The time surrounding your onsale date is usually the best window for promoting your book. But after the initial marketing and publicity push is over, how do you help your book keep its momentum? We sat down with Brad Meltzer, Angela Montoya, Hampton Sides, and a few experts from the Penguin Backlist team to talk about boosting your backlist.
Promoting your backlist can be challenging, but we assure you, you are not in it alone. (And if you have another title on the way, it’s totally okay to focus your energy there.) Behind the scenes at PRH, there are multiple teams, from the dedicated Penguin Backlist team to Consumer Strategy, who work tirelessly to track potential readers and connect them with books they will love, no matter when they were published.
Step 1: Tune in to Your Audience
A great way to promote a book is to understand why someone would want to read it. The advantage of promoting your backlist is that there are already readers who can inform you on this exact point. There are plenty of places to get this feedback, but the most accessible one is your own platforms. Try sending out a question or a poll on your Instagram story. If you have an author newsletter, that can be an excellent place to connect with your most dedicated readers. If you are unsure what to ask, here are some ideas:
- What made you want to read my book? Why did you put it on your TBR?
- When you read the book, did any of the characters, themes, or settings remind you of something else you enjoyed?
- Have you recommended my book to anyone, and if so, why?
Remember, you are looking for information about what stuck with your audience most. For example, Disney movies remain evergreen as topics people love to talk about. Angela Montoya found that the romance in her first novel, Sinner’s Isle, reminded many readers of the movie Tangled, something that now gets new readers excited to pick up her book.
Step 2: Trends and Viral Moments
Reaching new readers can be as simple as keeping your finger on the pulse of what people are talking about, flagging something that you can relate to your book, and identifying ways to tell new audiences about it.
There are countless ways to approach this. Brad Meltzer keeps a content calendar of holidays where he can celebrate with his readers and shout out relevant books from his backlist. You can frequently check your socials for reader trends: The romance trope “enemies to lovers” is beloved by the BookTok community. That’s a great theme to shout out if your book features characters going through a similar arc. The Author Newsletter also shares quarterly Moments articles from our Consumer Insights Team, which detail what readers are interested in for each season.
As shown by the recent rise of Colleen Hoover’s It Ends with Us, a title can experience sudden virality well after its initial release. It’s good to keep in mind that (even in that case) viral moments are often not manufactured by the authors themselves. It’s hard to make a book trend—but it’s much easier to contribute to a conversation when the moment is already happening.
Take note if a book of the same genre or on a similar topic as yours is gaining traction. Readers who enjoyed it might be looking for similar content. These are referred to as “comp titles.” Bestseller lists in places like The New York Times, USA Today, and Amazon are an excellent place to look for these.
Step 3: Reassess (or Make) Your Pitch
Once you’ve gathered a few ideas, take another look at your book pitch. If you’re starting completely from scratch, check out this Author University session about media training and pitches, but here are the basics:
- Keep it to about 60 seconds.
- Characterize the essential details that a reader may want to know about your book.
- Your goal is for a listener to walk away with something they remember.
That last part is where you may want to leverage the information you’ve gathered, for example to tell a potential reader that your book is “A great read for fans of ____ ” and why. You can mention a popular trope that will grab a BookToker’s attention or a topical piece of recent news that connects to your story.
Most important, when you practice your pitch, try to tap into what it meant for you to realize you wanted to tell this story. As time passes, and you give more and more readers your pitch, it can be easy to forget that spark. Your enthusiasm and authenticity matter, and readers will notice.
Step 4: Outreach
Once you have some ideas for readers to connect with and a solid pitch, it’s time to begin your outreach. Social media is a great place to start. If you are trying to stay atop the speedy trend cycle, you can save yourself energy by having post templates ready to go on Canva.
Share your pitch in conversations with local libraries and bookstores, in your author newsletter, and with fellow authors (join us for an Author U social hour!). Hampton Sides mentioned that he likes to stay connected with organizations who might invite him to talk in interviews and on podcasts. Conventions can also be a great space to connect with passionate readers and other authors.
Finally, talk to your publishing team! They’re a great source of ideas, and if you find good comp titles, they may be able to find different ways to use them on your book’s sales listings and bios.
For more on how to keep your book’s momentum in the months and years after launch, check out last month’s Author U session with authors Brad Meltzer, Angela Montoya, and Hampton Sides here.