Do Virtual Book Tours Sell Books?

There has been an interesting conversation over at Book Market Ning Social Network concerning virtual book tours. An author was interested in finding out whether virtual book tours worked well as marketing tools and whether they really sold books.
I'm sure everyone else was wondering the very same thing.
We get the same question at Pump Up Your Book Promotion. Authors are very interested in whether their promotional dollars will be spent in a good place and I can certainly understand that.
If you are like one of those authors, let me explain what I tell them. Virtual book tours are but one vehicle to sell books, but if you choose this method to publicize your book, it's money well spent as it will greatly increase your online presence, thus making it more available to people who search for your book online using your key search words.
It's not rocket science, but it is a formula you must use.
So, how does this add up to book sales?
Don't bother emailing the author because they aren't going to know exactly unless they are self-published. If they are not self-published, there are five ways they can at least take a stab at it:
1. Amazon Rankings
Amazon is the world's largest book store and goes by a ranking system. According to the people who think they have solved the mystery of how books are selling there, it operates by putting a ranking number in your book description. The lower the number, the better the book is selling.
If your book dips in rankings, it is assumed you have sold a book. If it does not climb quickly during the next few days, you can safely assume that the book is still selling. If it takes a nosedive under the 100,000 mark and continues to stay there or even dip lower, you can safely assume you are selling more than a few books. Stick around the #1 spot and you are really doing well as far as sales are concerned.
But, there's no real way in telling exactly how many books are being sold and why your rankings are what they are but you can use that guide as a good ball park guess. I've had authors tell me their books moved during the tour, but no one can safely assume it was because of the tour or any other type of promotion they may be doing at the same time. But, a ball park guess is better than no guess at all.
2. Ingrams
Of course, if your book is not distributed through Ingrams, this won't do you a bit of good, but there is a number you can call and their automated system will be able to tell you how many books were sold on a certain date. The number is 615-213-6803.
The problem with this method, though, is that not all the sales may be reported at the time of your call because it could take more time for the sale to get into the Ingram system. This is a fun thing to use and you could get quite obsessive over it, but it's also not a sure-fire way to tell just how many books were sold during your tour unless you wait for weeks afterwards and call. And, then, it's still a ballpark guess as to whether it was because of your tour or not.
3. Word of Mouth
Another surefire way of knowing if your books sold during your tour is for someone you know to tell you they bought one of your books in that time span. If your Amazon rankings have moved about this time, you can assume that this might have been why, but there's no way of knowing this to be a fact or not. And, again, word of mouth is simply word of mouth.
4. Royalty Checks
Of all the ways of telling if you have sold books that we have discussed thus far, your royalty check is your best bet. ONLY, if Amazon or any of the other online bookstores have sent their money to the publisher. I knew I sold books through Amazon (word of mouth) during one pay period, but my sales were not reported on my royalty check. Seems it takes Amazon a while to deliver.
5. Publisher
Perhaps the best method of knowing if you have sold books is to ask your publisher to keep an eye out for sales during this time. However, this method can only work if all sales were reported during this time and your publisher has an account with BookScan (www.bookscan.com).
This is perhaps the ONLY surefire way you are going to know if you sold books during a certain time frame. It is quite expensive to have an account at BookScan, but some publishers feel it's well worth the expense.
Bottom line is, the next time someone asks if virtual book tours sell books, check with your publisher to see if they have an account at BookScan, because any other way of telling is not going to tell the whole story.
Virtual book tours are just like any other promotional opportunity for the author; only, it's probably the best way to hit your audience on a global scale. Besides, virtual book tours are perpetual. Long after your tour is over, it still keeps going and going because as long as the tour host keeps your appearance in their archives, it will continue to bring in those book sales to those online consumers who use the search engines to find what they need.
Dorothy Thompson is CEO/Founder of Pump Up Your Book Promotion, an innovative public relations firm specializing in online book promotion. Sign up for their FREE newsletter at http://www.pumpupyourbookpromotion.com
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