Build An Audience For Your Book With A Blog By Jimmy MooreThis article may be reprinted/redistibuted freely, as long as the entire articleand bio are included.Shhhhh. I've got a secret to share with you that you may not even know about.In fact, if you have ever written a book or thought about writing a book, I'mgonna let you in on something that won't cost you a dime of money, but couldproduce an incredible opportunity to effectively market your work.What is this dream plan for building an audience of enthusiastic buyers for yourbook? Simply put, it's a blog. What's that?!A blog, short for weblog, is a web site journal where you can post just aboutanything you want about whatever subject matter interests you the most. For me,after losing 180 pounds on a low-carb plan in 2004, I knew I had found a topicthat I was very passionate about sharing with others and that there would be anaudience who would be willing to listen.In April 2005, I started my "Livin' La Vida Low-Carb" blog located on the Internetat http://livinlavidalocarb.blogspot.com. When I first started my blog, I had justbegun work writing on my book, also called "Livin' La Vida Low-Carb."The early days of a blog are kinda like being on a 100-watt radio station out inthe middle of nowhere. You talk and talk and feel like nobody's listening. And ifyou expect to find instant success with your blog, then just don't bother.But if you write freely about what is in your heart, share openly and honestlyabout what's on your mind, and provide relevant content that people will want toread, then you will begin to build an audience who will follow you and want tocome back for more.To let others know about my blog, I went to other similar kinds of blogs and websites to introduce myself and to let them know about what I was doing. I probablyposted my URL on about 50 different low-carb message boards to get the word outabout it. In my first month online, I had about 5,000 pageviews.By the third month I was online, the pageviews at my blog grew to 10,000 thatmonth. In the meantime, I continued to post articles on a daily basis to keep theweb site looking fresh and new all the time and I bought the domain name for mybook, LivinLaVidaLowCarb.com. I had the domain forward all of the traffic to myblog. This is an excellent way to build those repeat readers by making it easy forthem to find you, and the faithful will come back to you often.Whatever you do, don't just suddenly stop posting to your blog. Nothing frustratesa reader more than to come to your blog for three or four days in a row with zeroupdates. Some people may wonder if you've gone away forever and may never comeback. Don't leave 'em hanging. If you can't post for a few days, then let yourreaders know it.When my book debuted six months after I began my blog, I was getting about 15,000pageviews per month. This built-in audience for my book gave me an instantmarketing strategy to provide them with an additional resource for informationabout low-carb, something that I had already been providing them at my blog.Since they knew my writing style and felt confident in my ability to write, I
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