My Blog Tour

[Teresa Edgerton]

Here is the first interview of my November blog tour (a year ago, I didn't even knew that such a thing as a blog tour existed ... but I have to move with the times, don't I... can you believe that I am saying that?)

My Bookish Ways

Not part of the blog tour, but the first review of GM in twenty years can be found in the Reviews section here. Written by TJ, and although there are a few negatives, I think there are many accurate insights into the story.

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[Mouse]

Interesting stuff! Particularly looking forward to seeing the trailer.

What is a blog tour, Teresa? Just appearing on different blogs?

[The Judge]

Originally Posted by Teresa Edgerton

Not part of the blog tour, but the first review of GM in twenty years can be found in the Reviews section here.

Yay! I'm the first!! And I have insights!! *goes and has a cup of tea to calm down*


It was an interesting interview. What's a book trailer, though? Like a film trailer? Someone reading from the book, or people acting it out?

[Teresa Edgerton]

A blog tour is like a book tour, except that going from place to place live, you either get interviewed by email and it's posted on the blog, or you write a guest blog entry, which I would have offered to do, except that I've been so tired mentally that I couldn't think of anything brilliant to say. (You may have noticed -- with relief or otherwise -- the recent paucity of entries on my blog here.) I'm also devoting my remaining brain cells to other projects.

Like ... the book trailer.

It's the same as a movie trailer (sort of) except that it's promoting a book. But then you have no film clips from the book, like you would with a film, so you have to invent something. If you go for doing something live, you could film yourself talking about the book*, or you could make a mini-movie acting out scenes from the book.

We did that for The Hidden Stars with mixed results. We knew nothing of what we were doing, and learned along the way. Unfortunately, by the time we had learned some of it, our actors were burnt out, and the light for filming outdoors with a green screen just wasn't there in November. There were some ... unfortunate ... choices. You can still see the good and the bad of it on YouTube.

Or you can do something more abstract with stills, or pictures of clouds moving across the sky, or animated images, or a combination, which you would combine with music and titles. We're going for stills with music and titles, but you will have to wait and see what kind of pictures we are going to be doing (because I'm not sure yet whether this approach will turn out the way that I want it to, or be a total disaster and have to be changed).

*For an example of an author explaining how he was inspired to write his book, you can visit Stephen Palmer's amazon site: Stephen's Trailer
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[Teresa Edgerton]

And stop #2 on my blog tour:

Guerilla WordFare

[Mouse]

Nice. Very interested in The Queen's Necklace sequel!

[Stephen Palmer]

I'm liking this "blog tour" idea...

[TheTomG]

Blog tours and book trailers, new ideas to me! Congratulations are in order, alongside thanks on sharing these 2 marketing / promotional ideas!

[Teresa Edgerton]

The book trailers were from a news article someone posted here several years ago, and another member was talking about his blog tour (maybe last year?) -- can't remember who, in either case -- so I can't take credit for bringing the idea to the Chronicles. Though maybe it was time to revive the topics.

I'll let you all know, when I've completed the tour and finished up all the trailers, how much good all of it did.

At least it's more fun that book signings.

Stephen, you should definitely do a blog tour. It's not just interviews. Writers going the rounds also do guest blogs, and I think you would be good at that.

[Stephen Palmer]

Cheers! I did a guest blog for my ol' mate Keith Brooke recently. It's a great idea...

PS - how are you getting on with all those images?

[Teresa Edgerton]

We're having some trouble with them -- the ones we already had, and the ones you sent to me. Things look different at different sizes. I'm really almost at the point of tearing out my hair, because I want everything to be so entrancing that people will want to run out and buy the book. (Or, more realistically, so that they'll give serious consideration to buying the book when they can afford it.*)

*Although the Kindle edition is so amazingly reasonable in its price, they could really afford to buy it right now if they only knew. At $3.99, it's a steal.

[Teresa Edgerton]

Another stop on my blog tour:

Yet another interview

Fortunately, they aren't all asking the same questions over-and-over (well, a couple of the same questions like, "Why now?" and "What's next?" but mostly different ).

I'm not sure when the Skyped interview for Off the Shelf Boooks comes out. I have a great deal of trepidation about that one. I know I stuttered alot. And do you know how difficult it is to say sffchronicles aloud when you're already nervous? That second "f" is a real beast.

[The Judge]

Another interesting interview! I'm fascinated by the mechanics of the interviewing, though -- do they conduct them over the phone or is it done by a succession of emails to get the follow-up questions?

And the big question -- can you tell whether the tour has had an effect on the book's sales?

[Teresa Edgerton]

I don't think I'll know for a while how much good the interviews do.

The interviews are conducted by email -- all except for the upcoming Skype interview, which was recorded. Most of the time they just send you a list of questions and you answer them. For the sffworld one, she sent me three questions, then three more (based on the first three), then more (based on everything that went before). I thought it was a very good way to proceed. Blogs that do an interview every few days don't have time for that, or to research the books.

[The Judge]

That is a clever technique -- balancing time-saving against being able to respond to the answers already given.