Promotional Plan

The Promotional Plan box is a vital space to communicate with your publicist and the rest of the team.

This is where your publicist will list what they plan to do for your book.

Your publicist will base their approach on:

• Your book.
• Your Reader Reports.
• Your Profile.
• Any additional information you’ve added to your Book Details and Marketing page.

They should do this a few months before your book is out.

You should use this box to inform your publicist:

• In Promotional Plans outline in bullets what you will do to promote your book. Update this regularly after publication. Add your website and social media.
• Under a separate title add Priorities for in-house PR. Detail the most important activities you think your in-house publicist should do to promote your book.
• Check your Keywords are the best they can be: These are crucial, so make sure you’ve read our Keywords guidance. Write them in the Keywords box in the Advertising section. We will enter them on trade databases, Google and Amazon so that your title has maximum “discoverability”. If you do not enter anything here, we will do it, but you are more familiar with the title.
• Upload a Press Release to Publicity. Include 8-10 talking points your publicist can use when pitching to the media.

Remember, there are tens of thousands of authors and publicists in the world sourcing interviews so really highlight areas of interest.

Don't talk about:

• Your writing process.
• Anything dull.

Do talk about:

• What’s interesting about you?
• What motivated you to write the book?
• What’s the story behind your book?
• What were your challenges writing the book?
• Human interest and layered talking points

Every time your book sells 500 copies, your publicist will perform another round of work and add their plan here.

So this is the plan. Where can I see which bits have been done?

Your publicist will record the work they complete in Marketing Activities. This page acts as a history for the Marketing and PR work that is done on your book. You can see, at a glance, what work has been done.

Don’t write urgent messages to your publicist here

Your publicist will check this box when it comes to make a plan, either for your book launch or for new 500+ round of work.

If you have a query that needs to be answered check the Publishing Guide, and if you can’t find the answer there, drop us a line in the Marketing section of the Author Forum. Remember, you can always discuss your publicity experience with other JHP authors too.