Book Title Subtitle Series Title...OH MY!

Welcome to the Author Audience show, the podcast that helps you reach more people with your message. Create a book, connect with your audience, change lives. Here's your host, Shelly Hitz.

Book Titles Subtitles Series Titles oh my. Do you ever feel confused about how to title your book? If so, today's training is for you. Hi, my name is Shelly Hitz. I'm the author coach@authoraudienceacademy.com I'm the owner of shellyhitz.com and I'm on a mission to help you reach more people with your message. It's time to let your light shine. And right now, my members of Author Audience Academy are going through a 90 day publish accountability group. That means we're doing all the steps in my 90 day publishing map to get a book published before Christmas. And we're kind of at that stage where a lot of people are choosing titles and finishing their first drafts and getting into self editing. And I've noticed some confusion when it comes to book titles like your main title, your subtitle and your series title. So I want to talk about that in today's training. So I've given you a couple examples in this training to kind of help you walk through the thought process of your main book title through your subtitle and your series title. Now these are all valuable real estate you get when you publish a book. You know, you think about real estate. One of the reasons this is valuable real estate is your book title will draw readers in. So it needs to be catchy, it needs to be something that draws them in. It's also a way to get exposure and visibility on Amazon when you choose certain keywords in your titles. And so when you can choose your main book title, your subtitle, and then if it's a series, a series title, and all have different but powerful and effective together, that can really help with book sales and exposure and so forth on Amazon. And so I wanted to dive into this a little bit more. The example that I have for you is all about my Gratitude Journal. It's a book that has sold really well on Amazon. It is available. And so I wanted to share with you kind of how I broke it down for that particular book. And then also a book that I did for authors on book marketing. So for example, the title of my book, the main title is the Gratitude Journal. Now I've shared in several trainings before. You may have heard me talk about this. I changed the title of this book. It used to be 21 days of gratitude Challenge, but I did some Keyword research. And I teach all of this inside Author Audience Academy. But I did some keyword research and I found that the phrase gratitude journal really is searched for a lot on Google. It's something that people even search for on Amazon. And so I decided to change the main title. So the main title is the Gratitude Journal. The subtitle is a 21 day challenge to More Gratitude, Deeper Relationships and Greater Joy. So I really talk about the benefits, you know, and trying to draw the reader in each, even from the very beginning with my subtitle. And then the series title is A Life of Gratitude. And there are three different books in that series. And then there's the compilation book, the book A Life of Gratitude. So there's actually four, but that's how I broke it down for that book. Heather Hart and I have also written a series for authors. We're getting ready to publish a couple new books in that series. Yay. So excited. We kind of put that on pause while we were doing some other things in life. You guys know how that happens sometimes you just have to stay focused. And so we're getting back into it. We should have two more books published in that series before the end of the year. And the other example I want to share with you is from that series. The main title is how to Get Honest Reviews. This is for authors. It says how to Get Honest Reviews. The subtitle is Self 7 Proven Ways to Connect With Readers. And reviewers.

Numbers do tend to do well in titles. So we put that number seven in there. And then the series name is Book Marketing Survival Guide Series. So that was our series name. And so you can kind of see a couple examples. I encourage you to do research on Amazon, do your market research. I share that in one of the trainings in Author Audience Academy about the importance and how to do that market research in your niche to see kind of what they're doing, typically for titles, subtitles, series as well. And then you need to make a decision. Successful people make decisions. There is no perfect title, but this is definitely one of the bigger decisions that you need to make. So don't rush it either. Do some brainstorming, do some research, do some surveying, ask some people. If you're an Author Audience Academy member, post in our Facebook group and we will help work you through that process of just giving you feedback and helping you make that decision. But again, these are three really key pieces of real estate that you have on Amazon with your book, your main book title, your subtitle, and your series title. And you can have those include keywords so you can do some keyword research. And then you can also have them include benefits and draw them in. You can have fun. Creative names. Also my book, Procrastination to Publication, that's more of an alliteration. It's more of a creative name so you can do so many different things with your title. But I just wanted to clear this up for you and I hope you found this helpful. So I'm going to head off. If you have any other questions, if you're watching later or if you're listening on my podcast or on YouTube or my blog, just let me know. What questions do you have about book titles and series titles? Did this seem to clear it up for you? Was this helpful? I love to hear from you. It really helps me to know that you're getting value from these free trainings. I'm doing this completely free, so. So if you are listening to my podcast, leaving a review means the world to me. If you're watching on YouTube, subscribe, comment, like, share and same thing on Facebook and my blog. I just love you guys and I really love helping you and I want to know that these trainings are valuable to me or valuable to you because it helps encourage me to continue creating more for you. All right, well, I'm going to talk to you guys later. Bye Bye.

Thanks for listening to this episode of the Author Audience Show. Connect with us online@authoraudience.com where you'll find all the resources mentioned in today's episode. While you're there, grab Shelley's free video training on how to write and publish your book using her Six Step Ascent method. Join us again next week to learn how to reach your audience with your message.