entire book based on interviews. You can also hire a research assistant, cover designer, book publisher and project manager – to name a few of the experts available. 

Since it is their livelihood to support writers, it costs a good deal to hire them. The price varies and can reflect what quality you get. The most significant factor, however, is how long it takes. A study circle can cost a few hundred dollars to hire a ghostwriter for a few monthly salaries. If you want to hire the right person, it is good to know a little more about what the different people are doing. 

9-PUBLISH YOUR BOOK

If you have gone through the great work of writing down your story, you should also make sure you keep your story in hand. You should at least print a copy for yourself. Maybe you even want others to read it? The fastest way to make sure you get your book in hand is to publish it yourself simply. This way you make all the decisions. 

10-ENJOY AND HAVE FUN! 

We have one crucial tip left and that is to enjoy. In order not to bump along the road, it is vital to take the time to have fun. Your book project is an excellent reason for a long line of pleasures. Get in touch with relatives, travel around and learn more about yourself. Call old friends you haven’t talked to for years and days. Visit places that were important to you in your upbringing and see what it looks like today. Review old diaries, photos and letters. Browse theater programs, movie tickets, children’s books or other things that matter to you. See if the favorite movie you grew up with. Take plenty of time and use the time to remember and reflect.   

Furthermore, writing a book does not have to be a one-man project. You can do a great deal of research together with others. Why not make it a family vacation to visit places you remember from before? Or start a circle with others living in the same area? Make sure you have fun together when you pinch your books. Enjoy and have fun!

All the best, Melissa.

Thanks to modern digital printing technology, the placement options for pixels are unlimited. A comprehensive background, images and headings placed out to the border, large images placed beyond the center of the book, and lists along the edge of the page are possible with digital printing.

SUITABLE TYPES OF PAPER

You can choose from the following paper types: white 80 and 90 g, cream-colored 80 and 90 g (80 g is only possible for publishers), matt 120 g paper and 200 g high gloss paper. If your book contains color pages, we recommend that you choose white paper. This ensures that the color of the images does not differ due to the color of the paper. The 120 g and 200 g paper grades are of high quality and are especially suitable for picture books. Note that minor deviations in the colors cannot be avoided with digital printing.

GENERAL RULES FOR GRAPHIC ELEMENTS

RESOLUTION: For an ideal print result, the resolution of the images should be at least 300 dpi. 

GRAY SURFACES: If the pages contain gray areas, you should choose a grayscale that contains at least 10% black color (not lighter). If the pages contain pie-charts or similar images, it is recommended that the gradation of the grayscale is at least 10%, so that the different sectors are clearly separated from each other.

PADDING: If the images are placed to the edge of the page, a five millimeter border should be created on each edge and side. A page with the size 12 x 19 cm will then have the size 13 x 20 cm. The trimmed edge will be cut off during production, but it has a purpose: Even if the book’s contents were moved slightly during binding, no white, unprinted border is left at the edge of the page. This cutting edge can be produced without major problems with professional layout programs, but if text editing software such as Word is used, the size of the pages must be determined and installed already in advance. The crop marks should not be visible in the document.

COLOR SEPARATION: When using a professional layout program, such as InDesign, color separation should not be used.

TRANSPARENCY: Use no transparency but only one level. If you upload files with transparency, all levels will be compiled automatically. This is a complicated process and can change your files. Therefore, you must create a file with one level. You ensure that the files look exactly as you want and thus avoid unwanted print results.

COLOR MANAGEMENT: Digital images are produced using either a scanner or a digital camera and the color setting is always RGB. Let the images remain in RGB format, do not change to CMYK format. However, if your images are already in CMYK format, do not change them to RGB.

COLOR PROFILE INFORMATION: RGB: When uploading files in RGB format without a specific color profile, the default setting is sRGB, as it is used for most image files.

CMYK: The default setting for CMYK files is ISOcoated_V2 (Fogra39) and we print the books with this color profile depending on the settings of the respective printing machine. With the help of DeviceLink conversion, we ensure that the digital print result is as close to an offset print result as possible.

TIP: First, process the images in a graphics program (such as Adobe Photoshop) and determine the final format, size, dpi degree and color format. Transfer the images to the layout program only after you have processed them.

SPECIAL COLORS: It is possible to simulate special colors in combination with process colors (CMYK). However, since many special colors are outside the CMYK workspace, it is recommended that this option be used only to a limited extent.

SIMULATION OF SPECIAL COLORS: To simulate special colors, you can use color palettes, where all existing Pantone or HKS colors are defined based on CMYK colors.

PANTONE AND HKS COLORS: If you upload PDF files with “genuine” Pantone or HKS colors (not simulated), these colors are printed as similar to the original colors as possible, in CMYK using color maps installed in our printing machines.

Thanks for reading, Sandy Kohen