Side Trip: How to Write a Non-Fiction Book Proposal – Part 8

Promotion and Marketing Opportunities

Make a list of things you will actually DO to promote and market your book.

Refrain from saying you’d be happy to go on Oprah or Good Morning America unless you have the connections and experience to actually get on those shows.

Instead, do some brainstorming and figure out practical ways you can promote and market your book.

• If you are a speaker, share how often you speak, the types of groups you speak to, and the number usually present.
• If you have a plan to reach potential reader/book-buyers online, share what you have in mind.
• If you have a mailing list you send to monthly or quarterly, share that.
• If you have connections to groups that will like your book, name them. For example, you can bet I will contact every pro-life group, and there are a lot of them, when my Deliver Me book is available. I plan to send them an e-mail. I could call them. If you were writing a gardening book, would a national gardener’s association want to know about it? Could you contact them? Then put it in your proposal!
• Are you willing to contact radio stations, starting locally and working out to ever-widening circles, and try to book yourself on their shows?
• Do you have a blog? How many readers do you have?
• Will you organize your own virtual book tour/blog book tour?

In other words, make a plan of how you will let people know about your book. Make it a plan you can actually work. Then tell the editor and agent you’re submitting your proposal to what you have in mind.