Blog Tours?

Thanks, Sarah,

I'll check them out and ask them some questions.

I paid for a blog tour and I think it was worth it. I didn't have the time to set up a tour on my own, so I was paying the company to do the work for me. In return, I got good reviews on my book and some sales. As long as it is reasonable and the tour matches the cost, I think it is worth the money.

I've heard good things about Goddess Fish, and there is one author who's blog I follow that uses them for his tours, which he does every 3 months or so. Unfortunately, there seems to be problems getting blogs to sign up to be a stop on his tour. His book is a dark fantasy vampire, and there have been blogs that do not focus on that genre that have featured his book. I once saw a blog that focuses mainly on romances feature his novel, so I wonder if there was poor planning from Goddess Fish or there was so little interest in his book that some bloggers had to be, I don't know, begged to cover it? I mean, it was awkward to see a romance book blog feature a dark fantasy book that has no romance to it.

I did a tour with Reading Addiction, and to be honest, I am disappointed. I think they see Fantasy in the light of Romantic Fantasy, which isn't the same and certainly not what I write My experience is the same as what Pearl tells.

To start with, I wanted a tour wih 20 stops in a month (10 reviews + 10 promo/interview). They couldn't fill these, so they shifted me to one of the small tours, with 10 stops (5 reviews/5 promo).

In the end, only 3 did a review, grudgingly. They didn't like my cover, they liked the story but there wasn't a hint of enthousiasm. The other promised reviews defaulted, as did one of the two interviews.
Halfway, a blogger forgot to post anything. I mailed and a day later they did post it after all.

After the second non-appearing review I mailed my dissatisfaction, nicely, and they would check and contact me again. I didn't hear from them again, though the review popped up two days later, reluctantly.

All in all pretty useless. No sales, the statistics of my webside didn't react, total silence. Luckily I only had to pay for the short tour, less 10% summer sales, so all in all it didn't cost much.

I did have the feeling they were stuffed to the gills with tours, sometimes two on the same day. That's asking for trouble imo.

Still, I don't blame them. I should have said no thanks after they couldn't fill the original tour. But my book and their bloggers were totally mismatched and that's a pity.

...

Now I'm going to try another tour, with Promotional Book Tours. They are quite a lot more expensive, but they make a much more solid impression too.

They offer 30 stops in two weeks, with 18 book reviews (also on Amazon and Goodreads) plus promotion in all relevant media. Reviews, 2 interviews, 6 book excerpts and prizes for a reader contest and as an incentive for the bloggers). I had to arrange for the prizes myself, but that's only extra advertisement, as I can send them directly to the winners myself..

It's scheduled for the first week of October, to give the bloggers time to read the book. Sounds all very professional.

I didn't have to pay for my blog tour because my publisher assigns us all a publicist who sets them up. That said, I do think it was helpful. I was totally unknown and don't see how I would have sold books to anyone who wasn't a friend or family member if the blog tour hadn't helped spread the word. I will say that having prizes is important. Make tweeting or posting about the book a way to enter for the prize and you'll get a lot more promo.

Graylorne, sorry you had such a crappy experience! I've used Reading Addiction a couple of times, and I think you might be right about their volume of tours. I think they might be struggling a bit. Bloggers are chocked up with reviews to do.

I decided to go with Enchanted Book tours this time around. It starts in 3 days so I'll have to report back.

One thing I've noticed about blog tour organisers is that they tend to be skewed towards YA, PNR, NA, and romance in general. Hard Fantasy and Sci-Fi aren't a great fit. Hopefully you'll find something that fits better with your genre.

Another thing I've noticed is that they often don't give reviewers enough time. About 3 weeks ago I sent the organiser all my gubbins: cover, blurb, review copies etc. but they only started asking for sign ups about 4 days ago, giving the reviewers about a week to read three of my books! Fingers crossed there are some enthusiastic reviewers out there.

But on the flip side, I just can't seem to get hold of reviewers anymore. Even the ones who were really keen to review the first book and gave it 5 or 4 stars aren't interested anymore. Maybe it's the time of year, maybe it's a growing despondency towards blogging or self-published authors, I don't know.

I've some hopes of Promotional, they sound pretty businesslike. They wanted at least a month for their reviewers to read the book and they opened the sign-up yesterday, a month before time. They offer reviewers a $5 Amazon Gift Card for quality and timely reviews on Amazon (not for all of them, but as a price to be won) and I had to bring in an incentive for a blogger contest.

Sarah, did they publish your tour already? I just checked enchanted book promotions.com but apart from being a very icky website (it moves!), I couldn't find your book. Did I have the right site?

I found some reviewers on Goodreads, but that's about all.

Maybe I need to spend more money next time. That does sound very professional.

No, it's not started yet. The sign up place is here: http://www.enchantedbookpromotions.com/scheduling-tour-for-the-unleashed/

Yes, I see it now. It doesn't look bad and they have a decent-sounding list of bloggers. (Reading Addiction had one of my stops on an 18+ site. Heh, my books are for Adults and older Y.A., and there is hardly an ounce of sex in it).

Let's hope it brings you success.

This has been very useful. I want to try a blog tour for my first novel. Word of mouth is very important, and I'm certainly going to need it.

Do you all think blog tours really get the word out there? Which ones do that best?

I written a YA fantasy novel. I'm a little lost on how to promote it, but I've heard good things about blog tours. I'm willing to pay for a blog tour because I don't have the time or connections to find tons of reviewers and blogs.

I filled out the info today to do a book tour with Fire and Ice Book tours. It cost $20 for a one week tour, which I think is not bad. This will be my first tour, and I'm very excited to try it out.

I've bought a cover reveal tour, and hosted very briefly for Novel Publicity. I think for bloggers there's a danger of burnout, and also of posting a lot of very similar content to everyone else. Especially if it's all promotional cheerleading, it's not very good for the blog in question. I've come across a few blogs that do tours to extremes, and sign up with a lot of organisers. I mean, there's a lot of merit in having an active blog, but it's better to be offering something that hundreds of other blogs aren't, and when that happens it's better for the authors as well.

I wouldn't warn anyone off blog tours entirely, but I think it would pay to avoid anything that will result in a lot of duplication. For instance, I think it's better to do a cover reveal on one higher traffic blog, rather than twenty or thirty.

I mostly do tours for reviews and a bit of visibility. I don't actually expect to sell a lot of books or get my money back.

I agree with Ros about blogs saturated by tours. The only thing is, as you say it's better to snag a shout out on a blog with high traffic, but it's getting that coveted spot. Even after a year of self-publishing, having highly rated books, selling well and having great covers, I still find it difficult to get a response from bloggers and it takes up too much of my time.

Especially now that I have some momentum with my sales I need to write and release in a very timely manner. Trying to get onto blogs eats away at my writing time.

I think I might go for tours that specialise in reviews from now on, as reviews are so important for promotions.

I'm glad I found this thread. I was just about to ask the same question.
It seems like we have mixed reviews on the worth of blog tours. I've never done one but feel like giving it a try to see how it goes and because like some of you have said the time constraints on setting up my own is worth the pay. Although some of these places are too expensive.
Here are a couple of other places I've had recommended to me. I haven't tried any of them yet.

FireandIce
Illustrious Illusions
Girls Heart
Promotional Book Tours
Platinum Book Reviews

My first experience with blog tours was a cover reveal but it didn't help me as much as I had hoped, either because of the book itself (YA / NA paranormal romance, only made it as far as 3k in rankings before playing in the 6k to 10k range) or because I had exceptionally high expectations.

Then my publisher and I tried the Book Blitz package of Xpresso and this one did a lot better. However, this tour also came with a Kindle Fire HD / $150 Amazon GC giveaway so I'm sure that's another factor.

All in all, I think reasonably-priced blog tours are always worth a shot, but you need to switch blog tour companies every so often just for the sake of reaching out to new readers.

I'm thinking of doing a blog tour when things are ready, but I'm not sure what a "prize" is that some of the organisers ask for. I can't really arrange for material prizes as I live in Europe; are book vouchers OK? I prefer a straight up fee, tbh!
Also, so many of those mentioned here seem to almost all romance, YA, NA or fantasy; my book is none of these. Anyone have suggestions for Women's Fiction (yes, I hate the term too but that's what the trade calls it!), multicultural, historical?

aruna said:

I'm thinking of doing a blog tour when things are ready, but I'm not sure what a "prize" is that some of the organisers ask for. I can't really arrange for material prizes as I live in Europe; are book vouchers OK? I prefer a straight up fee, tbh!
Also, so many of those mentioned here seem to almost all romance, YA, NA or fantasy; my book is none of these. Anyone have suggestions for Women's Fiction (yes, I hate the term too but that's what the trade calls it!), multicultural, historical?

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Amazon vouchers are OK, at least with the tour operator I'm using. For my upcoming tour, I arranged two viking hangers. I'll send them by post to the contest winners, that adds the personal touch and isn't overly expensive.

As to the genre, I suggest google some of the better tour operators. They have lists of present and past tours with links to the participating bogs. That way you can choose one that suits your genre.

Folks looking at blog tours might want to check out the Orangeberry Book Tours thread in the Bewares, Recommendations, and Background Checks board.

That looks really interesting, James. Thanks!

oooh... finished reading the thread....

I'm the commenter who's been hammering Orangeberry over on the Bewares Board.

Reading through this thread, I can see that in the beginning there was some logic behind virtual author tours, and perhaps some novelty value as well. I can't fault cooperative arrangements between writers and bloggers who have some acquaintance in common.

What alarmed me about Orangeberry was that they'd set up 50+ fake book blogs to which they propagated identical content. That was why they could promise their clients a specific number of mentions and reviews on a tight schedule: "50 mentions in book blogs" was one lackluster piece of promo copy automatically propagated to 50 fake weblogs that no one reads.

I don't have time right now to do an in-depth analysis of every "virtual author tour" provider, but I've done a fair amount of looking around. My take on them at this moment is that they range from real, experienced, well-regarded book promotion operations, to perfunctory sites that were obviously built around online marketing scammer templates.

One description of VATs that greatly bothered me came from a site I won't name, except to say that the overall vibes weren't all that bad. The problem is that it's shot through with magical thinking.
"Social media buzz" is not a magic nostrum. At the time that people are talking about your book, they're interested in your book, and they may go so far as to buy a copy. When the talk shifts to other topics, those people are no longer thinking about your book, and will be far less likely to buy a copy than when they were thinking about it.

Human attention doesn't accumulate indefinitely. Memory degrades over time. There is no delayed tertiary stage where blog readers suddenly feel moved to buy a book they've stopped talking and thinking about.
This is true, and it's at the heart of the problem. I discussed this in the Orangeberry thread and the Bewares Board's Not-a-FAQ.

There are some top-notch blogs that really can increase your sales. (Sites I mentioned at random: The Millions, Neil Gaiman, Smart Bitches Trashy Books, and Boing Boing.) They have high traffic and a lot of credibility with their audiences. The next tier down -- still prominent, established blogs with solid traffic stats -- have noticeably less clout. Below that, it's nice if they liked your book, but don't expect to get a lot of sales out of it.

I work in conventional publishing in NYC, so I may have a different notion of the level of return on promotion that's worth pursuing. Nevertheless: the vast majority of the sites which providers identified as host sites for VATs were not going to do the authors much good at all; and none that I saw were the sort of top-of-the-line blogs that really can help turn a book into a commercial success. Some host sites appeared to have become so indiscriminate about hosting that they'd turned into solid ribbons of unbroken promo. That's deadly. No one's going to read it.

However, done consistently over time, all those incoming links increase your visibility online. And the more visibility you have online, the more likely you are to sell books!​

Not so fast. If you're going to self-promote, you have to pay attention to orders of magnitude, click-through rates, and other technicalities.

An accumulation of inbound links over time will increase your visibility on Google, which is good if someone's already looking for you, but not a lot of use if they aren't. And while it's true that more online visibility may translate into more sales, at lower levels of visibility and awareness that effect becomes extremely slight.

To repeat an earlier observation, human attention doesn't accumulate indefinitely, and memory degrades over time. Promotional strategies either sell books or they don't. If they don't, they may leave behind a faint residuum of consciousness of you or your book, but it's not enough to help. The single biggest reason anyone buys a book is that they read and enjoyed another work by the same author. Below the "actually bought a copy and read it" line, the force generated by decomposing social media buzz is usually too faint to be measured outside a laboratory.

My alternate suggestion is that you use your time and energy to write another book. A good book is a permanent advertisement for all your other work. If you want a reliable multiplier of force, that's the one to pick.

I have not paid for a book tour, but have taken part in tours just arranged through forums. I think that sort of arrangement can be quite successful because the participants are sincere and enthusiastic.

"Blog Tours" are an actual thing - our publicity dept organises them now and again on publication. The crucial thing there is (a) we don't pay for coverage and (b) they are actual blogs, not spam blogs that nobody reads.

I don't really have any idea how blog tours translate into actual sales. I know I've bought books before based on them featuring on, say, BoingBoing or Whatever; those are about the only two instances I can think of, though. I'm sure it doesn't hurt, but I would be very hesitant about paying for it.

The reason I would pay attention to a blog like BoingBoing is that I read it every day while drinking my train-coffee, because it's entertaining; and because I know that things they feature are there because the editors genuinely like them, not because the author paid. Our tastes often intersect. If I am reading a blog that takes paid content from marketing networks, it's likely to be a mass of marketing material. Oh, wait - suddenly I'm not reading that blog at all!

Likewise, why am I - the genuine consumer looking for book recommendations - going to be following a Twitter account that blasts tweets out based on the subjects' ability to pay? Your book will reach their 10K followers or something. But why are they following? Are they fellow authors, or spambots?

Before you sign up for any kind of marketing service, put yourself in the shoes of the person you think is going to buy your book, and think about how they're habitually directing their attention. Is it at low-traffic, paid-content blogs, spammy Twitter accounts and Facebook pages?

Great advice. Thinking like a reader clears up all kinds of confusion.

HapiSofi said:

However, done consistently over time, all those incoming links increase your visibility online. And the more visibility you have online, the more likely you are to sell books!​

​

Not so fast. If you're going to self-promote, you have to pay attention to orders of magnitude, click-through rates, and other technicalities.

An accumulation of inbound links over time will increase your visibility on Google, which is good if someone's already looking for you, but not a lot of use if they aren't.

Click to expand...

Actually, in an attempt to crack down on the use of link farms to game the algorithm, Google will now penalize a site that has too many incoming links from low traffic websites.

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I think it's important to choose a book tour company which is right for your genre. If you have a YA book YA Bound is good, bit expensive. Site's a bit bright.

If you have a paranormal Bewitching Book Tours is typicall the place to go as that is about all they do.

If you have a Adult Romance your options are pretty open. Tasty Reads is an newer company but quite popular. Goddess Fish is another been in business for 5 years.

Do your research, rely on friends who've used the service before, most companies will answer any questions you many have, I know we do. (I'm not pimping myself out here) Just a bit of pointing in the right direction of ones that my author friends say are good.

LindaJeanne said:

Actually, in an attempt to crack down on the use of link farms to game the algorithm, Google will now penalize a site that has too many incoming links from low traffic websites.

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Glad they're being attentive. Google can cause real distortions in the online world when they fail to account for gaming strategies.