The Old Neverending PublishAmerica Thread (Publish America)

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James D Macdonald

Waiting 90 Days for Payment?

Here's PA's retailer information:

<BLOCKQUOTE>

We offer the following retailer discounts:

1-50 copies: 40%
51-100 copies: 45%
101+ copies: 50%

Our books are not returnable, and we require pre-payment by credit card (Visa, MasterCard, or American Express) or check or money order. Retailers may place an order by calling us at 301-695-1707.

</BLOCKQUOTE>

So -- where's this "we have to wait 90 days to get our money" stuff coming from? Prepayment by credit card, check or money order sounds a lot like Cash Up Front.
 

XThe NavigatorX

Re: More PA woes, straight from a PA author's mouth...

heh. The authors are better off calling up and pretending they're a retailer. They only get 20% off and no royalties on small orders.
 

priceless1

Re: For those trying to stop sale of their PA books

<blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>btw, this thread www.publishamerica.com/cg.../10857.htm makes me want to throttle someone. Spam? SPAM??<hr></blockquote>
<img border=0 src="http://www.ezboard.com/image/posticons/pi_freak.gif" /> Yeech, as if we don't acquire enough of this sort of garbage as it is. I think this is more of a guarantee of how NOT to get your book sold. <img border=0 src="http://www.absolutewrite.com/images/emoteHammer.gif" />
 

publishorperish

I just have to RANT

Why not go through your phone book and telemarket? Or fax every business in town? Go door to door? Set up shop outside of Walmart like the girl scouts?

Correct me if I'm wrong, but it doesn't seem to me that these type of campaigns would work for fiction books. There is an inherent disconnect between writing a novel and schlepping it all over town as if it were a box of cookies. I had a short stint as a telemarketer in high school. People hated me and it took like a zillion calls before anyone bit (I'm a crappy salesperson).

Also, if you *want* to be the sole salesperson of your book, why not just use cafe press, buy your own isbn, copyright the dang thing and sell it like that??

People who go with PA love to tout the mantra *Except for the copyright, I didn't pay a thing!*

But you DID pay a lot! Not just in buying your own books, you also paid in your own time, in investing your money on a bad marketing plan, etc etc.

Fiction is art, fiction is a form of entertainment, fiction is not a commodity....
 

publishorperish

I just have to RANT

Why not go through your phone book and telemarket? Or fax every business in town? Go door to door? Set up shop outside of Walmart like the girl scouts?

Correct me if I'm wrong, but it doesn't seem to me that these type of campaigns would work for fiction books. There is an inherent disconnect between writing a novel and schlepping it all over town as if it were a box of cookies. I had a short stint as a telemarketer in high school. People hated me and it took like a zillion calls before anyone bit (I'm a crappy salesperson).

Also, if you *want* to be the sole salesperson of your book, why not just use cafe press, buy your own isbn, copyright the dang thing and sell it like that??

People who go with PA love to tout the mantra *Except for the copyright, I didn't pay a thing!*

But you DID pay a lot! Not just in buying your own books, you also paid in your own time, in investing your money on a bad marketing plan, etc etc.

Fiction is art, fiction is a form of entertainment, fiction is not a commodity....
Readers vote not only with their pocketbooks, but with their minds...
I don't know how most people choose what to read, but I do so by perusing the New York Times Book Review, the library, bookstores, and amazon/bn for books I might like...I especially love entertaining and well-written reviews (Not cheap praise written by someone else who can't write).

One more thing, if the book is over a certain price I WON'T BUY IT! If I really really really want to read a hardcover book that just came out, I'll go to the library and check it out. There is no way in hades that i will buy a $20 paperback book (I don't buy cds, either.) I'm avid reader. I'm also cheap.

/rant over
 

aka eraser

PA spammer

That planning-to-spam PA author is in for a rude awakening. His inbox will fill quickly with irate letters from folks vowing to NEVER purchase a book of his and he'll be flamed out of existence on a lot of those message boards.

I'm a proponent of subtle (WFDWYTK) understated (check out my signature!) near-subliminal (frankbaron.com rocks!) ways of reaching folks.

But heck, that's just the kind of guy I am. :grin
 

priceless1

Re:I just have to RANT

<blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>There is an inherent disconnect between writing a novel and schlepping it all over town as if it were a box of cookies.<hr></blockquote>
Quite right. It's the author's job to write the book. Let the publisher market it.
 

CaoPaux

Re: And now they will spam??

From that PA thread:

Word of mouth has long been the best advertisement. When someone likes something they typically tell 10 people about it, and when they hate it... about 15.
And post the spam on warning boards. Excuse me, I need to do something....

*whomps poster with cluebat*

Thank you. I feel better. :ack
 

James D Macdonald

Re: And now they will spam??

Spam. Oh, joy. Along with University Degrees from Prestigious Unaccredited Colleges and CH34P V14GR4, I'll get offers for PublishAmerica novels. From all 9,000 happy authors? Just what I friggin' needed.

This is on a line with going to bookstores, ordering your book under an assumed name, and never picking it up.

I wonder how long it'll take 'em to reinvent the cute stunt that a bunch of iUniverse and Xlibris authors already ran into the ground -- going to newsgroups and posting breathless recommendations for their own books, also under assumed names.

Does anyone want me to post a bunch of Stupid Internet Marketing Ideas that Don't Work but At Least Make You Feel You're Doing Something and Don't Cost Anything (other than your time and self respect and possibly your internet account)?

Effective marketing is a specialty. People who are good at it do it as a full-time job, for which they get paid. Unless you're a freakin' genius Professor-Harold-Hill-Sends-Me-A-Christmas-Card-Every-Year natural-born salesman this isn't something to try at home in your spare time. (And if you are that kind of salesperson, what are you doing wasting your time writing books?)

Bob's dad owns a barn, and Sue's mom can sew the costumes! C'mon, kids, let's put on a publicity campaign!
 

DaveKuzminski

Forget dumb marketing ideas

Have they forgotten the basic tenet of publishing?

Write a good book to begin with.
 

publishorperish

Re: re:confessions

Stupid Internet Marketing Ideas that Don't Work but At Least Make You Feel You're Doing Something and Don't Cost Anything

Yes please post! I need to laugh!

<a href="http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/business/2800049" target="_new">100,000 reasons to turn in spammers</a>
 

Whachawant

Re: rage against pa

...Thanks for the heads up XThe NavigatorX...

I'll have to increase the security on my Browser and email to block that bozo.
Strangely enough, not only will people react negatively to his spam marketing campaign.. He also won't sell any books cause he's using a third rate P.O.D. publisher.

Check out this quote.

"On 2000 emails with direct marketing, theoretically you stand to sell 400 copies. Non-Direct would yield about 100. "----ya good luck with that... has anybody tried to send out 2000 emails.... by themselves.. that's alot of work.----

Obviously this guy is just another dreamer waiting to run into the wall of disappointment.

Check out this irony......

"-----SPAM-----"
 

publishorperish

Re: Forget dumb marketing ideas

If I think my good is good, doesn't that make it good? If those arrogant NYC houses won't publish it, doesn't it mean that they are just stuck up? Life is unfair.
 

James D Macdonald

Re: re:confessions

Stupid Internet Marketing Ideas That Don't Work

Amazon subdivision

Go to Amazon. Find the hundred top-selling books that resemble yours in any way. Write reviews of those books (you don't have to read the books, just review them). Make sure your reviews are glowing five-star reviews. In the course of your review, say "This is the best book I've read since [Title and author of your book]." Post this as "A reader" from [Somewhere other than where you live].

Go to Amazon. Find the top hundred books in your category. You know those "recommended in addition to" links? Put in your book. If you have all your friends do this, you can have Lots of folks recommending your book "in addition to" the top-selling book.

Go to Amazon. Find the top-twenty best-selling books in your category. Make a list in the List-o-mania section. Put in those top twenty books, and your book. That way, any time one of those top books comes up, there's a chance your list will come up too. And if someone looks at the list, that someone will be looking right at your book!

Go to Amazon. Write a glowing review of your own book as "A Reader." For more fun, have all your friends write glowing reviews too. Try to spread 'em out in time, and sprinkle in a few four-star reviews to make it look realistic. If they review your book, you can review theirs! One hand washes the other... (and while you're at it, they can be the ones doing the "in addition to" check boxes).

Now, General Web:

Set up a web page about Your Book. Make sure it has a link to Amazon! Throw in a guestbook and a counter. Make the address of your webpage your sig for e-mail. Geocities is Great! Don't forget to enter it in all the search engines! And join web rings. Lots of web rings! Guest book! Counter! Flash animation! Graphics! Music! Make your page stand out. Get a list of the top fifty search terms at Google, and put them in the Meta-tag keywords.

Go to all those Free Ad Sites. (Google on "free ads") Type in ads for Your Book!

Go to PRWeb. Post your press release! A new press release every month isn't too much.

Go to various web boards. Enter, and post links to your webpage in random groups on assorted boards!

Do this in the middle of the night on a Friday when the administrators (who can delete the posts and lock you out) are asleep or away.

General Internet:

Get a list of e-mail addresses. Some folks call it lunch meat, but I call it Spam! Send nice chatty letters to thousands of unsuspecting strangers. If they only knew about your book they'd buy it, right? Make sure your letter has your ISBN and a link to your web page! The more thousands of strangers you can reach out and touch, the better. (You can get software packages that'll do this automatically, but doing it by hand is free.) Here's a bunch of tricks for getting past those pesky spam filters. They didn't mean to keep you out, did they?

Go to newsgroups. Hundreds of them. Thousands of them. Using a false name, go in and post a breathless announcement about your book. Don't forget to explain how you came across this book by accident, and make sure that you include ordering information.

Here's a made-up example:

<Blockquote>Hi! My name is Mortimer Glatzbier. The other day I was cleaning out the cat box when I saw a book that my friend Bob must have left lying around the last time he visited. It was The Apocalypse Door by James D. Macdonald. I'd never heard of either the book or the author, and it didn't look like the kind of book I like, but I picked it up. Before I finished the first sentence I was hooked! This book is the best book I've ever read. I asked my friend Bob who this James D. Macdonald who wrote The Apocalypse Door is, but he didn't know. Can anyone tell me who he is?! I must know if he wrote anything else, because I'm going to buy it! This is the best book I've ever read, and James D. Macdonald has to be the best author writing in English today! I can't believe that he isn't on the top of the New York Times Best Seller Chart! I'm going to have a sex change operation just so I can bear his love child!

I'm going to go over to Amazon.com right now and write a five-star review of this book. Everyone should go over there and write a five star review! Then I'm going to nominate it for a Hugo, a Nebula, an Edgar, a Howie, and a Rita. Then I'm going to read it again! The Apocalypse Door (by James D. Macdonald, a person I don't even know) is that perfect book that everyone will love!!!! You can get it at Amazon.com, at Barnes&Noble, or special order it at your local bookstore! It's got an ISBN number of 0312869886 (you'll need that to special order it). Don't forget to review it at Amazon, because you'll be totally amazed by this wonderful book by an author I'd never heard of before today!!!!!
</blockquote>
 

CaoPaux

"Marketing"

...going to newsgroups and posting breathless recommendations for their own books, also under assumed names.
They already do this. And when they're called on it, everyone is “just jealous of their success".

And I've also seen calls on the PA boards for their fellows to do the "in addition to" thing.

It's getting hard to maintain any sympathy for these folks, I regret to say.

:head

So, who's got a sub to the NYT? The "partnership" is supposed to be revealed this Sunday.

(Sunday, Sunday, Sunday! Be there, be there, be there!)
 

James D Macdonald

Re: "Marketing"

They already do this.

This is all stuff that they already do. See how useless it is?
 

James D Macdonald

Re: Marketing

CaoPaux

Ah, a man of few words is our Proandcon.

<HR>

It's getting hard to maintain any sympathy for these folks, I regret to say.

I've got nothing but sympathy for them. They're stuck in an impossible position. What can they do? They love their books, and they're seeing horrid things happen.

If my child were sick unto death, and I heard a rumor that standing on one foot until dawn might help him get better, you'd better believe I'd be up on one foot all night long.
 

priceless1

Re: re:confessions

<blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>The Apocalypse Door (by James D. Macdonald, a person I don't even know) is that perfect book that everyone will love!!!! You can get it at Amazon.com, at Barnes&Noble, or special order it at your local bookstore! It's got an ISBN number of 0312869886 (you'll need that to special order it).<hr></blockquote>
LOL, Jim. Whenever I've gone cross-eyed from reading too much, I invariably find something to make me smile. You made me laugh out loud. Thanks.
 

vstrauss

Re: re:confessions

>> Go to Amazon. Find the hundred top-selling books that resemble yours in any way. Write reviews of those books (you don't have to read the books, just review them).<<

Hey, it seems to have worked for Robert Stanek (he of the infamous Ruin Mist books).

- Victoria
 

publishorperish

Re: re:confessions

I have to ask: Why infamous? (I went to amazon and checked him out...story line seems vaguely familiar...)
 

AnneMarble

Re: For those trying to stop sale of their PA books

btw, this thread www.publishamerica.com/cg.../10857.htm makes me want to throttle someone. Spam? SPAM??

It's because of authors like this that the romance reader YahooGroup I moderate no longer allows promotional posts from AuthorHouse authors, iUniverse authors, and PA authors, etc. We do allow authors (and web sites) to post promotional posts as long as they followed rules. But the only ones I had to ban because they couldn't follow those rules were published by PA or similar publishers. Sometimes, it was because they were ignorant of netiquette, but in some cases, I think it's because they were so desperate.

What's sad is that they could have joined the list and actually followed the rules, particpated in discussions, posted a promo only now and then, and they might have made a name for themselves. There are some authors on the list published nontraditionally who do this, and people buy their books because they like the authors' posts. It's actually less work than harvesting those e-mail addresses, and it won't get you in trouble with your ISP.

Look, nobody is going to buy an author's book because they joined a YahooGroup and told everybody about their "great new sci-fi" novel or whatever. (Available for only $19.95 from...) In fact, some authors have really really screwed up (can I say screwed? :grin ) their reputations by spamming their books on mailing lists, usenet, etc.

Don't get me wrong. There are some traditionally published authors who screw up in the publicity seeking department. But they are usually outnumbered and outpaced by vanity and "vanityish" authors.
 

DeePower

What is "one source set up title"

I received an email that said her/his PA book couldn't be sold or even ordered because of something called "a one source set up"

"one source set up title, (have no clue what that is) that is preventing WaldenBooks from selling my book."

What is that? Why would it prevent books from being sold or even ordered.

Dee
www.BrianHillAndDeePower.com
 
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