When I first began reviewing books here at Colloquium, I happened upon Pump Up Your Book, specialists in virtual book tours, online book publicity, and social media marketing for authors. I grew up in the days when authors promoted their books by making the rounds of television talk shows, spending time chatting with folks like Merv Griffin, Johnny Carson (anyone else remember that if you were still awake when the author was introduced by Johnny, you were up really late?), Mike Douglas, et al., or being featured in newspaper and magazine articles. I was intrigued by the concept of a virtual book tour, and when I learned how effective and influential online book marketing had become, I eagerly became affiliated with Pump Up Your Book, regularly hosting their client authors and reviewing those writers’ work.
Working with Dorothy Thompson and Cheryl Malandrinos has been a complete pleasure. They are dedicated professionals who offer a full range of services to authors, while maintaining mutually beneficial relationships with a whole host of bloggers who, like me, earn their daily bread in another capacity, but love to read, and enjoy discovering new authors and providing them a forum in which to promote their efforts.
Throughout April, Pump Up Your Book is celebrating its fifth anniversary! That’s a testament not only to the hard work and commitment of their staff, but the importance of online marketing in the publishing realm. “What started as an experiment, escalated into one of the largest virtual book tour companies on the Internet.” Pump Up Your Book has represented authors “from all walks of life and platforms: from self-published authors to celebrities such as Judge Glenda Hatchett and cook show personality Paula Deen, and from those authors with little or no publicity, to New York Times bestselling authors such as Caridad Pineiro and Lisa Jackson.”
Congratulations to Pump Up Your Book on reaching this important milestone! I am pleased to welcome Cheryl Malandrinos as my special guest today!
Why I Love Blogging
Wow! It’s hard to believe, but Pump Up Your Book is celebrating five years. How did that happen? I’m thrilled to be here today to talk a little about the business and how blogging led me to it.
I left Corporate America in 2004 to embark upon my dream career — writing. I knew it wouldn’t be easy, but I was sure I could do it. What I didn’t know how to do was design a website. After attending The Muse Online Writers Conference for the first time, however, I knew I needed to create an online presence for my work early.
At that conference, people were talking about blogging. I had no clue what it was. Blogging certainly wasn’t a household name like it is now. I mean, who would have thought we would see TV commercials feature a Mommy blogger? The online world has definitely changed our views, and Pump Up Your Book is thrilled about it.
Pump Up Your Book opened its virtual doors in April 2007 with only one client. By September of that year, I joined founder, Dorothy Thompson, and between us we maintained an average of five to ten clients a month. It didn’t take long for Pump Up Your Book to grow. Now consisting of a five-person staff and touring thirty to fifty authors per month, we continue to offer affordable services for authors everywhere. We couldn’t have grown the way we did without the help of dedicated bloggers. We’re blessed to have them.
What does this have to do with my love of blogging? Well, without the blog I started in 2005, I never would have met Dorothy. She was looking for blog hosts and I signed up. A few months later I was asked to join her in the business. In addition, my love for blogging has grown through the years. I currently maintain eight blogs and contribute to several others. While most of my blogs are about books, I have one, Laura’s Little House, dedicated to my favorite television show, Little House on the Prairie.
Who knows where blogging will go in the future. It has certainly been an exciting avenue to help promote books.
Meet Cheryl
Cheryl lives in Western Massachusetts with her husband and two children. She also has a son who is married.
Contact with Cheryl at her website, or on Facebook or Twitter. Her blogs include The Book Connection and Cheryl’s Christian Book Connection.
Enter to Win a $25 Amazon Gift Card
Cheryl has graciously provided a $25 Amazon gift card to be awarded to one lucky reader! Enter utilizing the Rafflecopter widget.
16 Comments
Thanks for hosting me today and for the kind words about Pump Up. It’s been a great five years and I’m looking forward to many more. We’re always looking to add new bloggers to our team, so I hope your blogging friends will check out our website to see what books are touring.
Good luck to all who enter the giveaway.
Great post. Love Pump Up Your Book’s site and the work those folks do.
Great post. Happy anniversary!
Easter has passed – but I’ll be spending Sunday with my family. 🙂
I’ll spend my Sunday in the park with my friends walking dogs and just being outdoors:)
Congrats and Happy Anniversary!
Happy Anniversary. We spent Easter at home.
We celebrated at home with a family dinner and an Easter egg hunt. We usually do this every year.
Happy Anniversary! We will be working on the gardens over the weekend.
We do not do anything special for Easter. Last year we did go visit our son, but it was because of his birthday, not Easter.
We had a great day for Easter- kids finding eggs outside and inside! This Sunday we will be going to Great-Grandmas funeral 🙁
Easter has been over for a few weeks now, but this coming Sunday I plan to go to church and spend time relaxing with my family. We get all of our errands done on Saturday so that we can all stay home together other than being at church. Thanks for the awesome giveaway!
Time with family. Generally lunch.
Easter celebration of breakfast at church, worship followed by dinner with 2 of my children, then evening meal with family of extended brother, sil and their children – awesome day of God’s Gifts Given !
My family and I attended church and then enjoyed a great dinner.
We celebrated Easter with an egg hunt and some treats and time with family.
Thanks to all who entered. Congratulations to the winner! I’ll be in touch soon.