YouTube is often referred to as the world’s second-largest search engine (after Google). With more than one billion users and billions of daily views, it can really get your message out there. Make a short video, post it on YouTube, and link to it from your website.

You can make a video book trailer (like a movie trailer) that is specifically about your book, or you can make a video about a related topic, which might pull in more viewers — or do both.

For example, if your historical novel takes place in an Irish castle and you visited several said castles while researching your book, make a video about Irish castles that will appeal to both Irish tourists and castle buffs. At the end of the video, mention your book and ask viewers to buy it to learn what really went on when the drawbridge went up.

Use these simple ASBATM video guidelines that I just invented:

  1. Get your viewer’s Attention fast
  2. Tell a Story
  3. Include a Benefit
  4. End with a call to Action

If you need help creating a video, hire a professional like Gael Chandler of Picture Your Book, a company that specializes in producing book trailers. Here’s a Picture Your Book project showing how video trailers work:

Next: Create your collateral.

Back to Set up pre-launch communications.