Tag Archives: book promotion

How to Get Booksellers to Love You (And Sell Your Book)

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Erin Haire is the manager of the Hub City Bookshop, an independent bookstore run by the Hub City Writers Project.

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As a retail bookseller, one of the most exciting aspects of my job is interacting with authors.  The relationship between authors and booksellers, ideally, is mutually beneficial.  We have a common goal: sell some books.  As a bookseller, I’m much more likely to do that with an involved and enthusiastic author.

In the spirit of continued goodwill between authors and booksellers, here is some advice from a fairly successful independent bookseller to authors who are getting their start.

1.  Be nice.  Do you really catch more flies with honey than with vinegar?  Absolutely.  This is the most important and least frequently heeded advice I give to authors, especially those just starting out.  A good attitude and friendly demeanor will open a whole lot of doors when dealing with retail professionals.  When you work in customer service, you have to deal with some unhappy, rude folks.  It’s just comes with the territory.  If you make it your business to avoid the ranks of the disgruntled masses, my gratitude will get you one step closer to having your book on my shelves.  On the other hand, if you get me on the phone and tell me that you don’t think I was raised right because I haven’t had time to review your memoir, I’m not stocking it.  Period.

Once your book is in the store, there is nothing that makes me happier than selling books by authors I know to be genuinely nice people.  Most other booksellers I know feel the same way, so be nice to them.  Also, be nice to the reps at your publisher, because they’re the ones selling the books to us.  Generally, just be nice.

2.  Make sure your book is available.  This sounds like a no-brainer, but the easier it is to get your book the better.  If you know the name of the sales rep I should be dealing with at your publisher, put his or her phone number in the packet you send.  If it’s available from a wholesaler like Baker and Taylor or Ingram, make that clear up front.  If you’re self-published or with a very small publisher, I strongly recommend making sure that at least one of the big wholesalers carries your book.  If the book sells and the only way I can get more is to call you directly, it may or may not be worth my time to get a hold of you.

3.  Include all pertinent information when you make first contact.  Did you go to high school two blocks from my store?  Has your family lived in our town for a hundred years?  Do you teach at a local elementary school?  Is your cover art a photo of a local landmark?  If so, please tell me!  Mind reading is not an ability included on my admittedly impressive resume of personal skills.  If there is a particular reason you think your book will do well in my store more than others, lead with that.  Well, introduce yourself first, and then tell me about your mother’s book club that meets down the street and has a hundred members that are all dying to buy your book.  Remember, I like selling books just as much as you do.

4.  Get on Twitter.  This might sound like silly advice and you might think it’s not for writers who are serious about their craft, but get over that attitude quick.  Yes, Jonathan Franzen doesn’t like Twitter, but he doesn’t need personal contact with booksellers to ensure we stock his book.  After you win the National Book Award, maybe Twitter becomes a bit redundant.  In any other case, it can be an invaluable tool.  Twitter allows you access to a community of people who successfully work in the book business.  Publishers, editors, agents, bloggers, booksellers, and authors are all represented.  Participating in a community of like-minded people will feed you creatively and professionally, and Twitter is a very easy way to get involved.

Hopefully these tips will offer some insight into the minds of independent booksellers.  I think that the folks who make an effort with booksellers without a doubt have more successful events, more publicity for their books, and higher sales.  We love books, and we are constantly looking for the next fantastic piece of literature to champion and the next great author to get excited about.  Be committed to your work, because we’re committed to books. Also, be nice.

Booklife Guest David J. Williams, with “Viral Marketing Case Study: Or, How I Built Fake Websites to Sell My Real Books”

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Today, a great guest post by author David J. Williams , whose futuristic military thrillers I quite enjoy–tightly written, intelligent, and exciting. This is being posted on Tuesday rather than the regular Wednesday due to a WordPress issue. – JeffV

er, hey, is this thing live? Well, first of all, thanks a ton to Jeff for inviting me to say a word or two about how I’ve been marketing my Autumn Rain trilogy (consisting of the books THE MIRRORED HEAVENS, THE BURNING SKIES, and the forthcoming THE MACHINERY OF LIGHT). I’ll also say a bit about Lessons Learnt and all that…

First, let me reveal the Actual Strategy, and then I’ll break it down a little from there. “Viral marketing” has more definitions than you can shake a stick at; it seems to me that the essence of the best campaigns is that they’re not transparently related to the author, but instead help to generate a buzz by virtue of their being a little mysterious.

The core of my campaign was the following site:

http://www.greateramericanews.com/breakingnews

“TERRORIST STRIKE DESTROYS SPACE ELEVATOR”

“AUTUMN RAIN CLAIMS RESPONSIBILITY”

That dastardly terrorist group Autumn Rain! Who the #$# are they? I.e., we’re dropped straight into the world, with a faux news site with CNN-like look-and-feel, reporting on the aftermath of the catastrophic event that opens the first book. There’s plenty of “apparent” content and even (if you click on the graphic at the top) an actual video, in which a doomed reporter broadcasts his final hapless transmission. Of course, if you try clicking on the other links, you rapidly realize that there’s really not much to this website: it’s just a shell, intended to convey the emotional impact of Something Really Huge Going On, creating the illusion of verisimilitude…an illusion that’s carried still further by the page that virtually every link takes one to:

http://www.greateramericanews.com/restricted.html

The world of 2110 is one where the government has the Internet in “lock-down”, so it ties in thematically…but the point is that this website is like a cat that arches its back and makes all its hair stand on end to appear larger than it actually is. (I apologize for that somewhat-forced analogy, but as I write this, my feline friend Captain Zoom is sitting on my lap and intruding upon my cognitive processes, in addition to making it that much harder to type).

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Book Promotion: The Value of Acknowledging Constraints

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Promoting your book project may seem like it’s about shooting for the moon, and dreaming about the kind of coverage that means you have a chance to reach the largest possible audience under the circumstances. However, without acknowledging limits you may find yourself over-extended and floundering. Contraint can be as important as ambition. Here are two things to keep in mind when considering your options for promoting your book.

(1) Acknowledge the limits of your skill set.

The skills that led you to write a book or story or article are not the same skills required to leverage it in the public world. That is a separate skill. Not everyone has it, and only some people have it in genius-level quantities. This can work for you in areas where an element of inspired amateurism—the Do-It-Yourself impulse—is appreciated, even expected. However, even in areas previously the domain of amateurs, like YouTube book trailers or podcasts, more and more sophisticated, professional efforts have started to become the standard.

Therefore, to avoid stress and be more successful: Recognize your own limitations and find others with the required skills and experience. You may need a budget to hire someone, but you may also be able to barter for services. The barter system has become more and more common as creative individuals collaborate across the Internet. The best way to find the right people to work for you is to find existing examples of what you want to do, and approach whoever created them—whether it’s a banner ad or a website or a short film. In all things remember that a combination of mimicry and your unique vision provides the best chance for success.

Luckily, too, online platforms like blogs come with ready-made templates, and a blog platform like WordPress allows you to turn a blog into something very much like a website. Make sure to let standardization and templates do the work for you where appropriate. If you cannot find someone to do something you know is not your strength, you may need to decide whether it’s worth the effort. An ugly or clunky website or book trailer can be worse support for your efforts at leverage than no website or book trailer at all.

(2) Define the limits of your effort.

There are only so many hours in a day, and you have only so much stamina, across a day, a week, or a longer period. Before entering into a campaign for your creative project, decide how much time and energy you can afford to spend on it. Ask yourself these questions:

—How much time will I be spending on this effort and over how many days, weeks, or months? (For example, are you going to devote forty hours over three weeks, or sixty hours over three months?)

—Will I be traveling as part of this effort, or staying at home? (Time spent traveling may not be time spent promoting your work, but it’s still time lost.)

—Will I be spending money or only using opportunities provided by the publisher as well as free tools and platforms? (If you’re spending money, what’s your budget, and are you buying services, access, or hardware?)

—What form of follow-up is required for this project? (Whether it’s nudging gatekeepers, conducting interviews, or finding ways for people to view your book trailer, every creative project requires some type of followup. Follow-up, even if it’s just emailing people, takes time and must be accounted for in your efforts. Sometimes this is the most important part of what you will do for your project.)

—How much additional follow-up am I willing to do? (The “X” factor in all PR campaigns is the exponential way success feeds on itself. If you’re successful in your initial efforts, there will almost certainly be additional investments of effort to leverage that success.)

These questions and their answers exist in the context of a wider space: your creative life. Some writers can easily promote their work and continue to create by separating “creative” and “career” efforts into separate daily blocks of time. Others require the immersion of total concentration on the act of creation and must acknowledge (without guilt) that focusing on their careers will require not working on creative projects during that time. Whatever your personality and approach, make sure you know the personal consequences of your decisions in this area.

This week on my book tour, I’m lecturing in Seattle, heading over to Los Angeles for readings at Cal-State San Bernardino and BookSoup, and winding up in San Francisco for a workshop, reading, and discussion.