Fugal Promotion Tips

My guest this week is Carolyn Howard-Johnson, award winning novelist and author of the The HowToDoItFrugally Series for authors. Today I'm asking her questions about her book The Frugal Book Promoter.


Welcome Carolyn, first I have to tell you how much I love your subtitle HOW TO DO WHAT YOUR PUBLISHER WON’T and using the word “Frugal” for your series was brilliant. (I also love your unforgettable last name.)

Ahhh, subtitles. That alone is a subject I love. Many have noticed that they are getting longer. That's because readers find books these days by using keywords. So savvy authors will try to work more keywords into their titles and subtitles so that they are found more often on, say, Amazon's search engine. Also, a good subtitle that shows benefits and maybe even tells people (scares them a little bit?) what they will miss if they don't read the book.

Thus, if I were writing The Frugal Book Promoter today, I might lengthen that subtitle a tad--and spice it up a bit. The next in that series is The Frugal Editor: Put Your Best Book Forward to Avoid Humiliation and Ensure Success.  When I'm speaking, writers tend to laugh at the "humiliation" part.  But they laugh because they know its true.

Maybe that is a place to start. How does the author know what a publisher will do for them?

Well, first they read the publisher's Web site. If they have an agent, they ask them. That's the agent's job. An agent should negotiate for more. And they ask the publisher questions before they sign the contract.  But after all that, an author shouldn't expect much until their name has an Ann LaMott or John Grisham ring to it.

Is it in the contract?

Sometimes and sometimes not. Things can change quickly at publishing companies and contracts can be misleading. It's best to have an attorney specializing in publishing look the contract over. But better insurance is to learn how to do publicity yourself. Because it's an almost 100% chance that you will have to do it--at least in part. You can be a better partner for a house publicist should you be so lucky to be assigned one.

How does an author avoid duplications and misunderstandings?

After years of consulting with authors, I think this is almost an impossible expectation. New authors tend to have stars in their eyes and therefore miss or misinterpret the details. That's why I tell authors to learn as much as they can by reading and taking classes and getting outside help when possible. And, by the way, choose those sources carefully, too. There’s lots of misinformation going around the Web.

The best antidote for avoiding trouble going into a new venture is trying to see the publisher's side of any situation. Money is tight. The publishing industry changes daily. If you have a traditional publisher, they are the ones taking all the monetary risks and deserve to make a profit. Yes, they do. (-: 

One more question. You tell fiction authors to think like a non-fiction author to find ways to promote. Can you give me an example?

Look at the different themes in your book.  There are angles there you can exploit when you’re talking to editors. My first book, THIS IS THE PLACE is sort of romantic (a romance Web site will like it) but it is also set in Salt Lake City, the site where the winter games were played in 2002 and, though that’s a reach, I found sports desks and feature editors open to it as Olympics © fervor grew and even as it waned because they were desperate for material as the zeal for the games wound down.


And One more question. I’ve seen lists telling new authors what to do. You know, get a website, join loops, blog, twitter, print bookmarks, etc. etc. How does a fiction author with a small online publisher know what is working?

I use Google's Analytics feature and StatCounter.com. But here's the danger. Marketing campaigns are about a whole lot more than statistics. Success can't even be measured in sales because you are building a writing career, not selling books. And because marketing is an entity, not one small part. And with the Web working so interactively, it's important not to give up on something because you don't think you see any results. Everything is not cut and dried. Perserverance and motivation (meaning choosing the promotion you enjoy) are key. Repetition, too.


That's a great way to look at promotion. Thanks for sharing so much with my readers. 

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