Help for Writers a la Ann Landers

Note: I often answer questions in caps and in bits or color so I don’t forget anything!. This letter is from a client that I published in the Q&As a la Ann Landers section of my  #SharingwithWriters newsletter.  I thought visitors and subscribers to this #SharingwithWriters blog might benefit, too, because so many of my authors are getting inaccurate information--including information on publishers--on the web!  

Hello Carolyn,

Your recent article on Bookbaby’s blog coincided with my reading an article about using both Amazon and either IngramSpark or Bookbaby.

I am glad you read this blog post! It is an excerpt from the frugal book promoter. Did it seem familiar! (-:

I am inclined to do this so that we can get our books into bookstores and libraries more easily.

First of all, when you publish with Createspace (owned by Amazon and free) they have a distribution package (free) that lets bookstores and libraries order directly from other outlets like Ingram and . . .well, you would need to ask them about others. There are quite a few and the Createspace contact number is easily found on their site. Http://createspace.com

I understand bookstores hate Amazon, understandably so, and will not carry Amazon published book because of Amazonophobia and the uncompetitive wholesale rates.

Bookstores may hate Amazon. Most retailers aren't fond of their competitors and Amazon certainly fits into that category. But as a former retailer, I can tell you that bookstores order from Baker and Taylor almost exclusively because it is cost effective to consolidate all their orders (one check, one place to return books, etc.) and because B and T accepts returns. So, if your book isn't available at B and T, you will have no better luck no matter who you go with--Bookbaby or Smashwords or anyone else. And Amazon/Createspace does use Baker and Taylor as a distribution point.

Further, I'm  thinking you should go back to the Index of The Frugal Book Promoter (I know you have it) and research my rather strongly worded bit on why I think that in most instances it is an utter waste of good marketing time for self-published authors or micro presses like yours to go after bookstores, anyway...meaning, if you are published independently (or smaller than Simon and Schuster), you won't get much attention from them. And if you should get lucky a few times, that won't last long. They will return your books per their contract with Baker and Taylor and not order again unless they sell some given percentage (a lot) of your book within a given amount of time. I think time is better spent with other marketing--almost any other marketing--to targets that match your books. (for yours, spiritual titles--that might be independent bookstores that specialize in inspirational/alternative religion books.) In that case, bookstores will probably order from Baker and Taylor no matter who printed them--Createspace, Bookbaby, Ingram or about anyone else.

So, will I go with BookBaby or IngramSpark? What are your thoughts? Since you have an “in” with Bookbaby, maybe you can sell me on them.

You are very adept at formatting and computers so I don't think this is an issue for you, but amateur self-publishers find Ingram a real uphill climb compared to Bookbaby or Createapsce/Amazon.

I would appreciate your help with this. There is so much stuff out there on the web that I don’t know who to believe.

Exactly. You just addressed one of my major worries. That is, authors getting inaccurate information. That’s why I hope authors looking for reliable information buy full books from authors who have been around the block a few times and worked with micro publishers and self publishers--or better—have done that for themselves rather than taking unvetted advice in bits and pieces from the web. I can't tell you how much misinformation I find on the web every day and hear from new clients who are . . .well, confused! And often don’t know it!

I would love to see you at the Bookbaby conference. I think it is still only $149 and you can still use my "carolyn" code and get an additional discount. No, I don't get credit. I just twisted their arm so I could get this offer for my clients. I will be presenting on Saturday, Nov. 4.   

I would be happy to spend an hour with you telling you how to get your book into bookstores and libraries the old-fashioned elbow-grease way--the way my husband recently did for his What Foreigners Need To Know About America From A To Z. He regularly researches colleges and universities to find academic personnel and departments that would find his book useful and contacts them with their personal or department e-mail addresses and, when possible, fosters relationships with the decision makers. His results have been amazing including one university that recommends his book to their Fulbright scholars.

I could also share a story about one indie author who was relatively successful selling to a chain of bookstores in the Midwest and describe her process (at least an hour a day contacting them over a period of several years!). She shouts her success far and wide, but never bothered to say this one chain was the only success she had with bookstores (selling just a couple of books per store each month and accepting returns—many damaged—in order to do that!). And the marketing time she had to give up in order to achieve it.

Your friend,

Brother Simeon

Light of the Spirit Monastery

www.ocoy.org

Light of the Spirit Press

lightofthespiritpress.com

505.281.4888

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/light.of.spirit

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Light_of_Spirit

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/light-of-the-spirit-press

MORE ABOUT THE BLOGGER

Howard-Johnson is the author of fiction, creative nonfiction, and poetry. She is also a marketing consultant, editor, and author of the multi award-winning HowToDoItFrugally Series of books for writers including the award-winning second editions of The Frugal Book Promoter (where she talks more about choosing and the advantages of winning contests and how to use those honors)  and The Frugal Editor. Her latest is in the series is  How to Get Great Book Reviews Frugally and Ethically. Learn more on her Amazon profile page, http://bit.ly/CarolynsAmznProfile. Great Little Last Minute Editing Tips for Writers is one of her booklets--perfect for inexpensive gift giving--and, another booklet, The Great First Impression Book Proposal helps writers who want to be traditionally published. She has three FRUGAL books for retailers including one she encourages authors to read because it will help them convince retailers to host their workshops, presentations, and signings. It is A Retailer’s Guide to Frugal In-Store Promotions: How To Increase Profits and Spit in the Eyes of Economic Downturns with Thrifty Events and Sales Techniques. In addition to this blog, she helps writers extend the exposure of their favorite reviews at TheNewBookReview.blogspot.com. She also blogs at all things editing--grammar, formatting and more--at The Frugal, Smart, and Tuned-In Editor (http://TheFrugalEditor.blogspot.com )

Sharing My Favorite Newsletter Tips

I'm on sabbatical this week so I'm running a few of my favorite tips selected from my SharingwithWriters newsletters. Subscribe so you never miss a single one at http://howtodoitfrugally.com. There's a subscription form in the upper right column of every page of the site including all the Writers' Resources pages, just as I suggest in my The Frugal Book Promoter.  You'll get a freebie e-booklet, Great Little Last Minute Edits, too.

Tip: Thanks to Amazon guru Aaron Shepherd for this tip: When a bookstore or library tries to order your book from B&T's (Baker & Taylor) catalog, it may not be visible and they may tell you that it's "unorderable," but that doesn't mean it is really unavailable. Press a little. B&T does special orders for libraries all the time. If they can locate a supplier, they'll order it. (Not to mention that libraries are not restricted to ordering from B&T.) Find Aaron's books for writers--some as low at 99c by searching on his name at Amazon.

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Carolyn Howard-Johnson, author of This Is the Place; Harkening: A Collection of Stories Remembered; Tracings, a chapbook of poetry; and how to books for writers including the award-winning second edition of, The Frugal Book Promoter: How to get nearly free publicity on your own or by partnering with your publisher; The Frugal Editor: Put Your Best Book Forward to Avoid Humiliation and Ensure Success; and Great Little Last Minute Editing Tips for Writers . The Great First Impression Book Proposal is her newest booklet for writers. She has three FRUGAL books for retailers including A Retailer’s Guide to Frugal In-Store Promotions: How To Increase Profits and Spit in the Eyes of Economic Downturns with Thrifty Events and Sales Techniques. Some of her other blogs are TheNewBookReview.blogspot.com, a blog where authors can recycle their favorite reviews. She also blogs at all things editing, grammar, formatting and more at The Frugal, Smart and Tuned-In Editor .

Q&A a la Ann Landers: Do You Know WiseRep?

How Do YOU Evaluate Paid-For Services?

Question:
Thank you for your wonderful newsletter, I always find ideas for something new and leads to follow!

I am wondering if you or your readers have heard of WiseRep.com? They sent me an e-mail and I checked out their website; apparently they are a distributor to large department stores. They make some big claims about getting your book into these stores in large numbers. They have a pretty high enrollment fee (close to $200) and a monthly fee (about $30) to list your book, which means there would really have to be those big numbers in sales in order for it to be worthwhile. I am wondering if you know of anyone who has used them and what their results were. Can they really do what they claim? (Obviously I’m doubtful since I’m writing to you about it!)

Thanks for your help,

Patricia Dischler, author, Because I Loved You, From Babysitter to Business Owner and The Patty Cake Kids

Answer:
Patricia, I don't know about this business. They sound like a specialized distributor. My knee jerk reaction is that the service can't possibly pay for itself when one factors in generally low royalties and then projects how many books would have to be sold to break even. But I don't believe in knee-jerk reactions so, because I have had 30 years experience in the retailing business, here are some things that occur to me.

1. Check to see if books are returnable. Department stores usually don't work on a return basis like bookstores do. If books are sold as a final sales, that is something to factor into your calculations.

2. Determine how well your title matches the audience that frequents department stores.

3. Look at Wise.Rep's sales structure. Do they only send out a catalog or do they have sales representatives. Buyers -- all buyers -- including both bookstore buyers and department store buyers--are human. They tend to buy more readily from a representative they know, love and has provided them with saleable merchandise in the past.

4. Consider if this approach fits with your larger campaign. It is often difficult to ascertain which things work and which don't and everything you do in terms of promoiton accumulates.

As you are assessing, know that this and most other sales and promotion tools can't be completely measured in book sales. Rather we need to look at exposure, how the project builds credibility and how it works in terms of networking. I also like to look at the opportunities the specific effort afforded me to do things like send out invitations, media releases, etc. All those things help us keep in touch with our contacts and the public at large.

In the meantime, I hope Sharing with Writers readers will give you some input. E-mail me with WiseRep in the subject line. HoJoNews@aol.com.

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Carolyn Howard-Johnson, author THIS IS THE PLACE; HARKENING: A COLLECTION OF STORIES REMEMBERED; TRACINGS, a chapbook of poetry; and two how to books, THE FRUGAL BOOK PROMOTER: HOW TO DO WHAT YOUR PUBLISHER WON'T; and THE FRUGAL EDITOR: PUT YOUR BEST BOOK FORWARD TO AVOID HUMILIATION AND ENSURE SUCCESS.
Her other blogs include TheNewBookReview.blogspot.com and AuthorsCoalition.blogspot.com, a blog that helps writers and publishers turn a ho-hum book fair booth into a sizzler.

Questions a la Ann Landers--Giving Away 55%? Yikes!

Question: Did you happen to ask Linda Keller, the Community Relations Manager with the Dayton, OH, [She shared some of her wisdom in a previous newsletter of mine.] Barnes & Noble what percentage her store expects from the sale of books featured in her store? Locally, the B&N wants 55%. If this is what B&N stores expect, I might just as well give the 1,100 books that I still have in my spare bedroom away!

Even the local Books-A-Million wants 50%. I didn't write my book to make money but to almost give it away isn't something I relish either. No wonder little guys like me have trouble marketing our books . . .

From Lloyd King, author of To 'Nam with Love, a book of poetry
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Dear Lloyd:

I can't speak to any specific B&N location [Lloyd lives in LA] but generally stores want 40%. That's what I've been asked for, at least, and that seems to be the norm. Considering retailing in general, this is a low percent; that's why bookstores also get to return their books. That 55% figure appears to be Amazon's requirement and that of some other online stores.

Having said that, this is not so much a problem involving the bookstores' markup (they, after all, have high overhead and must make a profit to exist!). This is a problem that many self- and subsidy authors make: They don't mark their books up enough (gross profit) to cover the costs of doing business. You know, like a promotion budget, discounts for distributors and for wholesalers and, yes, for their own profit.

Printing books on a digital press (POD) makes it more difficult to be competitive because books printed that way cost more and so it is harder to mark up enough to accommodate these costs and still compete with books that are self- or subsidy- or traditional-published in large quantities on an offset press. Printing on an offset press costs less and less per book as the runs (number of books) increase in size. Books printed in huge quantities in China can cost so little that even with all of the chunks taken by the sales pipeline, the publishers make a hefty profit per book.

So, what do you do if you are already published and your profit margin and retail costs are skewed against you? I'm going to return to a refrain you've heard in this newsletter and in more detail in The Frugal Book Promoter. And here it is:

Bookstores are not the best place to sell books.

That is true of almost any book except those that are destined to be true bestsellers -- the ones by the John Grishams and Irvings of bookselling fame. The best places to sell books are at speaking and teaching venues where the author is the star, conferences where the author speaks, alternative outlets like catalogs and corporate sales, etc. (Again, all these subjects are addressed in your Frugal Book Promoter, so I won't bore you by mentioning them again.).

In your case, Lloyd -- as the writer of poetry -- the best place to sell books is at your own launch (I understand yours was very successful) and at readings -- perhaps at coffee houses and the homes of friends who will invite all their poetry-loving friends and (because of the subject of your book) all those interested in military matters.

If you truly have 1,100 books in your garage, your run of books was much too high for your genre -- poetry. You may still sell them all but it will take time and persistence. Lots and lots of poetry readings and maybe a promotional gimmick or two. Here's an idea for you. When you write your next book, you might offer this one at a discount when people buy the other as an example. Or do what Amazon does. Offer two related books (yours!) at a special price.


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Carolyn Howard-Johnson, author THIS IS THE PLACE; HARKENING: A COLLECTION OF STORIES REMEMBERED; TRACINGS, a chapbook of poetry; and two how to books, THE FRUGAL BOOK PROMOTER: HOW TO DO WHAT YOUR PUBLISHER WON'T; and THE FRUGAL EDITOR: PUT YOUR BEST BOOK FORWARD TO AVOID HUMILIATION AND ENSURE SUCCESS.
Her other blogs include TheNewBookReview.blogspot.com and AuthorsCoalition.blogspot.com, a blog that helps writers and publishers turn a ho-hum book fair booth into a sizzler.