Are you an indie author dreaming of ways to hit bestseller lists? At Ingenium Books, we have helped authors realize this dream. For example, Dr. Peter Silverstone’s The Promise of Psychedelics: Science-Based Hope for Better Mental Health hit number four on the Wall Street Journal bestseller list for nonfiction in April 2022, and Dr. Jack Rocco’s Recycled: A Reluctant Search for True Self Through Nurture, Nature, and Free Will hit the #1 spot for nonfiction ebooks in June 2023. (The WSJ has since stopped publishing its bestseller list.) We’ve have many other bestsellers on Amazon and Barnes and Noble, too.
Why is this such a prestigious achievement? And what can you do to become a bestselling indie author too?
What bestselling status can mean for you as an author
There’s a good reason why hitting one or more bestseller lists can be such a coveted milestone. While a measure of sales, it can also boost further book sales. It can establish or enhance your credibility. In essence, it symbolizes validation of your work, professional reputation, and market credibility.
What’s the secret to becoming a bestseller?
Based on our real-life experience at Ingenium Books, we have identified seven key steps to help you find your book on bestseller lists if you’re an indie author. Each of these steps is part of a strategic and multi-week content strategy. Here are the key steps to include:
1. Establish your target audience
A content strategy is meaningless if you haven’t first established your target audience. Knowing who your target readers are, where they are, and what their needs and desires are help you find ways to engage and resonate with them.
Once you’ve pinned down who you want to buy and read your book, you’re ready to develop a content strategy that caters to their needs and wants.
2. Gather endorsements
Endorsements are like little pots of gold for your content strategy. In today’s digital landscape, where the internet is flooded with information, it is essential to make your work stand out and capture the attention of potential readers. Endorsements act as a seal of approval, inspiring trust and confidence in the reader while showcasing the book’s merits.
An endorser should be someone your target readers already trust, and who is fairly high profile and well-known in their field. By securing endorsements from reputable figures, you can leverage your connections and demonstrate expertise in your subject matter. This not only enhances the book’s appeal but also opens the door for speaking engagements, partnerships, and mentorships, all of which can help propel your career forward.
Endorsements add credibility to the book and act as social proof, attracting a wider range of readers and impressing potential buyers. This invaluable social proof can help attract media attention as it simultaneously builds your author credibility, and ultimately drives book sales.
Dr. Peter Silverstone, for example, started his endorser campaign months in advance. It involved a team, plan, and strategy, as well as a rollout calendar. By gathering endorsements from other influential individuals, he managed to create a buzz around his book, thus driving sales during the crucial one-week sales period required for achieving bestseller status.
3. Build your author platform and presence
Your author platform is the foundation on which you build connections with your target audience, showcase your expertise, and ultimately, sell more books. A robust platform will not only help you establish credibility and trust with your readers, but it will also increase your visibility and secure future opportunities, such as speaking engagements and media appearances.
Your platform should encompass your social media presence, website or blog, email list, and any other channels through which you can engage with your audience. Investing time and effort into building and nurturing your author platform will lay the groundwork for long-term success.
A strong author platform enables you to create and nurturer authentic connections with your audience, leading to increased engagement and word-of-mouth marketing. Your platform and presence also helps bridge the gap between the reader’s expectations and the book’s actual content, as demonstrated through genuine reader reviews.
Finally, developing and maintaining a powerful author platform can pave the way for future success in the form of speaking engagements, media appearances, and even further book deals. By investing in a robust author platform, you create a foundation that not only supports your current goals but also has the potential to propel your career to even greater heights.
4. Create engaging social content
Many authors struggle with what to say when they think about sharing about their book via social media or elsewhere. But it’s fairly simple and doesn’t have to be yucky self-promotion. Your book delivers value to just the right reader — focus on that.
Creating engaging social media content, posts, articles, and emails involves sharing relevant quotations from inside the book, thought-provoking excerpts or longer pieces, and creating blog posts that resonate with your core audience. With these quotes and other content pieces prompting discussion, your book is more likely to capture attention and interest, resulting in increased book sales.
Consider building out a content calendar with milestone dates for the content creation, review, and then the social sharing schedule.
5. Build a launch team
Becoming a bestseller is much easier when you build a dedicated and focused launch team. This is a group of people that will work together to generate buzz and excitement for your book, leading to increased sales and visibility throughout the campaign. Leverage your connections, both personal and professional, and invite them to become part of your launch team. That awesome content you create in step four above is the same content you can ask your launch team to help you share and distribute, helping you reach beyond your network and into theirs.
It’s important to create a sense of community among the launch team members. This can foster open dialogue and a shared mission to promote the book. A team that comprises people with experience and skills in areas such as social media, public relations, and sales can significantly increase the chances of becoming a bestseller around your launch. Check out our online Launch Team Training for authors if you want to learn more.
Having a team of passionate supporters in place can generate a sense of momentum and excitement around the book, which in turn can attract readers, drive sales, and enhance reputation. Finally, the launch team’s collective efforts can help sustain the book’s performance in the market over the long term, ensuring that its impact extends beyond the initial launch period.
6. Advance review copies
By distributing advance review copies (ARC) to readers, including your launch team, you’re cultivating your audience, nurturing relationships, and helping turn potential readers into superfans. Providing these ARCs allows recipients to feel special and they’ll be empowered and eager to write reader reviews on platforms like Amazon or Goodreads. Your aim is to build momentum and anticipation for the book’s launch, establishing credibility and generating buzz around the impact of the book. This ultimately helps increase visibility and enhances the chances of driving sales during the crucial first week of the book’s release.
7. Ask for reader reviews
Right off the top here, let’s make it clear that you want honest, authentic reviews. Not an if-you-review-my-book-I’ll-do-x-for-you kind of thing. Real reader reviews play a key role in attracting new readers and the social proof they provide helps boost book sales.
Your launch team is full of people who you want to ask to write and publish a review. But don’t be shy — you want readers who are willing and able to share their experience with your book, what they liked and even what they didn’t. Balanced reviews, where a review talks about pros and cons from their perspective, help align reader expectations. And when you are doing that, you ultimately influence future reviews, because you should be getting more of the right readers attracted to your book.
If you need to aim for a number, try to get at least 15 published reviews on Amazon, from people you don’t know, within a few days of the book’s launch. Doing this means finding a way to follow up with your ARC readers, even if it feels intrusive, in order to encourage them to provide their thoughts on the book. And don’t take it personally when a majority of people who agreed to accept your ARC don’t actually end up writing a review. It’s not you — it’s just human nature. Accept this and move on!
Your Book on Bestseller Lists
Your bestseller status isn’t just a dream; it’s an achievable goal within your grasp. If you want to hear more about our experience bringing books to the Wall Street Journal bestselling author, be sure to check out this episode of the Ingenium Books Podcast.
