What does it mean to be a creative content producer for online book promotion

Alexandra Nieradzik, a creative content producer, who is working in the German book company «Hugendubel Buchhandlungen» for 3 years, was one of the key speakers at the BarCamp-2021 conference. She shared her fruitful advice about creative content and illustrated what is important in creating quality photography for the book promotion.

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How Alexandra became a Creative Content Producer

Alexandra Nieradzik’s background:

• 2013 — Diploma: Communication design
• 2017 — Internship: Graphic Design Agency
• 2018 — Junior: Online Marketing
• 2020 — Senior: Creative Content Producer

What is Hugendubel? It is a bookstore, based in Munich, and it has about 100 stores all over Germany. Hugendubel loves Social Media: you can find them on Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, TikTok, and Spotify.

The social media team in Hugendubel now consists of four people.

Social Media Manager makes content for Facebook and Instagram, makes cooperation with imprints, team organization, and trend research.

Creative Content Producer makes product photography and editing, graphic design, creative concepts, and Instagram Livestreams.

Digital Producer makes video production/tech checks, podcasts, and content for YouTube, graphic design.

Community manager makes community managements, influencer marketing, and affiliate marketing.

How to take interesting pictures of books

1. Make a moodboard

Pinterest is great for inspiration.

2. Play with light and shadow

Camera lights, candles, or coloured light LEDs can create a great mood.

3. Use props

For example, fake blood, fake pieces of evidence, a sword, plants etc.

4. Capture the book’s mood

Capture their vibe.

Campaigns and formats. How to promote customer loyalty

First case. Bookstock: an online festival

• Streamed on YouTube and Instagram;
• With international and national authors;
• The genre changes every festival;
• Tickets are sold online, there are free events and paid events;

There were created a festival kit with a cosy festival hoodie, bookish candle, Hugeldubel merch, snacks, festival wristband, and poster with line-up inside.

For promotion was created Book Blind Dates, which show only the first sentence on a book cover.

Second case. Livestreams: «NOW Streams»

• On Instagram, every Thursday at 8:15 pm;
• With international and national authors;
• All genres, mostly new adult, young adult, fantasy, thriller;
• Topic: new book presentation, Q&A, best books of the month;
• Moderated by a bookblogger with a follower reach from 10k to 40k;
• Livestream slots are sold, imprints can book a slot for promoting a new book.

Third case. April Joke: Launch of a fitness app

It is a prank on April 1st that we do every year on Instagram. Our community loved the prank so much, so the joke became reality. The app didn’t come true, but we produced three bookworm workouts.

Do’s and Dont’s

Do’s:

• Storytelling is a key;
• Be brave on trying new things like our April prank;
• Be memorable, find something that sets you apart from other companies;
• Listen to your community, ask them what they want and need.

Dont’s:

• Don’t forget the “social” in social media;
• Don’t expect short-time results, formats need time to establish;
• Don’t do too many projects at once, focus on a few things but 100%

Important tools for Content Creation

• Lightroom and Photoshop help for editing;
• Later helps for scheduling social media posts;
• Socialbakers helps for analyzing your online performance;
• Unfold and Canva have nice quality templates for Instagram and Facebook;
• Pinterest helps with Moodboards and inspiration.