Cindy Ratzlaff

Bestselling author, award winning brand marketing and social media pro, Cindy Ratzlaff, creates sales driving campaigns for authors, books and publishers.

Social Proof for Authors

By Cindy Ratzlaff

In personal branding and book marketing, one term keep cropping up, social proof. Let’s look at what social proof is and how it can best be used to accomplish an author’s primary goals on social media; creating awareness of his or her book and driving purchases of said book.

What is Social Proof?

Social proof relates to the number of followers, friends, subscribers and connections an author has on their social networks and website. It also relates to the number of social interactions one has on their various social profiles. Every platform has an algorithm that surfaces your posts to more people based on the volume and velocity of engagement. So a post that has 30-40 likes and 10-20 comments within a few hours will most likely be seen by significantly more of your fans than a post that gets 5 likes over 3 days.

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7 Ways to Build An Author Platform – A Checklist

By Cindy Ratzlaff

When an author submits his or her manuscript to a publisher, there are several things to go into their decision on whether or not to publish the author’s work. First, of course, is “Is this a well-written book that people will want to read?” The very next question is “what is this author’s platform?”

What is an Author Platform?

An author platform is a suite of sites, tools or outlets through which an author can assist the publisher in creating sales for his or her book.

The publisher wants a partner in the author.

  • A speaking tour with sales opportunities at the back of the room is considered a potential platform.
  • A regular radio show with national distribution or being a frequent guest expert on a national television show is considered a piece of a sales driving platform.
  • Being a previous bestseller is also a part of an author platform.
  • Having a very large e-mail database with a healthy “open rate” could be the type of platform item that could convince a publisher to publish a book.
  • And, so could a large and engaged social media following.

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VIDEO: Creating the Brand of YOU

By Cindy Ratzlaff

Cindy Ratzlaff is a dynamic keynote speaker who grabs her audience from the very first moment and takes them on a journey, disarming, and then inspiring, them along the way.

Learn more about creating YOUR brand in the video below:

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VIDEO: Creating A Keyword Rich Bio

By Cindy Ratzlaff

Keywords are another word for search terms; the words or phrases you enter into a Google search to find exactly what you offer. Take note of those words to optimize your bio.

Learn more about writing an optimized author bio in the video below:

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VIDEO: Facebook Call To Action Feature

By Cindy Ratzlaff

Facebook’s Call to Action Feature is a free, easy to use, under utilized, and extremely effective digital tool for creating more traffic to your website or sales page from Facebook.

Learn more about how you can leverage this feature in the video below:

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To Boost or Not to Boost a Facebook Post

By Cindy Ratzlaff

To boost or not to boost? That is the question Facebook page owners ask me when they’re struggling with decreased reach and no engagement. Is it better to boost a particular post, or to promote the Page for Likes? The answer, as in every marketing question, depends on your goals.

If your goal is to bring more visibility to a particular offer, sale or promotion, you might benefit from boosting an individual post that includes a call to action or leads people back to a sales page. Or, if your Facebook business page fans have not been engaging with your page and your reach has dropped significantly, you might consider boosting a post you know will have a high perceived value for the majority of your fans.

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Platforms and Personal Branding for Authors

By Cindy Ratzlaff

Congratulations. You’ve written a book. Now you’re about to take on a new job; Chief Marketing Officer of the Brand of You.

“I just self-published my first book and I need help marketing the book.”

Every week I received at least one email from an author that starts like this, “I just self-published my first book and I need help marketing the book.”  I always respond to the author with the following questions:

  1. What are your goals in publishing this book?
  2. What is your platform for helping your ideal reader find your book?
  3. What is your current plan for letting your ideal reader know your book exists?

The first question informs the entire approach to book marketing and promotion. The second question lets me know if the author has any way to let readers know the book exists. The second question lets me know if the author understands the concept of “discoverability.” The third question helps me guide the author to focus on the actions that they will most likely be able to take to help them achieve their goals.

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How To Create A Marketing Calendar | Business Strategy

By Cindy Ratzlaff

Every small business, entrepreneurs, author or brand needs to plan their marketing in advance in order to budget their resources. But what if you don’t have experience creating a strategic, goal-oriented year-long marketing plan? No problem. You can use the tips and tools listed below to map out your strategy for the coming year and take advantage of the natural promotional cycles built into every business niche.

Create a Marketing Calendar Like a Pro

Creating a marketing calendar puts a brand or product front and center so the marketing efforts reach the ideal customer or client. A marketing calendar provides a blueprint for a product launch, helping you develop brand awareness and increase visibility and cement your position as a thought leader in your niche.

Time spent creating a detailed marketing calendar directly correlates to your launch rate of success.

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How to Market with A Facebook Personal Profile

By Cindy Ratzlaff

While I think every author, brand or entrepreneur needs a Facebook business page, there is still a great deal you can do, right now, to optimize your personal profile to increase your personal brand visibility – and use Facebook more efficiently for your business.

Facebook builds in some terrific marketing features for business pages and every brand, business, entrepreneur and author needs a business page to fully take advantage of the rich ecosystem where more than one billion people log in every month. But did you know that your personal profile also has some great hot spots for promoting your business – without driving your friends and family crazy? Here are my four favorites and you can start using them to increase your brand visibility, today.

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5 Promotional Hot Spots Every Facebook Business Page Can Use

By Cindy Ratzlaff

With more than one billion people logging onto Facebook every month, entrepreneurs cannot afford to ignore the marketing implications.  Custom designed apps serve as mini web pages on a site with more traffic than most websites will ever hope to have. The large cover photo at the top of every business page is a digital marketing billboard and key promotional hot spots can help convert fans on Facebook into visitors to brand websites.

Every entrepreneur, author, speaker or small business with a business page has several key  consumer facing hot spots to share sales, specials, invite opt ins and even promote events.

Is your business page using these five promotional hot spots? Take this checklist and compare it to your page to make sure you’re using every available promotional opportunity built into the Facebook business page model.

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