Tips on Writing and Publishing

[1] For example, for romance writers, it’s useful to know what the current most popular subgenres are and to emphasize this if your book is in one of them. Also, it’s good to know that the top traits (in this order) romance readers enjoy in heroines are intelligence, strength of character, and attractiveness, while the top traits in heroes are muscularity, handsomeness, kindness, and intelligence. Sometimes it can be helpful to emphasize how your characters are like this in your short summary of your story as well as how/why your characters are unique, standing out above the rest.

[2] An excellent resource with more information is Lisa Collier Cool’s How To Write Irresistible Query Letters (Writer’s Digest Books, 1987), which applies to articles as well as books.

Publishing your own book is a very exciting yet amazingly complex process. Be prepared to put in more time and energy than you have ever imagined. For nearly two years it took virtually all my time to create and market the first five books I’d already written, with no time left to write more books. This is not to discourage you—on the contrary! Be patient with yourself and realize you’re doing a good job even if the task stretches out as you find more and more problems to solve and ever increasing details to take care of.

Fundamentals of book creation: ideas, writing, editing, illustration, page design, printing

Taking the books you publish from initial idea to final book is a long and involved process that I cover in another presentation and handout called “The Secrets of Creating Your Own Books.” Once you have your complete and professionally edited manuscript, count on up to a year or even more of part-time work before your book comes off the press, especially if your book includes illus-trations you must hire others to create.

During the year when you’re putting the finishing touches on your manuscript while getting it ready for press, you must already be thinking in terms of marketing. In fact, it’s best to consider your market from the very beginning. Who is your audience and what information or story do they most desperately want and need? Where do they shop in person and online? Choose five target markets for your book and start researching how you can reach them. Once your manuscript has been professionally edited, find educated people in your target market to give honest feedback on how you can improve it further. If your manuscript is polished enough, these readers may even give you endorsements. J A good list of publishing and marketing resources is available at http://www.midwestbookreview.com/. Also, the following books have been very helpful to me. The two by Fern Reiss are required reading before you commit to publishing because they give you an overview of what’s really involved. The others are also very important if you self-publish: The Publishing Game: Publish a Book in 30 Days and The Publishing Game: Bestseller in 30 Days by Fern Reiss, The Complete Guide To Self-Publishing by Tom & Marilyn Ross, The Self-Publishing Manual by Dan Poynter, Make Money Self-Publishing by Suzanne P. Thomas, Publicize Your Book!: An Insider’s Guide to Getting Your Book the Attention It Deserves by Jacqueline Deval, Guerrilla Marketing For Writers: 100 Weapons for Selling Your Work by Jay Conrad Levinson, Rick Frishman & Michael Larsen, Guerrilla P.R.: How You Can Wage An Effective Publicity Campaign Without Going Broke and Guerrilla P.R. Wired: Waging a Successful Publicity Campaign Online, Offline, and Everywhere In Between by Michael Levine, How To Publish and Promote Online by M.J. Rose and Angela Adair-Hoy, and Promote Like a Pro: Small Budget, Big Show by Linda F. Radke. Also consider attending PMA’s Publishing University, which is held each year in conjunction with Book Expo America (see http://www.pma-online.org/).

You need industry reviews for your books. This is free publicity which can greatly affect how many libraries and bookstores buy your books. As soon as you receive your galleys (early copies of your book: be sure to request these as some review sources will not review finished books), which should be four months before your publication date, you must submit them with a press kit to top review sources.

Submit to at least 20 reviewers, including Publishers Weekly
(www.publishersweekly.com/index.asp?layout=submissions&publication=publishersweekly), Booklist (www.ala.org/ala/booklist/insidebooklist/booklistproc/proceduressubmitting.htm), Library Journal (http://www.libraryjournal.com/index.asp?layout=forReviewersLJ), Kirkus Reviews (www.kirkusreviews.com/kirkusreviews/about_us/submission.jsp), and, for independent books, ForeWord (www.forewordmagazine.com/forewordreviews.htm) and Midwest Book Review (www.midwestbookreview.com/get_rev.htm). Go to their websites for guidelines and also search the internet for many internet book review sites. To find smaller reviewers, see www.rio-reviewers.com/membership/riomembers.html, but beware of people who pose as reviewers to get free book copies and then don’t review your book. Ask to see other reviews the small reviewer who requests your book has written before you send them a copy of yours. Also, tell them as much about your book as possible before asking them to commit to reviewing it. That way they can decline if the book seems like something that won’t interest them. In general, it’s much easier to get reviews from smaller book review sites, though their reviews won’t sell as many books as the larger review sources. Still, seek out as many reviews as possible. Go to Amazon.com and other online mega bookstores to see who has favorably reviewed other books similar to yours. Approach them about reviewing your book. Approach magazines that fit the topic of your book and which do reviews. One problem is if you don’t get big reviews (i.e., reviews that are then listed in the large online review databases for bookstores and librarians), libraries probably won’t carry your books, and some bookstores may not either. So you may have to do like I did and commission an expensive ($295+) review from ForeWord Magazine (www.forewordreviews.com/Publisher), guaranteeing that your review will make it into these databases.

To even have the chance to get other top book reviews, you must have a professional-looking media kit. It’s very expensive to hire someone to create one so I created my own. You’ll need a cover letter, press release (be sure it has a topical hook; for a free template, see www.press-release-writing.com/content-basics.htm), a mock book review (a full page sample review from which busy editors can lift sections for their own reviews), real endorsements and reviews, an author biography, a sell sheet/order form, catalog/tip sheet, a mock article (covering some important topic related to your book), a real or mock interview, something excerpted from or based on your book that is immediately useful to readers, and at least one novelty item (postcard, book cover, bookmark, sample chapter, or table of contents). See http://www.howellcanyonpress.com/ for examples of these items. Better yet, buy Dawn Josephson’s excellent book Putting It On Paper: The Ground Rules for Creating Promotional Pieces that Sell Books at http://www.cameopublications.com/ or by calling (866) 372-2636. Her advice has been enormously helpful to me. Besides sending your press kit to book, magazine, and newspaper reviewers, you also need to send your press release to thousands of newspaper editors. There are various services for doing this. I use a service at http://www.prweb.com/ that is excellent and very inexpensive. You can also get free weekly press releases with your subscription to http://www.expertclick.com/, but this is an expensive site to join (in return for which you are listed as an expert for media to contact for interviews).

Literally hundreds of literary and marketing organizations exist to help you write, print, and market your book. You should at least belong to the national organization(s) representing the genre(s) you write in. For me, that’s Romance Writers of America (http://www.rwanational.org/), The Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (http://www.scbwi.com/), and the Dog Writers Association of America (http://www.dwaa.org/index.html). Do an internet search of organizations appropriate to your genre(s) or go to www.midwestbookreview.com/bookbiz/writers.htm. Important associations for all small publishers include Publishers Marketing Association (PMA— www.pma-online.org— this one is essential), Small Publishers Association of America (SPAN—http://www.spannet.org/), and Small Publishers, Artists & Writers Network (SPAWN—http://www.spawn.org/).

In order to ensure your book will be available nationally, you must sign up with the wholesalers most bookstores order from. The two largest are Ingram (http://www.ingrambookgroup.com/start/) and Baker & Taylor (http://www.btol.com/). Your books must be easy to order through these venues, or most bookstores won’t buy them. Other wholesalers I’ve found helpful are Quality Books (http://www.quality-books.com/), which sell to many libraries, and Partners West (http://www.partnersbook.com/), which is the largest wholesaler for the 11 most western U.S. states (the region where I live). Wholesalers typically want a 55% discount on the books they purchase from you (you get 45% of the cover price of your book) and take about 90 days to pay you. This may seem like a jip, but consider that bookstores buy from them at a 40% discount. That 15% you pay the wholesaler covers the cost of making your books available to all bookstores and for filling their orders. If you had to fill all your own orders, you’d spend too much time doing that and wouldn’t have time and energy left for creating and marketing your books, which is where your effort should be concentrated. At first I tried to get by with wholesalers only, but I ran into two problems: 1) If you’re a small press, Ingram won’t carry your titles unless you’re represented by one of their approved distributors. 2) Even doing fulfillment to the wholesalers and collecting from them takes time, and 3) Without a distributor, you have no one visiting lots of bookstores to encourage them to carry your titles. Consider getting a distributor: someone who’ll pitch your books to bookstores and manage all your wholesale accounts. I chose Biblio Distribution (www.bibliodistribution.com/distribution/index.shtml) because it specializes in representing publishers with fewer than ten titles. My experience so far (1 year) is Biblio responds quickly to emails but takes a long time correcting errors (such as your book cover missing from their website). And although their reps visit many bookstores, this doesn’t necessarily translate into sales. You make sales as a result of your own marketing efforts. The “disadvantage” of having distributors is you sign a contract giving them exclusive rights to sell to the “trade” (physical bookstores and major online bookstores). I cannot now sell my own books directly to any bookstore, but that’s fine: if I call or go in person to pitch my books or to ask for a reading/signing event, I simply direct the store to order the books through Biblio or their favorite wholesaler.

Do not rely on your wholesalers and distributors to get your book into retail stores and libraries, though your distributor will have a seasonal catalog that includes your book and should have representatives meeting in person with the top accounts (large chain bookstores) to announce all new titles. You must do virtually all your marketing yourself. If you can afford it, consider hiring someone to help you with marketing (to pitch your books to both the book industry and to the public) or at least with publicity (to pitch your books to the public through media like radio, TV, newspapers, magazines, etc.). Plan to pay $1,000 to $5,000 a month for this service, however. You can learn how to do most of it on your own by reading the books mentioned above, but you’ll find that effective marketing is often more than a full-time job. Here are the main ways in general in which you want to booksellers and librarians: Through direct mail, advertising in industry publications, contact advertising and making appearances at book trade shows, and making personal appearances at stores and libraries. Direct mail on your own (usually not very effective) to bookstores and libraries is very expensive and can be tricky (you need eye-catching and pithy material, a good mailing list, and you should do test mailings first). I recommend that you do cooperative advertising through places like PMA (http://www.pma-online.org/) and your distributor. They have their own target mailings to bookstores, libraries, and reviewers, and they get reduced rates for advertising in top places like Publishers Weekly. Another reportedly effective source for library mailings is Florida Academic Press (fapress@worldnet.att.net (352) 332-5104), though it’s significantly more expensive than PMA.Other catalogs to consider are those put out seasonally by Bowker (http://bowkersupport.com/publishers/promotional.htm), Ingram (www.ingrambook.com/programs/catalogs/trade.asp), Baker & Taylor (www.btol.com/supplier_advertising.cfm), and Foreword (http://www.forewordmagazine.com/ad_info.htm), though I haven’t found these very effective because your book gets lost among literally thousands of others. You may want to appear in person and do a book signing or have your book displayed in a booth at the many trade shows that take place each year in the US (the biggest is Book Expo America http://www.bookexpoamerica.com/) and abroad (the biggest is The Frankfurt Book Fair www.frankfurt-book-fair.com/en/portal.html). I prefer the smaller regional shows, however, where you can meet many of the booksellers in your area and do book signings with relative ease. My regional organization is PNBA (The Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association—www.pnba.org), and you can find yours by contacting the ABA (American Booksellers Association—www.ambook.org). You may also want to attend your regional library association shows. There are many opportunities to display at these events, notably through your distributor and PMA, but my favorite for price and visibility is Combined Book Exhibit (http://www.combinedbook.com/). You may also sell your book in huge quantities (but at a huge discount, of course) to corporations, book clubs, and bulk purchasers such as Books Are Fun (www.booksarefun.com/booksarefun). Subscribing to the PMA monthly newsletter is essential for staying informed of various marketing opportunities. You might also consider subscribing to Book Marketing Update (www.bookmarket.com/newsletters.html) and checking out John Kremer’s general site at http://www.bookmarket.com/.

You must have your own website, which is attractive, updated, simple to use, and geared to effectiveness for marketing books. This means you need a system set up for building your online customer database (including a prominent opt-in system on your website and a campaign for driving web traffic to your site), for keeping in touch with customers at least periodically, and for processing the resulting orders online. Auto-responders are an indispensable tool once your customer database grows. An excellent service that offers these features and many more is
http://www.1shoppingcart.com/ Designers can be expensive, but unless you have a lot of expertise, don’t attempt to design your own sites. Your designer should have marketing knowledge so that s/he sets up your site in a way to generate maximal sales. You may also need expert help to drive good traffic to your sites. Consider creating a webpage or even separate website for each book you have and one for you as author as well as a general one for your publishing company. You’ll also want to advertise your books and offer them for sale on other websites (Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Books-a-million, and many others) and may want to create an e-zine or other way to communicate with your customers regularly. See the books listed above for details. This is a vast and complex subject. I also recommend Best Seller Mentoring, an excellent teleconference book marketing course with Randy Gilbert and Peggy McColl that gives you an extensive, college-like education in online book marketing. They guarantee that if you go through the steps they suggest, your book will make the best seller list at Amazon, or you’ll get all your money back for the course.

There are hundreds of contests you can enter. Entering gets your work seen and evaluated by many judges (enter those contests that promise judge feedback), and winning generates publicity for you as well as becoming a selling point for your book. The various writing and marketing organizations you belong to may sponsor contests, and you can find numerous contests online at http://www.literature-awards.com/.

How to get your book noticed through bookstore, school, and library readings/signings

Doing bookstore appearances not only gives your book the visibility to sell copies before, during, and after your visit but also can be used to generate a lot of free publicity. Newspapers and radio may announce your visit (send them a press release), and your appearance makes bookstore staff aware of your books (so they can direct customers to them). School and library readings and signings not only generate sales but also pay you an appearance fee. (I know a man who makes a very good living just by giving presentations in schools a few times a week!) You’ll also want to investigate speaking at various conferences and other events that relate to your book topic. Always arrive well ahead of time for your events, be courteous and enthusiastic with everyone you meet, and write the appropriate organizers and staff a thank-you note afterwards.

Hundreds of consumer magazines, newspapers, etc. offer advertising, but these ads are often very expensive. Here again is a place to get very creative (see above books) in how you reach the consumer through all possible media. It’s usually better (and certainly cheaper!) to submit informational articles to various publications that welcome topics in which you have expertise (which may or may not be related to your book) than to pay for an ad. At the end of each article you can have a byline that identifies you as the author of certain books and mentions your website address. This will give you free advertising and position you as an expert in your field. You can also get free advertising in newspapers (under current events) or on radio announcing your upcoming bookstore appearances. Keep creating fascinating articles and interview topics based on your book and get as much newspaper, magazine, radio (radio is surprisingly the most widely experienced media in America), and TV coverage as possible. Consider taking out an ad in Radio-TV Interview Report (http://www.rtir.com/) to obtain offers for radio and TV interviews, and get listed in the Yearbook of Experts (http://www.expertclick.com/). Better yet, get your own list of the top radio stations (see http://www.radiopublicity.com/
com), and even better than that (if you can afford it), hire a good publicist, who’ll have the necessary contacts to place you on the shows that are most right for you. Don’t forget the vast online advertising opportunities (but be sure their website traffic is high enough to get sufficient exposure for the fee charged). Take advantage of opportunities to submit online informational articles to prominent (and even small) websites, and persuade large list owners to post either these articles or special offers you have for their subscribers.

Advantages and disadvantages of self-publishing, or when to go with the big guys

If you self-publish, you get to control the whole creative process, and you guarantee that your book gets printed. If you market effectively, you can make a lot of money (you get more per book than you do just as an author). However, you will have an enormous amount of work and expense, and you are very unlikely to sell as many copies on your own as a major publisher could sell of your book. They can afford to print and to advertise on a large scale. However, there’s no guarantee a large publisher will do a lot of advertising—you may still have to expend time and money for advertising to get your book maximal visibility. You will certainly still have to do some marketing, including making bookstore appearances and hiring a publicist to handle your radio, TV, magazine, and newspaper interviews. Also, nonfiction titles can do very well self-published, but you can usually sell fiction better through a large publisher. If you want to have a lot of time to write books, do not self-publish. Publishing, including the endless marketing you must do if you are your own publisher, will take all your time.

(Trisha Howell has written sixteen books in four years (publishing five in the last year alone). Before that, she had numerous articles, stories, and poems on a wide variety of subjects published in newspapers, magazines, and anthologies. She holds a BA and MA in Philosophy, an MA in Humanities, and an MA in Critical Film Studies. She’s taught at Montessori schools, Stanford University, and the University of Southern California and frequently offers educational programs at writing conferences, schools, libraries, bookstores, and other organizations. For more information or to purchase autographed copies of Trisha’s highly acclaimed books, including The Princess and the Pekinese, The Pekinese Who Saved Civilization, Living In A Glowing World, The Adventures of Melon and Turnip, and The Journeying Workbook: A Shamanic Guide to Accessing Your Inner Power, please call (360) 563-0865, (888) 252-0411, or email info@HowellCanyonPress.com You may also see our books and free bonus gifts as well as order online at http://www.howellcanyonpress.com/ and http://www.addisonthedog.com/ or order from your favorite book store. Also please
see http://www.trishahowell.com/ for more information about Trisha.)

Have you ever thought, as a kid, a teenager, or as an adult, “I’d like to write a book.” Or after reading a book, have you ever thought, “I could have written that,” (or even something better)?

"Whatever you can do or dream you can…Begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it." --Goethe

I believe that there’s a book/books in each of us. Some will express their creativity with books that don’t appear between covers, like designing and tending a fabulous garden, building a team, restoring an antique car or cabinet, serving science, the community, or helping raise a child’s self esteem. We contribute our creativity--creating something new that would otherwise not exist--in diverse ways. What if you want to write a book?

What does it take? Let’s start with the things it doesn’t take, things that can stop people from even starting or taking the first step in the direction of their dreams. 1. Time. It doesn’t take extraordinary amounts of time. People like you with busy, full lives write most books. I wrote my first book the year I started a business, was helping raise five children, and worked 60 hours a week. People who quit work to write often find they are unable to. 2. Talent, giftedness or special skill. Books are written by ordinary Joes and Joannes whose desire doesn’t hold them back. I say, you gotta wanna. 3. Education, training. Writing your ideas down is a way to honor your voice and value your own experiences—this is universal. An editor can smooth the rough edges. Spelling and perfect grammar are not required. 4. Money or Connections. When there’s a big enough why for anything we want in life, a how can be found. This is true for your book too.

How can I say with conviction these things aren’t necessary to write a book?   I have written ten books that are between covers, plus several hundred workbooks, a CD and a board game. I’ve got another dozen books in the pipeline, and I have no more of the above than the average person.

"You can’t leave footprints in the sands of time if you’re sitting on your butt. And who wants to leave
butt prints in the sand of time?" --Bob Moawad

What does it take to forge a book from the twinkle of an idea to marveling at the finished product, like holding a newborn in your hands? I’ve discovered five “F” factors for forging a book. 1. Fire. From somewhere an idea spark ignites, then blazes across your mind. It travels to your belly and smolders there, and finally takes up residence in your heartspace as desire, where its heat remains, nudging you, until you honor it and take the first step. 2. Fear Reduction. This is the oxygen of creativity and the lifeline of accomplishment. It’s as necessary as wiping the steam off the mirror in the morning after a shower so that you can see yourself clearly. 3. Focus. Distractions, detours, and demands are always nipping at our heels. Centering our attention, five minutes at a time, gets the job done. 4. Friends. My daughter came home from kindergarten and announced, “I’ve got fwends!” Herein lies the difference between heaven and hell. Find kindred spirits. Lavishly assist them. Let them know what you need. 5. Faith. Belief in yourself and your source of aliveness is the bedrock to carrying on. Claim creativity as your birthright.

If you’ve got the fire of a book or other creative project warming your insides, I hope you’ll go for it. You’re worth it. If it keeps calling you and won’t leave you alone, know that you can do it, you have what it takes.

Pick up your pen and begin to write, “My book (project) is important to me because…”

You’re on your way…Trust the process, and that you’ll be given everything you need once you
put your energy in motion. "Use what talents you possess; the woods would be very silent if no birds sang except those that sang best." –Henry Van Dyke

Joanne Klassen is President of Heartspace Writing School. Her latest book, Tools of Transformation: Write your way to new world of possibility—in just 5 Minutes, is available at http://www.buybooksontheweb.com/ or free at (877) BUY BOOK.

Contact Joanne Klassen, Heartspace Writing School, at www-write-away.net.

Article by Michelle Ailene True

from The Published Poet