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The World Of Writing
Question:
What was it like as new authors in the publishing world?
Answer:
As free-lance writers of informative articles, we had no prior experience with book publishers. We did a lot of research and were aware of some basic contract and publishing procedures, yet there were many things we were not prepared for. For instance, there was the book cover design to conceive of - which our good friend Brian McAndrew created. The back cover text had to be developed, an author's bio written, photos to have taken and lists of nearly 2 hundred contacts to sort out. The marketing research took weeks to do, but it resulted in a 12-page plan to ease our way.
Then there were formal things like dealing with the Library of Congress and Copyrighting. For instance, copies of the book had to be sent to the Library of Congress at our expense. There are rules to be aware of as well. The rights for free use (using quotes from other people) is so gray that we opted out of including this kind of text. Unfortunately, that meant more editing. We were disappointed because there were some very good quotes that would have added a great deal to the book.
Question:
What were some publishing experiences or unexpected turn of events?
Answer:
While Lillian was browsing the Internet looking up information on other publishers, she came upon Publish America's website. It inspired her to send a query in on the spot. Within 3-days we received a request for a sample manuscript. Now, these publishers only accept 20% of the thousands of queries that cross their desks, so we were excited to have such a good response in a very short time.
Unfortunately, we were also relocating our home from one part of town to another, finishing a garden year and working as well. Time was short and stress was high. We got that sample manuscript off in a timely fashion, however, and we received an acceptance within a few days. The heady sensation of signing the 7-year contract flew by us in a blur.
Question:
What time and resources do we put in for promoting the book?
Answer:
Every day we put in 2-6 hours into some aspect of the book. The Internet has proven to be a powerful tool where an immense amount of information can be found from newsletters, publishers, forums and authors. Every on-line communication we have is an opportunity to plug our book by simply attaching an auto signature. We developed promotional materials (flyers, mini-posters, large posters, bookmarks, and labels) and, of course, galleys and sample packages for editors and booksellers. Most importantly, we had a great website built for us by Brian McAndrew of Beyond Graphix (www.openminder.com).
Question:
What did you learn in researching the book?
Answer:
We thought we were committed to the concept of the book in our lives, but when researching and writing this book we found we became much more motivated, more committed and more informed about waste reduction.
Question:
As a writer, what have you learned about staying organized or motivated?
Answer:
Having a plan of action for every project is vital. Every project should have an outline starting from the title through to the end. There should also be a market plan laid out. Who are you marketing to? How you are going about it? What will you do first? These are the most important tools of a writer. Most people think of a writing career being one where you have lots of leisure time and creating with words. On the contrary, most of the time is spent marketing and organizing projects. For instance, we might write an article and query it to a market. That market may take a few days to get back to us, but it may also be as long as a year before we hear from them. That article is idle and we do not get paid until after it is published.
A writer may have hundreds of pieces of their work at various stages of writing and marketing at one time. They need to know where it is and its status, at a glance. We use the Excel program to take care of this. For the book, plans were indispensable. The market plan alone is a book in itself and will take us years to complete. That is normal, actually. A writer must spend much of their time promoting the book for years after publication in order to keep sales happening. Unfortunately, promotion and writing time are unpaid hours in the meantime.
Question:
When do you write?
Answer:
We have to do a bit of juggling to manage our business, day job and writing career with some kind of balance. Usually, We work as a team, though we write separately and then conglomerate and edit the work together. Because we share one computer, this can be a bit of a juggle. Dave works shift work so when he is at work or sleeping Lillian will use the computer to research and promote.
Question:
What is your professional background?
Answer:
Dave and Lillian began their (paid) writing career working as staff writers at Openminder Newsletter where they experienced the harried pace of getting several articles and even feature or interview articles ready for a by-weekly deadline. It was our start in the writing world and plunged us head-first into the community, interviewing unique and enterprising people. The concept of Trash Talk was already developed and this market snatched up the column immediately. When Openminder closed shop, we started a free-lance career. Our articles have since appeared in a variety of magazines including Seeds of Diversity, Country Connection and ISKRA.
Question:
Have you won any awards or contests?
Answer:
Yes, Dave has recently won first prize in the Nature category of BC Cottage Magazine's 2004 Photo contest. Lillian has won several editorial awards for her poetry and has had her work published in 5 hardcover anthology books of poetry through contests.
Question:
What is the most important lesson in your writing career?
Answer:
Research. If you know something is coming up, research it and make a plan of action well ahead of time. If we did not start the market plan and develop a plan of action and estimated schedule soon after finding out the manuscript was accepted, we would have never been ready for the myriad of work ahead of us, much of which is time-sensitive. Doing it right is essential - there is but little chance to make an impression with a reviewer, reader or publication. Even with the best of preparation you will be caught off guard or unprepared. Don't sweat it too much if you make a mistake. Think of it as a lesson.
Question:
Have you any advice for new writers?
Answer:
We hate to sound redundant, but again, do your research. Join forums and research the previous messages for several months ago. You will find many novice questions are thoroughly answered with many different people contributing ideas and opinions. Always research your market and query them in a professional manner before sending a finished product.
BONUS : The Write And Wrong Way To Promote Your Book
Did you know that if you're marketing your book to sell books, you may be marketing for all the wrong reasons? Why? Well frankly, marketing a book to make sales will rarely ring the cash register; in fact, most of the time it amounts to what I call the "anti-sale," the sale that always seems to elude you.
If you're looking at your last 12 months of marketing and wondering what went wrong, ask yourself one question: "What was the driving force behind my book marketing choices?"
In a recent coaching session an author told me: "I spent $30,000 on advertising and I don't know why I haven't sold a single book." Why did the author advertise? Because she thought it would sell books. Now you might think that $30k is extreme, and perhaps it is, but she isn't the only one. Most of the topics of conversation during coaching calls, consultations or classes I teach are: "I've spent all this money and done all this work, what am I doing wrong?" What you're doing wrong is selling the book and not the message or the benefits. In other words, you're marketing your books for all the wrong reasons.
It's not that dissimilar from scheduling a slew of book signings because you think you "have to" or because you're hoping to sell scads of books. If you hate doing them, and they're not working, why bother?
Let's take a look at the example of our $30k author more closely. She had a book about child rearing, she was a noted speaker, a child psychologist and was quoted extensively in the media. The odd thing was, when you walked into her office her book was no where to be found. "I don't want to be boastful about my book." She said, "I think selling my book to my patients is unethical." Well, perhaps she's right, but still, she was missing the point. The point was that she had her buyers in front of her all the time and yet she overlooked them in search of the almighty book sale.
In fact, I found out later that she wasn't even selling her book at her speaking sessions. Why? Because she thought the ad space she bought would be enough to carry the momentum of the book. When we finally broke down her marketing campaign and her options, she realized that she could sell thousands of copies of her book and it wouldn't cost her a dime. She had at her disposal hungry buyers she wasn't even tapping into.
So are you missing your buyers? What piece of your campaign have you overlooked in an attempt to "sell" your book? To distill this even further, let's go through an exercise together to help unearth some marketing opportunities you might be overlooking. When you do this exercise I want you to remove the notion of book sales from your vernacular, what I mean is I want you to start looking at your efforts through a different lens:
On a separate sheet of paper, list all the marketing that you've done for your book. This may take a while, but seeing it all on paper will be helpful. List everything, even the minutiae.
Now that you have your list, let's take a hard look at it. First off, I want you to cross off the marketing you've done that has just been a total waste of your time.
Next, go through and star everything that worked really well. Remember, by "really well," I don't mean book sales, although that could have been a result of your efforts; I mean star the items you really enjoyed doing that seemed to get you great feedback.
What you have left will be a list of mediocre things, marketing ideas you tried that did reasonably well (at least enough so you didn't feel you needed to cross them off with the first batch). Take a hard look at the starred items, what do you see? Quite possibly you see a list of things that a) you loved doing, and b) that sold you some books despite the fact that you didn't think it would.
Now let's expand on that starred list. For example, if you have "book events" on this list, how can you expand this?
Next, I want you to make a list of the items you're missing. If you are brainstorming an expansion of your star list these missing pieces might be self-evident or they may require some additional brainstorming.
The idea behind this exercise is to become very clear on what's working and what isn't and to focus on the stuff you love doing. Generally the stuff you love is dialed directly into your audience. And if you love it, you'll probably do more of it, and hopefully this will lead you to book sales.
In author coaching I've found that we often set aside the stuff we love because we think book marketing should be hard. Let me tell you, it doesn't have to be. And if you're doing stuff that's hard, you're probably marketing for all the wrong reasons, anyway.
In a recent interview, media darling Rachael Ray cited that for years she did only local media. She would do cooking show after cooking show, often losing money on each one (when you factored in her time, gas, supplies, etc.). So why did she keep doing it? Because she loved it and because it's what she wanted to do. Now, of course, she's on everything from your local cross-town bus to any and all kitchen supplies. I'm not saying that her way of marketing is a recipe for success. Certainly, it worked for her, but the bigger message is that when you do what you love, you'll keep at it, and thatÂs the key. Whatever you do, you must love it, and you must do a lot of it.
This coming year can be a revelation for your campaign if you take the time to figure out what worked, what didn't, and what you'd love to do more of. Do it because you love it, and the sales will follow. You can bank on it!
Did you know that if you're marketing your book to sell books, you may be marketing for all the wrong reasons? Why? Well frankly, marketing a book to make sales will rarely ring the cash register; in fact, most of the time it amounts to what I call the "anti-sale," the sale that always seems to elude you.
If you're looking at your last 12 months of marketing and wondering what went wrong, ask yourself one question: "What was the driving force behind my book marketing choices?"
In a recent coaching session an author told me: "I spent $30,000 on advertising and I don't know why I haven't sold a single book." Why did the author advertise? Because she thought it would sell books. Now you might think that $30k is extreme, and perhaps it is, but she isn't the only one. Most of the topics of conversation during coaching calls, consultations or classes I teach are: "I've spent all this money and done all this work, what am I doing wrong?" What you're doing wrong is selling the book and not the message or the benefits. In other words, you're marketing your books for all the wrong reasons.
It's not that dissimilar from scheduling a slew of book signings because you think you "have to" or because you're hoping to sell scads of books. If you hate doing them, and they're not working, why bother?
Let's take a look at the example of our $30k author more closely. She had a book about child rearing, she was a noted speaker, a child psychologist and was quoted extensively in the media. The odd thing was, when you walked into her office her book was no where to be found. "I don't want to be boastful about my book." She said, "I think selling my book to my patients is unethical." Well, perhaps she's right, but still, she was missing the point. The point was that she had her buyers in front of her all the time and yet she overlooked them in search of the almighty book sale.
In fact, I found out later that she wasn't even selling her book at her speaking sessions. Why? Because she thought the ad space she bought would be enough to carry the momentum of the book. When we finally broke down her marketing campaign and her options, she realized that she could sell thousands of copies of her book and it wouldn't cost her a dime. She had at her disposal hungry buyers she wasn't even tapping into.
So are you missing your buyers? What piece of your campaign have you overlooked in an attempt to "sell" your book? To distill this even further, let's go through an exercise together to help unearth some marketing opportunities you might be overlooking. When you do this exercise I want you to remove the notion of book sales from your vernacular, what I mean is I want you to start looking at your efforts through a different lens:
On a separate sheet of paper, list all the marketing that you've done for your book. This may take a while, but seeing it all on paper will be helpful. List everything, even the minutiae.
Now that you have your list, let's take a hard look at it. First off, I want you to cross off the marketing you've done that has just been a total waste of your time.
Next, go through and star everything that worked really well. Remember, by "really well," I don't mean book sales, although that could have been a result of your efforts; I mean star the items you really enjoyed doing that seemed to get you great feedback.
What you have left will be a list of mediocre things, marketing ideas you tried that did reasonably well (at least enough so you didn't feel you needed to cross them off with the first batch). Take a hard look at the starred items, what do you see? Quite possibly you see a list of things that a) you loved doing, and b) that sold you some books despite the fact that you didn't think it would.
Now let's expand on that starred list. For example, if you have "book events" on this list, how can you expand this?
Next, I want you to make a list of the items you're missing. If you are brainstorming an expansion of your star list these missing pieces might be self-evident or they may require some additional brainstorming.
The idea behind this exercise is to become very clear on what's working and what isn't and to focus on the stuff you love doing. Generally the stuff you love is dialed directly into your audience. And if you love it, you'll probably do more of it, and hopefully this will lead you to book sales.
In author coaching I've found that we often set aside the stuff we love because we think book marketing should be hard. Let me tell you, it doesn't have to be. And if you're doing stuff that's hard, you're probably marketing for all the wrong reasons, anyway.
In a recent interview, media darling Rachael Ray cited that for years she did only local media. She would do cooking show after cooking show, often losing money on each one (when you factored in her time, gas, supplies, etc.). So why did she keep doing it? Because she loved it and because it's what she wanted to do. Now, of course, she's on everything from your local cross-town bus to any and all kitchen supplies. I'm not saying that her way of marketing is a recipe for success. Certainly, it worked for her, but the bigger message is that when you do what you love, you'll keep at it, and thatÂs the key. Whatever you do, you must love it, and you must do a lot of it.
This coming year can be a revelation for your campaign if you take the time to figure out what worked, what didn't, and what you'd love to do more of. Do it because you love it, and the sales will follow. You can bank on it!
