Book Reviews: Reasons Your Book Is Turned Down
Being a book review blogger, I get more book review requests than you can even imagine. That’s to be expected since the service I offer is free to the author and a great way to get their book in the spot-light to the community. There has to be a method to the madness otherwise the books would pile up in my mailbox and my reading list would go on forever. Therefore, book reviewers devise a method to how they go about narrowing down the list. Here are some helpful tips to get your acim NOTICED in the crowd.
Personalize: Reviewers don’t want to see a generic forwarded email popping up in their inbox. If you plan to take all of five minutes to create a mass text email to send to hundreds of bloggers, why should they take hours to read and write about your book? Show that you are a real human being and are looking for honest readers to check your book out. Personalize each request if you can.
Research: Most review websites will plainly write a list of which books they enjoy reading and will accept for review. If the blogger is solely a reader of paranormal books and you send a request for a western novel, you have to expect the no. Take time to find the blogs who enjoy the topic you have written about.
Be Patient: Book review blogging does not in fact pay our bills, so you won’t be our number one priority. Bloggers appreciate anyone who sends out a resource in the hopes that we will review your book, post a timely review and say nothing but great things. This is real life. Unless you find a blogger new blogger who does not have a mile long reading list, you’re going to have to wait some time for your review.
Looks Matter: Reviewers like book covers that look professional. If you are a new author who does not have the current funding for a professional looking book cover then you are going to have to go the extra mile in selling it. Take time to let the blogger know exactly what your book has to offer.
Connect: If your email book request is the first time you are ever acknowledging the book review blog, it could hurt your chances. Be engaging and show that you took the time to read the bloggers other reviews by leaving comments throughout a few of their posts. This will get you on their radar as someone who cares about what they have to say. Most of these tips will be consistent with any book review blogger you try to connect with. Being an “up and coming” author means you have to put in the extra work in order to get noticed, so take the time to get to know the blogger before you pitch them.
On one final note, consider offering something other than a book review (yes, I said OFFERING). Try building a post about the ins and outs of your book, then pitch the document to the blogger saying “I know you’re busy, so if you don’t have time right now to read my book I completely understand. I would love to talk about creating a feature post to highlight what my book is about and who I think would love it. If I created the post for you, would you be interested in checking it out to possibly put on the site?”
You could write a post about the challenges of becoming a writer, the process you took while getting your book published or even the brainstorming that went into the ideas inside your book. The list of topics that are relevant to book review blogs could go on for days. You may be surprised by the change in results if you simply offer to do some of the work for them. Try it.