Lets say your an author, and just released your first book Where would you promote it, and how would you go about promoting it??
First, I might try getting a publisher to publish it. If that wasn't gonna happen, I would self-publish; selling it in mostly e-book form, but also having limited copies of paperback. I'd probably sell it through Amazon, to start. I'd sell it cheap and promote it on various forums, book websites like GoodReads, and other social networking sites like Facebook and StumbleUpon. Choose forums and people to recommend it to based on the topics of the book. I would start my reconnaissance early, while I was nearing the end of my manuscript, and create more of a rapport on writing forums, book forums, and forums relevant to the book; so I wasn't just another spammer. I would also give the book a gnarly website, linking to a website showcasing other works of mine, cherry picked based on their relation to the material and their quality. Add that to stumbleUpon, link to that, etc. Might even do some fanfiction and build up a following on fanfiction websites when I was about midway through my manuscript, to get fans on those. Another important note, is that if you are choosing to self-publish or self-promote; I would, and one should, choose material that is easy to market.
Youtube is a good way to get some recognition. It might be hard to pull off but I've seen people make videos promoting their paintings and posting them on ebay. One painting got bid all the way up to 900$
