Last week, in one of my online groups,
TWL Author Talks, we had a very special lady join us by the name of Stacey J. Miller. Stacey is founder of S. J. Miller Communications, a full-service book promotion firm. She joined us for a full week and liked it so much, we've inducted her in as a permanent TWL Author Talk member...wowzers.
Stacy is also author the ebook,
How to Market, Sell, Distribute, and Promote Your Book: Critical, Hard-to-Find Information for Authors and Publishers and you might want to check out her blog at
http://bookspromotion.blogspot.com/ to find out some really good publicity tips.
She's a wonderful person with lots of integrity, soul and most definitely a people person. I simply love her and would recommend her to anyone.
Before I give you the lowdown on what she had to say regarding book publicity, I have to tell you how it is that I came to meet her. She'll probably kill me, but it's something that really touched me and I think you'll think it's neat, too.
I received an email from her out of the blue saying she wanted to buy a copy of my ebook,
A Complete Guide to Promoting & Selling Your Self-Published eBook, but wanted to know if it was okay because she didn't want it to look like she was buying it for insider secrets since we both write generally about the same topic.
After I picked myself up from the floor, I emailed her and basically told her to...BUY THE BOOK. LOL, well, I didn't put it quite that way.
What was extraordinary about this is that she sent me her ebook without asking ME pay for it.
And, yes, I feel guilty.
I've read her book and I have to tell you, this is one of the best marketing ebooks I have ever read. A definite two thumbs up!
Why I have told you this seemingly long story is because this gives me hope...that there are other players out there who has the same values and morals that Stacey has. No one has ever emailed me, asking permission to buy my ebook. I've got to admit, I have bought marketing ebooks/books in the past and not once did I email the author to ask if it was all right. The girl's got class. Besides that, she is one of the most personable people I have ever met and I'm sure her clients just adore her. If they are reading this post, consider yourselves very, very lucky and in dependable hands.
Without further ado, and with Stacey's permission, I'd like to give you an excerpt of what she had to say about publicity in my group last week.
Dorothy: Thank you for coming into the group, Stacey!
Stacey: Thank you, Dorothy. It's a pleasure to be here, and I'm looking forward to meeting your group. Let's get started!
Dorothy: Yahhhh...you made it! I'll tell you what I'd like to know...what prompted you to go into PR? I see you have books...were these books you had written before going into PR or afterwards? I'm soooo excited you are here!
Stacy: What prompted me to go into book promotion was that I was/am abookaholic. I mean, I inhaled books, and I breathed books, and I lived for books (sound familiar?) I needed to work in the publishing industry. Except I didn't figure that out until about a month before I was slated to graduate from college with a degree in mass communication with a concentration in television production and a minor in theatre arts. So I was living in Boston, and I was 20 years old, and I was about to have this useless bachelor's degree. I walked into the human resources office of Houghton Mifflin, and I grinningly announced to the personnel director that I was there and available to be hired in a month, and she was kind enough to interview me. Her first question was, "So, why didn't you study publishing or something related to it?" I thought, oh, dang. I'm in trouble. BIG trouble. Then I drifted around Boston-area companies, from one demoralizing job to another (sadly, I was emminently employable because I typed about 87 words a minute on an IBM Selectric, which was executive secretary-quality stuff at the time, and that didn't help my search for a real job). All that time, I was begging Houghton Mifflin, Little Brown, and any other publisher in Boston to just break down and HIRE me! It would have been so reasonable for them to do that, and for whatever reason -- my arrogance? lack of experience? failure to have anything real to offer them? -- they didn't know that.
Finally, I found a publisher that would hire me. The hitch was: the job was in public relations, not editorial. Okay...I could handle that. Whatever public relations was, I could handle it. Probably.
Let's face it. If the job had been cleaning toilets at a publishing company, I would have jumped on it with gratitude. I'd been looking for a job in publishing for about 5 years at the time.
Who would have thunk that I'd love book promotion? Of course, I'm on my own now, at my own PR firm -- and the whole definition of book promotion has changed about 46 times since then (it changes 3 times aday now, it seems) -- but I love it more than ever, and I'm sooo glad that I'm here.
I wish my road had been easier, but...well, okay, if it hadn't been for that 4-month stint of paying telephone bills for the Filene's department store during the winter in an office that was about 25degrees below zero, I wouldn't have as much character as I do now. Right? :-)
Dorothy: Stacey, I noticed you said something about book promotion rules are changing. I love to hear you say that because a lot of authors are still bound by the old rules. Can you give us an example of how book promotion is changing in your prospective?
Stacey: Dorothy, you're my example of how book promotion is changing. Everyone who hangs out online, poking around the search engines looking for"who's who" and "what's what" in book promotion has heard of you and your offerings. You're the queen of YouTube, the guru of ebooks, the grand pooba of booktrailers, the paragon of press releases, the benchmark of blogs...you're a living, breathing example of how to become a credible and prolific (and attention-getting) nformation- and content-provider online and, in the process, a household name. My new mantra is: ask yourself, what would Dorothy do. And then do it!
Dorothy: Whoa...after picking myself up off the floor, I am speechless. You're pretty super duper yourself! ;o)
Which brings me to another question. I deal with online. You deal with offline, although you are edging towards online if you haven't already done so. My question is something dealing with offline which is the biggest stumper I've ever had. Take for example, a book I've put together on soul mates. It's an anthology, but the next book will be solely on soul mates from my perspective. I've created a buzz as a relationship expert, and I've gotten one big gig, non-monetary-paying gig in the celebrity tabloid, OK!, as well as a few radio interviews, things like that. If I wanted to continue this path (although I'm really into this promo stuff so I hope I don't lose interest in the relationship stuff), what direction should I take as a non-fiction author who has created a somewhat of a kind of relationship expert status, to take if I want the attention of big print magazines, such as uh...let's see...Cosmo, Glamour, Redbook? Do you think they take queries for feature spots or interviews from publicists faster than queries from people off the street? And, if so, wouldn't that make the author look more professional if it came from their publicist?
Stacey: I hope that we publicists earn our keep. Helping authors look more professional is one service we provide...working full-time on promoting books so that their authors can go on with their lives and not have to quit their day jobs is another...and tapping our media contacts is another way we earn our keep.
But I always preach about the fact that publicists are just people who are doing, full-time, what other people can do very effectively if they can make the time for it, and if they can develop the contacts. Dorothy, you know how. You have all the skills, and you certainly have all the smarts you need to pick up the techniques you haven't needed until now. You'd be a good candidate to conduct a do-it-yourself campaign -- if you wanted to.
Hint: one of my best friends is a fellow book publicist. He's my old boss, in fact, so I have to consider him one of my best friends or we wouldn't be on speaking terms now (just kidding). We have an unspoken agreement, and it goes like this: when he has something to promote, he creates a press release, and puts it on my letterhead, and tells me who to send it to...and then he follows up. And vice versa. That way,we're each other's publicist, which is very helpful for the credibilty that it provides. But does he need me to honestly be his publicist --that is, write his media materials, create the strategies for a winning PR campaign, and keep in contact with the media about potential news hooks and media angles? No, and I don't need him to do that for me. We need each other's reputations and letterhead.. .and that's about it. The rest, we can do ourselves. *grinning* See? It's nice to have friends.
Of course, I wouldn't want to talk you out of hiring a book publicist.I could be ostracized for such heresy. But...book publicists come with a pricetag, and if you can do the work yourself, shoot, go for it.
Dorothy: Stacey, how effective do you believe press releases are when an author sends them blindly to newspapers or print publications?
Stacey: Yes...you almost have to send press releases blindly to the media. Of course, you want to begin with a targeted list. If you're promoting a book about relationships, you won't want to sent it out to a general list of media outlets that includes, say, political talk shows and sports editors. You want to be smart about sending out press releases but, sure, you do need to send press releases out with the rest of your media kit, along with a copy of the book.
Note one caveat: I'm talking about sending press releases only via snail mail. I would never email a press release to anyone in the media unless that person had requested a copy of the media kit (I'm sort of using the phrase "press release" and "media kit" interchangeably, but as you know, a press release is one component fo a media kit.)
Everyone, in every context, resents receiving unsolicited file attachments. I do, you do, and the media does. Nor does the media want a press release embedded in an email message...life is too short to read an entire press release that's delivered via email. We expect emails to be short and succinct. I use email pitches all the time, and I use them very effectively. ButI'd never take the liberty of emailing an entire unsolicited press release even to some of my best friends in the media. And faxing a press release? Out of the question these days. No one wants to tie up a fax machine with unsolicted anything -- press releases, vacation offers, multi-level marketing plans, and whatever else. No, save press release for traditional mailings. But do use traditional mailings. They're still important, and they're still a great way to book national media.
Dorothy: Stacey, I don't know if this has been asked yet, but when an author is interested in your services, what are the steps you take with them at first? And, do you have to believe in the book's success before you take them on? Have you ever turned anyone down, and if so, what would be the reason for doing so?
Stacey: Good question. Yes, I really do read a book before I offer to promote it. Most books I receive get me excited about their PR potential, and as I'm reading I think about possible medi hooks. But, sometimes, I just doubt that I'm the right person for the job. Or, sometimes, I know a book publicist who's a better match for a particular project, and then I recommend that other person.
For instance, if Caro came to me and inquired about my book promotion services, I'd have to refer her to you, Dorothy. In addition to that, I'd suggest that she network a bit and find an Aussie book publicist, since I'm sadly out of the publishing loop on most continents except ours. :)
The next step in the process would be the author to work with me to define his/her publicity goals. I never begin by saying "what's your budget" because, as a matter of personnel preference , I think that's tacky. If the author's goals are within the range of my corestrengths, then I provide a range of labor costs without getting specific. If there's no "sticker shock," then I move onto creating a publicity proposal, email that along, and then we can discuss the proposal, clarify anything that's unclear, revise the plan as needed, and then -- let the book promotion campaign begins. Depending on the plan, and the situation, the campaign might start within a few days, and bookings might begin immediately.
If I have an overload of authors who are in need of publicists, Iwould love to represent them all -- but, obviously, I can't. So,candidly, sometimes my personal tastes come into play. You want to say"yes" to everyone, but there are only so many hours in a day, and you have to be fair to clients. An overwhelmed publicist isn't an effective publicist.
Dorothy: Stacey, do you have any success stories you'd like to share? Like major coops...Redbook, Oprah, American Idol...lol.. .the last one doesn't count, of course.
Stacey: Survivor. Just kidding. I think I've booked all the major media outlets, so my biggest bragging rights are to the projects that came out of nowhere to do well. For instance, I just got off the phone with a client whose memoir will be featured on the Paula Zahn broadcast on CNN. The crew just left her house. She also was on two other nationl TV shows -- the Early Show and Today -- and she was interviewed by New York Newsday about a week ago. Her book was published by a one-book publishingcompany, and happy for her? Don't ask. She's wonderful, she's talented, she's kind, and she deserves success, but I really didn'tthink it would happen with her memoir. I'm so glad that it did, because obviously, that's the book that means the most to her. My success stories are when great things happen for great people.Those their successes, but they're my successes, too, because I'm lucky to be a part of that. I have the world's best job!
I made an interesting discovery last night that even astounded me, someone who thinks they know EVERYTHING there is about blog promotion (*hint* I'm still learning with the rest of you), which I'd like to share with my readers.
