Your book’s description must be pithy, compelling, engaging, and accurate. It must draw readers in; it must say to them, “You will love this book.”

In addition to appearing on the inside jacket cover or the back of the book, the description is used by online web retailers such as Amazon or Barnes & Noble. You also draw from it as you write your book announcement press release. And if you pay to promote your book in one of the daily deal newsletters that include BookBub, Fussy Librarian, or Riffle Select (among many others),  you’ll pull from that description when you create your deal alert.

You know that your book description can make or break your book.

Know what resonates with readers

That’s why it’s important to know what words, phrases, and references resonate with readers.

To help authors with this, BookBub tested book description language to see what words and phrases help sell more books. I summarized its research findings in a recent Build Book Buzz newsletter; our friends at Where Writers Win recently shared that article as a guest post.

You’ll want to read my newsletter article, “6 Magic Phrases You Can Use to Sell More Books” because the information from BookBub’s research will help you decide what to include in your all-important book description, and what you might leave out.

Let’s give a big round of applause to BookBub for sharing its research with authors!

Was writing your book’s description a challenge for you? Why or why not?

They pulled the list from The Science of Marketing: What to Tweet, What to Post, How to Blog, and Other Proven Strategies by Dan Zarrella, an inbound marketing manager at Hubspot. (Read a free sample chapter courtesy of Hubspot.)

Which word do you think gets retweeted the most, according to Zarrella’s research?

It’s “you.”

What word gets retweeted the least?

“Game.”

“You” suggests that the content being retweeted is focused on helping others, while “game” indicates that the tweet is more personal in nature — as in “I’m watching the game,” which isn’t the kind of content we retweet. That doesn’t mean that there isn’t a place for personal tweets. There is — they help us get to know you better. But don’t expect your tweets with “gme,” “lol” or “tired” to get retweeted because it isn’t going to happen.

Tips for getting retweeted

If you want others to help you extend your reach by retweeting your messages, make sure they:

• Focus on others
• Use the words in the list on the Where Writers Win blog post
• Contain helpful information that’s interesting to others

Messages that are self-serving or self-centered won’t be shared nearly as much as those that serve others. That’s why it’s so important to learn how to use Twitter properly for book promotion. (Get a few tips in this article.)

What’s your best Twitter tip for getting retweets?