Whether you work at the marketing department of a publishing house or running your own show as an indie-author; there comes a moment in which you need to collaborate with readers to help you get your book out there. Maybe it’s different when your name is Colleen Hoover, Stephen King or Taylor Jenkins Reid, but they didn’t get to be auto-buy authors overnight either.

For most marketers, PR managers and authors the reality is that it is hard to sell books. How do you get your book into the hands of readers? There are different ways to achieve that goal. In this blog I will share different ways to collaborate with readers to reach even more people.

Meet the Online Book Community

The online book community is huge. People from all over the world use the world wide web to express their opinions about the books they read. They leave reviews on Goodreads or Amazon, write blogs on their personal websites, post pretty photos on Instagram, talk about their favorite authors on YouTube or create entertaining videos for TikTok. To give you an idea about the size of the community; the hashtag #bookstagram on Instagram has been used 104 million times to date. The hashtag #booktok on TikTok was used 32.6 million times already.

We, as consumers, get influenced by what we see online. We’re growing more and more sceptical about commercials where we believe recommendations by our peers to be more trustworthy. Readers are influenced by what other readers read. They go on Goodreads to read reviews before ordering a book. They go on Instagram to read about the latest releases and they scroll through TikTok to hear all about the latest BookTok hit. So, the next question is: how do you get collaborations with these readers off the ground in order to promote your book? These are some of your options.

Running your own promotional campaign

A lot of spare time, an established backlist, a large mailing list and a strong social media presence are the perfect ingredients if you’re looking to run your own promotional campaign. You have already connected with lots of readers and they can’t wait to read the next book you’re wanting to publish. You got this! The reality is that besides the big publishers and a handful of well-known indie authors, most of us don’t have these ingredients at our disposal. And spare time is an issue for everyone. So even the large publishers often lean on others to help them market their books. Let’s take a look at the routes they choose.

A Readalong with The Tandem Collective

Tandem is well known in the book community because of their unique concept: the Readalong. They send out free copies of the book to a select group of micro influencers. Led by a coordinator, the groups read the book simultaneously and use prompt cards to discuss the books topics in a private chat. In the meantime, participants share their thoughts on their social media channels, involving other readers in their journey through the book. Lately they have been working on books by Gabrielle Zevin, John Marrs, Claire McGowan and many many more. Reach out to naomi@thetandemcollective.com to learn more.

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A virtual book tour with Bookinfluencers.com

Bookinfluencers.com runs virtual book tours, like many other book tour companies. However, they bring something more to the table than your average book tour company. Their in-depth knowledge of TikTok ads manager ensures that publishers and authors can make the most of their book tours. Any BookTok video can be promoted resulting in increased views, engagement metrics and even clicks to webshops. Bookinfluencers.com also relies heavily on their strong community management skills that lead to high upload percentages. We all know nothing is more frustrating than distributing books and getting nothing in return. Lately Bookinfluencers.com have been working on books by Kalynn Bayron, Junji Ito, Ali Hazelwood, Samantha Shannon and R.F. Kuang. Email me at antina@bookinfluencers.com to learn more.

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A bookish challenge with ChallyPop

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The new kid on the block is ChallyPop. ChallyPop is a competition-based platform that enables everyone to potentially be a paid creator based on the quality of their content rather than the size of their following. The platform challenges creators of all sizes to enter by making content based on a brief. The top 20 submissions receive a money prize. ChallyPop just launched and is running 3 challenges set by one of the largest publishers in the world, Simon & Schuster. Creators are challenged to create content about the thriller Redemption by Jack Jordan, the romantasy The North Wind by Alexandria Warwick and the romance Under Your Spell by Laura Wood. ChallyPop is a great method to get early attention for a new release and to encourage preorders. Email the team at hello@challypop.com to learn more.

As you can see, there are various ways to collaborate with readers. It’s up to you to decide the best course for your book.