We're better together: Supporting each others' Book Launches, by Natasha Woodcraft

My first Book launch 

I joined ACW about a year before releasing my first book. In that time, I went from “I’ve written a book!” excitement, to realising I’d merely written a first draft, to receiving feedback from helpful beta readers, to revising, getting a professional edit, submitting for feedback again, revising, resubmitting… you get the idea. I couldn’t have done any of it without the support of many of you. Thank you.

As I neared publication day, I then learnt (chiefly from watching other authors) that there were certain things one tended to do surrounding a book launch. I duly set up a launch team of ARC readers (ARC = advanced reader copy) and bloggers, which was possibly even harder than all the stages that had gone before, because it involved giving away my finished product, multiple times, when I'd hoped people would buy it! 

I have to give books away?!

It was a valuable lesson to learn, and you'll now find me frequently espousing the virtues of freebies. Wonderfully, during its release month, word got out about my book. It even became a bestseller (if you count the fact I only needed 8 sales to hit number one in my category on Amazon – ha ha. I got to sit next to Pilgrim's progress for a while, which was fun.) In all seriousness though, my launch team were invaluable. I didn’t just need their reviews and shares, I needed their encouragement and prayers! If you are releasing bible-based books, be in no doubt that you face a battle. Prayer is essential!

Why am I telling you this? 

Because ACW members (met through the ACW Facebook group) made up more than half of my launch team, and many went on to support me a second time when the sequel released a little while later. Added to which, it took a while for more reviews to trickle in, and I was heavily reliant on that first bunch for some time.

Why else am I telling you this? 

Because in the past few years, Facebook has changed enormously. I don’t know about you, but I like to see what my Facebook friends are up to, and I have several groups I enjoy interacting with. But do I see what my friends are up to, or group conversations in my feed? Rarely. Most of the time I just see ads. We’ve all felt it, I’m sure. The things we want to see, we don’t, and this goes for ACW posts too. I miss so much now. Despite having notifications set to ‘on’ for ACW, most of the notifications I get are @everyone posts from people I don’t know in other groups!

This means that as we (rightly) aren’t meant to overpost or overpromote in the ACW group, I miss people’s book launches, including those I’d like to support. I’m sure I’m not the only one. I’m on the team at Broad Place Publishing, and we’re trying ever so hard to support our authors, but we’re acutely aware of how many posts don’t ever get seen.

I’m also aware that there is a world out there of book reviewers who may want to support us, but aren’t in the ACW group and don't know we exist.

Are there other group solutions?

In the past, I’ve had great support from genre groups. However, I’m also in several ARC reader groups where 99.5% of the books that get advertised and released are ones I do NOT want to support. If these are garnering all the attention, that leaves the Christian market crawling behind. What is the solution? Perhaps a specifically Christian ARC group. Could I find one? No, I could not. (Well, there was one, but there’d been no activity in it for years…)

So, at the risk of starting another Facebook group that won’t make it to our feeds, I thought it was at least worth a try to get interested parties together, who don’t mind a bit of extra posting, who’d like to support each other around book launch time by reading ARCs, reviewing and sharing wide. Because, ACW family, we’re better together! 

Introducing...

Hopefully over time this will ‘go global’ so we can widen the pool of readers and let our light shine before men, brighter than all the yuck out there that doesn’t honour Jesus.

If anything in this blog has struck a chord with you and you’d like to join us, do head on over https://www.facebook.com/groups/1986823598506787/ 

I’d love to see you there.

Natasha Woodcraft lives in a slightly crumbling farmhouse in Lincolnshire with her husband, 4 sons and a menagerie of animals. She believes stories have power to communicate deep truth and transform lives. Her published novels explore God’s redemptive purposes for messy people by reimagining the tale of Cain & Abel. Also a songwriter, Natasha peppers her emotional prose with poetry and song.