Monday, November 21, 2016

Mason Canyon Tours

There may come a time in your professional career as a novelist when you'll wonder whether you need a literary publicist. Maybe you have a 40 hour a week job. Or you've got small children at home. Or you're in the midst of trying to sell your home, as I am. 

As the author of two published novels, I certainly understood what was needed before, during and after my novel Mâtowak: Woman Who Cries was due for release. But just thinking about it left me in a brain-fog. While I'm not great at delegating chores, nor am I good at relinquishing control, even I knew I was exhausted and needed help. They say a woman asking for help is an anomaly. I'm so glad happy I broke that cycle. 





At the end of a month long virtual book tour, I'm sitting here grinning from ear to ear because I had Mason Book Tours campaigning on my behalf. While I sat back and enjoyed the process, MBT did the work. 

Want to know what they did?

Here's just a few of the things:


  1. MC produced the tour page with all the pertinent information: bio, blurb, photo, book cover, and calendar. 
  2. MC created the Rafflecopter. 
  3. MC designed the tour banners and graphics and promoted the event on Facebook and Twitter. 
  4. MC served as a middle man between all hosts and myself, so that I had only ONE person to interact with. 
  5. MC provided books for the reviewers and collected questions from the hosts. 
  6. MC gathered the answers to all the questions and returned them to the designated hosts. 
  7. MC put together the tour package with the essential material. 
  8. MC chose the excerpts and sent them out to the right hosts in chronological order to match the calendar. 
  9. MC coordinated the hosts within the calendar month, making certain they had everything they needed before their day.
  10. MC updated the author's tour page each morning and sent out individual emails to those hosts. Q&A, guest posts, and excerpts. 
  11. MC visited every single site, left a comment, and shared their links with her networks.
  12. MC sent a final thank you to all hosts and a wrap up to me with a complete list of all host bloggers and their blog links.
  13. ...
I could go on and on, but I think you get the point. Mason Canyon Tours did what would have taken me a few extra months of prep work. MC took the pressure off and made the release of my third novel a joy. 

Circumstances change and as authors we adjust and we cope. It only takes one published novel to understand that writing the book is the easy part. 

Happy Reading. 



18 comments:

Pat Hatt said...

Wow, I know some tours that don't do all of that. Would sure be a perk as I just gave the heave ho to marketing lol.

Rachna Chhabria said...

Wow! Getting Mason Book Tours to help you with marketing your book sounds like a good idea!

cleemckenzie said...

That is a huge chunk of work that you didn't have to do. I can certainly understand the joy of that! Thanks, Joylene. I found this very informative.

Stephanie Faris said...

Knowing how much work goes into a blog tour, all of that hard work was well worth it! Plus, I saw your book everywhere, so I know they did a great job.

Mason Canyon said...

Joylene, thank you for the kind words and the wonderful shout out. I can't image how an author promotes a book while writing another all the while doing the normal things they have to do at home (and most of the time at another job).

It was wonderful working with you and I enjoyed your book so much. Wishing you much success.

Thoughts in Progress
and MC Book Tours

L. Diane Wolfe said...

Mason did a great job with the tour!

Susan Gourley/Kelley said...

That is a lot of service. I have them as an idea for my next book release. I think I might.

Lynda R Young as Elle Cardy said...

wow, that did a LOT. I'm impressed.

Chrys Fey said...

Mason sure does a lot. That help is invaluable.

Hilary Melton-Butcher said...

Hi Mason and Joylene - fascinating to read through .. and I've definitely noted for the future ... thanks for writing it up for us ...

Cheers to you both and have Happy Thanksgiving Mason, and Joylene you've already guzzled your turkey ... tough now! I shall enjoy mine at Christmas ... still we can in the meantime have fun - Hilary

Juneta key said...

Great post and tip.

Juneta @ Writer's Gambit

Karen Lange said...

Joylene, I'm glad you had such great support for your tour. Good to know that MC Book Tours is helpful and trustworthy. Will keep that in mind for future reference. Appreciate your insight!

Michelle Wallace said...

Wow! Sounds like they did a fabulous job!

Joylene Nowell Butler said...

Thanks so much, everyone! Best to you all.

DMS said...

This sounds like a service that was definitely worth every penny. It is hard when we work full time jobs to then also put on our publicity hat and try to get all of that done. I can definitely relate to feeling overwhelmed by it all. Thanks for sharing your experience. :)
~Jess

Yvette Carol said...

I was so interested to hear your feedback on the blog tour. Thank you, Joylene, for sharing this information. Doing a tour when you're releasing a book can be a daunting process. I'll share this on my Newsletter, which I'm putting out today. Great post, girl!

Joylene Nowell Butler said...

Thanks everyone. Happy Thanksgiving!

Kristi said...

I LOVE Mason Canyon.
I've made sure all four of my HarperCollins books went through MC.
The best.