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FROM PUBLISHED TO DISTRIBUTED
Feb 1st 2004
Feb 1st 2004
Miller Caldwell looks at outlets for your work.
I arrived home after ten days on Madeira last September to a mountain of mail. I left till last the exciting corrugated package that I knew would be my first published novel. Inside was the finished article of c/word/novel03 in print. It gleamed back at me longing for recognition of approval. It would be on sale at authorsonline.co.uk and amazon but I needed some copies for family, friends, erstwhile colleagues and not to mention a few for the local press. I ordered 250 and travelled to Milton Keynes to collect them from Lightning Sources. Five boxes easily fitted in the car. But how did I go about advertising?
I then ordered 400 flyers. They are a necessity. I have two on my car side windows and I never close a letter without enclosing a flyer ( bank, house insurance, tax return, electoral role, bills, Barclaycard cheque, Birthday cards, yes they all know about Operation Oboe and the list keeps growing every time I go to the post box.)
I then thought of a local book signing where I used to work in Castle Douglas. The Co-operative Society store was the most spacious and appropriate venue but when I looked up their telephone number, I noticed they were part of Angus, Lothian, Borders and Dumfries & Galloway. So I offered to sign in each Co-operative superstore in Castle Douglas, and Langholm then stay with my 83 year old mother to do the same in Arbroath, Carnoustie, Forfar and Kirriemuir. The result was that I sold over 100 books.
At each town I contacted the local press and they duly gave free advertisement. On more than most occasions they either took a photo of me or scanned the one found on the publishers’ website. Local press is read by the national press and so I then discovered that the Sunday Post wished to interview me and they arrived in Dumfries to take my photo. ( The Sunday Post is as traditional as Iron Brew and Haggis in Scotland!)
Then I thought of the outlets I usually frequent. So ten books were left at the local Farm Shop and at neighbours’ Bed & Breakfast lobbies. In each case they retained £1 per book as an incentive. Then I had a problem with this ageing computer. When Clearwood Computers fixed the fault, they added to their own site, “Dumfries Customer writes novel” and when that banner is clicked, Operation Oboe details appear once more!
£20 for a car boot sticker is money well spent. The number of drivers’ passengers noting the book is remarkable and that is reflected on the number of times the online site has been hit.
Local bookshops also take an interest but be wary. High street bookshops seek a 35% of the bookcost. That makes each sale minimal to the author. However publicity and getting the book to a wider audience is achieved. That is so important.
Charity causes are always well worth investigating. The Dumfries & Galloway Constabulary Benevolent Fund benefited from a pre-Christmas offer of a £2 donation for each book sold. After £48 went into their coffers in January, the offer has been rolled out to all Scottish Police Force Benevolent Funds and I await a modest deluge of orders. The Chief Constable liked the book so much that he has asked me out to lunch to hear more of it. The Alzheimer and Dementia Society together with Headway have been approached to order Operation Oboe in a similar offer. Now the RNLI in Scotland have taken the book on board.
Further afield? Well my wife’s cousin in Monte Carlo who runs the English speaking bookshop has just been sent a copy and I am more than willing to drop off a box or two if she is interested. I think I might just wait till the warmer weather, or perhaps the weekend of the Monaco Grand Prix!
I hope these activities inspire recently published authors to venture further into distribution initiatives. As the Ghanaian Twi proverb states: Bad dancing will not harm the ground. In other words, there is no harm in trying.
I arrived home after ten days on Madeira last September to a mountain of mail. I left till last the exciting corrugated package that I knew would be my first published novel. Inside was the finished article of c/word/novel03 in print. It gleamed back at me longing for recognition of approval. It would be on sale at authorsonline.co.uk and amazon but I needed some copies for family, friends, erstwhile colleagues and not to mention a few for the local press. I ordered 250 and travelled to Milton Keynes to collect them from Lightning Sources. Five boxes easily fitted in the car. But how did I go about advertising?
I then ordered 400 flyers. They are a necessity. I have two on my car side windows and I never close a letter without enclosing a flyer ( bank, house insurance, tax return, electoral role, bills, Barclaycard cheque, Birthday cards, yes they all know about Operation Oboe and the list keeps growing every time I go to the post box.)
I then thought of a local book signing where I used to work in Castle Douglas. The Co-operative Society store was the most spacious and appropriate venue but when I looked up their telephone number, I noticed they were part of Angus, Lothian, Borders and Dumfries & Galloway. So I offered to sign in each Co-operative superstore in Castle Douglas, and Langholm then stay with my 83 year old mother to do the same in Arbroath, Carnoustie, Forfar and Kirriemuir. The result was that I sold over 100 books.
At each town I contacted the local press and they duly gave free advertisement. On more than most occasions they either took a photo of me or scanned the one found on the publishers’ website. Local press is read by the national press and so I then discovered that the Sunday Post wished to interview me and they arrived in Dumfries to take my photo. ( The Sunday Post is as traditional as Iron Brew and Haggis in Scotland!)
Then I thought of the outlets I usually frequent. So ten books were left at the local Farm Shop and at neighbours’ Bed & Breakfast lobbies. In each case they retained £1 per book as an incentive. Then I had a problem with this ageing computer. When Clearwood Computers fixed the fault, they added to their own site, “Dumfries Customer writes novel” and when that banner is clicked, Operation Oboe details appear once more!
£20 for a car boot sticker is money well spent. The number of drivers’ passengers noting the book is remarkable and that is reflected on the number of times the online site has been hit.
Local bookshops also take an interest but be wary. High street bookshops seek a 35% of the bookcost. That makes each sale minimal to the author. However publicity and getting the book to a wider audience is achieved. That is so important.
Charity causes are always well worth investigating. The Dumfries & Galloway Constabulary Benevolent Fund benefited from a pre-Christmas offer of a £2 donation for each book sold. After £48 went into their coffers in January, the offer has been rolled out to all Scottish Police Force Benevolent Funds and I await a modest deluge of orders. The Chief Constable liked the book so much that he has asked me out to lunch to hear more of it. The Alzheimer and Dementia Society together with Headway have been approached to order Operation Oboe in a similar offer. Now the RNLI in Scotland have taken the book on board.
Further afield? Well my wife’s cousin in Monte Carlo who runs the English speaking bookshop has just been sent a copy and I am more than willing to drop off a box or two if she is interested. I think I might just wait till the warmer weather, or perhaps the weekend of the Monaco Grand Prix!
I hope these activities inspire recently published authors to venture further into distribution initiatives. As the Ghanaian Twi proverb states: Bad dancing will not harm the ground. In other words, there is no harm in trying.