If you have something to sell, you need to find your particular buyers. You must identify them, locate them and approach them. Otherwise, how will they know about your book? Think about it. I mean, really think about it this morning. How will they know your book exists?
Some of you may remember a time before “self-publishing” companies, widely accepted independent publishing, a huge influx of traditional publishing companies and a saturation of books on the market all competing against each other. When your book was accepted by a traditional publisher, you went back to work writing your next one. Oh, you may have had to appear at a book signing now and then. But the publisher took charge of promoting your book. And how did he do that?
You see, this is what many authors are forgetting—that even in the 1980s, ‘70s, ‘60s, ‘50s and so forth, a book, in order to sell, had to be promoted to the appropriate audience. Readers would hear it talked about on a radio/TV show, read a review, see an advertisement in a magazine, notice a press release or story about the author in a newspaper, pick up a publisher’s catalog with the book in it, see it at the library and/or see it in bookstores. The publisher had marketers on staff and they approached your particular audience with news and information about your book.
Fast-forward to 2012. There’s even more competition for books in most all categories. Statistics show there are fewer readers. Publishers have cut way back on their marketing staff, except where a blockbuster book by a name author is concerned. This means it’s up to someone else to promote the other hundreds of thousands of books published each year.
Who do you suppose is interested enough in your book to take on the intense job of marketing it? That would be no one but you. Right?
If you go with a pay-to-publish (self-publishing) company or produce the book yourself, you have signed up to take on the entire job of promotion—or you will fail. And you certainly have some tools and options available to you that were not around in the ‘50s, ‘60s, etc.
Those of you who are currently writing a book or who are ready to publish, make sure that you understand what you are signing up for. My first suggestion is to study the publishing industry so you know what you can expect from it and what it expects from you—if you want some measure of success, that is.
Read the following books from Patricia Fry
Publish Your Book. Learn about the industry and how to navigate it, your options and how to make the right choices and your responsibilities as a published author.
Promote Your Book. This book includes over 250 book promotion ideas with many, many resources and anecdotes and tips from around two dozen authors.
Talk Up Your Book. Personality sells books and this book shows you how to turn up your personality so that you shine, people will notice you and you will sell more books.
All of these books are available at http://www.matilijapress.com and Amazon.com and other online and downtown bookstores. Also available from the publisher’s website: http://www.allworth.com