Has anyone paid for a blog tour? What was your experience? Was it worth the investment? If so, any recommendations on companies?
Blog Tours?
- Thread starter JamieMarchant
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I haven't done it yet, but I plan to. I've done some research and plan on using Goddess Fish Promotions. They have reasonable prices and good reviews.
When I was a brand new pseudonym (eight or so months ago), AW's own Allison M. posted that she'd be hosting a blog tour for romance writers. She very nicely let me join the tour and I finally had some visitors come to my blog site.
Most of them were fellow writers, true, but writers are almost all readers, and a few of them have stuck around to become my readers. I counted this as a wonderful success.
I've never tried a commercial blog tour but the few I've investigated were expensive. I contacted one writer who had paid for the service (only one: results may vary) and she was impressed by the company, impressed by the tour, but unimpressed by resulting sales.
Most of them were fellow writers, true, but writers are almost all readers, and a few of them have stuck around to become my readers. I counted this as a wonderful success.
I've never tried a commercial blog tour but the few I've investigated were expensive. I contacted one writer who had paid for the service (only one: results may vary) and she was impressed by the company, impressed by the tour, but unimpressed by resulting sales.
I wouldn't bother pay for one. Just set it up with authors who write in the same genre or niche (who you can meet on our very own AW, of course!), who have followers who are likely to enjoy your books as well.
Agree, this isn't a service I would pay for. Particularly if you're not familiar with the blogs who will be featuring you on the tour.
Agreed! I wouldn't pay for it either. The girl who organized my first one was marvelous, and she didn't charge a dime. She's getting out of blogging apparently, but the girls who are organizing my next blog tour are just as awesome and they, too, don't charge.
I definitely don't advocate paying for them unless you really can't afford the time.
Take your time, get know bloggers in your genre and their reviewing style, then politely ask for a review. As a (retiring) book blogger, I much prefer authors to treat me as a normal human rather than sending some strange, impersonal tour company to my inbox.
Also, none of the money made by blog tour companies goes to the bloggers. This bothers me a lot.
Take your time, get know bloggers in your genre and their reviewing style, then politely ask for a review. As a (retiring) book blogger, I much prefer authors to treat me as a normal human rather than sending some strange, impersonal tour company to my inbox.
Also, none of the money made by blog tour companies goes to the bloggers. This bothers me a lot.
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Blech. I wasn't planning on doing a paid blog tour in the first place, but now there's no way I'm adding it to my to-do list. Thank you for the heads-up.
The money you pay blog tour organisers is in return for the time and expertise they use arranging your blog tour. If you paid a publicist would you expect the newspapers which reviewed your book to receive part of that payment?
sarahdalton
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I do pay for my blog tours because that they are arranged quickly and the organisers have better contacts than me. Plus, after the blog tour has ended I then have a new contact to approach by myself in the future. You can do it by yourself. I just find it a leg up this way.
For a week promo blast I pay $40, which I think is very reasonable and worth it. But, each to their own.
For a week promo blast I pay $40, which I think is very reasonable and worth it. But, each to their own.
That's what I'm doing for the exact reasons you listed. I have contracted Goddess Fish Promotions and am just waiting to get my dates. I'll post back on the results when it is completed.
I absolutely pay for my blog tours. Goddess Fish is great as are some others. As another person said, if the money *did* go to the bloggers, there'd be a conflict of interest because they review the book. I do try to offer a sizeable giveaway for their readers, since that helps them draw traffic. Quite frankly, I consider it a must have for getting exposure. Sales are another thing but that is more dependent on your cover/blurb/etc. Or if you do a tour with blogs with low traffic...
I was confused by the idea that people set up tours for free? I have setup one of my own tours and it was incredibly time consuming contacting those places and scheduling everything. I consider most prices I've seen, including Goddess Fish, to be very fair for that much work. I'd never ask anyone to do that for me for free... except maybe my husband
I was confused by the idea that people set up tours for free? I have setup one of my own tours and it was incredibly time consuming contacting those places and scheduling everything. I consider most prices I've seen, including Goddess Fish, to be very fair for that much work. I'd never ask anyone to do that for me for free... except maybe my husband
I'm wondering about the usefulness of a blog tour for a literary novel. From what I've seen, most of them seem geared toward blogs in particular genres, and there aren't that many blogs that focus on lit fic.
The cost of a blog tour concerns me too, in a bang-for-the-buck sense. Has your own tour been successful, if you've done one?
The cost of a blog tour concerns me too, in a bang-for-the-buck sense. Has your own tour been successful, if you've done one?
Yeah, I don't get it either... but then I have zero social networking skills...
What would you call a "success?" I'm not clear on the idea behind blog tours, either - mainly because I don't read many blogs about writers.
I'm not completely convinced of the usefulness of blog tours. I'm not convinced blog tours up book sales. What do you guys think? I mean, yes, it's obviously amazing to get the word out, but how effective are these tours? For folks who are experts at this stuff, please advise ...
My first book was published in January 2013. I set up my own blog tour. Yes, it was time consuming, but not too bad. And hey, it was free. A couple months later, I paid $20 for a "review only" blog tour and I was happy with it. I got approximately 8 reviews - honest reviews. As a matter of fact, one kinda sucked but it was still a three star. The rest were really good. I write erotic paranormal romance and used Book Monster Promotions. She's had a few best selling authors book with her. http://www.bookmonsterpromotions.com/p/home-page.html
A couple months later, I paid $20 for a "review only" blog tour and I was happy with it. I got approximately 8 reviews - honest reviews. As a matter of fact, one kinda sucked but it was still a three star. The rest were really good. I write erotic paranormal romance and used Book Monster Promotions. She's had a few best selling authors book with her. http://www.bookmonsterpromotions.com/p/home-page.html
Same here. I decided it wasn't worth it for my book. Genre fiction, especially popular genres, can definitely benefit from a well-organized blog tour, though.
I've known two self-publisher writers who tried one. Very different results. They both paid the same, but one saw only a small change in sales and the other saw a modest change. That being said, their genre's and writing styles are also different, which might have played a part. I waiting for more feedback before I try one.
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I pay for blog tours and consider them an essential part of my marketing. I've done tons of individual letters to bloggers and have certainly gotten reviews that way. But compared to the ease and speed with which a tour operator can set up 30 reviews in thirty days -- and all for a couple of hundred dollars-- the tour gets my vote every time.
I monitor my sales daily and find that, when I've got a tour going, my sales percolate along nicely. It helps a lot if they run tweets about their reviews. It's all part of keeping some kind of presence out there all the time, so people don't forget about you. Even if you don't get a sale from a review, all those posts and tweets and reviews all over the internet add up and work for you eventually.
You need, of course, a reputable tour operator. If you look in any of those blogs you'd like a review from, you'll probably see tour banners at the top of their reviews. That's because so many bloggers do much of their reviewing in connection with tours. Booking a tour with one of those operators can be an easy way to get reviewed in the blog that interests you.
I monitor my sales daily and find that, when I've got a tour going, my sales percolate along nicely. It helps a lot if they run tweets about their reviews. It's all part of keeping some kind of presence out there all the time, so people don't forget about you. Even if you don't get a sale from a review, all those posts and tweets and reviews all over the internet add up and work for you eventually.
You need, of course, a reputable tour operator. If you look in any of those blogs you'd like a review from, you'll probably see tour banners at the top of their reviews. That's because so many bloggers do much of their reviewing in connection with tours. Booking a tour with one of those operators can be an easy way to get reviewed in the blog that interests you.
Anne, do you think you recoup the money you spend on tours in sales as a result of them? Or do you think that it's good exposure and worth the reviews, and hope that it all works out in the future?
Just wondering.
Just wondering.
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It's a fair question. Sometimes I do recoup my expenses dollar for dollar in sales. But sometimes I don't. I look at it as more of an investment for down the road, although not a very big investment. I don't have a huge marketing budget by any means!
I do think that paying $150 for a 30 review tour is well worth it. To generate that many reviews on my own would take such an enormous time and effort that it makes the $150 price tag seem reasonable. You also get the additional exposure of tweets and repostings of the reviews in amazon and goodreads.
The book tour reviews definitely bring in more sales than ads, say in goodreads, or press releases, which haven't gotten me anything at all.
I've also noticed that really high-profile mentions, like in huffpost.com and usatoday.com, brought me sales, but not noticeably more than my old tried and true book tour reviews.
That's why I keep coming back to the book tours. But are you guaranteed to make your money back? Nope. I don't think many fiction writers can expect that.
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Speaking of blog tours, would anyone happen to know (of) a reputable blog tour operator who (a) does fantasy and (b) does selfpublishers?
I've been surfing myself in a knot but I'm too unfamiliar with the international blog world to get very far on my own.
I've been surfing myself in a knot but I'm too unfamiliar with the international blog world to get very far on my own.
sarahdalton
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I've used Reading Addiction Tours. The first one went really well, but I did notice in the second one that a couple of the reviewers never ended up posting a review and I don't think they chased it up.
However, they are very reasonable and accept self-published writers. They also create a nice little banner for hosts to display on their sites.
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