Guest Post: Author Central Features for YA and Teen Book Authors by Dave Chesson

I would like to welcome Dave Chesson from Kindlepreneur to the backwoods today. He is here to share some of the secrets that YA and teen authors (or any author) can use to help market themselves and their books by using Amazon’s Author Central.

On a personal note: I also use Author Central and have an author page–I haven’t been able to use ALL the goodies since I don’t have videos yet. You can go to my about page or look in the right sidebar.

Anyone publishing in the young adult and teen genres knows just how competitive they are.

There’s nothing more disheartening than pouring effort and energy into a book only for it to fall upon deaf ears.

Often, there’s nothing inherently wrong with the book itself. The writer has spent time crafting a quality story they know the right readers will love. The issue is making those readers aware of who you are, what you write and convincing them that your book is worth their precious time.

Some of the best ways to improve your appeal as an author are often overlooked or unknown. For example, did you know that Amazon offers a comprehensive author promotion platform, called Author Central?

A lot of writers overlook Author Central. That’s a real shame, because it’s packed with the following awesome features.

Share Your External Content Directly To Amazon

If you’ve taken the time to make epic content related to your work, like blog posts or YouTube videos, it makes sense to spread it as far as possible. After all, you’ve already put the work in to create the content. Why not reap the maximum reward from it possible?

If you think about it, there’s nowhere more valuable for your content than directly on Amazon itself. After all, Amazon customers are book buyers. They are on Amazon for one reason only – to spend their money on something cool to read. You stand a better chance of reaching the right people on Amazon than almost anywhere else.

Author Central lets you share your blog content directly with Amazon browsers. Imagine you were browsing for a new book, unsure of what to buy, and came across a new author. You check out their page and find an interesting, entertaining blog post you spend a few minutes reading. Wouldn’t that positive experience make you more likely to buy a book from that writer?

All Your Books In One Place

Navigating Amazon can be something of a maze at times. There are so many categories, subcategories and other avenues for browsers to explore that it’s easy to feel like a kid in the biggest, most distracting candy store in history.

On your Author Central page, the focus is entirely on you and your work. All of your books are in a single location. Each and every one. This makes it a lot easier for a reader interested in checking out your work to find the best book to get started with.

If a book browser came across one of your books while randomly browsing Amazon, and decided it wasn’t right for them, the chances are they would navigate away from your work to someone else’s pretty quickly. That sucks because maybe one of your books would have been just perfect for them had they seen it.

Author Central puts all of your books in front of a browser at once. This means a title or book cover could catch their eye that they may never have seen otherwise.

Add Editorial Reviews

Reviews are one of the most frustrating aspects of succeeding on Amazon for most writers. Anyone who’s felt the pain of a bitter, one star review left for an unfair reason knows exactly how maddening they can be. It’s also a simple truth that reviews are one of the most important factors in determining how many books you sell.

Did you know that Author Central allows you to add editorial reviews for your work?

An editorial review carries far more legitimacy and weight than a review left by some random customer. Setting up Author Central and adding attractive author reviews is a perfect way to fight back against the haters and show book browsers how good your work really is.

If you’re not sure about where to get editorial reviews, just reach out to people within your genre or niche. Bloggers and fellow authors of your genre are likely to be willing to take a look at your work and provide a few words that can be used as a review.

Author Central Summary

Hopefully by now you see that Author Central is worth your time to set up and make the most of because –

• You can share your other content directly with Amazon browsers
• You improve your chances of a greater amount of your work being discovered
• You add powerful editorial reviews which help your book to sell more copies

Have you had any experience with Author Central personally? Have you come across any impressive Author Central pages you think writers would benefit from seeing? Please feel free to share in the comments!