THE ANSWER IS NO! DEFINITELY NOT!
If you have the resources to hire someone or are with a publisher that DOES provide you with a more dedicated individual, awesome! BUT you will still have to do the vast majority of what is in this book (like setting up your website, email list, and social media), and the more you know about the process of what the publicist is doing, the better.
Why? There are two key reasons.
1 Because no matter how great that person is at marketing , they cannot take the place of you, the person who wrote the book. Readers want to know what YOU think. They want to know what made YOU write your book, what you’re about, and what makes you enjoy life, and they want to hear YOUR voice. There is only so much of this another person can communicate on your behalf and still seem real or relatable.
2 Because even if you are paying someone good money to help you market your book, you must still know what is going on so you’ll know if they are actually doing what they are supposed to do (or in case you want to fire them and bring your book promotion efforts in-house one day, which should absolutely be your right). Knowledge is power, and you never want to give away all of your power. Just ask now-broke athletes or people who trusted Bernie Madoff with their entire financial futures.
Also—and this is something publicists are hesitant to discuss—the services of a publicist are actually only REALLY helpful if your book happens to be newsworthy or related to a current topic/news story. Here’s something they WON’T tell you—if you have your website/social media set up properly, by the time a news story breaks, you will already be known to be an authority in your subject, so you won’t need the publicist to connect the dots. Reporters will find you, even without a publicist.