PAMB and its quotes

PVish said:

Uh-oh. The "slip a book onto a store rack" marketing idea has resurfaced (bolding mine):

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When I used to hang out with vanity-published authors, I got told this strategy a lot. It never seemed like something even slightly feasible.
Lose more money with each sale!

the more you sell
the more folks will seek you out
they will come to your door
I hope that was meant to be a figurative example.

Whenever I sell my book, I don't want people to ring my doorbell an ask me to sign their book. All I would probably think about would be Kathy Bates and James Caan... It's a good movie, but still...

Jerz, need a lighter please.

PVish said:

Uh-oh. The "slip a book onto a store rack" marketing idea has resurfaced (bolding mine):

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That's unethical, plain and simple. It's like leaving your business card/bookmark in all the books in the library and the local bookstore that is similiar to your own book. All it does is annoy people.

Whenever a staff member goes to work on the books, he's going to find that book, take it to a computer, look it up, get very confused, then annoyed, then have to properly get rid of it. They would have looked it up through the distributor, only to find out that that particular book is not returnable (I looked). Then they are stuck with it, and I'm sure they wouldn't sell it - no price, no barcode, no sale. Bottom line.

Either way, the author has just wasted anywhere from $10-20 dollars, depending on the discount he got when he ordered that batch of books....

But hey, he didn't pay to have published.

the problem is the majority of PA authors are so ignorant about the business of publishing that it's scary... and the mis/disinformation on the PAMB from those who should know better just helps the victims get deeper and deeper into the cesspool of debt.

I can't wait until PA offers their own credit card. Only 55% interest on the first $5000 spent on your own books!

**hands em a blue Bic**

I read that about putting the book on the shelf anyway and thought "Um... and how do you expect to get paid for that? It won't be in inventory, doesn't have a price sticker, and do you really want to be remembered as the guy who snuck a book on the shelf?" That is, if the same manager finds it in the first place.

So many reasons why this is not a good idea...

It's a good thing I unpacked my box of Bics

It's his local grocery store and everything in the store is inventoried. If someone did become interested in the book, it wouldn't scan. The cashier would bring it to the attention of the manager and he'd determine it wasn't one of their products.

He'd be annoyed at the man who placed an authorized product in his store and the people in line would be irritated because of the delay.

Book goes in the trash. Where it belongs.

What annoys me is the fact that the authors' books that are on the rack worked hard to get them there and their publishers spent a great deal of money to advertise and promote those books. Wonder how he'd feel if the positions were reversed and it was some vanity press published author's book covering up his best seller?

Just shows what PA published writers have to stoop to in order to get a copy of their 191 page, $19.95 softback on any kind of shelf.

emsuniverse said:

That's unethical, plain and simple.

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I agree. I asked my co-manager at the Kroger store where I work about this. He said that if someone did this after he told the writer what the proper channels were to try to get the book stocked, he would throw the book in the trash. He also told me that you would be surprised how many people try this sort of thing to get their products out there.

brianm said:

Just shows what PA published writers have to stoop to in order to get a copy of their 191 page, $19.95 softback on any kind of shelf.

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Sad, and just a bit horrifying. It's not so much a case of guerilla marketing as it is desperation trumping common sense.

In my deep, dark past I once managed a retail store. Occasionally someone would walk in with a product in hand, asking about placement on store shelves. I had no choice but to give them the contact info for the buyers at corporate. We were simply not allowed to sell anything that didn't come to us from the distribution warehouse. I could understand their position. Every product in the store is backed by the reputation of the chain. Not only that, but a customer expects that if their friend found Item A in store 42, then they can go to store 142 and find the same item - or at least have the manager order it if they're out of stock.

If someone had placed their product on the shelves and walked out, I would have treated it like any other lost item and placed it in the back room or underneath the counter until the owner showed up to claim it. I suppose the person with the product would have sent their friends in asking, and I'd have truthfully told them that we didn't stock such a product and there was nothing like that on our shelves. And if they brought the product up to the counter and asked to buy it, I wouldn't sell it. It's not in the system. I wouldn't have an official way to record the sale.

Even if I did have the leeway to stock extra items, I still wouldn't sell it without some sort of agreement in place with the producer of the item. And if they'd pulled the above stunts I'd be so ticked off at their underhanded tactics that I wouldn't want to deal with them.

This is why PA (and self-pubbed) authors have a better shot at local stores. I'm not knocking that at all. In fact, I've got some photography on display at a local coffee shop. Smaller businesses have more flexibility in terms of what they can put on the shelves.

I don't suppose that placing your book in a bookstore when the employees' backs are turned would be considered illegal, would it?

A replier to that thread said...

Those are some great ideas for promoting. I love that you left your book on the best sellers isle. that is an awesome idea.

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Now everyone's going to do it.

emsuniverse said:

I don't suppose that placing your book in a bookstore when the employees' backs are turned would be considered illegal, would it?

A replier to that thread said...Those are some great ideas for promoting. I love that you left your book on the best sellers isle. that is an awesome idea.

Now everyone's going to do it.

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Not everyone. Some will probably take a more conservative approach and just put their business cards or brochures inside the beside sellers. (Hey—it's better than putting them on the windshield of cars in the parking lot. You just know if someone picks up a bestseller they probably are readers, and if they find a note inside the best-seller recommending an even better book, they're going to ask the bookstore manager where that book is so they can immediately buy several copies, and the manager will rush to the phone to order a couple of dozen copies while setting up a reading for the author, etc., etc.)

Now, where is that box of Bics?

you're quite good!

I dropped one off at Martin's ( a local market ) and the manager gave it back to me and said to contact the district manager. Hell, I'd already signed it for the local one. I waited til he left and I put it on the front row of the best selling books. At least someone will look at it.

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Ever dreamed of seeing your novel sitting alongside the works of the world's best selling authors.

Well, that dream can now become a reality. Just walk in to any bookstore and plonk it down there when the manager turns his back.

Then sit back and reap the .... (sorry, we'll have to get back to you on this one, seems our promo dept hasn't fully thought this out)

**rips tape, pulls up box flaps, riffles through newspapers**
AHA!

Who needs a Bic? This is one of the biiiiig boxes, so there's plenty to go around!

Jersey Chick said:

**rips tape, pulls up box flaps, riffles through newspapers**
AHA!

Who needs a Bic? This is one of the biiiiig boxes, so there's plenty to go around!

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Pass one my way. I still think what this writer did was wrong! If I was the store manager and saw that book, I would call the writer up if he left his contact info and tell him it looks like he left his book at my store. Then I would tell him he has an hour to come get it or it's getting thrown out with the trash. Mean to do? Yes. But I just feel like the guy would have it coming his way.

What's the opposite of shoplifting? Shopleaving?

**tosses black Bic to Jimmy**

I imagine the writer has no idea how he might be remembered by that manager. Probably not quite what he had in mind, eh?

Hey, that's a way to make some money!

Offer it as a service: Attention PA writers! If you send me ten copies of your book and $100, I will place your book on the shelves of ten major bookstores!

Understatement of the hour day week month year decade.

http://bb.publishamerica.com/viewtopic.php?t=24184

We all know that PA is quite generous in accepting manuscripts in various forms.

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Here are two of my favorites they accepted.

http://www.critters.org/sting/

http://www.crackofdeath.com/

Attention writers!

Do you suffer from Golden Word Syndrome? Are you ready to admit you have a problem? If you think you might be suffering from this condition, but aren't sure, here is one indication that you have this condition:

1.

Last saturday night, I stayed up until 2AM on a "Spillane Run," producing 10,870 words for my latest novel, xxxxxxxx xx xxxx. I went over it the next day and rewrote 3 sentences, but have found the majority of it to be of remarkable quality.

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Yes - it is possible in a first draft to have well over 10,000 words that are of remarkable quality - but for most mere mortals, a first draft is hardly of this caliber. So, if you sit back and think your first draft is remarkable, you might, indeed, suffer from Golden Word syndrome. But fear not, help is available. However, admitting you have a problem is the first step in curing.

And now back to our regularly scheduled programming.


BTW- Happy Halloween!

Yesterday I was in Borders and there was a display of books that were published by PA. I was surprised that a large retailer like Borders would allow that. The author even has a book signing scheduled there for this weekend. Is this typical?

Salem Ollivander said:

Yesterday I was in Borders and there was a display of books that were published by PA. I was surprised that a large retailer like Borders would allow that. The author even has a book signing scheduled there for this weekend. Is this typical?

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of course not - the author has purchased the books him/herself and put them there on consignment or hoodwinked the manager into purchasing one or two copies.

any manager who orders PA books without checking their abysmal policies should be fired.

it's probably a local author who has hopes of selling to friends and family - after that, it's all downhill. Check the prices - they're not going to be competitive with other books in the same format and genre.

sad.

When my book came out one of the first things I learned about "marketing" was to leave my cards in other people's books. I thought it was all kind of cheesy and didn't do it. So that is a big thing over there, the little deceptive tricks to sell their books p*s people off. Most of them don't know any better.

xhouseboy said:

Ever dreamed of seeing your novel sitting alongside the works of the world's best selling authors.

Well, that dream can now become a reality. Just walk in to any bookstore and plonk it down there when the manager turns his back. . . .

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It seems to me (probably influenced by recent reading in The Golden Bough) that the practice is an instance of sympathetic magic -- that is, of the attempt to bring a hoped-for outcome about through use of similarity (loosely interpreting the concept here). It is similar to the wearing of eagle feathers to give one the sharp vision of an eagle.

Now, if I am correct in that inference (amateur psychology/anthropology alert!!), then perhaps some are attempting to draw bestsellerdom by pasting the title of their book into the NYTimes bestseller list or wrapping a copy in a photo of Oprah. For that matter, any invocation of Oprah in connection with a book (other than those she really picks, of course) seems to be a sort of incantation, a resort to superstition akin to sympathetic magic.

My idiosyncratic views, FWIW.

--Ken

Sheryl Nantus said:

of course not - the author has purchased the books him/herself and put them there on consignment or hoodwinked the manager into purchasing one or two copies.

any manager who orders PA books without checking their abysmal policies should be fired.

it's probably a local author who has hopes of selling to friends and family - after that, it's all downhill. Check the prices - they're not going to be competitive with other books in the same format and genre.

sad.

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That's not true--it is not completely out of the ordinary for stores like Borders or Barnes and Noble to have some books by PA authors, or to hold signings for PA authors. I've had signings at both of those chains, and they were not on consignment, and managers weren't "hoodwinked" into buying books. I simply asked, and they complied, no coaxing needed at all. Plenty of others have done the same.