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Book Review & Contest Insights from Real Reviews and Submissions

What separates great books from the rest? Below are articles with insights from real reviews and contest submissions—what works, what doesn’t, and how to improve your book. You’ll also find a wide range of articles covering writing, publishing, marketing, and more. Each article has a Comments section so you can read advice from other authors and leave your own.

Why Some Books Win Awards (And Most Don’t) — Insights From Real Contest Submissions New!

What separates award-winning books from the rest? After evaluating contest submissions across a wide range of genres, certain patterns become clear. Some books consistently rise to the top. Others, even with strong ideas and clear effort behind them, fall short. The difference is rarely dramatic—it...

What We’ve Learned From Reviewing Hundreds of Thousands of Books (And Why Most Don’t Stand Out) New!

After reviewing and evaluating books across thousands of submissions over the past two decades, certain patterns become impossible to ignore. Some books immediately stand out to reviewers. Others—even well-intentioned ones—fade into the middle or fall short. The difference is rarely luck. It comes down to...

4 Features That Make Good Book Titles

There are no hard-and-fast rules for coming up with the perfect title. But there are some conventions and similarities between wonderful ones that may assist you in choosing yours. This article points out four of those common elements. 1. They fascinate and attract the reader A title...

4 Tips to Market Children's Books

To market a book, you need to find out who likes your book, discover where to find them, then sell your book there and convince them to buy it. With publishing a children’s book, your book is for children, but adults are the buyers. So,...

A Novelist's Guide to Writing a Book Blurb

A blurb can convince readers to consider your work or move to the next book. A good blurb makes readers take a chance on your book. Crafting an impressive book blurb has specific rules that guarantee its success. This article discusses four guidelines to apply in...

5 Common Marketing Mistakes That Authors Make 

There are many things you might be doing that are hurting your sales. Authors often find themselves falling into common pitfalls that lead to them wasting their efforts and seeing little results. If you want to make the most of your marketing efforts, here are...

Advanced Tips To Creating A Unique and Effective Author Website

To make the most of marketing opportunities available on the internet, you need a unique and effective website. This article shows you five things you need to know to advance the design and effectiveness of your site.  1. Make sure your website is not non-responsive A non-responsive...

5 Basic Tips To Making an Author Website

The book market is highly competitive, with many authors publishing books regularly. Making an author website can help you sell more books and build your brand awareness. This article provides five tips that you can't ignore in creating an efficient author website.  1. Make it easy...

Three Online Marketing Hacks for Indie Authors

Promoting your book online can be difficult. And as an indie author, you may be wondering what more you need to do to increase your sales and make the most of online marketing. Though there's no one-size-fits-all solution to internet marketing for writers, there are...

First Three Steps Towards Optimizing Your Amazon Book Page

The key to success on Kindle Direct Publishing is traffic. You need to get visitors to your book page and convert these visitors to buyers. This process is much harder in practice, and if you don't understand what it takes, your book may not do...

Basic Steps To Setting Up Your Mailing List

A mailing list is a powerful marketing tool for authors. Unlike social media platforms, your mailing list is entirely within your control. You can leverage it well to keep your readers and turn them into die-hard fans. This article is a brief beginner's guide with...

How Important Is Your Book Blurb?

As an author, your main goal is to sell your books, but what can you do to help improve sales? One of the key ways to sell your book is to write an effective blurb. Without it, readers will not know what your book is about or...