Author: Bernard Shakey
Date:   01-27-04 12:59

At EE's suggestion I picked up Jacqueline Deval's HOW TO PUBLICIZE YOUR BOOK. It is very well organized and full of useful info., especially for midlist (i.e., most) authors, who are going to have to shoulder most of the publicity burden themselves.

One thing that really struck me in reading it is how often the actual publication of a book ends up being somewhat or very anti-climactic. The typical scenario for a midlist author at a major house, especially a first time novelist, is to have a first printing of a few thousand copies go out with almost no publicity, and to have the book more or less die after a couple of months.

The book doesn't end up earning back even its low five figure advance, and within a few years it's out of print.

The end -- at least as far as "the market" is concerned.

Not to sound like Blip, but it does sometimes seem kind of crazy how hard we work at all of this, given what "success" so often looks like.

Of course anyone who is in this for fame and fortune is simply nuts -- still . . .

It's a thousand pages give or take a few
I'll be writing more in a week or two;
I can make it longer if you like the style
But I need a break and I want to be
A paperback writer.

Author: Claire
Date:   01-27-04 13:06

Bernard-- I just got back from a couple hours browsing at B&N and came to the same depressing conclusion. I've been doing a little amateur sleuthing-- I actually moved some copies of a really good new release paperback that was languishing in the fiction section onto an unused piece of prime real estate on the New in Paperback table (don't know the author. I think of it as a kind of Bookstore Robinhood) Two weeks later, the three copies are 1)still on the new in paperback table 2) still unsold. I was walking around seeing all the fabulous books on the remainder tables and the dusty copies of books back in fiction that it seemed like no one would ever see, and I started to ask myself "why am I the only person I ever see in the fiction section?" Left the store into the slushy snow and decided I need to stay out of Barnes and Noble for awhile. I'm afraid I'm starting to hate book stores.

Author: LauraMT
Date:   01-27-04 13:07

Betsy Lerner pretty much gives us the same vision in THE FOREST FOR THE TREES, which I just finished reading. It's a realistic yet not depressing insider's insight on what goes on with the agenting and publishing process, from start to finish.

Author: Gary Kessler
Date:   01-27-04 13:13

No, that's not necessarily "the end." When/if the author's readership takes off (and it's up the author to write books that will build to this), those early works are reprinted, and sell more/better the second time around. Then they can be turned into movies too, at which time those old books start reappearing on the best sellers lists even. Watch the best sellers list over a few months. You'll be surprised by how many represent second helpings.

Author: Iris
Date:   01-27-04 13:24

Still, 'ol Blip's point (however crudely made) was one that every writer needs to understand: there are a LOT of books out there and no one is gonna be panting in anxious anticipation of yours. Most first books fall flat, flat, flat. About the only person who can prevent that from happening is the author! Deval's book is one all of us need to read.

Author: Gary Kessler
Date:   01-27-04 13:35

Nuts. The publisher (who knows the market/ropes) can see that the first book doesn't flat far better than the author (whose contribution is an entirely different function altogether) can--and they are still doing that. Good publishers don't take on a first author they are not going to promote. And most best sellers (and even high performers), especially those from first authors, don't happen because of the author's promotion efforts--they happen because the publishers identify them as best sellers (and high performers) and promote them as such.

The failing here is the assumption that the author is the only person in the room (or even dominates everyone else in the room). It's a natural perspective if you are an author and don't understand the business. But everyone in the publishing room has a function--and is, for the most part, doing that function. This is just zip-to-the margin naivete and self-absorption.

Author: Bernard Shakey
Date:   01-27-04 13:50

Gary, look at the numbers. Have you ever worked at a big publisher? Check out the ratio of marketing and publicity people to the number of books the publisher churns out each season, and the budget the publisher allocates to these functions. Then consider the rough percentage of these resources that is being devoted to the pre-existing or newly anointed stars on the publisher's list.

It's simply not possible for most books released by major publishers to get more than cursory marketing and publicity. A few favored titles get the lion's share of the publisher's resources; but in most cases the author might as well be the only one in the room six weeks after the book's launch date.

Hey, if your publisher is knocking itself out to promote and market your book -- great, sit back, order some Margaritas, and let the good times roll, assuming they do, which of course they often don't, despite Herculean efforts.

But if you're in the 90% of new authors who are going to get no support from their publisher beyond the mailing of some review copies and some not very prominent space in the catalog, you'd better have a Plan B.

Author: Terez
Date:   01-27-04 13:57

Great thread - thought-provoking arguments on both sides. Thanks, all.

And Claire, I just LOVED your Bookstore Robin Hood scheme. I'm going to have to go do that, too.

Author: Gary Kessler
Date:   01-27-04 14:16

Bernard. Nuts to you too. I have worked in a trade house where I was asked (even though I wasn't in the marketing department) to throw in with an effort to direct, cold-call bookstores nationwide for three days to promote a first-time author's book. That was just a bundle of joy that I will never do for a book of my own. The author probably never even knew this promotion was going on inside the publishing house. That's my point. Most of the discussions about this on this dicussion board have been of the "About the only person who can prevent that from happening is the author!" variety that Iris gives above--always, of course, from the author's perspective.

Well, when a publisher contracts your book, this becomes the publisher's book just as much as yours. They have taken the risk and laid their financial future on the line on that book. Sure the author has to join in the promotion, but to take the "author has to do it all" or "is doing it all" or even that the author "has to do most of it" route is dumb, and naive, and myopic, and self-absorbed. Good publishing houses, big and small, have marketing departments that are doing the bulk of the promotion no matter what individual effort the author puts into it--and are doing their jobs more or less in ways the author doesn't come anywhere close to realizing--and apparently that the author doesn't always appreciate.

Becoming an author doesn't suddenly make you an expert in how books get produced and marketed. But it certainly does seem to make many authors think they are the only ones doing anything. lol.

Author: Claire
Date:   01-27-04 14:23

Terez-- maybe we can start a movement....

Author: danielle S
Date:   01-27-04 14:27

I flipped through her book and thought at the time it was the best I had seen. Since then, I've looked at Publicity for Dummies and really thought it gave the nuts and bolts authors needed. I don't remember if Deval's book was as detailed or not...

For example, most books discuss the need for authors sending out press releases to media but none of them explain exactly which media or how to reach them. Dummies lists the various media directories and websites author can use to create distribution lists. It also includes names of news release distribution services (reputable ones!).

Author: Bernard Shakey
Date:   01-27-04 14:38

Thanks for the tip, Danielle.

Gary, my comments on this are based on the opinions of MANY people who have worked in publishing, as well as those of authors.

It's quite true that most of the publicity that is ever generated for most books is mostly due to the publisher's efforts, which is why most new books get little or no publicity. I'm not complaining about that, and I'm certainly not complaining about my own experiences. My previous book was reviewed in a lot of the major media, including the NY Times Book Review, even though the publisher had a small promotional budget, because the publisher made the most of what it had to work with (I also worked hard on my end, which is absolutely essential.)

My next book is relatively high up in the food chain of a big publisher's spring list, and three months out from publication I certainly don't have any complaints about the efforts that are being and will be made in its behalf, which I realize are substantial.

And again, it's not as if publishers are being irrational when they give a very disproportionate share of their time and money to promoting a small percentage of their lists (are you denying this is the case, BTW?) It's just a reality of the business, which the sooner most authors face up to, the better off they'll be.

Author: Gary Kessler
Date:   01-27-04 14:50

Here's food for thought.

Your book is published by Simon and Schuster. It says that on the spine.

Your book automatically gets into bookstores nationwide (and maybe beyond). You can readily get the book reviewed. Your book is readily accepted as worthy of consideration. Your book gets into the catalog of a respected publisher and that catalog, the base of boostore ordering routines, travels far and wide. When the regional sales agents of S&S travel their routes, your book is in their cases and gets shown to buyers. Media outlets return calls. Simon and Schuster provides booths at major book shows; your book is sitting there on their table.

This is promotion. This all happens outside of the individual promotion budget assigned to your book.

This level of promotion has happened without the author lifting the finger or writing a check.

Simon and Schuster has paid for and expended the shoe leather on this promotion.

Author: Bernard Shakey
Date:   01-27-04 15:01

Good points surely, but relevant only in comparison to the fate of authors who are being published by small publishers or (far, far worse) POD-type outfits like PublishAmerica.

For the purposes of this discussion, I've been taking it as a given that we're talking about publication by a major publisher, which in addition to the factors you list will almost always also include an agent in the mix, who has nearly as strong an incentive to see the book sell as the author himself.

Still, it's not quite true to say that my book "automatically" gets into bookstores. It gets into bookstores if bookstores order it. Whether bookstores order it depends in part (in relatively small part, admittedly) on how hard S&S or whomever pushes to get them to order it, what sorts of incentives they offer etc.

But I concede that your broader point is valid: A book published by a major house has a huge leg up on the competition that isn't, most especially including the legions of POD books out (or rather not out) there.

Author: Gary Kessler
Date:   01-27-04 15:13

And follow-up food for thought. (Sorry, Bernard, this was planned to appear before your last post intervened)

You are the author. Take a look at what you automatically get in promotion from Simon and Schuster. Consider what you would have to do in time, effort, and money to replicate that basic level of promotion on your own (putting aside for the moment that a bookstore owner, book reviewer, or TV producer wouldn't give you the time of day without that Simon and Schuster stamped on the spine of your book).

Now tell me the author has to do it all--or most of it--or even a significant amount of it.

-----

On your last posting, Bernard: Certainly, we weren't talking about POD production. Of course, you have to do it all then--and it's an uphill battle. And the contemplation of that is why writers almost universally would prefer being published by a traditional publisher (who will be doing most of the promotion, while the author tells everyone the publisher isn't doing any of the promotion).

On getting it into bookstores: Well, yes, S&S does promote its books for bookstore purchase in its basic marketing functions completely outside what it charges to an individual book's promotion budget--and it's chances of getting the book on the bookstores shelves as an independent promoter of the book are astronomically greater than the chances an individual author can do so by walking in the door, books in hand (even with the S&S stamped on the spine). So I hardly think that damages my point(s).

Author: Gary Kessler
Date:   01-27-04 15:15

Good discussion though--and remember I'm talking about the "the author has to do it all or most of it" statement, not an "the author has to help" statement.