Book Promotion Tip #5: Seize the moment! Follow up immediately when booksellers and school/PTA contacts in your address book respond to your new book announcement. Are they interested in book signings or school visits? Better yet, when would they like you to come for book signings and school visits?
For my current book, A SISTER MORE LIKE ME (Disney Press 2013), I was able to coordinate enough school visits, library visits and bookstore signings for two trips to Southern California from my home in Washington State, and negotiated enough in speaker's fees to cover travel expenses plus some of the costs for promotional materials I'd already paid for.
In addition, I gave lots of good business to a bookseller I'd worked with in the past who was willing to make contacts and provide books for the school visits. (I created a book order form, pictured here, for each school and arranged for the bookseller to receive orders in a timely manner. Make it easy for students to buy your books and booksellers to sell them!)
Another bookseller with whom I had a relationship wrote and sent out a press release to local media about my signing at her store. Booksellers are great marketing partners!
If you're promoting your first book, you probably don't have a lot of booksellers and school/PTA contacts in your address book. Before you send out your initial announcement, it's not a bad idea to get on the Internet and do a little research to find contacts in the places you think you could swing a trip--for example, places you have friends or relatives who haven't seen you for a while who would be thrilled to host you for a day or two. Just make sure they really would be thrilled! So far, I think I've managed to avoid making a pest of myself--but I'm very selective about the friends I ask to visit, and I make sure to plan enough time in my schedule to thank them with dinner out or a nice bottle of wine.
Stay tuned--more promotional tips to come!
Barbara Jean Hicks is a regular guest contributor to Tales From the Rushmore Kid. She is a credentialed teacher in K-12 English/Language Arts and the award-winning author of seven picture books for children, including AN AMAZING SNOWMAN (February 18, 2014, Disney Press), which along with A SISTER MORE LIKE ME is based on characters from the 2013 Disney animated feature film FROZEN.
Comments