|
||||||||||
|
Subscribe to the Absolute Write Newsletter and get the Agents! Agents! Agents! report free! Click here.
|
Win a 1-year subscription to Writer's Digest by subscribing to Absolute Markets-- all paying markets for your writing. Click here. |
|
| |||||||||||||
|
|
Interview with Joan
Stewart
We've been having some debate at Absolute Write
about whether or not book signings are really "worth it." What's
your take? Is it a good use of an author's time? Only if you want to sell more books. There are two
key reasons you should do book signings: First, they help position you as a celebrity. All authors should want to be
known as celebrities. Second, a book signing brings you face-to-face with your customers, and with
bookstore owners who you rely on to move your books. It prevents you from
operating in a vacuum. There are two types of book signings: --The kind where readers stand in line and wait for you to sign your book.
These are wonderful for your marketing campaign because many readers consider it
a real honor to meet the author in person and to get an autographed book.
Anything you can do to add value for your customers is a great marketing
strategy. And you might hear
comments like “Have you ever thought about writing a book about…?” or
“I’d love to see you create a product like…” or “What else do you sell
at your website?” --A “drop-by” signing is one in which you visit bookstores, usually
independent bookstores, and sign books that will be put onto the shelves, or are
already on the shelves. Bookstores cannot return autographed copies, so they
will be more inclined to keep them on the shelves. When visiting bookstores,
make sure you’re friendly with the staff. Ask if there’s anything you can do
that will help them sell the book. Ask if they’ve featured the book at their
website. If not, you might offer them a free article or a list of tips that tie
in to the book, or that can be featured along with information about the book.
Call first before visiting so you don’t catch them on a busy day. “Relevance” is more important than “reach.” In other words, even though many authors think they can sell more books by
hitting the bigger stations, that isn’t necessarily so. First, getting booked
as a guest on a major station is a long shot. Second, many people who are
listening to those big stations wouldn’t necessarily buy your book. An author
could probably sell many more books if she hit two or three smaller stations
that had listeners who were a perfect match with her book topic. The author of a
book on a religious topic, for example, stands a far better chance of getting
onto smaller
Christian, Gospel and Ministry stations—and selling more books—than by
getting onto a big station with a secular audience and selling only a few books.
Just as it’s important to get TV experience in smaller markets before
trying to get onto “Oprah,” it’s important to get experience on smaller
radio shows or in smaller markets before you try to get onto Howard Stern.
Besides, smaller, targeted programs and smaller markets offer lots of advantages
for authors: --If you do well, chances are good the host will ask you back for another
interview. The marketing “Rule of 7” says your message has to be in front of
people 7 times before they buy. So that can happen on a smaller station easier
than on a bigger one. --Smaller stations are more likely to invite you to be a “regular”
contributor. For example, the author of a sports book might be asked to appear
every Monday morning at --Smaller stations are more likely to put information about you on their
websites. --It’s easier to become a big fish in a small radio pond and next to
impossible to become a big name on a big station, or in a big market. --It’s easier to book interviews with smaller stations because the
competition isn’t as fierce. Here’s something else that’s important to remember about radio. National
Public Radio can be a goldmine for authors. You’ll find dozens of shows—some
local and some syndicated—that welcome authors as guests, including some
stations that feature topics so narrowly niched that
virtually any author who has written about them will be invited onto the show. I hosted a teleseminar called “How to Get
Booked on National Public Radio” earlier this year. You can learn more about
what we discussed at http://www.publicityhound.com/publicity-products/marketing-tapes/NPR.htm
How can an author drive home the sale on radio or TV
without constantly saying, "As it says in my book, How to
Care For a Walrus..."? The best way is by simply giving a terrific interview that’s informative
and entertaining and packed with sound bites. Here are 4 other things you can
do: --
Check with the host or interviewer ahead of time and ask if it’s OK to give
away copies of your book. You can even have some fun and turn it into a contest.
The host can say something like, “The first five callers who call with the
correct answer to the following question will win a copy of How to
Care for a Walrus.” --Before the show begins, ask the host to promote your “free tips” just
before a commercial break. The host would say something like this, “When we
come back, Sally is going to share with us her top 3 tips on how to deal with a
2-year-old who’s having a temper tantrum. So grab a pencil and paper and be
ready to take down her valuable tips…” You
do this so people actually have a pencil and paper handy when the host gives
your toll-free number at the end of the show, so people can call to buy your
book. (You do have a toll-free number, don’t you? Don’t start doing TV or
radio interviews until you get one.) --Tell the host you want to make a special offer just for his audience.
Example: “Anyone who buys a copy of Sally’s book today and mentions this
show will also get her free report titled “13 ways to teach children how to
save money.”
--If you’re doing TV talk shows, offer your book to the hosts ahead of time
and ask if they will mention it. Most stations will. In fact, many stations will
also take a still shot of the book and store it in their computer, then use that
shot to show on the screen during the interview. It’s to their advantage to
promote your book because the fact that you wrote a book validates you as a
guest. It boosts your credibility. DO NOT, under any circumstances, hold the
book in your lap during the interview, then hold it
up in front of the camera and start talking about it. That’s the fastest way
to get kicked off the show forever. What are the two or three most original book
promotions you've ever heard? I’m purposely not telling you about big, gaudy, expensive promotions
because I think most writers would rather hear about successful promotions that
can be done on the cheap. Here are three ideas anyone can borrow:
--Involve
journalists in your story. Bart Baggett, an author and handwriting
expert, is a sought-after radio and TV talk show guest. Before he appeared on
the Howard Stern show, he offered to analyze the handwriting of Howard Stern and
his staff at the radio station. They submitted handwriting samples beforehand.
Every single person said Bart’s analysis was dead accurate. Any promotion that
involves media people in your topic, rather than having them just report from
the sidelines, is a great tactic. Think of ways you can involve reporters,
editors, talk show hosts, etc. --Use
business cards that are keepers. Michael Charles Messineo, a Harley rider, wrote a fiction
book titled Rigby’s Roads. It’s a story about what happens when a
mild-mannered man who is about to end his life gets mixed up with motorcycle
gangs, the FBI and a chase for terrorist secrets. Messineo knew that most people throw away standard business cards. So he put himself
inside the boots of other Harley riders, a huge target audience for his book,
and asked himself, “What would I want to see that I wouldn’t throw away?” Based on his experience riding his Harley in the mountains of Boulder,
Colorado, where the weather can be a rider’s delight one minute and a nightmare the
next, Messineo hit on an idea. All riders—not just
those in Colorado—are affected by the wind chill factor. So he printed business cards. The
front of the card advertises his book. The back of the card features a handy
chart that helps bikers calculate the wind chill factor within a few seconds by
referring to the place on the chart where the temperature and wind speed
intersect. Messineo mailed the cards to 150
Harley-Davidson dealers throughout the United States. Along with the cards, he included a sales pitch encouraging store owners to
give the cards to customers and use them as a natural conversation-starter that
could then lead store owners to talk about their winter clothing specials. “So
I created a plug for my book that was secondary to the main focus that everybody
would keep it for,” he said. What kind of a “keeper” business card can you
create? --Start
an opt-in email newsletter or a “tip of the week.” This is not an
original idea. But it’s a smart idea. And I’m amazed at how few authors take
advantage of this. My ezine, which now has about
10,100 subscribers, has become my Number One marketing tool and my primary
revenue-generator. Non-fiction writers can write ezines
that dole out free advice on whatever their area of expertise happens to be.
Fiction writers can also write ezines. If you write
romance novels, publish a “romance tip of the week.” If you write Civil War novels, publish interesting little facts about the In a "chicken or egg" scenario, which
comes first, publicity or distribution? If my book isn't regularly stocked
in bookstores, should I concentrate on getting national media attention?
Or is that wasted effort until people can walk into a store and find my book? Publicity comes first. That’s because you can be selling your book at
dozens of places other than bookstores. In fact, Dan Poynter, the guru of self-publishing, says bookstores are the worst places to sell
books. If you’re selling a book on parachuting, for example, where do you
think you will sell more books? In a bookstore like Barnes & Noble,or in a shop that sells parachutes? Many books don’t have national distribution. But if you’re creative with
your marketing, there’s no reason you can’t sell thousands of them through
toll-free numbers, from a website, through joint ventures with trade
associations, from the back of the room during speaking engagements, on
home-shopping networks, through catalogs, by selling to libraries and book
clubs, through articles you write for print and online publications, etc.
National publicity gives you credibility. The trick is to do everything you
possibly can during media interviews to ensure that readers will know how to get
your book if it isn’t offered in bookstores. To encourage media people to
print your website URL, always offer something for free at your website. On a personal note, I used to go to bookstores exclusively to buy most of my
books. Now I buy almost all of them online, directly from the author’s
website, if possible, or through Amazon.com. If you had the budget for only one of these things,
would you do a targeted direct mail campaign, buy an ad in a
major print magazine, or buy a series of ads in an e-zine? None of the above. Remember, I’m The Publicity
Hound and my tagline is “Tips, tricks and tools for free publicity.”
Here’s what I’d do: --I’d first identify the people who would likely buy my book, then identify
the ezines those people read.
Then I’d contact the publishers and offer a very short article, or a short
list of tips they could use for free, on the condition that they include a link
back to my website. Offering these kinds of things over a long period of time
helps establish me as an expert and makes it possible for readers to seek me
out, rather than putting the burden on me to seek them out. It also saves the ezine
publishers time because they don’t have to come up
with their own original content each week. Why should I buy a series of ads in
an ezine when the publishers will gladly give me
more space to dazzle their readers with free advice—and it costs me nothing? --National magazines are a harder nut to crack. So instead of buying an ad,
I’d write creative briefs, fillers, Q&As,
quizzes—anything short that editors can plug into a small hole on a page. Pick
up any issue of Cosmopolitan, or a major health or lifestyle magazine. Alongside those expensive
paid ads, you’ll see dozens of little editorial items that cost nothing.
Editors love briefs because they help fill odd-size holes on a page and they
require little editing. --I’d do direct mail, but only in conjunction with another medium. For
example, if I did a special promotion to my email list, I might follow it up
with a direct-mail piece, but only if I were selling
a big-ticket item. I’d have to make sure I was covering the cost of expensive
direct-mail. For the record, I have never bought an ad in a national magazine. I have
never bought a series of ads in ezines. And I have
never done a direct-mail piece. Yet I sell thousands of dollars worth of
information products each year, using many of the same techniques I am writing
about here—through my ezine, by writing articles
for print and online publications and by submitting briefs to national
magazines. Tell us the etiquette of following up. Let's say I've sent a press release to a local newspaper and haven't gotten a response. If I'm going to call to follow up, what do I say? First, here’s what you must NOT say. Do not say: “Hi, my name is Joan and I’m calling to see if you got my news release on my new book called '7 Tax-Saving Secrets the IRS Wishes You Didn’t Know'? (The reporter probably doesn’t know if he got it and he won’t drop what
he’s doing to look. And he’ll think you’re a dork because you don’t know
how to play the game.) “Hi, my name is Bob. I sent you a news release last week and I’m calling
to find out when it will appear in the paper.” (The reporter probably doesn’t know when it will appear. That’s because
the size of the newspaper is determined by how much advertising it sells. If
tomorrow’s paper isn’t big enough, it might go in the next day, or the next.
All you have done by asking this question is annoy
the reporter.) Instead, you need a REASON to call. So make your follow-up call and offer
them something that you didn’t give them in the original release, like this.
Notice that in the follow-up, you never use the phrase “news release”: “Hi, this is Joan. I sent you some material last week about 6 no-cost,
low-cost tips for small businesses on tight budgets. I’m calling to let you
know that I also have names of three small business people in your area who have
seen their sales skyrocket as a result of some of these ideas, and who would
agree to be interviewed. Does this sound like something you would be interested
in?” If you call and don’t get an answer after two days, try e-mail. If you
still don’t hear anything from them, try calling again. Use a combination of
phone calls and e-mails. If you still don’t hear anything after seven tries,
then drop it. But make a note to come back to them a few months later. Remember
that media outlets see a lot of turnover. So the editor who you called this week
might not be there in four months. I did an hour-long telephone seminar with author Jill Lublin called “Failproof Ways
to Follow Up After Sending a News Release or Story
Pitch.” You can learn more about it at http://www.publicityhound.com/publicity-products/marketing-tapes/failprooffollowup.htm
What are the differences between working with small
presses and large presses in terms of publicity? What can I expect a large
press to do, and what can I expect a small press to do? I asked Lissa Warren about this. She’s the author of the excellent book The Savvy Author’s
Guide to Book Publicity at http://www.savvyauthorsguide.com/,
which I recommend highly. She also has worked as a publicist for several
publishing houses and is currently senior director of publicity at Da
Capo Press, a smaller publishing house. Lissa said publicists at small and large presses usually have the same number
of books to handle. Usually, they have similar experience and similar expertise.
But there are two key differences: First, publicists at larger publishing houses have a lot more pull with book
review editors and producers at radio shows like those on National Public Radio
because their company is a household name. Second, larger presses have bigger budgets. That usually means more extensive
book tours for the author and bigger, fancier press kits. Regardless of whether you are represented by a small or a large press, learn
as much as you can about publicity from your publicist. Ask her how she wants
you to help and when you should stay out of the way. Remember that your
publicist will be working on your book campaign for about 6 months. Then
you’re on your own. Don’t ask your publicist for her list of media contacts. This is
proprietary information and few publicists ever share this with authors. Several people suggest that an author should be
relentlessly outgoing when doing an appearance-- for example, greeting people at
a bookstore entrance. But what do you say to people to break the ice? “It’s so good to see you. I’m honored that you took time out of your
busy schedule to come here tonight. What kinds of books do you like to read?”
(Get them talking about themselves.) “C’mon in and make yourself comfortable. Help yourself to coffee on the side
table. We’ll be getting started in about 15 minutes.” “I’d love to talk to touch base with you afterward. By chance, do you
have a business card so we can stay in touch?” (They will be flattered that
you asked. Also, ask permission to e-mail them with promotions such as an e-zine.) Ask them a question that fits into the topic of your book. If you write about
dogs, say something like, “Do you have a dog at home? You do? What kind? And
what is its name?” “I’m so grateful you came here tonight to be with me. Thanks so much for
sharing your time. It really means a lot and I hope we can stay in touch.”
Bookstore buyers often ask for a media kit that
includes publicity plans in it. What kinds of things will impress the
buyers? What are they looking for? They want to see creativity, energy, persistence
and fun ideas. Anything other than the standard, ho-hum news
releases. You can create that energy and fun through things such as contests, polls and
surveys, briefs, writing op-ed columns and letters to the editor, special events
in your community, posting to discussion boards, offering free advice in any
format, piggybacking ideas off holidays and anniversaries and the four seasons,
speaking engagements, teaching classes in your community and many of the other
things I am mentioning in this interview. What are your three best pieces of advice for new
authors seeking publicity? --When contacting the media, do not—I repeat DO NOT—pitch your book.
Unless you are contacting a book reviewer, most media people don’t care about
what’s between the covers of your book. What they DO care about is what’s
between your two ears. In other words, they want to know what you know. They
want to know how you can help them come up with good story ideas, entertain and
enlighten their readers, increase circulation or get better ratings. That’s
all they care about. About 150,000 new titles are published each year. While the
149,999 other authors are pitching their books, you need to be pitching story
ideas and your expertise. While everyone else is zigging,
you need to be zagging. When the media write about
you, or feature you on their TV or radio show, guess what they will mention? Your
book, of course. --Never forget the most important question you can ask anyone in the media.
That is, “How can I help you?” Pay attention, take notes, then
help them however you can. Position yourself as a valuable source and they will
come back to you again and again. --Media people seek out, interview and want to stay connected to experts. Yet
many authors are reluctant to position themselves as experts. Read the excellent
White Paper called “The Expertise Imperative” written by a special committee
within the National Speakers Association, the professional trade group of
speakers, many of whom are also authors. It explains the six levels of expertise
and what you need to do to jump to the next highest level. You can read it for
free at http://nsaspeaker.org/pdfs/Expertise_Wht_paper.pdf
Anything else you'd like to add? Before writing your next book, ask yourself this question: “Who is my
target audience, and why should they spend time and money reading my book?” When an author starts complaining to me that their book isn’t selling, I
ask them that question, and I’m amazed at how tongue-tied some of them get. Or
an author will say, “My target audience is everyone. I think everyone should
read my book!” “Oh really?” I ask. “Do you have the time,
energy and money to target your publicity to every media outlet that exists?” The more narrowly you can target, the easier the job of marketing your book
and the more effective your publicity campaign. Stop thinking that the good
publicity results from the blast-fax news release you send to 3,000 media
outlets. It doesn’t. I’d much rather see you target 30 media outlets that
are in the best position to help you sell more books, then start establishing
valuable relationships with the reporters, editors, talk show hosts, producers,
columnists and assignment editors who work there—so they keep coming back to
you again and again. Finally, if you have any questions about how to publicize your book or anything else you’re doing, you may email me at jstewart@PublicityHound.com. I’d love to hear from you. Subscribe to Joan's free newsletter, “The Publicity Hound’s Tips of
the Week,” at http://www.publicityhound.com/
and take advantage of more than 40 free articles about publicity at her website.
|
Sponsored links 
Make a Real Living as a Freelance Writer! How to find a book publisher |
Text on this site Copyright © 1998-2007
Absolute Write, all rights reserved.
|
Joan Stewart's free publicity campaign started at age 10 when her hometown newspaper wrote a story about a blue ribbon she won for a 4-H sewing project at the Ohio State Fair. From then on, she was hooked on publicity.
