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July 4, 2013

Karen Pokras Toz: Street Teams

Tips on Thursday
Today I want to talk about street teams, otherwise known as promo teams. Street teams are a great way to get the word out about your books and events to a fresh new audience and should be a part of every author’s marketing plan. Here are my tips on street teams:

Set up a separate Facebook group page just for your team.

I recruited the initial members of my street team by posting about it on my Facebook author page. That way, you know that the people who respond are people who follow you regularly and are familiar with your books. I directed everyone to a separate group page where the team now hangs out to discuss promos.


Love your street team, and they will love you back.

Your street team is your promotional team. As such, they should be paid. After all, if you went out and hired a PR firm, they wouldn’t spread the word about your work out of the kindness of their hearts (although I’d be ever so grateful if they did!) In a perfect world, I’d be able to pay my street team in cash. But since I can’t, I pay them in the next best thing: SWAG. It’s true – street team members love swag!  I like to offer monthly prizes and often will throw in other prizes during the month just because... I use random.org and rafflecopter to keep it fair. I like to use prizes that are exclusive to my team, or that I offer to my team first before anyone else sees them.

Showing off the prizes that you’re giving away to street team members on your author page is also a great way to lure more members into your team. 

Keep it simple.

The first team I started was a disaster! I had this whole elaborate point system that depended on who posted what where. The members were like WHAT? I was like WHAT? It never got past day one. This time around, I did things completely different. When I ask my street team to share, I will have the post or tweet already written. I pin it to the top of the group page where it stays for a few days. They are free to reword if they wish, or they can simply copy & paste it to Facebook, G+, Twitter, etc. Once they share it, they simple let me know in the comments and they are entered into the giveaway.

Don’t overkill.

My team’s followers will get bored if they see the same posts everyday, so unless I have a tour going on, I try to limit posts for the team to once maybe twice a week. Also, I always let my team members know when I hear of other teams looking for members. What? Why would I do that? For starters, I like helping other authors, but also I'm helping my team members have variety in their posts so that their readers won’t get bored and will hopefully stay more engaged.


Ask their opinion.

What types of prizes do they want? What types of posts do they like? A while ago I asked about Twitter and found out about this site called Click to Tweet. It made everything so easy to share. I never would have known about it otherwise.


Have fun & get to know your team!

Remember they are with you because they both like you as a person and enjoy your work.

About the Author:

Karen Pokras Toz, recently discovered her love for writing. Karen writes middle grade and adult contemporary fiction. Her middle grade children’s novels have won several awards including the Grand Prize in the 2012 Purple Dragonfly Book Awards and First Place for a Global E-Book Award for Pre-Teen Literature. Karen is a member of the Society of Children’s Book Writers & Illustrators (SCBWI). A native of Connecticut, Karen now lives outside of Philadelphia with her family. For more information, please visit www.karentoz.com.

About the Book:

Could you handle life in the spotlight?
Julia Alexander is a quiet girl from a small town. Content to spend her days with her small group of friends and a pile of books, Julia thinks her future is set. When she unexpectedly meets Chase, a fellow college student and budding musician, she is unaware of just how drastically things are about to change.
Suddenly thrown into the limelight, her life is no longer her own. Relentlessly followed by the paparazzi, Julia is forced to make tough decisions about fame, love, family, and relationships. But just how much will Julia have to sacrifice to become invisible...
Buy Chasing Invisible at Amazon






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3 comments:

  1. Great advice, Karen! I'll have to look into this a little more. :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks for stopping by. Street teams can really help get the word out about you and your writing.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Thanks for letting me stop by to guest post, Donna!

    ReplyDelete

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