Essential Marketing Terms

I thought I'd put together a few terms that I've come across regularly since I began marketing my YA series "The Chick friends rules". I'm sure there's tons more but these are the terms I've come in contact with most often.

ARC- Advanced Review Copy. Usually a free copy of your book sent to reviewers.

Bar code-That's the row of lines on the back of your book where they will place your ISBN# which will identify your book title.

Blog-Personal digital diary shared with the masses.

Blogger-The author of the personal digital diary that is essential for a word of mouth campaign.

Copyright - Protecting your property. Back in the 80's I would mail a copy of my books to myself as a cheap version of copyright protection. I also remember if I wanted to submit a book to the Library of Congress I had to get an application, print out a hard copy of my book usually at $0.2 per page, get a money order for the processing fee, carry the thick stack to the post office and pay hefty postage.Phwwww! Now I can go directly to the Library of Congress website and upload my book directly from my laptop for $35.00. The process takes 15-20 minutes. Now that's progress. Super simple, easy breezy. http://www.loc.gov/index.html

CPC- cost per click. If you decide to go the paid advertising route, you will see this term used often. It's what you're paying every time a potential customer clicks on your ad that takes them to your designated landing page. The typical rate can range anywhere from $0.15 per click to $0.45 per click. I usually don't go over $0.45

DRM- Digital Rights Management provides the software locks put on information distributed digitally to prevent unauthorised distribution. Every time I upload a book I'm asked if I want this feature. Hell yeah,I want it.

ePub - format used for B&N and others.

eKindle - format used for uploading to Creatspace. Genre- where does your book fit. Mine is YA (Young Adult).

Giveaway- A necessary marketing tool. Giving your baby away for free.

ISBN- International Standard Book Number. It's your books birth certificate. Awww.You don't necessarily need one if you're going through Creatspace; they will provide you with one for free but it's only good for Createspace. But a batch of 10 isbn codes can be purchased as well from Bowker. http://www.isbn.org/standards/home/index.asp Month-to-date sales unit- Tells you how many books you've sold within the month. I get butterflies every time I click on this link. But, lately...not bad.

Review- Submitting your book to a reviewer and waiting for a analysis of your literary talent. It can be nerve wrecking.

Tags- keyword or term best used to describe your book. For example, my tags are usually; YA, teens, realistic fiction, social issues,peer pressure, sexual abuse.

URL destination- What website address you want your customers to be directed to. A quick copy and paste will do the trick for this one.

This is all I can come up with off the top of my head. Feel free to share more useful terms by leaving a comment.

4 comments:

Karen Cioffi said...

Great information, Vici. Thanks for sharing.

Magdalena Ball said...

Good list Vici - sometimes we take for granted that everyone knows these words. I'll add "galleys" - an early, pre-publication, but usually bound copy of a book. They're great for getting early reviews and mandatory at some venues like Foreward and Publishers Weekly. I will also add that I am strongly against DRM. It stops me from, for example, converting a .pdf into a .mobi so I can read more comfortably on my kindle, and a whole welter of other problems that make reading harder.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for sharing this information.

Anne Duguid Knol said...

Really useful list, Vici, and I strongly agree with Maggie re DRM. When my head is not so scrambled with Christmas imperatives, I'll try to come up with one more but at the moment it seems to me you've covered all the bases LOL

Audio Books – Make Your Own or Hire It Out

    Contributed by Margot Conor The fast-growing industry of books on audio has become a compelling reason to go that extra distance as an ...