From book distributor Dennis Jones, the following practical suggestions for getting traction with your ebook offerings.
1. Sites where you can add yourself as an author, and your book if it's not already listed (or add to the details about your book if it's already there)
- Amazon Author Central: https://authorcentral.amazon.com/gp/help
- Shelfari (An Amazon Company): http://www.shelfari.com/
- Goodreads Author Program: http://www.goodreads.com/author/program
2. Some useful starting points about blogging and social networking
- Links to author blogs and blogging resources: http://www.internetwritingjournal.com/authorblogs/
- Useful notes about Facebook/Twitter versus blogging
3. Mobilise your fans/family/friends on these sites
- Amazon Kindle eBooks
- Kobobooks: http://kobobooks.com/
- Angus & Robertson Online eBooks: http://www.angusrobertson.com.au/ebooks/ebooks/45
- Borders Online eBooks: http://www.borders.com.au/ebooks/ebooks/45/
- Booku: http://www.booku.com/
On any site that allows ratings/reviews (such as those above), ask all your friends and relatives (and anyone you know with an internet account) to go and rave about your books with positive comments and ratings… many sites are also now starting to feature Facebook 'Like' buttons or Google+ '+1' buttons, so any friends who are on those social networks should make sure they click these as well. Every good review, 5-star rating or 'Like' will add to the book's visibility in searches both on the bookseller sites and in general internet searches. Amazon leads the way here (as they do for general online shopping customer interaction); Kobo has some interesting features available for accountholders (it's free to join), including automated linking to Facebook inside the 'Reading Life' area of their site; Booku allows reviews, ratings, likes and +1s
4) Other ideas
Make sure you include links on your blog/website to other blogs/web resources you have found useful, they will often give you a 'link-back' which will add traffic to your site(s).
Don't limit yourself by only thinking about how to use your online presence to attract new readers, make sure you interact with other authors doing the same thing, learn from them, compare notes, share tips. Whenever you visit another author's blog/site look at all of the links they have included, there will almost always be something of interest there.