How OK! Magazine taught me a thing or two about book promotion

I'm guest blogging today over at Tony Eldridge's blog, Marketing Tips for Authors!

How OK! Magazine Taught Me A Thing Or Two About Book Promotion By Dorothy Thompson: http://bit.ly/49x2rF

See the magazine cover on your left? Look to the right and you see a picture of Jennifer Aniston? I was called by the editor of OK! Magazine to give my opinion of the Jennifer Aniston l Vince Vaghn relationship. My quote appeared in this very magazine in '04.

Seems so long ago. I had put together a book of soul mate stories - true soul mate stories - called Romancing the Soul, and I knew there was a vast untapped online market out there to get me and my book in front of. The thing is, I had to try this, try that, and what happened really became the backbone of my company, Pump Up Your Book Promotion and now, it's wonderful new counterpart, Pump Up Your Book.

One of the great things about newspapers going bust (I don't mean that in a negative way of course) is that what's happening is that they're concentrating now on online measures to get their news out - more so than ever before Back in '04, newspapers were still thriving but the journalists had discovered how to cut a few corners and that was to find what they wanted over the Internet.

If you concentrate on building up your author platform, present yourself in a professional way (great website), write until your fingers fall off about your expertise...someone is going to find you and present an offer you won't believe such as I did the day OK! Magazine's editor called me for a quote.

I can't stress enough how important it is to find an author platform you would be comfortable with. After all, if you can't talk the talk when you walk the walk, people will see right through you. I knew my stuff. Putting together an anthology of true soul mate stories where more than half of it was written by other writers, that's not enough. To make my book stand out, I divided the questions into three sections - Twin Souls, Companion Soul Mates and Karmic soul mates - and through my expertise, I could tell which story fell in which section. As it turned out, it wasn't just a collection of stories, but a lesson in finding and keeping your soul mate and learning why certain people come into your lives.

So, there was my platform. I became the soul mate expert, then gravitated to relationship expert.

Define your author platform, use those key search words in everything you send out. Who knows - there are journalists, magazine editors, book publishers, agents, ect. out there looking for the next big thing. Or, at least a quote. And, believe me, that quote is like getting a gig on Oprah. It could be your big break, open a few doors, or make you believe in miracles.