How to promote your book

What I'm doing one month before publication

My next picture book The Hug Button publishes in just over a month’s time on the 3rd July.

It is the seventh picture book I’ve had published in four years and I’ve learned A LOT during that time about how to promote a book.

Back in 2021 when our first book The Perfect Fit published during lockdown, I tried everything I could think of to promote it, some things worked brilliantly, others probably weren't the best use of my time.

Over the years I’ve been able to refine this so that I know what to ask my publisher for and where to put my energy.

There is SO much behind the scenes that goes on in the run up to publication, not just by me and the illustrator Rebecca Ashdown, but from the marketing and publicity team at our publishers too. I always say publishing a book takes a village and promoting one is no different.

Back in February I shared my marketing and publicity plans six months before publication. Today I’m going to give you a behind the scenes insight into what I’m now doing a month before pub date.

Before you dive in, I just want to say that this list is quite personal in some ways, it contains all the things I’ve found work for me and that I’ve chosen to do to promote this particular book. This isn’t an exhaustive list of everything you have to do, or should do.

When you first sit down and chat with the marketing and publicity teams at your publishers, normally around 6 months before publication, this is when you all brainstorm ideas about what you could do, want to do and what is actually feasible due to budget/time/availability.

Every author/illustrator will promote their book differently - there isn’t a right or wrong approach. But I do think seeing what other people do can be helpful as it gives you ideas for how you could promote your own book.

The other thing worth mentioning is that when publishing and promoting a book it is important to remember you are playing a long game. You never know who will see your promotional activity, who will buy your book or where it will all lead. The aim is to build both your profile and the profile of your book too. Hopefully you’ll also have fun along the way meeting readers, booksellers, librarians and reviewers.

So, in no particular order, this is what I am doing to promote The Hug Button this month: