Blogger: Rachel Kent
An author should expect to put time and money into marketing a book. The publisher has a marketing plan and budget for a book release, but the author is expected to market to his or her circle of influence.
I think it’s a good idea for an author to take time before a book release to plan and budget his or her own marketing much in the same way a publishing house would. Set aside a certain amount of money (comfortably within your budget!) and write out a plan 
of what you will do with that money and with the time you have to put into marketing as well. The key to planning successful marketing is to remember that what you put out should be earned back with interest through increased sales. Marketing should be an investment, so you should focus on what payoff your efforts could have. If you spend $20 on gas and food to drive to a book signing in another town, how many books are you likely to sell by doing this? If we estimate the royalty at $1 per book, I think you’d need to sell at least 40 copies for the $20 trip to be worthwhile. That doesn’t even take into account the time that was spent on the trip though. A full day is worth a lot.
It’s extremely hard to know what the actual monetary gains will be from a marketing effort. For example, if you are able to gain a few new readers for one book, they are likely to buy other books from you in the future, and they might tell their friends about your books. I suggest estimating your return at the lowest possible payback for your efforts so that you are sure your marketing dollars are being spent well. The extra sales that might come from your efforts will just be icing on the cake at some future date.
If, for some reason or another, your marketing efforts don’t end up paying back what you put into them plus interest, you can console yourself with knowing that your money spent on marketing is also a tax write off.
How do you estimate your investment returns on marketing efforts?
Do you enjoy marketing your book? Why or why not?
My father used to say, “Let’s see what my friend James has to say about this.” And friend James has a perfect comment for today’s topic:
*” Look here, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we are going to a certain town and will stay there a year. We will do business there and make a profit.’ How do you know what your life will be like tomorrow? Your life is like the morning fog—it’s here a little while, then it’s gone. What you ought to say is, ‘If the Lord wants us to, we will live and do this or that.’ Otherwise you are boasting about your own pretentious plans, and all such boasting is evil (James 4:13-16).
*We measure success in books sold, God measures it in lives changed. Suppose I drive to a book signing and sell no books, but I have one conversation that puts someone (that someone might be me) on a better path. A successful trip!
*All the things you say here about marketing, Rachel, are true and good. Let’s just remember to invite God to the planning sessions.
My friend James…. ? I bet conversations with your dad were very interesting.
I agree. I’ve done workshops on the Bible for kids with no outward gain, but knowing that maybe some of the children will know more about the Bible than they did and maybe even start reading it.
This is good stuff. There are so many costs involved in signings if you don’t do them at a bookstore, too. Purchasing books to sell, paying sales tax on them, any “decor” for your table, percentage of sales for credit card reader, etc… Some book events charge a table fee, too. I’m still in trial and error mode!
Great post, Rachel. Truly food for thought.
* Book signings are pretty easy to quantify in terms of profitability, but there are other avenues that can be awfully difficult. A FB ad campaign…unless you can offer a coupon and see how often it’s used, there would seem to be no way to directly correlate sales with investment (Click-throughs would work to at least see how many people went to your Amazon page, but I don’t know if Amazon gives you the information of how many of these actually make a purchase.)
* I’d be wary of the “We’ll market your book!” websites. From what I’ve heard, they will market it, yes, but according to their own lowest-common-denominator protocols. If they’re working for a flat fee, they’ve already done what they set out to do when you pay.
* Too, it’s good to remember that marketing ideas can have success specific to a time and place, and that re-using one that been known to work doesn’t guarantee future success. You’ll never know why. I ran into this during the brief period when I sold art-history AV software by direct mail; a ‘time-limited postcard special’ for a set of specific titles had a huge response, but a year later another postcard (for a different set of titles that had shown even greater appeal) fell on its can. The only reason I could see (and never prove) was that the second went out in an election year (it was a fall mailing) and may have been sidelined by the PO so that the more time-constrained election materials could be delivered. There was some indication that this was so; people were calling after the expiration date, saying that the card had just arrived.
* The best marketing is Jesus’ way. Word of mouth. Make the message compelling to heal a common hurt in every reader, and they won’t stop talking about you.
It’s good to know this before being published. Knowing the expenses WILL be coming (some fine day), I should prepare accordingly.
Thanks, Rachel, both for the reality check and for the reminder of the up side to a down turning marketing effort–if this happens to be the year I need to file with Uncle Sam on my writing. In my disappointment over the lack of success of my recent release efforts, I forgot about them having potential as a tax write off. 🙁
I’m also trying to think positively about another statement you made: “It’s extremely hard to know what the actual monetary gains will be from a marketing effort.” Ain’t that the truth!I do hope something I did will pay off in the future! Even though I did all the things I’ve done in previous releases (except for free days) plus had a better cover (and paid for medical and forensic consultation), I had the worst release ever. The only sure thing in this business is that there are no guarantees!
On a humorous note, the more I keep trying on the latest release, the more my previous release sells. Go figure!
This is a great post, Rachel. Such a good reminder to think AHEAD about the goal of each effort and what “payoff” would help a writer measure success.One thing I’ve learned is that as a career moves forward, a writer may not want to continue doing events they did at first. Or they may add something they didn’t do at first. number of books sold. In recent years, I’ve decided that one measure of success for an event is the potential for long term relationship. Public librarians have been very good to me, and I enjoy supporting their efforts with the occasional free program (at which I always have a book sales table to help cover expenses). When I had young children at home, I didn’t have the freedom to participate in marketing events that I have now. As life changes, so must our marketing activites.
Great advice!