How can an author (or author/illustrator) make an impact on sales of their books? It can be such an intimidating prospect. Many people get a bit paralyzed and don’t know where to start or what they could do, with limited money, connections, and time.

Mary Haque, author of the picture book, PAINTING THE SKY WITH LOVE (released in 2025 from Feiwel & Friends), faced these dilemmas and came up with a great range of activities. In addition to what she’s noted below, Mary had contacted bookstores to set up her book signings. She crafted paintbrush wands with hearts and clouds to give out at  signings and included the paintbrush, the cutout hearts, the book swag in goodie bags to pass out at book signings and/or for mailings. She requested the publisher to send books to a targeted list she obtained from social media book reviewers, and most reviewers responded positively. Mary reached out to indie bookstores not only in her home region, but also in other parts of the United States. She is looking out for their needs as well as her own, by “plugging the bookstores, and sharing the book reviews and reviewers on social media periodically.” 

         Check out her tips:

Make the calls, set up the signings or story time as available at the bookstore. Get some balloons! Get your table swag going and check out other authors’ signing table ideas on social media. I received many tips just from sending a private message to authors on where they got their tablecloth, runner, etc.

Hit your local Indie bookshops and ask if they can put you in the local author section. If you have a holiday book, Earth Book, Star book, etc., ask if they can display it for you! For indie bookshops across the states, I used Google and located the contact email for the bookshop. My books are displayed currently in many stores in Chicago and suburbs for Valentines Day and now are on display in TX, NH, MA, and NC (on the shelf!), simply from an email I sent. Google is your friend; look for the top ten indie bookstores in the United States to start with. (I followed up for photos of the displays).

Get a craft going! Remember the Dollar store is your friend! See what you can put together; check out Pinterest or Google for ideas. Pick up a sheet of stickers! A Bag of 20 goodie bags is $1.25. You would be surprised what you can find. (I found a lot of unopened crafts at thrift shops, too).

Get the Book Swag! I did a price range comparable: example being $55.00 for 500 bookmarks! You can go lower than that: there are many to choose from. I went a little big on the swag from postcards to stickers initially, then to bookmarks. QR Code cards are valuable with your book cover on the front and the QR code on the back (you can get your QR code from Amazon). I did mailings of them to various family and friends to pass out for me. I left them at mail places, businesses, bulletin boards and even passed them out on occasion in the Starbucks line waiting for my coffee! Additionally, I gave my hair stylist about 50 postcards to pass out and she received a free book.

Make your own ads for social media! I used a graphic design program that allowed three creations per month for free, although now I pay yearly because it is a valuable tool to create my ads.

Facebook/Instagram Ads! Depending on how much you want to spend, I find Facebook to be more responsive. At times, I’ve spent less and still obtained lots of views but few visits to my page. Instagram seems to be THE best place for free reviews and it has a lot of picture book accounts 

The ideas are endless once you start figuring out what works for you!