Authors today need a

Until now, the author pitch was defined as a hard-sell verbal punch to persuade agents and editors to take on their book. It was typically brief, high-concept, often hyperbolic and was designed to convince the agent standing there that the book was fabulous and so was the author.

But as with everything else in the book business, pitching too has changed, evolving with the times into something different and actually much more interesting.

Choosing the right pitch for the job

Like all good pitchers on the mound, authors today need a few tricks up their sleeves. They need to choose the right pitch for the job, taking aim directly at readers, retailers, social networks and media. Unlike the old arm-twisting approach, the new pitch doesn’t try to persuade these folks they’re going to love your book.

Instead you let them know what you’ve written in a way that makes them want to read it. Your goal is to hear back: “Sounds interesting. How do I get a copy?”

The new approach

The new pitch isn’t a hard sell or painful duty, but rather an extension of your creative process. This is a very different approach. It’s all about using the right words to represent your work. The oldest adage about good writing also applies here: Show, don’t tell. And by extension: Show, don’t sell.

Three new developments — the etiquette of the softer sell, online connectivity and independent self-publishing — have revolutionized pitching. These have opened up a whole new world of alternative ways to craft different types of pitches, depending on your specific book and what it needs. The new pitch may be delivered or written directly to potential readers, reviewers, book bloggers, feature writers, interviewers – and it may be in person or online.

In many cases, the author has no intention of seeking either an agent or a conventional publisher. For those writers seeking a traditional book deal, however, pitches may still be directed at an agent or acquisitions editor, either in writing or at face-to-face writers conferences with blind-date or ask-the-pro sessions.

The new author pitch in action

Pitching directly to readers

Feature a short description of your book on your website. In this case, I recommend a one-paragraph straightforward description. No excessive adjectives or adverbs. Just very well-crafted essential information about the book’s story and characters, whether it’s a novel, romance, mystery, YA, memoir or nonfiction how-to book.

You can also pitch on your blog, but in a different manner. The interactive features built into blogs provide the opportunity to discuss the process of your writing, offer sample chunks or chapters, and invite feedback. You can establish a dialogue with your readers to captivate their interest and increases the potential for ultimate sales.

In both cases the reader gets to know you without your having to deliver a rapid-fire biography, including credits, education, track record, and other forms of visibility, media and otherwise. That traditional platform pitch can appear elsewhere on your website under an “author” tab, and it can be as long as necessary.

Pitching to a social network

This kind of pitch involves reaching out to comment on other websites and blogs where you can be helpful and offer a contribution. It can include tweeting, with either links or referrals, or by distilling selections of your content into 140-character haikus.

Social networking is like entering a cafe or front-porch conversation, and adding your two cents about the topic under discussion. This is the most subtle form of pitching and requires a keen sense of online etiquette. Don’t begin by saying you’re an expert, and expect everyone to sit up and listen. Be altruistic, service- oriented, and keep yourself out of it on a personal level until you’ve established some ongoing connections.

A variation on this approach is a pitch to book bloggers who build powerful websites with dialogue that usually focuses on a particular genre. They discuss, review, interview and generally chat up a storm about a book or author they like. These days traditional publishers are courting book bloggers who have tremendous influence in a particular field. We’ve known for years, for example, that Mommy bloggers are well organized and have created many bestsellers in parenting and baby care categories. And the legendary self-publishing phenom Amanda Hocking reached her multimillion sales level only after going viral with book bloggers who specialized in YA vampire romances.

Pitching to retailers

It takes courage to walk into a bookstore and talk about your book. Reading or memorizing isn’t natural and can appear canned, so the best technique is old-fashioned sincerity. This means telling the truth – you’ve worked hard, you care about this book, you want them to read it and give it a chance on their shelves, or better yet on the front table if they will agree to a reading and author signing. It can help if it’s your neighborhood bookstore, where you browse and shop regularly. But ultimately the proof will be in the pudding: will the buyer believe in you enough to sample the content and will they like it. Bookstores will be especially interested if you can guarantee crowd of local friends who’ll fill seats and buy a stack of copies.

Pitching to the media

Local print and broadcast media are always looking for material about local authors and their work. They have space to fill with material to attract advertisers. Offering them a sample of your book or interview may be done with a carefully written press release, or, if their internal process is more informal and easily accessed, you can call them up or go into their offices. In either case, they’ll want to hear a short description of who you are, since there may be a strong local personality hook, and also what you’ve written, particularly if you’re known in the community or the content has a local angle.

Pitching to the virtual media takes less dressing up. There are many websites that feature book reviews, interviews, and samples of new books, usually self-published but occasionally from traditional houses. Here, as always, the drill is to be authentic, brief, and provide either content or service that fits their purpose.

The video pitch

In the YouTube era, your visually delivered pitch doesn’t have to be slick, heavily scripted, or shot with fancy cameras and lights. Put your digital camera on a tripod or ask a member of your family to shoot you at your desk or walking outside. Again, don’t read, just be yourself. Tell us the story, how and why you wrote the book, and why it’s important to you. Enough said. This variety of pitch can be directed at your readers, or as a link when approaching busy retailers, book bloggers, and media professionals.

What about you?

Have a few tricks up your sleeve?  We look forward to hearing about your experiences in the age of the new author pitch.

Every good book needs

An eye-catching cover can persuade readers to pick up and buy a book. But a jacket that’s confusing or boring or worse, can stop a potential buyer from giving that same book a second glance. Covers also need to pop as thumbnails, for all those online shoppers.

Publishers rely on talented jacket designers to create great covers. These specialized graphic artists are either on staff or hired as freelancers.  Staff designers frequently cross over, creating a jacket for their own publisher one week, freelancing for another house the next week and taking on an indie author client the week after that.

Attention indie authors

For self-publishing authors, the ability to hire a professional designer is a new and important development, because nothing shouts amateur louder than a lousy book jacket. “There’s no reason why a self-published book should look “self published,” says Laura Duffy, a senior art director at Random House.

Hear hear! Read on to learn how four highly successful book jacket designers create stunning, memorable covers, along with their practical advice for writers who want to understand and participate in the crucial process of getting it right.

How 4 professional designers create great covers

Laura Duffy is Senior Art Director at Crown, a division of Random House, where she has worked in the art department for 15 years.

Kimberly Glyder is principal at her own book-design firm based in the Philadelphia area.

Henry Sene Yee is the Creative Director of Picador, a leading literary trade paperback imprint of Macmillan Publishing.

David Drummond is founder and principal of Salamander Hill Design, based in Québec, Canada.

What’s the most important thing to accomplish in a jacket design?

Laura Duffy: My goal is to create a cover that stands out, gets the correct message across, and looks interesting and even exciting. In the olden days our only goal was to have a jacket standout on a crowded bookstore shelf that would inspire someone to cross the store to pick it up. Now we also have to consider how covers will look online, so we’re doing things like making fonts thicker and subtitles bigger and really paying attention to how designs look when they’re shrunk down.

Kimberly Glyder: It’s been said before, by Chip Kidd [one of the industry’s best known designers] that a successful book cover is one that gets you to pick the book up in a store. I would add to that in this day and age, if someone “clicks” on a book online I’m doing my job well. Book covers are still marketing tools and a good design is one that makes someone want to take a closer look. My fear with e-books is that a large image and big type is what ebook publishers consider successful. Clickable covers are not ideal though, I still hope people buy their books in bookstores!

Henry Sene Yee: My goal is that the reader has an emotional response and connection to the story and characters or ideas. The minimum you can do is give out info, but how you say determines how it will be received, like hey, by the way, your house is on fire.

David Drummond: To surprise the viewer – not in a gimmicky way – but hopefully by solving the visual problem in an intelligent way.

How do you begin the design of a new jacket?

Duffy: Here at Random House we have concept meetings at the beginning of every list where we sit down with the editors and listen to what they’d like to see on the cover, as well as offer ideas of our own. I try to read whatever is available in order to have as much to work with as possible. Occasionally I work directly with an author. I look at other jackets in the same genre (comp titles). I also research online to get a bigger picture of what I’m working with, perhaps looking at an author’s website.

Glyder: I do like to read the manuscript in its entirety. Typically, I’m given a pub sheet with information regarding the sales handle and competing titles. With about 90 percent of my cover jobs, my interaction is limited to working with the art director who acts as a go-between with the editor, publisher, sales, marketing, and the author. I do sometimes see email exchanges with the author, but mostly I’m kept out of that discussion. The benefit of working with a traditional publisher, rather than with an author who’s self-published, is to make use of the specialists who deal with books on a daily basis.

Yee: In my meetings, I may ask for plot summary, characters and description but what I need to know is the theme, tone, mood, point of the book, what makes this different than other similar books, the meaning of the title, etc. An author & the editor can get too personally close to the project and know and want too much on the cover. I need to reduce and suggest using symbols, metaphors, tone. Not say everything. I do not want to illustrate a scene or turning point in the book but the subtext of that scene and what it means to the overall theme.

Drummond: I read the book if it’s fiction. If it is non-fiction I try and get a really good brief. I am always looking for a hook or a way into the material. If I need more information I talk to the editor and on occasion the author although that rarely happens.

Have you taken on self-publishing authors as clients?

Duffy: Yes, many times. I love working with these authors because I can bring all my experience to the project, including marketing ideas. Many times I’ve helped them evaluate their copy and its emphasis, perhaps changing wording or including elements in the design that make information pop that they didn’t realize was important. I’ve also helped them create selling back cover copy and discussed ways to market their books. It’s a lot of fun. My advice to them, is that if they’re hiring me they’re in good hands, so let me do what I do best and not over think the design. There’s no reason why a self-published book should look “self published”.

Glyder: Up until last year, I rarely accepted self-publishing authors. However, it’s hard not to notice that the publishing environment is changing rapidly and self-publishers have many more resources available to them. Still, I’m picky–I tend only to take on self-publishing authors whose work I find very interesting. As a designer, it’s difficult to take on authors directly who may not understand the publishing process and how books are marketed, especially just how important it is to consider the audience in finding a successful tone for a design. My experience working directly with authors is that they become set on one vision, rather than being open to understanding that the way they view their book may be different than how a book needs to be marketed so it appeals to a wider audience.

Yee: I have. The best advice is to hire someone good and then trust them to do their best job. Have all your information ready for them to create.

Drummond: Lately I have been doing quite a few covers for self-published authors. The ones I have worked with have been really good about letting me do my thing with a few exceptions.

Do you have a standard contract with mutual expectations, dates and other terms? What’s the typical cost range for a jacket design?

Duffy: Some of the houses I do freelance for send me very specific contracts with design direction, due dates, and budgets. The costs vary from house to house with the smaller ones paying $500-$800 a cover, and the larger ones $1200-$1800.

Glyder: Most of my contracts come directly from the publisher. Dates and terms are included, covering all expectations, including (sometimes most importantly) the kill fee. When I hand off the initial comps and can bill for half the fee, that’s already a large amount of time spent. Typical fees range on the low end for university press clients approximately $800, all the way up to $3000 for some trade publishers.

Yee: In general, two weeks for sketches/comps for the art director and another week to refine an idea to show the editor. And then the game of a thousand cooks with their own opinions of the cover begins. The base amount is $1500. But can range as low as $1,000, and as high as $5,000

Drummond:  The process is usually quite informal. I do sign contracts for the bigger publishers. My range for cover designs runs the gamut. Average fee is about $1000.

DIY book jackets

Many authors feel strongly about having a hand in their own jacket design. The late Steve Jobs reportedly loathed the initial cover design of his own biography by Walter Isaacson. Jobs, although not the author, insisted on redoing the cover himself with the clean white aesthetic typical of Apple products.

In the case of author Bruce Spitzer, a background in advertising led him to design the jacket to his debut novel Extra Innings, a sci-fi baseball thriller about Red Sox legend Ted Williams, who is brought back to life with cryonics in the year 2092. Spitzer, experienced working with graphic print media, had a strong sense of the front cover photo and design he wanted, and a creative way of achieving his goals.

Spitzer had a limited budget, so he recruited a graphic design college intern who could translate his rough sketches into a polished jacket. He then found a photographer online who turned out to be a huge Red Sox fan. A neighbor with a young son fit the bill perfectly as the tall, lanky Ted Williams and Johnnie, a child who plays a central role in the novel. Then he located a vintage Ted Williams’ jersey with his famous number nine, bought some cleats and authentic red socks, and they were ready to go.

Spitzer’s garage became a photo studio using the photographer’s lights, a white backdrop, reflectors, shades, power cords and cameras on tripods. He found a model release online, always a good idea. A few days after the photo shoot, Spitzer and his designer sorted through the shots to pick a favorite, choose the jacket’s colors, the type, and to organize the copy Spitzer had written.

Costs so far for his jacket, still a work in progress: Art Direction/Graphic Design: $300. Photography: $300. Props:$200. Models: $1. Collaboration: “Priceless!” Spitzer says.

What about you?

As authors, what’s your take on all this?  Have you been satisfied with your jacket designs?  Did your publisher involve you in the process?  If not, do you wish you’d had the opportunity?  And if you’re self-publishing, what are your plans for your cover design?

Any thoughts on the jackets pictured in this post?  Which stand out for you?

The gold standard for

It shouts “Read Me! I’m certified!”

How does an author accomplish this feat? What does it take for a book to become a bestseller?  Some of the answers are right there in the list. So let’s drill down and and see what can we uncover about writing, getting published and appealing to readers.

♦ What’s the single most important thing an author can do to get on the list? Scroll down for the answer from a writer whose book has been on the coveted list for 117 weeks.

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6 lessons from the New York Times bestseller lists

1. The list is widely diverse

The New York Times now publishes 23 separate bestseller lists. The lists range from Combined Print & E-Book Fiction and Non-Fiction, to Hardcover, Advice, Political, Business,and Children’s books. They include everything from literary novels to thrillers, memoirs, romances, mysteries, sci-fi paranormal books, YA and middle-grade, self-help and how-to, religious, inspirational books, and many others.

The lesson:

Don’t worry about following any so-called trends. There’s tremendous variety and no dominant category of successful books. Put away the notion that if you’re story doesn’t have a vampire or get-rich quick scheme, it’s going to die on the vine. Trying to anticipate what category of book will be selling by the time your book is written or published is a waste of time.

2. Book length varies

In my work as a developmental editor, authors ask me frequently “How long should my book be?” or “I’ve heard no book can be over 300 pages.” My response has always been that a book should be as long as it needs to be and no longer.

What the New York Times lists reveal is a broad range of lengths in both fiction and nonfiction. Kathryn Stockett’s best selling novel The Help is a heavyweight at 544 pages, while Blind Faith by CJ Lyons is 392. On the nonfiction side, Heaven is for Real by Todd Bupo is only 192 pages, but Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand is 496.

The lesson:

Don’t pad or cut to fit any arbitrary length for your book. If you have nothing else to say – stop. If there’s more essential story or information – keep going. I always do recommend, however, that a book should include nothing that will be never missed, so avoid any self-indulgent tangents or digressions.

3. E-books are the future

Earlier this year, the New York Times began running four new bestseller lists that include e-book sales, and it’s about time. The Association of American Publishers (AAP) and the Book Industry Study Group of Bookstats show unit sales growth of e-books increased a whopping 1039.6% between 2008 and 2010, with 114 million units sold last year. This number only includes those reported by traditional publishers, not all e-books sold by self-publishing authors, so the actual numbers are even greater.

The lesson

The old days when hardcover was king are over. You can sell large quantities of your book in a virtual e-book format that’s either self-published or traditionally published. Authors can pick their own formats and channels.

4. Self-published books can compete

Here’s an astonishing fact: Three books on the top ten titles on the Combined Print and E-Book Fiction Best Seller List are self-published: #4 Blind Faith by CJ Lyons, #5 The Mill River Recluse by Darcie Chan, and #6 The Abbey by Chris Culver. Wow. The speed with which self-published books have risen in acceptance and success is something traditional publishers never anticipated.

The lower cost of e-books have made waiting for mass-market reprints of higher-priced hardcover or trade paperbacks increasingly obsolete. AAP and Book Study Group reports show that mass-market paperbacks are down 13.8% during same period.“The people who used to wait to buy the mass-market paperback because of the price aren’t going to wait anymore,” says Liate Stehlik, publisher of Morrow and Avon at HarperCollins.

The lesson:

Think about self-publishing as an honorable and attractive option to the frustration of trying to find a literary agent and traditional publisher. Self-publishing is increasing exponentially. It’s not easier. You still have to write a good book and sell it largely on your own. But it’s faster, you have more control over it, and you get a bigger share of the profits.

5. Film and TV tie-ins are changing

The #1 hardcover fiction on NY Times Combined Print & E-Book Fiction list is The Help by Kathryn Stockett, the 544-page blockbuster novel about African-American maids working in white households in Jackson, Mississippi during the early 1960s. Originally published in 2009 it has spent 107 weeks on the Hardcover Fiction bestseller list. The film based on the book was released in August of 2011 with what these days is a modest budget of only $25 million. It’s a big hit, grossing more than $123 million to date in the US alone.

The lesson:

Think film, and not only if you’re writing a conventional thriller, mystery or romance. Don’t assume your book has no chance of becoming a major motion picture.

6. Bestselling authors are avid self-marketers

The top ten combined print & e-book fiction and nonfiction authors are able self-marketers, including famous writers with big track records, like Lee Childs, Kathy Reichs, James Patterson, J.A. Jance, John Grisham, and Johanna Lindsey. The newcomers are also at it, including Rebecca Skloot, Chris Culver, Darcie Chan, Alexandra Fuller, Erik Larson, and others.

The lesson:

No one can sell your book as well as you can, whether you already have a big platform or not. Publishers have finally realized that readers want to have direct contact with authors, not with publishers. They don’t really care who published the book but look for reading advice from book bloggers, online reviewers, websites, blogs, tweets and Facebook posts from people they know and trust.

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What’s the single most important thing a writer can do to make it to the list?

For an answer, we turn to Garth Stein, whose novel Racing in the Rain has been on the New York Time Trade Paperback Fiction list for 117 weeks, this week at #8.

“Well, not to sound simplistic or anything, but the single most important thing has to be having a good book, doesn’t it?  I mean, I’ve heard there are clever ways to spend a lot of money to get on the list, and once on the list, there’s a little bit of self-sustaining momentum.  But that doesn’t last unless it’s a good book and people want to read it and they buy extra copies for their friends and family and so forth.

I’m all about marketing and social networking and rah, rah, rah!  And it takes a lot of work from a lot of different people, like the publisher, sales force, booksellers, and the author to land on a (or “The”) list.

But if the emperor has no clothes, the readers will see it right away. So write a brilliant book first.”

Thanks Garth.  Easy to say, right?

What about you?

Do you monitor the bestseller lists?  Or do you avoid them entirely?  I’m interested in your own observations and insights as writers, which I hope you’ll share here in comments.

The author platform isn’t

Instead, they’re looking online and expecting to find a more direct path to a favorite or yet-to-be-discovered author.

The tired old model

By definition, the old model of the author platform was the writer’s public visibility and reputation that the publisher’s publicity department used to promote and sell the book.

During the many years I signed up authors as an acquiring editor at Simon & Schuster, Bantam, Wiley and elsewhere, I did indeed look hard at the writer’s platform, and favored authors with high gloss visibility in the national media, big buzz for recent accomplishments, an Ivy League affiliation with maybe a Nobel Prize thrown in for good measure. We insisted on a stellar track record in book sales and appearances on radio and TV. Everyone understood that the bigger the platform, the higher the advance. But like everything else in the book business these days, things have changed and all bets are off.

The new approach

It’s still about visibility, but today’s approach has changed. The New Author Platform requires a focus on developing an unobstructed back and forth between authors and their readers, with the authors — not the publishers — controlling the flow. Now it’s the author, not a publicist, who inspires readers to buy the book. The New Author Platform allows not only well-established authors, but unknown, first-time beginners to do an end run around the conservative gate-keepers and reach readers directly.

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The New Author Platform

Here are some of the elements of the New Author Platform I discuss with my author clients who want to build their currency and visibility with readers online.

Personality

Successful authors today are designing websites filled with their work-in-progress, writing frequently updated blogs, tweeting, and shooting home-style, brief videos to post on their sites and on YouTube. They’re offering original content in samples and chunks, with invitations for feedback, and taking every opportunity to comment and join forums and other online venues on topics that relate to their own work.

In this way, they’re creating a public face that represents who they are and what they want to say.

Authenticity

Readers like to know and trust an author before buying their book. An artificial, smiley-face false front won’t do the trick. Instead, authors need to extend their literary skills to create a genuine bona-fide online persona that has human quirks, dimension, and nuance. You can be funny, cranky, indignant, nostalgic, didactic.

As long as you’re honest and persuasive, you have a better chance of getting potential readers interested to the point where they make the final commitment and put their money down.

Expertise

Authors don’t need to be full professors at Harvard to contribute useful comments and information online. Post brief sections from your book, and take social networking seriously by commenting and tweeting to build your reputation and visibility. This is true whether your subject is science and technology, history and biography, food and cooking, parenting and relationships, really any subject in any genre, and whether you’re a fiction or non-fiction writer.

Consider yourself a public service resource in the field you’re writing about. Your reputation and expertise will flourish in proportion to the value of the content you offer.

Subtlety

A cardinal rule of the new author platform is never to actually ask people to buy your book. Rather promulgate your work by making an enduring connection. Establish an authentic online personality, offer valuable information, analysis, opinion, and inspiring entertainment.

These are the elements of the New Author Platform that will ultimately sell your book.

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Examples

Here are four illustrative case histories with strengths and weaknesses as noted.

1. Freakonomics by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner

The co-authors of the hugely successful Freakonomics books offer up a website that exemplifies the New Author Platform. It’s deep on content with terrific value for the reader, including a very active blog with posts on breaking news from their famously no-prisoners-taken perspective.

The authors and a roster of 13 top-drawer contributors (but no women on the roster — hmm…) post daily and cover topics from the current budget crisis to the economics of the latest NFL Lockouts. The site also does a great job with sharp video graphics that explain things so that even mathophobes (like me) can understand the numbers. The site is easy to navigate, cohesive and sharply focused on the subject of the books, but there’s no hard sell. Overall, a great sense of humor and brilliant content.

2. In the Garden of Beasts by Erik Larson – This portrait of Berlin during the rise of the Nazi Party concentrates on William E. Dodd, who became the U.S. ambassador to Germany in 1933, and his daughter, Martha. Current #3 NYTimes non-fiction bestseller.

This bestselling author has created a charming and engaging website. Larson is funny and self-deprecating, providing both an official and a “real story” author bio and including some humorous jibes from his young daughters and a full-page devoted to photos and tributes to his late dog Molly.

What’s missing is an active back and forth with readers. While Larson invites visitors to send in questions about his work or on the subject of writing, he doesn’t promise to respond, saying only “From time to time I’ll choose one and answer it in my blog as frankly as possible.” And there’s no option for comments on his blog posts — which however, are definitely worth reading as deeply felt and revealing insights from an enormously successful writer. The latest, for example, is about being “stranded in the dark country of no ideas,” after completing In the Garden of Beasts.

3. The Paris Wife by Paula McLain — Ernest Hemingway’s first wife narrates this novel set in Paris. 17 weeks on the NYTimes fiction bestseller list.

This is a glitzy publisher-generated website and it shows. There’s some very interesting background information regarding how this novel relates to the true story of Ernest Hemingway’s marriage to Hadley Hemingway during the period documented later in his book A Moveable Feast. There’s also an excellent time-line with key events in Hemingway’s life for fans and readers.

The site also has a couple of video taped conversations with the author, but that’s as close as readers get. There’s no blog or invitation for readers to weigh in. So the website stops short of creating reader engagement, and remains a publisher’s sales tool, like an elaborate publicity kit.

4. My Dangerous Pleasure by Carolyn Jewell — Book 4 in the My Immortal series. Self-published author of historical and paranormal romances

This website  establishes the author as an easy-going, likeable person, with quirks and idiosyncratic tastes, who encourages readers to contact her, promising to reply to every email.

The site includes a personal blog about Jewell’s struggles as an author. There’s also has a section directed at writers, which is highlighted on the homepage, offering tips and advice on topics such as “Why do romance novels get no respect?” and “Are critique groups any help?”  The peer-to-peer advice is frequently spot-on, and probably much appreciated by aspiring writers, but does this focus inspire visitors to buy her romance novels?

What about you?

Please weigh in on how you’re building your platform, what seems to be working well, what isn’t, and please include any special tips and advice for fellow authors. Your input is greatly valued!

You’re missing out on a megaphone that can help blast out your message and attract new readers.

Your readers are wondering: Where are you?

“There’s a conversation going on right now on Twitter about your book, about your topic, about your area of expertise. And if you’re not there, your readers are wondering why you’re not participating in the conversation.”

That’s the gospel according to Cindy Ratzlaff, a 20-year publishing veteran who designed the campaigns of more than 150 New York Times bestsellers and pioneered a strategy of treating authors and books as brands. I listened to Ratzlaff the other day on a webinar about Twitter for authors and publishers, sponsored by BookExpo.

Readers are brand evangelists

“Twitter has trained readers to expect instant access to their literary heroes,” Ratzlaff said. “They want to be your partners in promoting your book.” Authors who understand that communicate directly with their followers on Twitter, allowing them to experience a personal connection and behind-the-curtains look at the author’s life – and that creates brand evangelists, Ratzlaff said.

And speaking of brand evangelists, check out these numbers, which underscore why Twitter is now an essential venue for every author with a book to sell:

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The numbers

• There are 175 million registered users on Twitter (source: Twitter)

• There are about 95 million tweets every day (source: Twitter)

• Around 42% of users check Twitter to find out about products (source: Edison Research/Arbitron: Twitter usage in America)

• About the same number tweet about brands they follow (source: Edison Research/Arbitron)

• 67% of brand followers will purchase that specific brand (source: DigitalSurgeons)

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The world’s biggest cocktail party

Think of Twitter as a huge, noisy cocktail party, packed with publishing insiders, agents, editors, journalists, book bloggers, reviewers, your readers, potential new readers, other writers – just about everyone you’d ever want to connect with — there and waiting for you to drop in and mingle your heart out.

That’s how Rusty Shelton sees it. He’s a branding and digital platform consultant for authors and publishers, who advises writers to think strategically about Twitter.

“It’s about building authentic relationships and connections. It’s not about direct marketing,” he told me recently in a phone conversation. “But you need a focused strategy with specific goals. Twitter is a huge network.”

What publishers expect

Big-time commercial publishers now consider Twitter a crucial element of book marketing. What’s more, they expect authors to go out there and tweet under their own names, not under the auspices of the publisher. Bestselling mega-authors Tim Ferriss, Margaret Atwood and Paulo Coelho are on Twitter. Self-publishing also requires it, even if you’re not the aggressive outgoing type but prefer to remain at home with only limited breaks away from writing. Self-published phenoms like Seth Godin, Amanda Hocking and Victorine E. Lieske are all at it.

Given how precious time is to the hard-working author who may also have a day-job or kids to take care of, it’s important not to waste a lot of hours tweeting in the dark without a sense of how it works and a specific blueprint to sell your book. For a primer on starting from scratch, check out Twitter Basics.

Here then, a roundup of strategies on tweeting for authors, from experts including Rusty Shelton, Cindy Ratzlaff and others.

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Strategic Tweeting for Authors

Use your real name, first and last as your Twitter ID

Even if you have more than one title to sell, your name is your brand and that’s what people should see on the screen. No other choices, just you. You don’t want to splinter your audience over multiple accounts. Get used to thinking of yourself as your own brand, and that everything you do is an extension of that.

Have specific goals

What are you trying to accomplish? No one wants to know what you had for breakfast, so send out only what’s valuable and helpful to others but also accomplishes your goal in some manner: primarily to sell your book, we assume. In some cases the book itself may not be ready, so you may just be building your social network and expanding your platform.

Know your audience & build a following

A great thing about tweeting is you can focus on readers who are especially interested in your topic or story. You can find them by searching for book bloggers, also by  following other authors in your genre or area of expertise to see who’s reading them.  Use resources like Twellow, a yellow-pages style directory.

Follow others. They may return the favor and follow you back.  GalleyCat has compiled lists of book people to follow on Twitter, including reviewers, publishers, authors and agents. Organize those you follow into Twitter lists. Ratzlaff says the lists are her all-time favorite tool to “filter the noisy stream.” She recommends making lists of relevant users to follow by category, like book reviewers, journalists, and booksellers. By clicking on a list, you see just the updates of those in the culled group.

Join the conversation

Tweeting is like joining a backyard full of like-minded neighbors or a lively cocktail party. First just listen in for a while, don’t jump in intrusively. Then gradually add something that’s useful or entertaining to what’s on the collective minds participating at any given moment.

Be helpful. Say something useful. Establish gratitude, altruism, reliability, and trust. Don’t talk about yourself or your book for a few weeks. Be patient.

Never be negative. No one likes a grouch who seems full of himself. Never appear stubborn or inflexible. It’s OK to have a distinct personality. Yes, you can have an opinion, but keep it positive and upbeat.

Provide content

Begin to tweet your own ideas on your topic, your expertise and life experience in relation to that topic, or, if you’re writing fiction, a character, scene or situation you’re working on. Tweet about key concepts from the book. Link back to your other platforms, your website, blog, Facebook. After a decent interval, mention that you’re finishing the book, or may even have it up for sale. Link to a sample chapter or way to buy.

Don’t sell

It may sound counter-intuitive but please carve these two words in stone and keep the tablet over your keyboard whenever tweeting. Strategic and effective tweeting isn’t about pitching or promoting your work in any explicit or blatant manner. Ultimately, yes, you want to sell your book, but old-fashioned hard-sell advertising is not the proper etiquette or correct approach.

As Rusty said to me: “Don’t be overly promotional about your book, especially not too close to publication. Start at least a year ahead – the moment the book sells to a publisher. If you’re self-publishing, start earlier, when you begin writing the book.”

Retweet

This should be at the core of any author’s Twitter strategy. When you retweet, you keep the conversation going and point out something interesting to your own followers by reposting another’s tweet. Retweeting also gives you an opportunity to add a few words of commentary or expertise to the retweet. Here’s one way to do that.

If your followers deem your missives worthy of retweeting – think original, funny, timely, informative – then even if you only have a small following on Twitter, the megaphone effect of retweets can help spread your links and articles to millions of other people on Twitter.

For more detail, check out this link on the beauty of retweeting.

Add your twitter handle to all your other IDs

Put it after your email signature, feature on your website and blog, put it on the back of your book. It’s an important part of your brand, your total identity, who you are in this brave new world.

Don’t quit!

Strategic tweeting takes time and patience. You may not see an immediate spike in sales or in your own list of followers. Think long term.

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.What about you?

Ready?  OK. 3,2,1, start tweeting. And please share your own tips and techniques.

That’s how Amanda Hocking describes the impact book bloggers had on sales of her self-published paranormal romances.

When she rolled out the first of nine books in March of last year, Hocking had no idea what to expect. Over the next couple of months, her Kindle sales amounted to around 600 eBooks. Not bad for a newbie, but not enough for the 26-year-old to quit her day job.

Whoosh! Into the fast lane

Then she discovered and tapped into the world of book bloggers. Her sales took a gigantic swerve into the fast lane, tallying 164,000 books sold by the end of 2010.

“I had no idea such people existed,” Hocking wrote on her own website. “They just read books and write about them.  And I don’t mean “just.” They take time out of their busy lives to talk about books and have contests and connect with followers and writers and other readers. These guys are honestly my heroes. I’m a little in love with all of them.”

USA Today this week reported the jaw-dropping news that last month alone, Hocking sold 450,000 of her nine titles, breaking into their top 50 bestsellers list. Taking her cue from iTunes, she had priced her self-published eBooks at $2.99 (she keeps 70 percent) and .99 cents (keeping 30 percent.) Do the math. That day job is history.

Bloggers reach millions of readers

Book bloggers love to read books and to recommend them to their own followers. There are scores of avid bloggers in every genre, out there reviewing thousands of books and interviewing hundreds of authors every year. They do this for pleasure, and are a very diverse crowd: some are book people in their day jobs, some are stay-at-home moms and dads, some are students.

The book blogs, with names like Fantasy Cafe, and Write Meg, have become increasingly influential. They collectively build markets that can reach millions of potential readers and can turn books into bestsellers. As serious and discerning critics and social networkers, these book lovers have formed regional and national organizations and established huge databases, including this searchable list of more than 1,400 bloggers.

Mainstream publishers take note

“We think book bloggers are the absolute best way to get your book to exactly the right people who are interested in your topic, whatever it is,” says Samantha Rubenstein, a publicist at John Wiley & Sons. “Reaching out to specific book bloggers is a large and important part of a book’s publicity and increasing by leaps and bounds every six months.”

The publishing industry has welcomed the bloggers into the fold, including them in the annual Book Expo in New York, coming up in May.  The Book Bloggers Convention, which will follow the official Book Expo, will feature face time with authors and panels on topics like blogging for niche markets and technology for bloggers.  Authors are welcome to attend.

The future is now

Things are happening so quickly now in what was once the stodgy old world of writing and getting published. The balance of power has shifted and even the most traditional agents and publishers realize that authors have many new choices on how to present and market their work. What was once thought to be far in the distance has already happened.

This is an opportunity that authors can’t afford to ignore.

Everything is in place

So how do you begin? Here are the steps Samantha recommends:

Getting started with book bloggers

Research

Search the Book Blogs Search Engine to find bloggers in your field.  Study their sites, see whom they recommend, read their review policies and link with them for further networking.

Join the community

Remember: don’t hard sell but rather enter into a relationship, a conversation with many participants. Follow the discussion, offer your point of view.

Submit your book

Once you’ve established some kind of relationship, prepare to submit your own book for possible review. Bloggers will indicate in their review policies whether they prefer to receive books electronically or in print.

“I’ll usually send an eblast or query first, giving a quick summary, because you don’t just want to send people free copies if they’re not seriously interested.”

Offer an interview

Samantha reports that she gets more requests for interviews and actually prefers them, since that gives the author a better chance to describe the book’s contents than a review, which is often unpredictable in quality or point of view.

Be patient

“We don’t expect and rarely see a spike in sales right after a review or interview appears on a blog. But we appreciate many benefits and are very happy when we do get attention, since this is where people go to get information. It puts our author in front of readers who are most likely to be interested in their book.”

An example is blogger John Merrow, President of Learning Matters, a non-profit that produces educational reports for the PBS NewsHour and elsewhere on NPR. If Merrow mentions an author’s book about teaching or learning in his blog, sales usually jump up.

Cultivate those contacts

As in any form of publicity, the ongoing back and forth between authors and bloggers is crucial. Unlike traditional broadcast or print media however, “you can’t call anyone on the phone,” Samanthan advises. Bloggers work at home, so use email to stay in touch.

Be quick and persistent

You’ll be competing with other authors and publishers’ publicists. At the upcoming Book Bloggers Conference in NYC, for example, there’s a panel with publicists from Random House, HarperCollins, Hachette, and others.

Marketing yourself to book bloggers is not for everyone. It takes time and energy you might prefer to spend writing, or cultivating other gardens. But it’s definitely one of the most powerful new ways to get your work in the hands of readers available today.

Any thoughts about all this? If your book has been reviewed by a book blogger, please tell us here in comments about the experience.  Any advice for fellow writers will be much appreciated.

What does a recipe

A lot, as it turns out, in the case of The School of Essential Ingredients, the acclaimed debut novel by Erica Bauermeister, described in reviews as a seductively delicious tale of love, loss, and redemption.

Identifying potential readers

“I decided to target foodies and cooking students by offering recipes created by my fictional characters, which I gave away in guest posts on blogs and at readings in culinary schools,” Bauermeister told me in a phone interview from her home in Seattle.

Her guest post titled Carl’s White Cake, appeared on the blog Bookingmama, and included enticing backstory details alongside the cake recipe. It can still be viewed on Bauermeister’s own site.

“When I started niche marketing this way, my novel shot up the Indie Bestseller List and stayed there for six months. But it fell off the list when I stopped to work on my new book.” Scroll down for more examples of niche marketing for books.

Fiction or non-fiction, niche marketing brings results

“Niche marketing is identifying and reaching out directly to groups of potential readers, says Sandi Mendelson, of the literary public relations firm Hilsinger-Mendelson which orchestrates campaigns for blockbuster authors Larry King, Tina Brown and many others. “It’s relationship building — and requires a personal commitment to an ongoing give-and-take conversation with your readers, using venues like blogs, vlogs, and newsletters as well as Skyping with book groups, specialized book tours, and readings.”

Taking it a step further, Bauermeister says “It’s about finding an angle in your book — an element of the plot or characters — that could appeal to a whole new audience of readers who might never have heard of your book or thought about picking it up.

“It means really knowing your market and offering them a tangible take-away, or surprising, original special information they can use in their daily lives.”

Niche marketing works in every genre, fiction and non-fiction.  Smart authors these days realize that this targeted approach to selling books is a highly effective use of their time and energy.

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Case examples of authors targeting niche markets

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Fiction

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The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein (Harper Books)
Target niche: NASCAR enthusiasts

This New York Times bestseller is told from the point of view of Enzo the dog, who observes the life of his master Denny, a race car driver. There’s a lot about race track culture and what it takes to be a champion, so Stein targets racing enthusiasts with special readings and promotional materials at NASCAR events and local fan meetings.

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Shadow of the Swords: An Epic Novel of the Crusades and Mother of the Believers: A Novel of the Birth of Islam by Kamran Pasha (both published by Simon & Schuster)
Target niche: Muslim and Jewish community groups

These two historical novels, written from an Islamic point of view, are finding a market among Muslim and Jewish audiences. Pasha is intimately familiar with both groups, as he was born in Pakistan but raised from the age of three in a mostly orthodox Jewish neighborhood in Brooklyn, New York. Community groups like the Progressive Jewish Alliance, the Muslim Public Affairs Council and others arrange for him to read at events like a recent fundraiser for the Islamic Domestic Harmony Foundation for abused women.

“I know I’m reaching people because I get both fan letters and hate mail. Muslims either love the book or think I’m a traitor to my religion,” Pasha said. “Non-Muslims are either fascinated by hearing another perspective on history and religion — or they accuse me of being part of a terrorist plot to take over America.”

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Breaking Dawn – Twilight Saga by Stephenie Meyer (Little, Brown)
Target niche: sub groups (teen goths, fans of historical fiction, teen boys)

With this fourth book in the series, could the Young Adult Twilight Saga juggernaut find an even bigger audience?  Adrienne Biggs, a book publicist based in San Francisco, thinks so. “Beyond the principal market of teen girls, smart marketing should include targeting diverse niche readers like teen goths, fans of historical fiction, readers of thrillers, romances, and pop culture,” Biggs said.  “Plus, if they’re clever, they could also target moms of teen girls, teachers, and teen boys — all niche groups with connections to the main market.”

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Lumby on the Air by Gail Fraser (Penguin)
Target niche: Lovers of Americana

This is the fifth novel in a series featuring the old-fashioned country town of Lumby populated by “relentlessly quirky residents who remind us just how crazy normal life usually is.”

Fraser interacts with readers on her extensive  website’s blog and chat room.  She writes that readers make some great suggestions. “I jokingly posed the idea of buying an 18th century grindstone to which I could put my nose when a deadline approached. Within hours, I had received a dozen emails from fans who had tracked down various grindstones for sale. The following weekend, we were hauling a stone back from Manchester, Vermont.”

Blurring the lines between fiction and real life, Fraser has created something of a tourist destination out of her own homestead, “Lazy Goose Farm” in upstate New York, where by arrangement, fans can visit the gardens, red barns and organic farming that inspire the fictional town of Lumby.  Online, reader fans can immerse themselves in Lazy Goose Farm and Lumby lore, and shop for branded merchandise, from coffee mugs and aprons, to paintings of Lumby created by Fraser’s artist husband Art Poulin.

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Pushing up Daisies by Rosemary Harris (St. Martins Press)
Target niche: Garden lovers

This debut mystery, first of a series by Harris called The Dirty Business Mysteries, features a gardening sleuth. Harris targets garden lovers by giving away seed packets printed with the book’s cover at readings she gives at flower shows and garden clubs. Readers send her snapshots of the flowers they’ve grown from those seeds.

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Non-Fiction

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Queen Bees and Wannabes by Rosalind Wiseman (Random House)
Target niche: teens and their mothers

This groundbreaking book about girls and bullying in school was used as the basis for the hit movie Mean Girls. Wiseman is also the author of a recent Young Adult novel Boys, Girls, & Other Hazardous Materials (Penguin.)

Wiseman targets teens facing serious issues via “Rosalind’s Inbox” on her website, where she responds to questions in a video (vlog) format. With her high visibility in the tween market, she also created her Girl World Book Tour targeting mothers and daughters, packed with interactive features, Q&A sessions and book signings.

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Is This Thing On? by Abby Stokes (Workman Publishing)
Target niche: computer illiterates

With the subtitle A Computer Handbook for Technophobes, Late Bloomers, and the Kicking and Screaming, Stokes discovered an unexpectedly large and receptive market among older folks who’d never touched a computer before. She calls them “silver surfers,” and discovered they’re well organized and eager for help.

Stokes targets these “digital immigrants” at conferences like the 10,000-member Southwest Computer User Group in San Diego. On the other side of the country, the Florida Association of Computer User Groups invited her on their cruise to Cozumel, and plans a direct-mail campaign to its 20,000 members with a special offer for her book. Every time Stokes makes one of these appearances there are new bulk sales and big spikes on Amazon.

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Tips for writers

• Be creative. (You’re an artist, right?) Think how to convert the book of your heart to a “product” of special value to your potential readers.

• “Never say no!” (in the words of Abby Stokes.) Get out there and boogie. Send that postcard. Return that phone call. Resist the desire to be alone all day. Don’t be shy, no one can sell your book as well as you can.

• Be willing to phone-in or visit readers groups and book clubs who have an special interest in some aspect or angle of your book.  Check out this central resource for book groups across the country.

• Sign up for Google Alerts, so when a website, blog, reading club newsletter or posting mentions your name, you’ll be notified by email. Keep track of how often you’re mentioned on these sites and offer to do guest posts, send free books to members, and give away information, tips, tidbits that relate to the topic of shared interest.

• If your book holds interest for a professional or academic audience, go to conferences and meetings, ask to make a presentation or present a paper. Sell your book at the event. Get the mailing list of the organization for postcards or email mailings. If they have a newsletter of their own (and many do) take an ad and send in a free article highlighting ideas from your book.

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Have you identified your niche markets?

And once you’ve got some ideas about groups of potential readers, how will they find you and your book?

This approach takes creativity, perseverance, passion, and that very important personal touch, so authors who take this on with enthusiasm and energy will be the most effective.  Each writer I interviewed for this post was deeply dedicated, feeling an enormous stake in the outcome.  These missions are personal and that makes all the difference.  One more time:  No one can sell your book as well as you can.

Would be very interested to hear about your experience tackling your own niche markets, what worked, what didn’t, what you’ll try next!

True story.

That anecdote comes from veteran bookseller Andy Ross, who for 30 years owned the venerable Cody’s Books in Berkeley (when bookstores still carried back stock.)

Bookstores account for 60% of sales

Make no mistake: Book placement matters. Brick and mortar bookstores account for more than 60 percent of all book sales, so we publishers agonize over where our books are placed, and struggle to get higher visibility, title-by-title, for the books we love.

And where a book sits can incite bitter shelf wars among authors, publishers, sales reps, and retailers, leading to frequent incidents of guerrilla merchandising, with the interested parties surreptitiously rearranging the stock for their own benefit.

Can the right book placement produce a bestseller? Probably not, but sales can jump if a book is displayed face-out near the cash register – considered the absolute best spot in the store. Sales can also surge if a title has an enthusiastic hand-written staff recommendation tacked to the shelf.

Pile ‘em high and watch ‘em fly

That’s bookseller lingo for building those towering monoliths of stacked bestsellers you see near the entrances of the biggest bookstores. Other coveted placements to increase visibility and sales include the end caps of bookshelves and book posts with all the titles facing out.

Face-out or spine-out?

What author wouldn’t rather have their book turned face-out, with the cover visible to bookstore browsers? That placement decision, it turns out, is up to the store staffer who shelves the books. It’s usually a factor of how many copies are on the shelf; if there are more than a few, there’s a better chance the stack will be turned face-out. An eye-catching book jacket helps too.

The kiss of death

Sales will suffer, on the other hand, if – horrors – a book is shelved away in Sociology – a catchall section for ambiguous titles, and the kiss of death for book sales. Even worse and most frustrating of all, is if a store clerk misshelves the book to begin with. Then the book is doomed. It’s impossible to locate, even if a customer requests the book and the store shows it’s in inventory.

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Here’s more from my conversation with Andy Ross, who is now, incidentally, a literary agent whose authors benefit from his unique perspective and expertise as a former bookseller.

What determines the category where a title is shelved? What if, for example, a particular book could be interpreted as either a memoir or self-help?

The publisher assigns every book a section code. That code determines where a book is shelved in the store. It can be an important strategic decision. One of my authors, for example, is writing a book that could be positioned either as a travel narrative or political history. Travel narrative is hot now, so we’ll emphasize that to the publisher.

Who decides if a book is placed on a front table or other prominent spot?

The publisher has the biggest influence because they pay the store a placement allowance.

What’s a placement allowance?

It’s a percentage of the prior year’s total sales. The big bookstore chains get millions to spread around, while independent booksellers get a fraction of that for all of the publisher’s new titles. So basically the publisher is pumping money into the accounts to purchase the best space in the store — front tables, end caps and window space, in the same way General Mills and Proctor and Gamble buy space for their breakfast cereals and dish detergents in the supermarkets.

Do publishers allocate dollars for specific titles?

They pay fees for store placement. I suspect that money is also paid under the table for special side deals in the chains for a few blockbuster dreams. Of course nothing is ever in writing. There’s no way anyone can monitor this stuff.

What about those staff recommendations on the shelves and covers?

Those can definitely make a difference, especially if they’re personal and hand-written.

But a lot of those “staff recommendations” at the chain bookstores are phony, and written by someone at the central office. The American Booksellers Association also used to crank out fake recommendations for stickies, that you were supposed to slap on the big books.

Can a bookseller create a bestseller?

Not really. But a bookseller can certainly give a book a big kick-start. Here’s an example: Fred Cody (the founder of Cody’s Books) had sold a surprising 200 copies of Tom Robbins‘ first novel Another Roadside Attraction. That impressed him a lot. So when Houghton Mifflin came around with Tom’s second book Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, Fred ordered 1,000 copies. That really got the publisher’s attention. They leveraged that information and told all their other accounts that the legendary astute book buyer Fred Cody had taken a very strong position and they should too. Eventually the book was a big hit, still selling today.

I did the same thing later on with Michel Foucault’s History of Sexuality, Walter Benjamin’s Illuminations, and Jacques Derrida’s Of Grammatology. We moved out more than ten percent of all their total sales, and these were in my opinion some of the great works of modern literature.

What can self-published authors do to get shelf placement?

Self-published authors can make a deal with a local bookstore to have a reading or even a workshop, if they can guarantee that enough people will turn out. Then stores can special-order copies and put them in the window or front tables to promote the event. Now that there are oceans of self-published books, there are more of these events.

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Writers, have you had bookstore placement and visibility problems?  Were you able to resolve them?  Have any questions?  I’ll watch for them in your comments.

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Andy Ross is a literary agent whose book The Dog Who Never Stopped Loving by best-selling author Jeffrey Masson is a lead title from Harper Collins this coming fall of 2010.

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What’s more, a successful author reading can spark sales and help build a following for a new book.

Publishers know this, but unfortunately, the days of big budgets for glamorous book tours and star-spangled author events are now largely behind us.

Author readings still a hot ticket

Established and emerging authors, nevertheless, are still actively engaged in promoting and selling their work by reading, signing, and speaking at bookstores, libraries, seminars, and all manner of creative locations, like theaters, clubs, restaurants, retail shops, and private homes.

Even though bookstores these days are stressed and preoccupied with the problems of competing with internet discounting, retailers we surveyed remain enthusiastic about author events.

In the SF Bay Area, where I live, the enterprising retailer Book Passages produces a whopping 500 author readings and workshops every year, devoting two rooms exclusively to these events.  My own neighborhood bookstore, the lovely Mrs. Dalloway’s in Berkeley, schedules about four author appearances weekly. And venerable Kepler’s Books near Stanford University maintains a packed calendar of author events.

Author appearances are hot in venues across the country.  A quick search online for readings and signings coming up this week brings up big names like Andre Agassi and Hendrick Hertzberg in Los Angeles, Isabella Rossellini in Seattle, David Plouffe in Boston, Mary Gordon in New York and countless other authors appearing at bookstores and locations large and small.

Charging for admission

We’re noticing more author readings charging admission – and filling every seat – a concept that seems to work especially well when the author has built a local reputation and niche following.

I attended a couple of these events recently, and came away impressed by the organizers’ ingenuity and the positive audience response.

The first, in Seattle, WA, was held at Richard Hugo House, the center for literary arts — and featured three local writers, all talented presenters with fascinating stories. Despite the stiff admission of $25, the 148-seat theater was sold out.

The next event, back in my hometown, was sponsored by Berkeley Arts & Letters, and held at the city’s cozy Hillside Club. Fans paid $15 to hear author and anthropologist Liza Dalby read from her new novel Hidden Buddhas, a story taking place in Japan about “bad girls with cell phones, murder by blowfish, and the Buddhist apocalypse.”  Wow, now that’s intriguing.

In each case, back-of-the-room book sales were brisk.

Tips for successful author appearances

1.  Rehearse

Consider your appearance to be a dramatic performance from the moment you walk through the door. No matter the size of the audience, you have to be on.

That means preparing on every level. Choose four or five short passages from your book, though you may ultimately read only a couple. Read these selections out loud at home, while facing a mirror. Then recruit a family member or friend with a video camera to preserve your delivery so you can watch yourself in action and make any necessary corrections.

If you intend to talk about the book and how you came to write it, prepare an outline with key talking points.  Practice the material without reading from a script until it becomes familiar and comfortable.

2.  Read just enough, not too much

Pay close attention to your audience response.  You can usually tell if people are restless. Novelist Joyce Maynard (Labor Day; To Die For, Internal Combustion) says she reads for 12 minutes max, then talks and asks for questions.

Readers who come to events featuring authors who write novels, memoir or narrative non-fiction, history and biography, often want to know about the deeper meaning, choice of symbolic action, characters, and relationships in the work. They’re hoping for a personal connection when the author is someone they admire and appreciate. They want to find out what’s behind the story, why it was written and how – the artistic, creative, psychological process.

At events featuring the authors of how-to books, readers are more apt to ask questions related to the writer’s expertise, like “What’s the best time to sell my house?” or “How can I get my baby to stop crying and sleep through the night?”

Based on her decades of experience producing author events, Melissa Mytinger, now with Berkeley Arts & Letters, offers this advice to authors:  “Don’t read! Just relax, look up, and talk.”

3.  Look your audience in the eye

That advice goes for everyone except Joan Didion, who once arrived at a packed reading in San Francisco, stood at the podium and promptly buried her head in a copy of her best-seller Year of Magical Thinking. Without taking off her oversized coat, and without looking up, she began to read in a monotone so soft she could barely be heard.  Hard core fans were enthralled anyway, and leaned forward on the edges of their seats, mouthing the familiar words they had read so closely.

But we are not all Joan Didion, who is extraordinary and exceptional.

Veteran authors always recommend making eye contact with their audience, and to be sensitive and respectful to their needs and responses.

And some authors get a real dividend from events where they take the time to look at and listen to readers face-to-face. Like Po Bronson (What Should I Do With My Life; Why Do I Love These People) who says he gets good stories and ideas for his work when appearing before an audience of readers at lectures and workshops.

4.  Work with your publisher

Even if there’s no travel budget, your publisher may be able to help  book a local event in your neighborhood or the general region.

Their key concern will be whether you guarantee a crowd large enough to justify the store ordering enough copies to make it worth their effort. If you can’t really deliver a critical mass of eager buyers, don’t pursue this route, since it’ll wind up being frustrating for all involved.

5.  Work with your local book sellers

Cultivate a relationship that will interest them in you and your work. Take the time to see who’s coming into the store and find a connection between their demographics and your work.

Authors who do well at Mrs. Dalloway’s, for example, have a personal connection to literary fiction, gardening, poetry, and architecture.  Smaller independent book sellers want to establish good community relationships and increase traffic with potential readers for any book in their inventory.

6.  Go beyond bookstores

Some titles might lend themselves to appearances in settings other than bookstores and libraries. Identify your potential readers and ask yourself where they meet to discuss or shop for their interests. Possibilities could be as varied as a baby shop, the local botanical garden, or a professional conference.

If you’re writing fiction, find an element or location in your story that connects with a local organization or meeting. The mystery writer Rosemary Harris, for example, has a heroine sleuth who’s a master gardener (Pushing Up Daisies, The Big Dirt Nap). Consequently, she’s been able to have readings at garden clubs and shows around the country.

You can be creative with this.  In my neighborhood, I noticed that the author of a picture book of French postcards is doing a signing at a popular chocolate shop and cafe, where he’ll also be speaking about his favorite Parisian artisan chocolatiers.

Garth Stein says he makes it a rule to attend as many reader’s groups as possible. He enjoys going to community centers and people’s homes to sit down and talk about his books, answering questions, telling personal stories about how he works.  And his readers eat it up.

7.  Publicize your event

Put an announcement on your website. Mention it in your blog and twitter repeatedly leading up to the event. Send out a press release to local print media like shopping guides with calendars of community events.

Think of special personal touches that are uniquely yours. For example, Emma Straub, author of the novella Fly-Over State sent a love letter to each of the 400 people who purchased the hand-numbered first edition of her book. A second edition will be available soon from Flatmancrooked. Talk about building relationships and community outreach!

8.  Learn how to promote your book to niche markets

“Promoting a book is a significant and necessary part of the writing process” says Stein, who appeared at hundreds of independent stores, and reader’s living rooms to build a market for The Art of Racing in the Rain. Then he went beyond that to attend NASCAR racing events, where he handed out a self-produced pamphlet featuring appropriate highlights of the book. Stein attributes a good deal of the book’s word-of-mouth and eventual major sales to these kinds of efforts.

Not everyone has Stein’s charm and moxie, but his approach demonstrates that no one cares about a book more or can sell it better than the author.  For more on his methods, check out this earlier post and interview, How a best-selling author builds his market.

It takes persistence and hard work to arrange and deliver successful author events . Whether you have a publisher or are self-published, you need to connect with sympathetic local people who are busy but can be persuaded to see the potential your book has for them.

9. Make sure your books are stocked for the event: here’s how

One retailer recommends that authors maintain their own inventory of books, purchased from their publisher at favorable author discounts based on how many they order. That way, if the local shop can’t get them in time, they’ll buy them from the author to insure they have enough available.

That single piece of advice could save the day.  So many writers have had the awful experience of showing up for the reading, and you guessed it — for whatever reason, the books didn’t arrive on time.

Authors are also advised to sign all copies regardless of how many are sold on the spot, since stores will often keep an autographed  book on the front table long after your appearance  for book collectors and gift-givers.

Tell us about your author appearances

We want to hear about your experiences with your own author readings and signings: the great and the not-so-terrific.  What worked?  What went wrong?  Who’s had success with developing niche markets through readings?  Have you discovered any interesting off-the-track venues?

And we’d love to hear about memorable readings you’ve attended.  Did anyone else catch Joan Didion?

For those who are just learning the ropes, maybe struggling with some of this, take a look at this funny first-person account, Lessons learned from a book signing disaster by guest contributor Lisa Haneberg.  You’ll feel much better.

That’s why publishers and video producers are rushing to collaborate on low-cost video book trailers.  Publicists and marketing professionals believe these videos are the best new way to create the kind of buzz that attracts readers and sales.

In the past few months, publishers like Simon & Schuster, Harlequin, Scholastic, Wiley and others, have commissioned and produced hundreds of these short videos.  They’re posting them on their own company websites, on Amazon, YouTube, author sites and blogs, and an expanding universe of multimedia and social networking sites.

Some of these book videos look like movie trailers, with high production values, location shots and paid actors. Some are just about the author, with talking heads and an interview at home about the book and how it was written.

Here’s one I love

This is a book trailer for New Confections of a Closet Master Baker by Gesine Bullock-Prado (Broadway Books/Random House Sept. 09). It’s about the author and her quest for meaning and purpose in her life, which she discovers by becoming a master baker and opening her own shop in Vermont where she creates pastry and cakes to die for. They’re so well photographed you’ll want to rush out and buy them, and the book.

A sudden trend

This new approach is part of the sea change in the industry’s turbulent and volatile efforts to sell books.  Most of us generally agree that the old ways of marketing books has become prohibitively expensive and obsolete, especially in the current economy and declining retail sales in all sectors.

That full-page ad in the New York Times Book Review or the 30-second national TV spot on a show like Today or Front Line can cost tens of thousands of dollars with few tangible results. At the same time the DIY free-access culture of the internet has shown how powerful a three-minute YouTube video can be, careening around cyberspace in a few minutes if viewers pass it on to interested friends in their social network.

Book publishers are struggling to figure out how to survive and flourish in this brave new world of digital marketing. Many are now willing try something new.

At John Wiley & Sons, for example, we’ve already commissioned many such videos.  The Dummies division at Wiley in particular, is using video trailers to market its books.  Simon & Schuster’s CEO Carolyn Reidy, told me at Book Expo this year that she’s a big supporter of this recent initiative and has ordered dozens of videos for her various imprints. Jeff Gomez at Penguin is another strong advocate of this marketing tool.

We’ve also found that these book trailers are perfect as audition tapes for national broadcast and print media, and to generate author publicity and support the author’s direct-to-reader marketing efforts to drive sales and engage customers.

Growing book trailer industry

Video production companies targeting authors are emerging to produce book trailers. For example, Andrew Kaplan, Business Development Manager of the internet video company TurnHere, says they’ve produced about 500 book videos and is releasing three or four new ones every week.

Another producer, Scott Robinson of RFI films in NYC has been creating book videos directly with the author, most notably our own favorite discovery, Lenore Skenazy.

A quick search online turned up other players, including Living Jacket, Circle of Seven Productions, and Expanded Books. I don’t have any personal experience with these companies, so please do your own due diligence if you consider using their services.

If you’re a writer under contract, be clear about who’s paying for producing the video. If you don’t yet have a book publisher, consider doing something within your budget, either on your own or with professional help. The cost for such an effort can range from a few hundred to $5,000.

How can you make the best use of this new resource?

Watch as many book videos as you can and become familiar with the rapidly changing state of the art.  To get started, check out BookScreening, a hub for book trailers submitted by publishers and authors featuring great examples of this new medium.  Another big player in this arena is the book trailer channel at  Barnes & Noble Studio.  Search YouTube for book trailers, and you’ll find more than 50,000. And there’s Vimeo, with a roster of more than 200 book videos.  Also take a look at The Book Trailer Blog, with interesting background and commentary about making and re-purposing book videos.

Book trailers tend to fall into two major categories: Some are like Hollywood movie previews, with professional actors playing out elements of the stories in actual locations, with good music, slick editing, and high production values.

Others are entirely author focused, with a writer explaining why and how they wrote the book, often speaking from home.  The author might be sitting behind a keyboard, walking through a location associated with the book, or conducting an interview with an on or off-camera journalist or friend.

Readers want a relationship with the author

“Our experience and field surveys show that what potential readers want most is contact with the author,” Kaplan of TurnHere says.

“Book tours don’t often bring authors to neighborhood events anymore, but people still crave that personal touch, that sense of a real person they can get to know, that relationship between author and reader.”

What would work best for your book? Would you prefer to dramatize the story in an enticing manner, or talk about your work and how you did it?

Consider roughing out a preview trailer on your own. Do you have any video equipment at home? Do you know someone who would be willing to experiment and have some fun working on this with you?

“I’ve seen good book trailers that started as an amateur Flip camera version made by the author and then later redone with professional production values,” says Robinson of RFI films.

“Lenore Skenazy and her husband Joe, for example, did a first-draft video for her book Free Range Kids with consumer equipment and software.  They wrote their own script. It had humor – which is important for many book trailers — and a lot of smart ideas for inserts and locations. So we re-shot the whole thing with better audio and editing. Humor, good sound and good editing can all make a huge difference.” See the final version on Amazon.

Is Amazon charging for placement?

Book trailer producers have told me also that one of the biggest challenges they face now in video marketing campaigns is placement. It used to be easier to get a video trailer posted on Amazon, for example. Now I hear they’re beginning to charge for posting a video on the first page of a book listing.

Kaplan at TurnHere says that Amazon is beginning to charge some of his clients a $1500 fee for posting on the first page of a book listing. A spokesperson for Amazon, who prefers to remain anonymous, told me that such a fee would depend on how much business the publisher does with them, and the status of an individual author.

I’m told that we’re not paying that kind of money at Wiley for posting on Amazon, but we may be getting credit for the volume of cooperative advertising dollars that a publisher makes available to major retailers.

If anyone out there has had direct experience with Amazon regarding placement of a book trailer, we’d love to hear from you.

The bottom line

Here’s the bottom line: Smart buyers do research online before making any retail purchase. Book readers are no different. If they’ve heard about a book, or read something by a writer they like, they’ll search for it. When they find an actual video, the research shows that people have an attention span of about 3 minutes.

Three minutes doesn’t sound like much.  But that little book video could make a big impact in your ultimate sales.

We want to hear about your experience

Who’s got a book trailer?

Tell us about your experience and send links in comments.