I know I keep repeating myself, but when times are tough and you are cutting back on different things, make sure you don’t cut back completely on your marketing.  When sales are down and the economy is bad, marketing is the one thing you should make sure to do even more than usual.

You should already be doing one thing every day to market yourself or your business or your book or whatever it is you want to sell.  Try to step that up and do 2 things every single day to market yourself.  You will not see immediate results but it will pay off later.

Aggressively work on your marketing plan:

Send out press releases, keep yourself in the eyes of your target audience during the recession. Since you may have less work than normal, this is a great time to do this. Nothing may happen now but in six months you will see results.

One of the first things to go when cash flow gets tight is the marketing budget. You couldn’t make a bigger mistake.  Now is the time to amp up your marketing efforts!

When you stop marketing you will have less sales, which translates into less cash flow.

Everyone is cutting back on marketing right now, so this is your opportunity to really shine!  Some things you can do to market during a credit crisis include:

• Marketing online
• Guerilla marketing
• Word of mouth marketing
• Offering specials to existing customers

Co-mailing, what is it?

I co-mail, but I have to say that I don’t know many other businesses or author’s who do.

Co-mailing is the process in which a mailer, which would be you, combines the mailing of your brochure, flyer, postcard or magazine with that of other similar mailing pieces.

I have 5 self published books and when I sell a book (or two!) I send it out with inserts I have collected from colleagues in the industry.  My books are about collecting money and starting a collection agency.  When I make a sale, I package up my books and I include a flyer about collection software, a postcard about skip tracing, a brochure about becoming a certified collector and a catalog filled with debt collection stickers and tools. In exchange, these businesses have my book listed on their websites, or for sale on their websites.

We support each other while giving the customer added value.

Think about your book, is there anyone you can co-mail with? If you can’t come up with anyone you think you can co-mail with, post a comment below and I will brainstorm and come up with some ideas of who you can co-mail with.

Barack Obama has won the presidency! Rejoicing is going on world wide – the world has been watching. Obama has made history and will bring change.

How can you change what you have been doing this past year to make your book sales increase and to make more money?  Get out a notebook and write down a list of things you can do differently to increase awareness and sales in the coming months.

You CAN do it – ANYTHING is possible.  The first step is writing it down.