tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5166258876350767631.post4763300314252140316..comments2023-10-28T08:39:37.978-07:00Comments on ClaireMJohnsonWrites: Thoughts on MarketingClaire M. Johnsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01714407719530073304noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5166258876350767631.post-30134652439651564552014-01-19T17:33:21.486-08:002014-01-19T17:33:21.486-08:00Publishers are losing money for a variety of reaso...Publishers are losing money for a variety of reasons. Some of it is that newspapers are dying. The newspapers that remain are killing their book review sections. So that avenue for free advertising is no longer around. At least in the Bay Area, small bookstores are making a comeback, so that model where booksellers hand sells your book seems to be reviving, at least where I live. The days when publishers allocating advertising dollars to all their authors is long gone, and has been for years. <br /><br />I think with the advent of self-publishing, advertising fatigue is already setting in. I NEVER even look at emails from either amazon or B&N. I would imagine that's the response for most people. Blogging used to be a good way to get your message out without seeming like you were spamming people, but now everyone has a blog. Facebook? Not really working because, again, unless you already have a name, you're spamming your friends, family, and acquaintances. People are exhausted by all the information. My daughter says I need to tweet, but unless you have a targeted market, you are, again, tweeting to your friends and family, who have already bought your book. It's very hard to break out of that circle. <br /><br />I do think publishers need to stop publishing so much and they need to return to a model where books are edited and not just thrown in the market with a spell check. I see this as the only way for publishing to regain it's market share and, frankly, it's respect. I'm at the point where I only read non-fiction because fiction seems to be in a horrible slump where it's all badly written and badly conceived. There is this sense that no one is minding the store. But then publishers are now corporations and the search for profits is relentless. They are all looking for J.K. Rowling. One author, a gazillion sales. Claire M. Johnsonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01714407719530073304noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5166258876350767631.post-27415261756511619972014-01-19T11:44:16.842-08:002014-01-19T11:44:16.842-08:00Don't get me wrong - it makes me cringe too. T...Don't get me wrong - it makes me cringe too. The principle seems very unfair and exploitative, but I sort of suppose that there could be circumstances where it could work. If the alternative is that publishing houses will lose money on books by new authors that they can't afford to publicise enough (and consequently will not take any more on), I think co-publishing can have benefits for both sides. The authors will get the backing and authority of an official publisher and the publisher will be able to test out a new author without allocating significant publicity resources to them. If the authors are willing and capable, I suppose it could be okay. But I would like to see the author's hard work recognised in the form of much better royalties in return.<br /><br />On the other hand, if I was an author, I think I would feel like you - neither interested to market myself nor probably a genius at it. I would want to concentrate on the writing. Also, as a reader, I'm easily annoyed by authors who seem to push too hard or really tout their own horn. <br /><br />A third thing is - in the UK, the newest talking point in publishing is how everyone should be publishing fewer books. Fewer, better ones and more quickly. I would hope that if this is taken to heart it would mean that those few good books will get decent publicity, rather than just the big books.<br /><br />(Sorry for leaving the most disjointed comment ever. :P)Merinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5166258876350767631.post-44872292106946494932014-01-15T19:10:36.589-08:002014-01-15T19:10:36.589-08:00@meri: You know how much I adore you, truly, but ...@meri: You know how much I adore you, truly, but this, wow, this makes me cringe. Because it means that the benchmark is your mastery of technology. Let me put it this way. You can be a god at technology and not be able to write worth a damn, but you can be a god at writing and not be able to manipulate media worth a damn. Who is going to get the book contract under this scenario? More likely than not, it's the person with an unholy ability to corral social media. <br /><br />I actually don't see this as the third way. I see this as yet another way for publishing companies to maximize profits with little to no effort. They've already fired the editors, they've fired the copy editors (most books only seem to go through a spellcheck these days), so the only people left to fire are the marketing crew. Literally, *I* could run single handedly a publishing company on this model. And I'd be curious what exactly the percentages are in terms of royalties. Does this mean that the publisher only makes 7% on every book sold, given that the majority of the work is being done by the author? I doubt it.<br /><br />In my view the publisher is in charge of the content. I produce the content, and the publisher is bound to market that content. That is NOT my job. I already produced the content. Besides if someone is already very good at marketing, what incentive is there for them to hand over their rights to a publisher that demands that they do the marketing. It's a defeatist business model. On several levels. I find this business model predatory, frankly.Claire M. Johnsonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01714407719530073304noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5166258876350767631.post-83607042180053239422014-01-14T00:19:14.487-08:002014-01-14T00:19:14.487-08:00I like 'write it and they will come'! I th...I like 'write it and they will come'! I think you're right to focus on the essential.<br /><br />Have you heard about the experiment that an Italian publishing house is doing with new crime authors? They're calling it 'co-publishing' and what they're doing is essentially taking on a bunch of new crime writers, making them compete on self-marketing, and then picking the most successful one to publish. It sounds a bit dog-eat-dog to me but maybe it's good. The new authors are making it easier for publishers to sign them because they'll be doing half the work (more than half, considering they wrote the book too...). See here if you're interested: http://www.futurebook.net/content/co-publishing-third-way-between-traditional-publishing-and-self-publishingMerinoreply@blogger.com