How to Help Bookstores You Can't Visit for a Signing

This Q&A from a coaching client of mine is a reprint from my SharingwithWriters newsletter. I often recycle articles I write and other work I do. If you are like me and don't have an assistant, it's may be  time to break Google's rules or preferences or whatever they call them. It seems to me the world wide web is big enough to accommodate a whole lot of valuable information twice.  And I figure my newsletters are long enough that there is still plenty of new material in it if I occasionally borrow from it for this blog. Ahem!   

QUESTION from a COACHING CLIENT: 

My friend Tracy, a writer on the West Coast, offered to drop off my media kit at bookstores in the Berkeley area this month. This is too far away for me to travel for readings; not a cost-effective way to sell books, unless they pay my expenses (dream on!). What should I ask for in my cover letter? For the store to order the book for their shelves? Anything else?

Jendi Reiter

Author of Bullies in Love (Little Red Tree International Poetry Prize) and a new LGBT novel released this month, Two Natures.

Follow me on Twitter:

http://www.twitter.com/jendireiter 

ANSWER:

Oh, I agree! Even in San Francisco where your book is sure to have a loyal following, you would not make up for your expenses with book sales, even  very good book sales. Yes, ask them to carry your book. But also suggest they feature your book in their newsletter and be sure to offer as much help as they can possibly use. 

Example: an article or an excerpt? You might also tell them that you have small 12 x 14 posters for them to post in their windows or on their doors, which you would be happy to send them at no charge.

Even better, why not print up your posters and have your friend just deliver one along with your kit. And a reminder: does your kit include high res digital images of you and your book cover? Is there a chance that we missed that detail when we were talking about kits before? And do you have a glossy headshot as described in the Frugal Book promoter in your kit?  After all, these will not be delivered digitally!

And for this kind of long-distance promotion, maybe you should think about providing some of the things that you would provide if you were in attendance. Like fliers.

If you got an offer you couldn't refuse, would your friend be willing to host you so you wouldn't have to cover hotel bills?  

Speaking of fliers. No need to make them expensive. Light weight is good if you'll be mailing them, right?  I wish I had a copy of the big (expensive plastic coated poster) I made for my first novel, This Is the Place, back in 2000. Use your book cover on both your fliers and your posters. Use the greatest and very brief excerpt/endorsement/blurb you have. Include your Website address. And your name—BIG. Especially since your name is recognizable by a huge audience.  Think Danielle Steele's book covers. 

When you choose quantities, also think businesses you might approach, particularly in LGBT communities.  Yep, walk in. And ask.  I have one little Armenian grocery store that posts my local readings and also a beauty shop—every time I ask. I just ask when I happen to be in the neighborhood.  Oh, and the local carwash can use the same fliers on the bulletin boards most of them have. Maybe your friend will ask businesses she frequents as long as she is there anyway.

You might also contact local radio stations (there are probably many LGBT targeted stations in San Francisco). Pitch an interview and mention the bookstores that stock your book.

Great question! I encourage people to use the frugal way when they can make it work as well—or almost as well—as being there in person.

ABOUT YOUR SHARINGWITHWRITERS BLOGGER

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 multi award-winning second edition of The Frugal Editor; 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 .

Costco Can Mean Big Book Success--Or Big Profit Headaches

Joan Stewart, the well known marketing expert, offers information on selling to Costco on a new video.  I talk about selling through retailers like Costco and pricing your books with the required discount in The Frugal Book Promoter but this is a more extensive tutorial. In her Publicity Hound newsletter Joan says, “When it comes to choosing a limited number of titles for coveted table space in its book section, what Costco wants, Costco usually gets.

“Authors lucky enough to be chosen must agree to sell their books at a 55 percent discount, minimum.

“As painful as that sounds, work the numbers. If you sell 200 books yourself at the full retail price of $19.95, you've made almost $4,000. But if you sell 1,000 books at 10.97 each, that's $10,970.

“How long would it take you to sell 1,000 books on your own? How long do you think it would take a big chain like Costco to sell 1,000 of your books?

“Agreeing to a deep discount is one of several important factors in convincing the big chain stores to carry your title.

“You also must do your homework before approaching the stores. That means walking the aisles to see what they're already selling, talking to the people who buy the books, and creating an attractive book marketing package that makes it easy for them to know immediately what your book is about and why people would want to buy it.

“Amy Collins of New Shelves Distribution sells books to the big chains five days a week. Even though these stores favor books from major publishers, indie authors can claim their share of shelf space. Amy was a guest on one of my webinars, and you can watch the video replay of "How to Convince Costco, Walmart, Target & Other Huge Chains to Sell Your Books," You'll get a peek at Amy's Rolodex, and access to her contact information for the big chains. Some of the other tips she shared are at my blog. See ’5 tips for getting fiction or nonfiction books into Costco, Walmart, Target.’

I would like to caution you about Costco's contract, though. Like bookstores they buy their books on a returnable basis and if they order 30,000 (and that's not all that unusual!) books and “only” sell 2,000 of them, independent authors are going to have a garage full of books and a big investment that may take a great deal of time to recoup. So consider carefully before you use your valuable marketing time to approach them.

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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 .

Open Letter to B&N Pasadena

Dear Barnes and Noble in Old Town Pasadena:

I am so sorry to see your windows draped with kraft paper and only darkness beyond that. Still, I tried to share with management how they could raise their daily sales by 15% based on my combined knowledge of 30 years experience as a retailer and a decade as friend and coach for writers. I even sent your principals a copy of my book A Guide to Frugal In-Store Promotion with the chapter on how to partner with authors flagged.

And when authors brought me copies of your thoughtless refusal to partner with an author in their very own communities, I cried with them. I cried for you, too. If only you had honored the very people you need to be in business--authors. You needn’t have stocked their books. You could just have featured them in your store for a day, applauded them, and reaped the profits and good will. Your local authors are readers, too. They do talk to their neighbors. Most do have lists--some of them very long--of people in your immediate neighborhood who...yes, read.l 

Sincerely,
From someone who browsed your aisles and, yes, bought books and other things from you—but not nearly as much as if you had been supportive of the local writing community

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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 .

Penny Sansevieri Shares 12 Secrets to Selling More Books at Events

Penny Sansevieri has graciously agreed to a  SharingwithWriters guest spot while I take a little time off. I hope you'll utilize some of the other benefits she offers; they're listed at the end of this post. And do know that you'll find even more detailed information on making events of all kinds (bookstores, book fairs, writing conferences, etc. ) in my The Frugal Book Promoter (http://budurl.com/FrugalBkPromo).

By Penny Sansevieri

So you got a book event, great! Now you want to maximize it, right? You've heard your writing buddies (or perhaps read online) about the lack of attendance at signings so figuring out how to maximize the event, regardless of the numbers might be tricky. While I spend a lot of time addressing online marketing, the offline component is one you shouldn't overlook and if book events are where you want to focus, then bringing in some ideas to help you sell more books is something you should consider.

Some years back when I was promoting The Cliffhanger I ended up at a book signing in the driving rain, I mean it was pouring and the store was all but empty. It was amazing I sold even one book, let alone seven. While not a big number the copies were all sold to people who were seeking refuge in the store from the rain and not there for my event. This signing taught me a lot about events and connecting with consumers in stores. If you have an event coming up, consider these ideas before you head out:

1. Marketing: First and foremost is the marketing of your event. But I'm not talking about the marketing you do the media (though that is great too) I'm speaking of in-store marketing, this is what most folks seem to overlook. This is where you supply things to the store to help them market your event. Because the first phase of a successful event is driving people to it. Here are a few thoughts.
   1. Do bag stuffers. You can easily do this in your favorite computer program, do two up on a page, meaning that you use one 8 1/2 by 11 sheet of paper to do two fliers. You'll want to ask the store first if they mind that you provide this, most stores or event venues don't.
   2. Bookmarks: While most in the industry see these as passé, people still love them. You can do bookmarks and bag stuffers (or staple them to the flier) or you can do custom bookmarks with the date and time of your event. Nowadays it's pretty easy to get these done cheaply. Keep in mind that if you are having the event in a mall or other type shopping area, you might be able to drop the bookmarks (or bag stuffers) off at the nearby stores to see if they'll help promote the event.

Book signings are boring: Regardless of where you do the event, plan to do a talk instead of a signing. People are drawn into a discussion and are often turned off by an author just sitting at a table. Marketing is about message and movement so stand up and speak. If speaking in public is intimidating to you, go to Toastmasters or some other local networking/speaking group and see what you can learn.

Unique places: If you want to get more attention for your event, consider doing events in unique places. We've done them in video stores, electronics stores, gyms, even restaurants (on slow nights), doing outside-the-bookstore events is a great way to gain more interest for your talk. Why? Because you aren't competing with everyone else at the bookstore for your crowd. When you do an event at a local that doesn't normally do events, you'll gather more people just because it's considered "unique."

Show up early and talk it up: OK so let's say you're in the store and there are a ton of people in there shopping (a book event dream, yes?) I suggest that you take your extra bag stuffers or custom bookmarks and just hand them to the people in the store. Let me know you are doing an event at such and such time and you'd love it if they can sit in. You'll be surprised how many new people you might pull in this way.

Customize: Regardless of what your talk is about, poll the audience first to see a) what brought them there, or b) what they hope to learn if your talk is educational. I suggest this because the more you can customize your discussion, the more likely you are to sell a book. If you can solve problems (and this is often done during the Q&A) all the better. You'll look like the answer machine you are and readers love that. If you have the answers they'll want to buy from you. I promise.

Make friends: get to know the bookstore people, but not just on the day of the event. Go in prior and make friends, tell them who you are and maybe even hand them your flier or bookmark (or a stack if you can). Often stores have Information Centers, see if you can leave some fliers there instead of just at the register. Getting to know the people who are selling the book is a great way to help gather more people into your event. If your event isn't in a bookstore but attached to a shopping area or mall, go around to the stores (and perhaps you did this when you passed out the fliers) and let them know you have an event and what can you do to help them promote it. If you can rally the troops to help you market your talk, you could triple the numbers of people at your event. No kidding.

Take names: I always, always recommend that you get names and (email) addresses from the folks who attended. Sign them up for your mailing list is a great way to stay in touch with them and stay on your reader's radar screen. If you have a giveaway or drawing, great! This will help you to collect names. If you don't, offer them a freebie or ebook after the event. Often if I'm doing a PowerPoint presentation I will put together a set of them (delivered in PDF) after the event. Attendees need to sign up to get them and then once they do, I include them in our newsletter list which helps me to stay on their radar screen.

Pricing: Make sure your book is easy to buy. If you are doing this outside of a bookstore this is easy to do and will help your sales. I find that a rounded number like $10 or $20 makes for a quick and easy sale. If you can round up or down without adding or losing too much to the price, by all means do it.

Book pairing: One way you might be able to round up is by pairing your book with a freebie. When I paired Red Hot Internet Publicity with a second, but smaller, marketing book I took the awkward pricing of $18.95, bumped it up to $20 (so 2 books for $20) and quadrupled my sales after an event. Now the pairing doesn't have to be a book, it can be a special report or even an ebook that you send to them after the event.

Product and placement: As you're doing your talk (especially if it's in a non-bookstore venue) make sure that you have a copy of the book propped up in front of you so event visitors see it the entire time you are speaking. Hold up the book when appropriate and use it as an example when you can. This will help to direct the consumers eye to the book - and making eye contact with the product is a good way to make sure it stays on their radar screen throughout your talk. When I do a speaking gig at an event that allows me to sell books in the room, I will sell four times more than I would if the attendees have to go somewhere else to buy it so make the buy easy. If you can, make sure your books are for sale in the room.

Ease of purchase: Aside from pricing, if you're doing your own check out make sure that you have many ways consumers can buy your book. I take credit cards at the event, checks and cash. Don't limit yourself as to what you can take or you will limit your sales.

Post event wrap up: So the event is over, what now? Well, if you got attendees to sign up for your newsletter (you did do that, right?) and now it's time to send a thank you note for attending and remind them (if they missed the chance at the event) to buy a copy of your book at the "special event price."

Speaking and book events are great ways to build your platform, but if you aren't selling books there's little point in doing them. For many of us, our book is our business card and thus, if we can sell our "business card" we can keep consumers in our funnel. If your book isn't your business card you still want readers, right? So the marketing both post and during an event is crucial to building your readership. While it's easy to say that events sell books, they often don't. I find that if you don't "work it" you often will find your time wasted. Seek the opportunities when they are made available to you and then maximize them when they are, you'll be glad you did!

Are you ready for your own success? Then let's schedule a call! Call us at: (866) 713-2318 or contact me directly at: info@amarketingexpert.com

About Penny:
Penny C. Sansevieri, Adjunct Instructor NYU
Author Marketing Experts, Inc. http://www.amarketingexpert.com/
Find her on HuffPo: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/penny-c-sansevieri
Ready for your own success? Ask us about the 10 Bestsellers we've worked on! Will your book be next?
Office: 858/560-0121 Hotline: 619/808-BOOK
Follow @Bookgal on Twitter: < http://twitter.com/Bookgal>
AME's Facebook Fan Page < http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/pages/Author-Marketing-Experts-Inc-AME/43882181670?ref=sgm>
Get some great scoop on publishing and marketing! Listen to The Publishing Insiders on Blogtalk radio < http://www.blogtalkradio.com/ThePublishingInsiders>

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SharingwithWriters blogger Carolyn Howard-Johnson is the 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 .

Shouting Out Great (Frugal!) Writers Conference News

& July 20-22, The Greater Los Angeles Writers Conference will be at the Los Angeles Valley Campus. I’ll be speaking Saturday, the 21^st at 12:30 pm. on Building a Platform and on Sunday the 22^nd at 10 am on How to Develop a Relationship with a Bookseller. The same day at 3:15 we’ll talk about how It’s Never Too Early or Too Late to Promote Your Book.

The conference includes other speakers and panelists like Morgan St. James, Robin Quinn, and Dan Poynter. http://www.wcwriters.com/faculty/ There will also be an exciting screenplay track. Find the entire schedule here:

Friday: http://www.wcwriters.com/glawc/schedule-fri.html
Saturday: http://www.wcwriters.com/glawc/schedule-sat.html
Sunday: http://www.wcwriters.com/glawc/schedule-sun.html

And this conference is only $79 for one day and $199 for all three. Frugal as are most things I recommend to you. Compare to some other conferences that run as nigh as $625.!

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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 ediction 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 . If your followers at Twitter would benefit from this blog post, please use the little Green widget to let them know about this blog:

On Slow Book Sales, Bookstores, and Book Marketing That Works

Sometimes I run Question and Answers a la Ann Landers in my Sharing with Writers newsletters. Sometimes I share the same ones here, though not all the time. If you want to get in on the free mini consultations, you'll just have to subscribe to my newsletter (and get a free e-booklet!) at www.howtodoitfrugally.com.  Here is one from one of my former students at UCLA.

QUESTION:

HI Carolyn

I took one of your classes at UCLA a few years ago.

I've self-published a book called Peepeyes last March through Xlibris. Initially sales were good, but they've been trailing off to almost nothing. I'm trying to restart sales through greater exposure for the book, as I'm quite sure most readers haven't even heard of it yet.

The book is returnable through Ingram Book Distribution, but how do I get bookstores to carry it even though the risk is nothing since they can return unsold copies to Xlibris and lose nothing. I can't literally in-person visit all the bookstores across the country. I have postcarded all of them, including the libraries, to the tune of almost 5000 postcards. I've entered the book in a couple of national book award contests, but those aren't decided until later in the year. Xlibris provided an email marketing campaign on the book to their email list, and I've also emailed all the independent bookstores across the country about the book.

Any suggestions on getting the book greater exposure? Thanks.

Dwain Tucker, author of Peepeyes (www.peepeyes.com ),

ANSWER:

Dwain, I remember you. Partially because of your name.

When I wrote my novel the Net wasn't what it was today and one really needed to do a lot of selling through bookstores to be even reasonably effective. Today that has changed. As a disclaimer, I want you to know that some genres do better than others with no bookstore exposure, or very little.

Having said that, it is so much easier for independent publishers and authors to make a big splash (meaning get their books seen and known) on the Web than ever before. And many titles (like my Frugal Book Promoter (www.budurl.com/FrugalBkPromo ) thrive on that kind of marketing. Novels do tend to do better if they also have brick-and-mortar visibility, but to do great they still need that online promotion. That is one reason that I updated The Frugal Book Promoter to include more on online promotion than it had before. (The first edition was written before the days of blogging and social networks and in the years intervening I experimented with new promotions including the online ones.)

You didn't say how much you were doing with promotion outside of bookstores, but here's the thing. No matter what genre we write in, bookstores are a hard nut to crack for a variety of reasons. An author or publisher has to work so much (MUCH!) harder to get into bookstores, much less be seen there. If your book is in a bookstore, it is usually displayed on a shelf, spine out, where very few would see it anyway. Getting a signing or workshop is difficult, too--as you know. That's mostly because bookstores mostly still operate on the assumption that indie books are somehow inferior. Besides that, "new" (meaning current books less that 90 days from release) are part of what they look at when they stock books.

I have one author friend who does well as an indie author. She spends at least one hour every morning contacting bookstores and the buyers for chains. She has published about 17 books. She talks about these books to buyers in terms of seasonal interests--her novel based on Irish history, as an example, before St. Pat's day. She has developed relationships with these buyers. But as successful as she is, I can't help but think that if she put that same effort into promoting online, how many more people she could reach in that time. (By the way, she does that, too!).

I have another friend who landed publicity so spectacular for her nonfiction book it should have been an overnight success. She was on a sort of panel on Oprah. Then she was featured on the cover of Money magazine. I kid you not. I saw it! And you know what? She still has a garage full of books. She actually said she knows she didn't sell more than a dozen or so books after each one of those publicity coups!

The upshot of all this is that the methods I talk about in The Frugal Book Promoter work. Podcasts. Streaming radio. Videos. Blogs. E-mailed newsletters. Really everything in the whole darn book! They work. And they work better than bookstores when one factors in the time and money spent. It's persistence that counts most--not flash-in-a-pan publicity.

It is, after all, online bookstores that are keeping books alive. In the old days, books in bookstores that were over 90 days old got sent back to publishers to be reissued for remainder piles. The next time they were sent back, they were shredded. That most of these "older" books are still available these days on Amazon tells us that online marketing is where the results are. Shouldn't we then support those who do that for us? And shouldn't we support our books by doing what is best for them?

Truly, this is only a fraction of what I could tell you on this topic. I do consult and we could talk about setting up a campaign for your book--specifically for all the angles (themes, characters, setting, genre, release date, EVERYTHNG) being taken into consideration. Literally map the possibilities for your book. But then, the Second Edition of The Frugal Book Promoter will help you do that much less expensively than my hourly rate--which is why I wrote it.

I do hope this helps. I wish the best for your book. Basically the two magic words are "perseverance" and "viral." I also like "frugal." You don't have to spend a lot of money to market books. But in order to market them frugally, you need to do most of the work yourself and know how to do it.

You can do it. When my novel (This Is the Place (www.budurl.com/ThisIsthePlace) was published and my publisher did nothing, I dug in and did it myself. That same publisher eventually gave me their award for most books sold and best publicity campaign. That seems to be the only marketing they ever did other than try to sell me ridiculous packages that couldn't possibly have been effective. It took me another book with them to realize there are better ways to publish--and market. And since then, I've been exploring them all.

Best,

Carolyn

PS: Maybe it's a good idea now you've sent postcards to libraries and bookstores to follow up with a query letter proposing a workshop or seminar—at least to the local ones. Mention the postcard you sent in the query. And if you have their e-mail addresses, try an e-mail followup but targeted. By that, I mean, say, your story is set in New York. Send e-mails to the New York libraries saying your book is perfect for them because of the setting. In other words, play the angles.

----- 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 ediction 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 . If your followers at Twitter would benefit from this blog post, please use the little Green widget to let them know about this blog:

New Flash: Kindle to Feature Special Indie Bookstore

In the News:  Kindle/Amazon announced its new Indie bookstores of Kindle books today.

They see it as a wonderful advantage of authors. I am reading between the lines but I see it as a way to separate the wheat (professionally produced indie books) from the chaff (indie books that leave something to be desired). That is a good thing for readers and may be good for writers, too, if it encourages them to take more care with their editing and formatting, etc. Learn more about it on this Amazon page:

https://kdp.amazon.com/self-publishing/help?moduleId=200734540

By the way, there is no way for authors to submit their books for this honor. Amazon is selecting entries using their algorithms.

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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 Frugal Book Promoter: How To Do What Your Publisher Won't; 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 . If your followers at Twitter would benefit from this blog post, please use the little Green widget to let them know about this blog:

How Indie Authors, Publishers and Bookstores Could Lick the Recession by Partnering

(This blog features bookstores but most independent retailers could substitute the name of their own store every times the word "bookstore" appears. That's because their are authors who write on any subject imaginable and they are sure to find books that fit any store's product mix. These days the author of those books is more likely than ever to be a keen marketer, too.)

Retailing is in danger. Retailing of books is in greater danger still. We all know many bookstores have failed and many more are struggling. Independent bookstores are especially endangered.

Why then, are so many of these bookstores still adverse to utilizing the power behind their kin--that is the power of indie authors?

A new bookstore opened in my adopted hometown of LaCañada-Flintridge. Brave souls they are, for another small bookstore down the block had just closed out most of their books and reinvented itself into a café. Authors in the area were thinking, “Ahhhh, opportunity! Surely this indie will honor the needs of fellow indies!”

Those authors in my community were wrong. They have been turned away from that new bookstore in droves.

But let me digress. Because I am both author and retailer with some 30 years experience in the retail industry and ten plus in the publishing industry, I wish both bookstores and authors well and know that we are powerful if we work together. I cared enough to write a book that is now available on Amazon. 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. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1441467246/.

That indie authors were turned away on the basis of the press their books were printed on seems especially sad because the store is just one of many that seem to be operating on the theory that independent authors are all cut from the same fabric. Bookstores with this attitude are missing bets on two fronts.

The first, of course, is that they are missing out on good will in their communities. That is so important for any retailer, large or small, independent or chain. An unhappy author is an unhappy customer who tells other people why she is displeased. That is not good word-of-mouth. A happy author is quite the opposite and possibly more avidly positive because she has more at stake in praising the store and recommending its products.

The second opportunity they’re missing is the open door independent authors offer to profits.

Because small indie bookstores’ gross sales are anywhere from $200 to $1000 per weekday (and that upper figure is generous) they can easily increase their gross by tapping into the talent and energy of authors who live in their areas. By considering independent authors and authors published by small presses they increase their pool of possible money makers incrementally. If they harnessed this potential (particular authors who have the knowledge to promote well which readers of my Sharing with Writers newsletter and The Frugal Book Promoter do) they could up their annual gross profits by anywhere from 5% to 12% and that’s nothing to sniff at--especially if it will carry them through an economic downturn.

Here is the ammunition authors and publishers can use to convince bookstore owners that indie-published writers are profit-powerhouse:

1. If a bookstore had but one reading and signing event a week with an indie author and that author promoted (or the store gave them a handout telling them how to promote in exchange for being featured in an event), the free publicity that store would get would be worth the effort. Figured at about $50 a column inch for advertising space, a four inch article in the local paper is worth $200 alone and most events can bring more press publicity than that, some a lot more,and some may even get some TV coverage. An Armenian poet friend of mine did a signing and got coverage on our local cable TV station that caters to the poetry-loving Armenian community. The venue of the reading was, of course, featured prominently in the segment.

2. If the guest author sells 10 books at $12 with a 40% markup only to friends from their own contact list, that would raise that store's profits for the day by five to ten percent. If a bookstore sponsored readings, signings or workshops on slow weeknights 52 times a year and occasionally (for the authors who showed greater promotion promise) on the weekends, that profit could make an appreciable difference. Perhaps enough to keep the store kicking with energy through the recession.

3. If the store sets up an author-friendly program in which the store stocks five signed books for two weeks after the event and the author sends enough customers to the store to buy those books, the store promises to reorder, that’s like hiring a salesperson in the community--one that the store doesn’t pay a salary or commission.

4. If the store tracked some of the customers recommended to them by the local authors they partnered with they would find that many are people who have never been to their stores, may not even know their bookstore exists. Marketers estimate that it costs anywhere from $8 to $25 in promotion and advertising monies to attract one new customer. These new customers cost the store nothing because that author has already “earned” her event with points one through three.

Let’s factor the small publisher into this mix. What if every small publisher made certain that his author(s) know how to approach bookstores with the benefits of featuring him at a signing. Publishers could do that by gifting their authors with The Frugal Book Promoter or at least recommending it or other books on marketing like Janet Elaine Smith’s PromPaks or John Kremer’s 1001 Ways to Market a Book.

That publisher could even furnish his authors with templates for a query letters and media kits that would help convince bookstores that events--especially events that feature locals--are underused tools for profitability. Some bookstores like The Literary Bookpost in Salisbury, NC. have been using independent authors’ talent and enthusiasm to provide a community service to benefit their business successfully. There is no reason why--if we educated one another and supported one another--we couldn’t all benefit the same way.

Once the author has the information she needs to assure a successful signing and to sell her signing concept to a bookstore she:

1. Mails her query and media kit to the indie bookstore owner.
2. Drops by, introduces herself, and gives the bookseller a list of how her workshop or seminar can benefit him using information drawn from this article.
3. If the answer is still no, she drops by again with a list of what she will do to promote the event (parts of which would have been in her query letter). How many local people does she have on her contact list? Will she provide refreshments to guests? Does she have media contacts? She may even take the bookseller a copy of A Retailer’s Guide to Frugal In-Store Promotions. That’s an investment in the future--for the author, for the bookstore and for the community.

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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 two how to books for writers, 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 FRUGAL book for retailers 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. She is also the author of the Amazon Short, "The Great First Impression Book Proposal". 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 blog.

"THE MIDDLE-AGED MAN AND THE SEA" SERVES AS EXAMPLE FOR SELLING BOOKS IN A TOUGH ECONOMY

My friend and fellow UCLA Writers' Program instructor, Chris Meeks, is looking to selling books even in a rough economy. As per my advice in The Frugal Book Promoter, he posted an educational kind of release on one of my favorite media release disseminators, PRLeap.com. You'll find a list of others along with mini reviews of each at www.howtodoitfrugally.com. First click on "Resources for Writers" tab at the top of the page. Then find the media disseminators link under the title on that link. Lots of other resources, too! And here's what Chris is doing to beat the economy odds:


(PRLEAP.COM) There’s an old saying that in a tough economy, books and booze continue to sell. The booze is because people don’t stop drinking, no matter what, and the books are because people don’t stop thinking, no matter what.

Ah, but how does an author or small publisher get more sales when sales outlets become tighter, and customers are more discerning with their dollars? Here are six tips based on what "The Middle-Aged Man and the Sea" by Christopher Meeks has done to stand out. The collection of short fiction has garnered many great reviews, including one in the Los Angeles Times and a selection in Entertainment Weekly.

1) MAKE BOOKS "BOOKSTORE FRIENDLY" I.E. RETURNABLE AND RETAIL DISCOUNTED.

A number of small publishers have embraced the new print-on-demand (POD) technology, which heralded a green revolution for the publishing industry. Only books that book buyers ordered were to be printed—and printed quickly like a high-end one-hour photo. Most POD books, however, are not returnable, which means bookstores have stayed away in droves, not ordering anything POD.

Additionally, most POD titles are not discounted enough for bookstores. Barnes and Noble executive Diane Simowski in the Small Press Department says that only books that receive at least a 40% discount on will be labeled as a "retail discount" versus a "short discount." If a book shows up as the latter, individual Barnes stores can only order them if a customer prepays for the book.

Thus, if one is using print-on-demand, it’s best to use a printer that can print inexpensively, guarantee discounts to bookstores, and the books can be returned.

"The Middle-Aged Man and the Sea," first produced by Lulu Press, was not returnable and it had a short discount. Now with a new ISBN number, it’s published by White Whisker Books, printed though Lightning Source, and it’s bookstore friendly: retail discounted and returnable.

So is Meeks’s new book, "Months and Seasons," and his upcoming novel, "The Brightest Moon of the Century," out March 7.

2) ENABLE GOOGLE BOOK SEARCH.

Rhonda Herman, executive VP at publisher McFarland & Company, based in Jefferson, NC, has characterized the recent market for reference books as a "slow but steady decline." One of her company’s tips is to participate in Google Book Search. The full-text of their books are fully searchable on Google, resulting in a 1.5 percent click-through on a link to buy a book. Herman feels Google Book Search to be more effective than online advertising. "The Middle-Aged Man and the Sea" is fully Google searchable.

3) GO DIGITAL. GO KINDLE.

Books are not just in paper anymore. Books are now downloadable to computers and, thanks to Amazon, to a wireless reading device, the Kindle. The $359 Kindle is lightweight and can be used in daylight. It doesn’t cost publishers anything to make their books digitized for Kindle, and the growing market is thus worth pursing. For consumers, a downloadable book is much less expensive. Michael Connelly’s #1 bestseller, The Brass Verdict, retails for $26.99, sells on Amazon in hardcover for $16. 19, and for Kindle, just $9.99. "The Middle-Aged Man and the Sea" will soon be on Kindle.

4) TAKE ADVANTAGE OF LITERARY BLOGS.

Send your books to the best sites for review. A broad decline in newspaper circulation sales that began early this decade has worsened recently, according to figures released by the Audit Bureau of Circulations. That means even worse news for space allotted to book reviews in newspapers. Witness the recent downsizing of the Los Angeles Times’ Sunday book review section.

What the newspapers are losing, the Internet is gaining. Such huge sites as Salon.com, the Huffington Post, and Rebeccas Reads, review books regularly, but so do smaller sites known as literary blogs. These are often individuals with a passion for reading and reviewing. Meeks’s books have appeared on more than two dozen of these sites, such as Dawn Rennert’s She’s Too Fond of Books, Rebecca Schinsky’s Book Lady’s Blog, Marc Schuster’s Small Press Reviews, and Sam Sattler’s Book Chase.

Literary blogger Wendy Robards, whose website Caribousmom recently won a BBAW Award for Best Literary Blog and has reviewed Meeks’s work well, wrote recently that "Authors and publishers are not sending their books to bloggers simply to be kind. It is becoming more and more apparent that book bloggers are impacting sales, and for the cost of mailing a book, an author gets marketing, which travels around the world." As author Elizabeth Emerson Hancock adds, "The worst review is no review." Get your books reviewed.

Meeks says to find some great literary blogs, go to Google, click on "more" then on "blogs" then type "Christopher Meeks" and you’ll see. He also recommends using the book "The Frugal Book Promoter" by Carolyn Howard-Johnson.

5) TAKE ADVANTAGE OF INTERNET RADIO SHOWS.

With the airwaves finite, and the number of talk shows limited, the Internet is also becoming host to a legion of radio bloggers. Meeks is interviewed on http://www.blogtalkradio.com/Jordana-Ryan/2008/08/22/Chris-Meeks.

6) MAKE A VIDEO FOR YOUTUBE.

An author on YouTube is akin to a rock band on MTV - a growing necessity. Go to YouTube and type in your favorite author. You’ll see. The best videos are not mere authors talking to a hand-held camcorder, but they are made professionally with music and imagery, created by specialists such as the one for "The Middle-Aged Man and the Sea" produced by Expanded Books. You can see it at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hgq5N-Me7j4.


"The Middle-Aged Man and the Sea"
Published by White Whisker Books
ISBN: 978-0-615-24917-9
List price: $14.95; retail discount through Ingram

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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 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. She is also the author of the Amazon Short, "The Great First Impression Book Proposal." Some of her other blogs are TheNewBookReview.blogspot.com and AuthorsCoalition.blogspot.com, a blog that helps writers and publishers turn a ho-hum book fair booth into a sizzler.

Selling Your Book The Way People Want to Buy It

Or Your Per Book Net Profit and What You Can Do About It

Stop Whining!

You know, about how much money you make per book.

If you self-published and your margin is too small to accommodate the profit margins of bookstore or Amazon sales it's your own fault. You didn't do your homework upfront. So swallow hard and console yourself. You've learned a valuable lesson for the next time you publish.

Ditto for subsidy- or partner-published books. Your publisher doesn't give you enough royalties? Next time negotiate better or choose another publisher or, better still, self-publish (yes, a new learning curve for you but you'll have more control over your profitability).

If you're traditionally published, you made the tradeoff! You hoped for fame. And you hoped for big sales. You may have gotten one, both or neither. You knew there were no guarantees. And didn't you know, too, that the publisher was taking the financial risks and therefore needed to take a bigger share of the pie to pay for his or her expenses and to make a profit to stay in business? If you didn't, maybe you should have taken a Business 101, Basic Economics or The Essentials of Capitalism course before you embarked on what, after all, is a business. In fact, an industry!

So the fact remains, you're boo-hooing because you don't make enough per book, right? Well be comforted because volume counts for something, too. So, roll up your sleeves and go for more sales. Promote like crazy. To do that, you'll want to be able to write a picture-perfect query letter so you can:

 Pitch your next book to a publisher or agent who can be a partner in increasing your profits.

 You'll want to know how to query appropriately for feature stories on you or the content of your book.

 You'll want to know how to write a presentable cover letter to contest judges so you can win some awards to make your book stand out.

 You'll want your query to entice radio and TV producers so they'll want you on their show. To do that, get controversial -- yes, even in the query!

 You'll want to query magazine and e-zine editors to publish your articles and/or excerpts so you can build credibility for your book and more easily sell the next one. And you do that by -- you guessed it -- doing your homework. Buy a book that tells you how to do that.

By the way, The Frugal Editor is a good start on all of the above!)

And then get a few good books on promotion. You need to understand what the different kinds of editors need. And you need to know how to offer them what they want in a way that makes it supremely easy for them to pick you.

You want to sell your book any old way your customer wants to buy them. Many people prefer to buy from Amazon so why would you try to force them to buy direct from your site? What if it doesn't work and they buy somebody else's book from Amazon instead. You know, they may be at Amazon spending their money and be interested in a book like yours. Lots of people are. They may need one more book to make the minimum to get free shipping. Or they may not want to pay sales tax. Or they may not want to take the time to make two purchases, one with credit card, one with Paypal. Or they may just get ticked because you're trying to make them buy your book YOUR way, they won't buy your book regardless.

What if they like to read e-books or need a book instantly and your book isn't available that way? Yep, they'll buy somebody else's! Loyalty only extends so far.

Ditto for Kindle!

What if they long for a signed book? Do you offer a way for them to get your treasured signature? With a label sent directly to them. Your autograph is one way to entice readers to buy directly from you if you prefer that.

Many authors rely solely on online bookstore sales. Authors can avoid some or our industry problems by selling their books that way. But what about customers who prefer to buy from bookstores? You should have at least made the effort to assure that your book can be ordered for customers who request them at B&N and Borders or at your local independents.

And here's a last idea for boosting your profitability. It's especially useful for authors who have only one book. Sell another book with yours at book fairs and your speaking engagements. It helps if the second or third books are related to yours but don't duplicate it so closely that a reader wouldn't need or want both. You can offer a little gift with purchase if a customer buys both. Authors' Coalition does that at their booth at the LA Times Festival of Books.

To make something like this work, of course, the second book must be purchased in quantity and marked up. Here are some ways to do that:
 You can cross-promote with an author friend.
 Or you can contact an author, tell them your plans and ask for a bookstore discount if you buy, say, six of his or her books.
 Or you can sell The Complete Writers' Journal which was designed with this purposed in mind and is available at discounts in quantity. Find it at www.redenginepress.com.

I guess it comes down to this. We all make mistakes. But we don't benefit from them if we don't own up. Hoist up your panties, do what you can to rectify the mistake this time around and avoid making it again.

And keep learning. You do that by reading, reading, reading. Add evaluating to that list. Not all resources are born equal. Listen but don't swallow whole anything you hear or read. (I'm sure you've noticed that there is a lot of griping-to-no-purpose going around the Web!)

Once you've been around the industry a little while, it will be easier to tell if what you hear is right for you. You'll know what to adopt and what to discard. Hooray for you. Now you're a real author. An author who knows the industry you're in and how to make it work for you. The school of hard knocks isn't all bad.

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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.

Make Bookstore Book Buyers Sit Up and Take Notice

Calling booksellers on the phone can be a futile effort if they have no reason to know you.

Worse, it's impossible to call every book buyer and expensive to send info on your book out to hundreds of them.

And, yes, you need some credibility. There could be some past experience with the bookstores (you were a guest on a panel perhaps?). Or you could be part of a professional organization and that is evident in the first contact you make with them.

Authors' Coalition to the rescue!

Authors' Coalition sends out a catalog under our name. But we also tie it to our booth at the LA Times/UCLA Festival of Books. That's Double Credibility!

Participating authors provide the names of the book buyers we send it to, 500 or more. That means that it many cases the bookseller will know at least one author featured in the catalog. That's another level of credibility, another reason for them to pay attention to that book and the others in the catalog.

And it gives the author a way to follow up with a phone call that will be better received. They simply ask, "Just calling to see if your received the LATimes/UCLA catalog sent by Authors Coalition. My book, Great Expectations, was featured."

Then, of course, it's a four color catalog. It comes in the mail, a rarity these days. And, did I mention that it's less expensive than going it alone?

Learn more about this and all the Authors' Coalition programs at: http://www.authorscoalitionandredenginepress.com/fair_booths.htm.

The catalog and others are designed so you don't have to be at the fair or even in LA to benefit.

After you've peeked at the AC page, e-mail me with CATALOG in the subject line. I'll help you pick and choose the programs right for you. 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.