back matter – Science Fiction & Fantasy Marketing Podcast

SFFMP 49: Productivity and First Book Success with Zach Bohannon

September 29, 2015 SFFpodcast Author Interview, Podcast

Today we interviewed fresh new horror/dystopian fiction author, Zach Bohannon. Despite a full time job and a family, he’s managed to write and publish five novels (and some short stories) already this year. He also got off to a great start with excellent sales and reviews of the books in his Empty Bodies series. We asked him how he got those early sales, whether being in Kindle Unlimited helped, and why his dog is named after a beer company.

Here are some of the highlights:

Managing a full time job and a family while writing and publishing multiple novels a year
Calls to action (CTAs) in the back matter of the book to ask for reviews and mailing list sign-ups
Calls to action in the front matter of a book, yea or nay?
Can you have too many CTAs? Should you just stick to one?
Challenges of marketing dystopian/post apocalyptic fiction versus horror
Having a great first book launch based largely on a good cover and low price in a popular genre (Zach also started in Kindle Unlimited and had lots of good things to say about his experiences in KDP Select thus far)
Appearing on podcasts as part of a promotions strategy
What Zach does for social media, and does he think it’s important for book sales?
Connecting with readers on Instagram (check out Zach’s page) versus Twitter — people pause and you can more easily grab their attention with images on Instagram (he goes and comments on other people’s photos, rather than worrying too much about putting up photos of his own)
Using auto-responders for your mailing list to connect with readers.
How Zach feels about advertising and sponsored posts on blogs/newsletters.