Welcome Guest [Log In] [Register]
Add Reply
Are You Promoting Books With Video?
Topic Started: Sep 7 2015, 10:17 PM (157 Views)
kingwand
Member Avatar
Administrator
In my recent survey about the top 10 online promotional tactics authors are planning to use this year, video was the sixth most popular tactic. When a reader left a comment wondering why more authors don't use video to promote books, I suggested that perhaps they don't know how to create and use videos. Here are a couple of how-to articles that may be helpful: Book Video Trailers: 11 Steps to Make Your Own JoannaPennIn today's guest post, author and book marketing expert Joanna Penn shares her tips for creating and posting book promotion videos. She makes it sound so easy -- give it a try! Book video trailers are videos posted online and distributed via video networking sites like YouTube. These can be big budget blockbuster movie clips, or budget MovieMaker slides to music. You can make it an advert or a social media fun clip that people want to watch. It can be a human interest story made more like a documentary. It can be a cartoon. Essentially, it is anything you want it to be. Anything that catches people’s attention. You can get a professional to make you one or you can make your own for little or no money. I made this book video trailer with Windows Movie Maker (which is on most PCs). It took me several hours but was essentially free, and you don’t have to be too techy to make one too. Instructions after the movie! (comments and feedback welcome!) 1. Research other book video trailers that are similar to what you would like to do. Just search for book trailers on YouTube. Decide what you like and don’t like (and what is within your capacity and budget). 2. Write a brief script for the trailer so you can get it straight in your head and understand what images and text you will need (I just did this on Microsoft Word). 3. Find and download images to match your words. You can use your own or get free ones online by googling “royalty free photo”. I use iStockPhoto which I find easy to use with a variety of pictures and I did pay a small amount for some photos. You can also use movie clips (which I am still learning about!) 4. Import the pictures into Windows MovieMaker. (File -> Import Media) 5. Order the pictures. Drag them into the movie bar at the bottom of the screen in the order you want. Right click and Cut to remove again. Basic drag and drop functionality. Remember to save regularly! 6. Add script by clicking on the picture in the movie bar and then clicking Edit -> Titles and Credits. You can add text in various styles, colours and transition effects here. You can add text before, on top of or after your pictures. 7. Edit. Once you have got the basic pictures and text setup, see how long your movie is. Most book trailers are no longer than 1 minute 30 seconds. Edit as necessary by clicking and dragging the size of the boxes to shorten the time frame they show on the screen. 8. Find music to match the length of your movie (or cut to fit). I used SoundSnap.com but you can google “royalty free music” to find other sites. I searched on audio length within classical music and listened to a few before choosing. 9. Check you are happy with everything and then Publish your movie to your computer. 10. Find tags. Now you have a file you can publish it to the internet movie sites to get some viewers. You need to know what tags you want to add to your video when you upload it, so I suggest you also research what people are searching on in your genre. I use Google Keyword Search which has a number of tools and recommended related words. 11. Upload your video to appropriate sites. I have loaded mine to YouTube and Google Video so far. It takes some time per site, unless you use a video submission site like TubeMogul.com or TrafficGeyser, which is expensive and really only for companies with lots of video. You can submit manually to sites like Revver, MySpaceTV, Metacafe, Yahoo Video, Book Trailers, AuthorsDen. No doubt there are many more! Remember to also use the embed links to post to your own website, blog and social networking sites. Have you had any promotional success with book video trailers? Where do you post them online? About the Author Joanna Penn is an author and blogger at The Creative Penn: Writing, self-publishing, print-on-demand, internet sales and promotion . . .for your book. For more information on how to use Web 2.0 to write, publish, sell and promote your books, get your FREE Author 2.0 Blueprint here. Related article: 7 Ways to Promote Your Book With Video Promote a Book with Video - How to Get Started MaAnnaStephensonIn today's guest post, my favorite technical expert, MaAnna Stephenson, discusses the hardware and software needed to promote a book with video. According to a recent article in Scientific American, "video files will be part of 90 percent of all consumer Internet traffic (that generated by households, universities, and Internet cafés) in 2013." This statement is part of a report issued by Cisco, which is the leading supplier of networking equipment and network management for the Internet. Cisco issued that report just one day after Apple announced that their next iPhone will be able to not only record video clips, but will also be able to edit and send them via email or upload them to YouTube using voice commands. What this means is that it will no longer be enough to provide great text content for online marketing. As a promoter, you'll have to make it visually entertaining as well. Fortunately there are a lot of free or inexpensive applications available that you can use to make your own videos to promote your book. In fact, if you're on a PC, Windows Media is already available to you. There are even more programs available for MAC users. You say you don't have the money for a slick, high-budget production? No problem. Folk-style video is so common that even the most reasonable efforts to make it a quality production will stand out. And, there's another perk to making your own videos. They will have a genuineness and sincerity factor that high-budget productions can't match. If you’re a little intimidated by the learning curve and expense of equipment you’ll need to produce a video, don’t be. The best way to get started in promoting your book with video marketing is to make a movie trailer from still shots. The software to do this is free and may already reside on your computer. Following is a list to get you started. If your operating system is Windows XP or Vista, then Windows Movie Maker is probably already installed. If you use a Mac, look for iMovie software that is either already installed or free for download. Photo Story 3 is another video editor and is available as a free download and makes movies from still shots, like book covers. It also has a way to edit a sound track. (Works with Windows.) Paint.net is a free image and photo editing software that will allow you to customize your still shots, like your book cover and such. It will also allow you to create new stills for text. Audacity is an audio editor (for your soundtrack), and is available as a free download. A warning about copyright: There are lots of sites that offer stock clips and soundtracks. Do not use anything that does not have a public domain or Creative Commons license. If you want to make a live video, there are several inexpensive digital cameras with built-in mics and a USB connector. Two of the most popular models are the Flip Video Mino and the Kodak Zi6. Both come in high definition models. If you get the HD Flip model, be sure to get it bundled with a tripod. It works great sitting still, but doesn’t provide clear detail when being moved around. You’ll also want to consider your lighting source and background when you shoot a video. Follow the KISS principle and Keep It Simple, Silly. Remember, there’s a difference in hokey and folk-y. Keep your background clear of clutter. If you don’t want to put yourself on camera, you can still make an interesting video with still slides and a voice-over. Mics come in a lot of price ranges and the general rule about higher price – better mic holds true. However, if you are simply doing a voice-over after you have the video edited, you can probably make do nicely with a good USB headset mic, which is the same kind you would use to make a call through your computer on Skype. Plantronics makes a very good one that is affordable. And, you can use it for podcasts too. So, jump right in and start making a movie. You might be surprised at how much fun it can be. You can find the cameras and headsets listed above on Amazon.com. MaAnna Stephenson is degreed in electronics and is the author of multiple technical manuals. With over two decades of experience as a Web site director, she has helped many non-profit agencies and small businesses achieve their online goals. MaAnna is the author of the Just the FAQs series of e-books that teach the technical aspects of online marketing to non-geeks. Visit Just the FAQs for more. Related Articles: 7 Ways to Promote Your Book With Video Book Video Trailers: 11 Steps to Make Your Own
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
1 user reading this topic (1 Guest and 0 Anonymous)
« Previous Topic · Marketing eBooks · Next Topic »
Add Reply