Wednesday, September 11, 2013

Indie Life: Planning your Own Book Launch

Indie Life is a monthly feature hosted by the fabulous Indelibles where we get to share something related to indie writing life.

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So, as an indie writer, if you're wanting to have a book launch to celebrate the release of your book, you have to organize it yourself. I've never done this! For my first two books, I've done online launches with people spreading the word all over the web for me. And that was awesome (and I plan to do it again), but this time, for the third and final book in my series, I want to do a REAL LIVE BOOK LAUNCH!

So my first question for you today is this: if you've had one for yourself, or you've attended book launches for other authors, what actually happened there? I know you sell and sign copies of your book, and give a little talk, maybe read a section of your book (hoping no one falls asleep ... #authornightmare), and possibly do some giveaways of cool freebie stuff. But is there anything else fun and unique to do?

Please help me! I want to make my first real life book launch super, duper awesome!

My second question is this: If you are a published YA author and you have ebooks, print books, bookmarks, badges, magnets, keyrings, postcards, or ANYTHING pertaining to your books that you'd like to donate for a massive giveaway, please send me an email or tell me in the comments. For my online launch I'm planning to have a massive Rafflecopter giveaway, and for my real life launch, I want to put together a great big goodie bag of stuff for one lucky winner (which means your stuff will be going into the hands of a young South African reader who will hopefully spread the reading love around with her (or his) friends!).

THANK YOU!

PS. Today The Writing Nut is hosting me for the weekly Wednesday Writer's Workspace feature. Come visit!

14 comments:

Misha Gerrick said...

I also want to know! ;-)

Johanna Garth said...

I've always heard little giveaway freebies are key. Maybe candy attached to a swag book mark or something like that.

J.L. Campbell said...

Have fun with it! I think some sort of swag would be wise to have and books to sell are a must.

Natalie Aguirre said...

Rachel, how you describe it is how I've seen it done. Some people have cake or cookies at them. I've seen a few where they did a Power Point presentation of things like their writing as a kid or of things related to their book. Good luck with it.

Natalie Aguirre said...

And leave time for questions.

Alex J. Cavanaugh said...

Yeah, there will be questions. Keep your reading short as well. Don't give them time to snooze.

Kimberly said...

It sounds fun - I'd like to attend a book launch party! Will need to find some local one I guess. :)

Love all the suggestions and ideas you have already!

Lauren said...

I want to do a chat for my next online launch. We'll see what happens. :)

Lauren
lauren-ritz.blogspot.com

Andrew Leon said...

I haven't really done any kind of book launch, yet, e- or otherwise. Maybe for the next book.

Annalisa Crawford said...

A real live book launch sounds awesome. Online is great, but you do end up sitting in a room by yourself drinking Champagne! Good luck with it - I'm sure you'll come up with something very unique :-)

Tia Bach said...

I wish I had advice to give, but I hope you will share everything here when you compile all the input and do this. Excited to find out.

Oh, and I'm happy to donate an eBook of Chasing Memories for your giveaway. I'll message you.

My Indie Life Post

Michelle Wallace said...

Rachel, please let me know when you plan to launch!
If possible, I would LOVE to be there! (I'm Durban based...)
Writer In Transit

Casey said...

Advertisement is important! Let your local papers know about the event- they could write up an article or post in an area where the week's events are posted. These are usually free. Also radio stations will interview you sometimes if you have event scheduled. They will want to do that before your event.

Another tip- have your event somewhere your audience likes to visit. Like the local library, coffee shop, or wherever the teens like to be in your town:) And yes food is always great to have!
Good luck!

Kittie Howard said...

I have no idea -- but whatever you do turns out great!