Top Ten Ways To Use Social Media To Make Your Book A Bestseller

Books don’t promote authors; authors promote books. An author who writes a book to promote their business needs to shine the spotlight on the book in hopes of gaining buzz.

When it comes to promotion, Minal Sampat is an immigrant who thinks big. In 2013 at the age of 28 she launched her first marketing company by breaking a Guinness World Record (for the most simultaneous mouthwash swishers at one time).

Born in India, Sampat grew up in St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands, and now resides in the state of Washington with her husband. In 2020 Sampat used her social media skills to make her book, Why Your Marketing Is Killing Your Business And What To Do About It, an international Amazon bestseller. We met when she needed help editing the book.

The dirty little secret of books is that unless you are a celebrity, the publisher expects the author to promote the book. Even if you are a celebrity, the publisher expects the author to do most of the promotion. Naturally, the best place to promote is to go direct to readers with social media.

Recently I interviewed Sampat to find out how her book marketing campaign was so successful. Here are Sampat’s top ten ways to use social media to create a bestseller:

1. Start marketing with an intention. “Even if you are trying to simply do brand awareness about the book,” says Sampat.
2. Learn how the social media algorithms for sites such as Facebook and Instagram work and plan your strategy around it. The more you know, the better your marketing plan will be. “Whatever platform you are most active on, learn the algorithm for that platform,” she says.
3. Leverage the organic reach by building an audience that would be genuinely interested in your book and topic. Sampat focused on people in business who are readers and liked content about books.
4. Make your marketing message about them, and not you by highlighting the readers and spotlighting them in your marketing. “It’s about them; it’s not about you, is the attitude to have,” says Sampat.
5. Share content that is attached with the book, but can be easily downloaded such as worksheets, graphs, and checklists.
6. Continuously show appreciation for the readers and the book. When you focus on connecting and not promotion, you will continue to do better with your marketing. Sampat always highlighted readers on Facebook and Instagram. She created dialogue with readers and shared news about their businesses. “Nobody expected that from a random book they bought,” said Sampat.
7. On a weekly basis, share digestible content from the book, such as quotes, lines, chapter page photos.
8. Share your journey as an author. Readers want to connect with you. Give them a glimpse "behind the scenes.”
9. Show off social proof. For example, share testimonials and reviews. Sampat would take screenshots from Amazon reviews to show that people were commenting on her book.
10. Always offer book copies at webinars, conferences and seminars. If you are teaching a course, use the book as required reading. And why not? Shouldn’t students get your best thoughts?

Just this year, Sampat launched Marketologist, an online marketing strategy school for healthcare practitioners, coaches/consultants/speakers, and aspiring marketing ambassadors. To learn more or get in touch, please go to MinalSampat.com.