How Self-Syndication Leads to Free Publicity

In this world of everyone holding their hands out and wanting your hard-earned dollar, authors are heading toward more of a do-it-yourself attitude when it comes to book promotion. Since book royalties are usually nothing to get real excited about, funds for book promotion may be something that is non-existent for the first-time book author, or any author for that matter.

However, any book coach or publicist will tell you that you have to create a buzz for your book no matter what it takes.

So, what’s an author to do?

There are many strategies you can take, but the one that has given me more publicity is the syndication of my articles. No, I am not syndicated in the NY Times or Woman’s Journal, but I am syndicated on thousands of online websites and a few print publications as well, including the celebrity tabloid, “OK!,” which is found in most grocery stores and Wal-Marts (I know because I scarfed up their whole inventory when I found out).

How does one make this happen and how does this equal book sales?

Easy. There are hundreds of content ezines on the Internet and most of these online publications have feeds which send your articles to more publications, who in turn put your article up on their websites. What happens is that one article will appear on hundreds upon hundreds of websites, thus upping your search engine’s ranking because you were smart and included your website link in your bio.

Not only are you gaining expertise through syndicating your articles, you are helping bring potential buyers to your website to see what else you have to offer.

But, more than that, these same articles that, even though you aren’t getting paid for them, they are giving you free publicity that would have otherwise cost you hundreds of dollars.

Let me give you an example. Today, in the mail, I received a complimentary magazine with an article I had syndicated two years ago. Even though that article is not recent, it continues to bring in added publicity. But, what I found interesting was that if you wanted to advertise your book in this same publication, which included a 60-word description of your book, a color cover photo of your book and a direct link to your website, it would cost you $100 if you were not a member of their organization and $125 if you were.

Even though I didn’t get a color cover photo included of my book, I did get a full-page ad for my article, which included a generous bio, including information about my book and two links to my websites.

The cost? Zip.

So, how did I manage to get this non-recent article I have syndicated for years over the Internet into a print publication? I did nothing to make it happen, except list the article up on my website stating anyone was welcome to publish it as long as the bio was intact. Someone saw it and noticed that it would be perfect for their publication, and whammo bammo, I have a gig in a print magazine. Simple as that.

As for the OK! Magazine gig, the editor found one of my articles over the Internet which had my website address in the bio, and contacted me through the email address link on my website. He phoned me, asking questions about the Jennifer Aniston-Vince Vaughn relationship, and my quote ended up in the magazine two weeks later.

All you have to do is write an article, making sure it has a bio with your website link or contact information, and send it off to content ezines such as:

Alumbo!
http://www.alumbo.com

Article Alley
http://www.articlealley.com

Article City
http://www.articlecity.com

Article Marketer
http://www.articlemarketer.com

Article Corners
http://www.articlecorners.com

Associated Content
(this one pays!)
http://www.associatedcontent.com

Ezine Articles
http://www.ezinearticles.com

Go Articles
http://www.goarticles.com

A word of suggestion would be to not forget to add your articles to your website, as that’s where a lot of my contacts have come from, too.

Syndicating your articles is one of the most profitable publicity-wise venues I can think of and I am surprised when I find authors do not think to do this. If they only realized the potential this has, they’d jump on the self-syndicating bandwagon in no time!

Tags: How Self-Syndication Leads to Free Publicity, self-syndication, book promotion, Pump Up Your Book Promotion, PR marketing expert, content ezines