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There are two ways to think about book marketing. You can view it as an expense to be minimized or an investment to be maximized. 

If you want to reap a harvest, you must first sow the seeds. 

When you view marketing as an expense, you’re essentially asking, “How few seeds can I plant in the ground?”

Instead, you should ask, “How can I get the biggest harvest?” The biggest harvest often means sowing more seeds in better soil.  

You don’t have to throw good seeds on bad ground. But if you have good soil, you can maximize your harvest by planting as many seeds as possible.  

Many people believe that doing things on a budget means spending as little money as possible, but that is mistaken thinking. A budget simply allows you to count the costs of the project and decide how much you will spend before you even begin the project.

Jesus once said:

For who would begin construction of a building without first calculating the cost to see if there is enough money to finish it? Otherwise, you might complete only the foundation before running out of money, and then everyone would laugh at you. They would say, ‘There’s the person who started that building and couldn’t afford to finish it!’ (Luke 14:28 –30 NLT).

Failure to count the costs ahead of time commonly kills a writing career. Authors often run out of time, energy, or money before they find success. Since the book launch comes towards the end of the journey, it often gets short shrift. 

Cost to Launch a Book 

How do you get the most bang for your buck out of your book launch? How do you invest money in your launch so that you see a return, rather than wasting money on no-return expenses? 

Warnings

Now before we discuss the costs, let’s heed a few warnings. 

Warning #1: Only Invest What You Are Willing to Lose

Like any investment, investing in your book launch is risky. Even if you do everything right, you may not get your money back. This is especially true if you are launching your first book. 

My dad often reminds me, “Never make investment decisions out of fear or greed.” 

An old publishing joke says, “To make a small fortune in publishing, you need to start with a large fortune.” 

To make any investment work, you must be willing to take risks. It is hard and unwise to take risks with the money you need to pay your regular bills. If the amount you are investing in your book launch keeps you up at night, cut your launch budget until you can sleep. 

Very few books published by traditional publishers make money. At a traditional publishing house, one successful book in ten usually carries the other nine. 

While you need optimism about your book to begin the publishing journey, you also need to be realistic. Your book might not be a breakout money-maker.

If you are struggling to fund your launch, you may be launching too soon.

Warning #2: Don’t Go into Debt for Your Book Launch 

Predatory companies will pressure you to take on debt to publish and launch your book. Avoid any company that uses high-pressure sales tactics. Success in publishing takes a long time, and you don’t want to be running away from your creditors while chasing your publishing goals. 

If you need a loan to fund your launch, you are launching too soon.

Warning #3: Be the Customer

Free publishing tools and platforms abound. But when you use free tools, you are not the customer. You are the product being sold to someone else. 

The food is free in the chicken coop when your eggs are being taken away and given to someone else or, God forbid, you are put on the dinner plate.

Companies offering free tools may sell your attention to advertisers or sell your personal data to data brokers. While some free tools can help you with your book launch, others get in the way. 

For example, Facebook sells your data to Amazon. Amazon then deletes book reviews left by your Facebook friends and fellow group members. The more time you spend using the free tools of Facebook, the harder your launch will be. 

To find out if you are the customer of a free tool, ask yourself, “Do I have someone to contact if something goes wrong?” 

No one at Facebook will talk to you because you are not Facebook’s customer. On the other hand, if Amazon has a question, someone at Facebook will happily talk to them because Amazon spends millions of dollars buying Facebook user data.  

Authors who use Amazon and Facebook often become casualties of the data war. Authors aren’t necessarily doing anything wrong, but they suffer the consequences of other wrongdoers.

Amazon has a big problem with fake product reviews. Sellers on Amazon often join a huge Facebook group and give away free products in exchange for an Amazon review. 

To crack down on the problem and keep the review process legitimate, Amazon has started buying group data from Facebook and deleting Amazon reviews left by people who are friends with the seller or in the same group. 

Sadly, authors have suffered because of the crackdown.

The only free tools I recommend are tools that have a free version and a paid version. Even if you use the free version, you are still their potential customer. They want you to upgrade to the paid version, so they’re more likely to care about your user experience.

Warning #4: Save Strategically  

What if you don’t have the cash for a book launch? 

Do what your grandparents did back in the day. Save the money. In the olden days, if someone wanted something they couldn’t afford, they would save some money each month until they could afford it. 

So how do you get money to save? One great strategy to earn money and sharpen your author skills is to work as an editor or an author assistant. The experience and income you gain will help when it comes time to launch your book.

As Jesus once said, “Until you are faithful with that which is another’s, who will give you that which is your own?” 

Delaying your book launch allows you time to save up a pile of money to spend on your launch and learn the necessary skills. 

If you want more tips on how to make money as an author, listen to my episode called Yes, YOU Can Make a Living as a Writer, Here’s How.

Count Your Time and Money

I know an author who writes book after book and rarely invests time or money into launching those books. His books only get a few dozen readers and a couple of reviews. I hate to see excellent writing wasted and ignored like that. With a little marketing effort, those books could reach many more people. 

Launching a book will cost time and money. Evaluate how much time and money you have to invest in your launch. Be specific about the amounts you’ll spend. Write on a piece of paper how much money and time you are willing to invest in your book. 

As you choose the amount you want to spend, remember two things:

You Spent Hundreds of Hours Writing Your Book.

The launch investment needs to honor the time and money you’ve already invested in writing your book. 

You Can Never Make More Time.

But you can make more money. Remember that your hours are more valuable than your dollars. 

Got your numbers? Excellent! Now it is time to determine the best way to invest.

The amount you’ve budgeted to invest determines which strategy you will use. 

Some authors have more time, and some have more cash. Your time-cash surplus (or lack of a surplus) will determine which strategy you’ll use.

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Cash Rich & Time Poor

Authors who are cash rich and time poor can have successful book launches. The best strategy is to use your cash to hire professionals to take tasks off your plate and save you time. 

Hire: 

• a webmaster to prepare your website for launch
• a copywriter to polish your back cover copy
• a launch team organizer to interact with and motivate your launch team
• a PR person to set up media interviews
• an author assistant to help with email, logistics, and small tasks 
• a housekeeper

Several of those tasks require specialized skills, and even if you aren’t cash rich, you may save yourself a lot of time and headache by hiring a professional. 

Even if you are time poor, you must still invest some time into your launch. For example, a PR person can get you booked f