Don't Know Marketing

Don't Know Marketing
Do you ever feel like you're only barely qualified to talk about something? Yeah. Me and marketing.  It is a gaping black hole in the speckled galaxy of 'stuff Marcella knows'.

Solution: learn.
My current 'favorite' paid marketing is actually a class on marketing I just started taking. Not that I intend to turn it into a business or anything - this is a base layer so I can understand how marketing works.

Marketing is about relationships.
If you are authentic, you build organic and lasting relationships with people who think like you do. See? My classes are paying off already. Before two weeks ago, marketing was just selling something. Maybe it's no surprise, then, that my favorites are about relationships.

Relationship the First and the Free
Feline-L. These are people I've known for years who are members of a Feline Fancier's Listserv. We may be techno-dinosaurs (those should totally be a thing), but we have members in Turkey, Israel, France, the UK, South America, Canada and the US, all of us bound by our appreciation for felines. Our members encompass people from all walks of life. Scientists. Veterinary professionals. Artists. Techies. You name it. Fellow sci-fi/fantasy author Noel-Anne Brennan is a member. She even coached me through a few things when I was first published.

Several of my friends of Feline-L have come over to Twitter. Several of us have a 10% pact - 10% of what we make goes to charity whether it be animal welfare, environmental causes, or any other charity. We Tweet that we're donating and to whom, but dollar amounts never go on social media. We're interested in being accountable. Not in boasting or being jerks.

These folks buy books, talk about books and they leave the best reviews. To this day, I have a file folder full of pictures of their cats with my books.

Relationship the Second and the Paid

World of Warcraft.

Laugh if you like. While you laugh, I will sing songs of raids conducted in imaginary, animated dungeons by groups of like-minded geeks talking to one another live in real-time via Ventrilo. Or Mumble. These are people from across the world, techies, mostly. Your main tank may be an IT tech for the US military in real life. The lead healer may be a cyber-security expert from Down Under. One of the hunters is a programmer who lives just down the street from you. Sure. A few of the raid members are still nerds living in Mom's basement. Most of them aren't, though, cause the ones who can't afford to move out can't afford the monthly pay to play. Almost all of them will bend over backwards to buy a book from that little gnomish fire mage with tragic fashion sense. One of my fellow raiders ended up joining the guild I belong to so I could talk him through working on his own book and getting it ready for submission. This is my other group of friends from all over the world. These people whisper me in game demanding to know when the next book is coming out. The guild leader posts my releases in the guild message of the day and leaves it up for a week. We host real life guild events that pull people from all over and my guildies bring their copies of my book for me to sign. When we hear a guildie is coming in from out of town (or from out of country) word goes out and we meet up. These people buy and consume books like they weren't addicted to an aging massive multiplayer online roleplaying game. They write awesome reviews and twist their friends' arms to read my stuff.

Getting to be friends with your readers, does it get any better?

The Beast that is Promotion

Promotion is a challenging thing for a writer to get right.  You want to get word that your book is out there (or in my case, that it's available for pre-order), but you don't want to be that person who's just "BUY MY BOOK!"  Because that person is obnoxious.

Seriously, that person isn't just hypothetical.  There are people out there like that, and they are obnoxious.  I once knew someone whose twitter feed would auto-tweet one of ten different "BUY MY BOOK HERE'S THE LINK" messages every few hours, like clockwork.

I never bought that book.

But you have to do something, of course, else no one knows the book is out there.  The trick is getting the word out there without annoying the people you want to be enticing.  Of course, the best way to do that is for someone else to be the one talking about your book.  That way it's not you doing obnoxious self-promotion.  It's someone who's genuinely excited about your work and wants to talk about it!

And sometimes you get blessed with a bit of serendipity.  In my case, it tied to Book Country.  See, I was one of the initial beta-testers of the writing-critiquing community, which was designed and owned by Penguin.  Thorn of Dentonhill was one of the first books available on the site for critique-- at least, its first few chapters.  So when Thorn was bought by DAW-- part of the Penguin group-- the folks at Book Country were eager to talk it up. 

Of course, I'll still be talking it up plenty in the months to come.  Have no doubt about that. 

All right, off to the word mines.  See you all down there.

Promo Pushes - The Good, The Bad and The Serendipitous

by @JeffeKennedy

Because I ended up with an extra guest post on tracking sales, I gave up my regular Sunday spot to that. And, to save KAK another post on how she's not at the point of dealing with this week's topic - Our Best Planned & Best Serendipitous Promo Pushes - I offered to take her Tuesday post.

The thing about promo pushes is that most writers hate doing it. Worse, I think the marketers or the ones who do love that kind of thing make us feel worse about hating it. They remind me of my extrovert friends who simply can't understand how I can stay home - or sit by a lonely lake, as above - when there's a party to be had. More than that, they *worry* about me, that I'm somehow secretly unhappy and messed up that I don't want what they do.

OF COURSE I should want to sell books! What the hell is wrong with me??

The thing is, most writers want to write books and hope the selling will take care of itself. I just got off the phone with an amazing writer I feel lucky to count as a friend, talking her out of her tree about hating promo. No matter how we try to distance ourselves and treat our books as products, marketing our books continues to feel like dancing naked for the crowd, hoping they'll love you. Hell, I had to jump on James in the comments yesterday, to point out that he's doing more promo than he thinks he is.

Not many of us are good at this.

Thus, the serendipitous promo success - the one you didn't sweat and bleed for - is like manna from heaven. Having a planned promo push actually work in an identifiable way is the second best.

The best planned promo event I've done was a Facebook party and quiz that I did with my much more famous friend Darynda Jones. It took all bleeding day, was a ton of work, but we had fun - very important - and, thanks to her copious and enthusiastic fans, it garnered a lot of attention for me and my books. It worked way better than I hoped. And I have been unable to replicate it.

As for serendipitous promo, I'd have to pick those glorious occasions when a reader gloms onto my book and shouts their love to everyone in hearing distance. These come out of the blue and feel equally miraculous. They are also, I suspect, far more effective than anything else.This can't be planned or extorted - never mind that many authors try to - and that's part of why it works better than anything. It's sincere, real and true - and everyone who hears the message knows that.

All we can do is give our best and be grateful when serendipity bestows her blessings.

What I Should Be Doing

Ever had one of those weeks where you totally effed up the days of said week? A weekly gig that ALWAYS goes down on Wednesdays got rescheduled this week for Friday. Ergo, in what passes as an excuse for my brain, because I'm going to the Wed gig today - it cannot possibly be Friday. Then the caffeine hit fifteen minutes before I have to rush out the door for said gig. So I apologize in advance for the following fifteen minutes of stream of consciousness. Welcome to the inside of my head. It's a messy, disorganized place.

Promo. Dear Gods, promo.

What I'm doing:
Signings
Bookmarks
Cover cards
Guest Blogs
Cons
Facebook
Twitter - a tiny little bit. I seem to be awkward in the shorter venue

What I'm not doing:
Most notably, I'm not tracking actual sales back to any of those efforts.

Here's the deal. In marketing for every other industry on the planet, you expect to see some return on investment. The rub is that authors have to measure the worth of our time - do we serve readers better by planting our butts in our chairs and pounding out a new book? Or do we serve readers better by attempting (and in my case, failing) to be amusing on Twitter? Where's that balance?

When I worked for a large software company that shall remain nameless, they'd send out a mailer to registered customers about a new product. A 1% response rate (people calling our phone line to order) was a great response. Marketing swooned when 3-4% of people called. So did we, cause it meant our phone lines were swamped. But with the current state of traditional publishing's sales reporting, there is no way to assign cause and effect to any promotion an author pursues. Amazon is MUCH better about that, and I suspect a watchful author could indeed track sales back to a specific promotional effort and thereby tailor his or her efforts to reach and please more readers in that fashion.

Reaching readers is the point. Establishing relationship. Learning what resonates with the people reading what you write and providing some method for readers to feel a part of the larger world of characters and stories. All of that said, my very favorite interaction with readers is in person. I have met and become friends with some of the most amazing people from all over the world by going to conferences and conventions. I've made friends all over the world via email, Facebook and Twitter - but always, always, I love getting to meet and see these people without the veil of technology between us. And you know? The single question I hear readers ask the writers they meet?

"When's the next book coming out?"

Having a date (and, if you're lucky, a cover flat) to give in answer - is that the best possible promo and way to serve readers? If so, pardon me. I'm going to grab the Alphasmart and type during the down times in today's proceedings.

Promo ... when you don't have anything to promote

We all know I'm the token un-pub Word Whore, so when the topic of Promotions rolled around in the programming calendar, I had to laugh. Then groan. Then get that totally constipated contemplation look.

What sort of promotion should an unpublished author do?

The answer is so simple that I'm still sporting the imprint of my palm on my forehead. I've been to conferences, signings, lectures, and workshops...as an attendee, naturally. I've participated in online workshops, read countless interviews, and stalk follow various industry professionals on assorted social networks. When it comes to this particular topic, they all have the same core advice.

What kind of promotion can an unpublished author do? The same as a published author:

Write Another Book

Yeeeah. I know. Earth-shattering revelation, right?  To have a following, you need to have more than one crumb on the trail. How many crumbs? The magic number varies. Five seems to be a good target. How often does one need drop a crumb? That answer is in flux, much of it due to evolving expectations around ebooks. Once upon a time, one book per year was acceptable then the number crept closer to two books per year. Latest numbers floating around out there are four books per year with the books being a magical combo of novels and novellas. 

The wiser professionals issue reminders not to flood the market with too many releases per year -- that ties back to basic economic theory of too much supply drops perceived value. Let's not forget all that consumer-behavior research on too much choice crippling buyer decision that leads to no acquisition. Oh, and there's the age-old argument of quality versus quantity. Did I mention too many books being a threat author sanity?

Often the most effective solution is the most obvious solution. Best promotion an author can do:  

Write Another Book

How many books a year do you, dear reader, think an author should release? Are you satisfied with the occasional novella from your favorite novelist or would you prefer they use their time to get the next novel to you faster?

WHEW! A LOADED PLATE OF PROMO

Okay, this topic really rings for me because I just got done with back to back promo gigs. In the last weeks of June to the first weeks of July I was promoting the 2nd e-novella in the Deacon Chalk series SPIDER'S LULLABY. I had about three days off and then it was right back into promoting the 2nd novel BLOOD AND SILVER (which came out last Tuesday and is kicking ass at a bookstore near you so go get it! *end shameless plug*)

Speaking of which here is my pic for this post.

THAT is James DiNonno and he is the cover model for the Deacon Chalk series. You are welcome ladies.

Back to the subject at hand.

When it comes to promo I just about killed myself for book one. I wrote something on the lines of 30+ guest blogs and interviews with an average word count of 1500 words. I sent hundreds of emails to get review copies in the hands of bloggers. I facebooked, tweeted, and blogged. I also did my fair amount of conventioning and author events. Moving around the Southeast wherever I could.

It was a LOT of miles, a lot of hours, and a LOT of words.

It was also a LOT OF FUN. I had a blast. But I was tired by the end.
I'm an old man. 42 this year and still running a business, having a family, AND writing books. Plus, some of you know my family had a personal tragedy that happened just around this time last year that rocked the state of our household. We are better now, but it was a lot for us to go through.

So the point of this ramble is that I cannot think of anything I need to do that I am not. I work my ass off to promote the books and get the word out.
But here is some advice for those of you with books to promote.
MAKE FRIENDS WITH BOOK BLOGGERS.
Seriously. They are gold when it comes to letting the reading public know about your book. Bloggers are like the CNN of the publishing world. The publishers, for the most part, are doing big stroke promotion for your book (if any at all) while they are selling someone else's also. Bloggers are targeted. They work close to the readers and they can make your book a bestseller.
They love authors, they love books, and they love to share. Bloggers do what they do out of love and they get no respect from publishing by and large. And you read blogs, we all do. They rock.

That's all for now folks, I have to get back tot he wordmines. I am working on not one but TWO all new manuscripts that I would like to get done before Dragoncon in 2 1/2 weeks!

HEAD DOWN. MAKE WORDS.

Finding In-Person Ways to Interact with Readers

I do most of my promo online.

Cause that's how I roll. I live out in the country, remote from my neighbors. I work from home for both the day job and for the writing. I love my online community - both for the interconnectedness that it provides, that I wouldn't otherwise have, and for the ability it affords me to walk away when I'm tired of it.

For an introvert - even a reasonably social one like me - this is a great thing.

This weekend, though, I'm reminded of the larger world of in-person interaction. My guy is graduating from acupuncture college today and my stepdaughter and grandkids (above) have been here since Friday. Lots of other family arrived yesterday. We're in a social whirlwind.

So, I'm sitting here thinking about this week's theme of "Promotion Resolutions: What I Don't Do Now that I Should Be Doing." And, though I go to conferences, I'm realizing I don't do as much in person as I could.

Now, I'm a big fan of doing exactly the kind of promo you like to do - or it comes off wrong. If someone tells me they hate Twitter, then I say, fine, don't do it. The only thing worse than not doing Twitter is doing it badly. Twitter works for me. Facebook less so, but I definitely like my profile page better than my author page - and I'm sure it shows. I do Goodreads, in a low-key way, and I blog - here and on the personal site (http://jeffekennedy.com/category/blog/).

It's difficult, with primarily digital books, to set up real life events. Bookstores want to to sell books. They can't really sell eBooks. So the whole thing piffles right there. But, back when I had a physical book to sell, the bookstore signings were never terribly well-attended.

On the other hand, the numbers show that the sci fi/fantasy crowd are slow to adopt eBooks, so meeting with them physically is likely the way to go.

So, that's my resolution - finding new and different ways to interact in person with readers. More than just conferences, different than the staid book signings of the past.

All ideas welcome!

GETTING THE WORD TO BE HEARD

I am a fairly new author. My first novel hit the shelves back in February and book two will come out in 2 short weeks. I also have a few short stories and two novellas that have already hit. Even with that I don't have a huge body of work to draw readers in.

So when I have a new book about to be dropped into the world I still have that need to get the word out. I need people to know that the newest James R. Tuck story is available and they need to buy it.

I have found that the best thing for this is a two-pronged attack.

One- Book Bloggers.
Now I LOVE book bloggers. I read book blogs. I am a bibliophile. (James, how many books have you bought in the last 48 hours? Ummmmm, 8) So when you give me a blog written by someone who loves books too then I am hooked like a mackerel and will spend a ton of time enjoying their opinions. That's as a reader.
As a writer I also see how important book bloggers are for my career. They are the CNN and FOX News of the publishing world. They get the word to the people. I mean really, if you are a reader and not an author do you read Kirkus or Publishers Weekly or any of the other publications that the industry cares about? Normally, no you don't. But I bet you have a favorite book blog you check out. Even if it's a weird, conglomerate blog like Goodreads it's still a book blog. That's because, like Jeffe said yesterday, we are all interconnected and we are all hand selling books now. We like to hear about new books from someone who loves books, not from a cold dispassionate news source. We want that person who is telling us about a new author, a new series, a new book to be trustworthy because of their love for stories.
This is why I will work my ass off for a book blog. If a book blog asks me for an interview, a guest review, a guest post I will kill myself on an overdose of caffeine to make it happen. I appreciate what they do, almost always without pay and never enough thanks from the publishing "industry".

Two- Conventions
Being a guest at conventions is one of the major highlights to being a published author. It's a lot of work, but it is a lot of FUN work. I love it. I am a social person, not shy, and really, really enjoy being around other authors and most of all, fans of books. Conventions are where I get to meet and mingle with the folks I write for. And the people I write for, they love books just like I do, so it's not a blah-blah lovefest for my writing, it's a group of like minded, interesting people in a group dynamic that is energizing as hell.
People love to meet authors, especially if they are real. I have sold a ton of books just by being on panels and doing my damnedest to entertain the folks there. I also know that at a convention I am there for the readers. I am always willing to talk about anything they want, not just my books.

So those are the ways I get the word out about my books. They are the two most effective ways I have found and, coincidentally, the two avenues I enjoy working the most.

Keep checking back all week though, I can't wait to see what killer advice comes out on this topic from my awesome co-bloggers here!