{"id":97,"date":"2014-09-20T04:00:00","date_gmt":"2014-09-20T04:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/blog\/2014\/09\/20\/guest-blog-eric-e-wright-rocky-road-of\/"},"modified":"2023-05-25T18:09:46","modified_gmt":"2023-05-26T00:09:46","slug":"guest-blog-eric-e-wright-rocky-road-of","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/guest-blog-eric-e-wright-rocky-road-of\/","title":{"rendered":"Guest Blog: Eric E. Wright The Rocky Road of Book Promotion"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\t \n<\/div>\n
\n\t\"Buy<\/a>\n<\/div>\n

\n\tMy hair is turning
\n\tgrey. Why? Because I not only write books, but have to concentrate on
\n\tpublicity. Publicity? Yeah, I know, it’s a bad word—but a necessary one. Maybe
\n\tthere are those in book-land who love book promotion. Let it be known up front
\n\tthat I’m not one of them. But, BUT, it is necessary! So as my latest novel, Riptide <\/i>came out, I bit the bullet and
\n\tformulated a plan. \n<\/p>\n

\n\t \n<\/div>\n
\n\tAnyway, here is what
\n\tI’ve done which I present with the thought that it might help other reluctant
\n\tauthors.\n<\/div>\n
\n\t \n<\/div>\n
\n\tFirst I appealed for
\n\tsome reviewers and encouraged them to put reviews up on the Pelican site, on
\n\tAmazon, Indigo, and Barnes and Noble. The results were not only encouraging,
\n\tbut astounding. People actually liked, even loved my book! Of course, I’d already
\n\tupdated my web site and talked about the book on Facebook and twitter. \n<\/div>\n
\n\t \n<\/div>\n
\n\tI wrote a persuasive
\n\tone page description of the book which included facts, cost, availability, reviews,
\n\tetc. Along with a picture of the cover, I sent this to my email list
\n\tencouraging previous readers of my fiction to order the book. Orders began to
\n\ttrickle in.\n<\/div>\n
\n\t \n<\/div>\n
\n\tSince my home church
\n\thad been supportive, I approached the pastor about making the book available on
\n\ta Sunday. Some churches are sensitive about selling on Sunday. But since our
\n\tchurch allows the sale of missionary books and music videos from visiting
\n\tpresenters, the pastor was positive. With a notice in the bulletin for a couple
\n\tof weeks, the sales on the Sunday in question were good. \n<\/div>\n
\n\t \n<\/div>\n
\n\tNext I wrote a one
\n\tpage News Release and presented this in person to the offices of local papers.
\n\tOurs is a rural county with several small towns and a very active arts and
\n\twriters’ community. The papers readily accept news releases and often use them
\n\talmost verbatim. In my case, one of the widest disseminated free papers printed
\n\ta very positive article. I was astonished when three different people contacted
\n\tme directly as a result of the article. This doesn’t often happen. I’m still
\n\twaiting for two other papers to follow suit—especially when I approach them
\n\twith specific dates for book readings, launches, and events. \n<\/div>\n
\n\t \n<\/div>\n
\n\tOnce one news article
\n\thad circulated, it was time to approach local bookstores with whom I have
\n\tmaintained a relationship over the years. Fortunately, this personal approach
\n\tpaid dividends. All of the local bookstores have ordered copies from the
\n\tdistributor. Now I can direct inquiries to these stores. Even Indigo, Canada’s
\n\tanswer to Barnes & Noble, agreed to list it on their sites due to my
\n\trelationship with some of their store managers. It is also available on Kindle,
\n\tKobo, and other e-readers. \n<\/div>\n
\n\t \n<\/div>\n
\n\tThe article also
\n\tgenerated interest from libraries. So I took the time to personally approach
\n\tthe CEO of each of our local libraries with the suggestion they purchase
\n\tcopies. Most of them eagerly did so, purchasing copies directly from me. In
\n\teach case, I offered to either run or participate in a literary evening of
\n\treadings and discussion. So far, our nearest library has reciprocated and
\n\tscheduled an evening centred on reading from my three novels and discussion of
\n\tthe role of setting in fiction. \n<\/div>\n
\n\t \n<\/div>\n
\n\tThe summer is a great time
\n\tto participate in fairs, arts and craft shows, and farmers’ markets. Most years
\n\tI set up a table every Saturday at whatever event is taking place. Each of
\n\tthese cost money necessitating the pondering of whether or not sales will cover
\n\tthe cost of a booth. This year, due to some health problems, I’ve not been able
\n\tto do this as often as I would like.\n<\/div>\n
\n\tThese same challenges
\n\thave made it difficult to schedule a book launch evening at a local coffee shop,
\n\tbut this is being planned. A book launch where coffee and pastries are
\n\tavailable is a great place to invite friends and writing colleagues. Usually, a
\n\tcouple of local authors get together to launch their books, give readings, and
\n\tanswer questions. \n<\/div>\n
\n\t \n<\/div>\n
\n\tThe period leading up
\n\tto Christmas is an especially fruitful time to set up a book table at local
\n\tfairs and Christmas craft shows. People come to these looking for gifts and
\n\twhat better gift could they buy than a book?\n<\/div>\n
\n\tI’ve also found large
\n\tbookstores welcome me as a local author offering to sign books during periods
\n\tthat lead up to Mother’s Day, Father’s Day or Christmas. These stores, however,
\n\tneed to know far in advance as their schedules are often full and they need to
\n\torder books from a distributor. \n<\/div>\n
\n\t \n<\/div>\n
\n\tFinally, service clubs
\n\tand churches provide one of the most fulfilling venues to speak at as a writer.
\n\tThis is especially true if you have a book of local interest or can gear your
\n\ttalk to something that intrigues or educates an audience. Writers of
\n\tnon-fiction, particularly, have a ready-made topic on which they can speak. My
\n\tbook, Through A Country Window<\/i>,
\n\tdescribes the joys of country life in a general way but also focuses on
\n\tfascinating facts about our area of the country. Concerning my book, Church–No Spectator Sport<\/i>, I often
\n\tspeak about the discovery and development of spiritual gifts. From my book, Revolutionary Forgiveness<\/i>, I can address
\n\tmany questions about how to deal with bitterness, unforgiveness, etc. I find
\n\tthat people are also fascinated by the whole idea of writing a book of fiction.
\n\tHow did you become a writer? Where do you
\n\tget your ideas from? How do you get published? What advice do you have for new
\n\twriters? <\/i>\n<\/div>\n
\n\t \n<\/div>\n
\n\tWhile we who are
\n\tauthors may not be ideal promoters, any effort we can expend will be yield
\n\tsales and make our books known. With thousands upon thousands of titles
\n\tentering the book business every year, we must do whatever we can to promote
\n\tour book, unless we want it to sink into oblivion. (http:\/\/www.countrywindow.ca)\n<\/div>\n
\n\t \n<\/div>\n
\n\t \n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  My hair is turning grey. Why? Because I not only write books, but have to concentrate on publicity. Publicity? Yeah, I know, it’s a bad word—but a necessary one. Maybe there are those in book-land who love book promotion. Let it be known up front that I’m not one of them. But, BUT, it […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":814,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[512],"tags":[61,26,62],"class_list":["post-97","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-about-books","tag-book-promotion","tag-guest-blogger","tag-tips-for-writing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=97"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/814"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=97"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=97"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=97"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}