How to Get Free Book Publicity with Dedication Contests

You’re writing a book and you’re looking for ways to get the word out about it.

One novel approach (pun intended) is to run a dedication contest.

If you’re not familiar with dedications, they’re that little blurb in the front of the book from the author dedicating the book to someone in their life.

Who doesn’t want to have a book dedicated to them?

Run a contest on social media just as you would run any other contest but make the prize the dedication in your book.

Contestants get extra entries when they tell others about the contest, and the winner gets to help write the dedication itself.

It really is that simple.

It’s a great way to publicize your book without even seeming to publicize it at all – sort of a back door method of getting the word out.

Make sure you capture email addresses, too, so that you can let them know when the book launches.

And if you’d like to read some crazy, silly and fun dedications to books from recent years, check this out…

https://www.boredpanda.com/funny-book-dedications/

My favorites are,

“To my mother, Belzie. I would have made a terrible doctor, Mom. People would have died.” (Ouch.)

“For anyone who laughs in the theater while everyone else is screaming.” (Okay, I admit I have a dark sense of humor.)

“This book is dedicated to all the family members who are angry that I dedicated the last book to someone who won the dedication in a Twitter contest.” (Yes, that’s where I found this idea.)