My former writing coach client’s two books weren’t new. Far from it. Dr. Surender R. Neravetla, MD, FACS–director of cardiac surgery at Ohio’s Springfield Regional Medical–published Salt Kills in 2012 and Salt: Black America’s Silent Killer in 2014. During that time, neither had topped the sales charts. Still, knowing how passionate he was about his topic, I reached out to him after teaming up with @KeriBarnum, the book marketing expert now working with Incubation Press.
Although Dr. Neravetla and I hadn’t talked in years, we took back up like a couple of old friends. It turned out that the Doctor, who has performed more than 10,000 cardiac, thoracic and vascular surgeries since 1983, has consistently reached out to the Black American community about their particular sensitivity to salt. In the process, he’s given away thousands of copies of his book Salt: Black America’s Silent Killer.
I suggested that perhaps it was time to consider an online book campaign. Not only would it spread his message about the dangers of salt much more widely, he might actually make some money. Would he be interested in my setting up a three-way call with Keri?
After our conversation, before Keri and I had even put together our proposal for promoting his books online, Keri sent him an email.
“This never gets old,” she wrote. “Doctor, I optimized your categories on the Kindle edition of the 2nd Salt book [Salt: Black America’s Silent Killer] yesterday. Before optimization, your highest ranking was 6,042. After optimization, your highest category ranking is 60 – which officially makes Amazon’s bestseller list!”
Yup! After six years of less-than-stellar sales, Dr. Neravetla can now say that he has an Amazon bestseller. While bragging rights are lovely, that ranking will help sales. And that’s just the start.
Imagine what will happen when we (and by “we” I mean Keri) optimize both versions of both of Dr. Neravetla’s books and advertise them.
And imagine what could happen to your book, whether it’s been out a while or is still incubating.
I know I have. That’s why I’ve hired Keri to promote the memoir I co-authored–Busting the Brass Ceiling: How a Heroic Female Cop Changed the Face of Policing–and why she’s helping a number of my clients who have finished their books. Stay tuned!
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