Tag Archives: Seth Godin

Planting the Seed

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We often equate book publicity with planting a seed. You have a written a novel (or self-help manual or cookbook or memoir). You have published it (either through a major publishing house, a small press, self-publishing, or e-book). It is ready to go out into the work or it’s already out there on shelves or online.

Now you’re ready for people to start talking about it!

So where are all the reviews, interviews and coverage?

According to Bowker, 3 million books were published in 2011. Consider the staggering fact that 248,000 books were published in 2003 and the figures continued to double every year after that. Bowker estimates, as reported by Seth Godin, that the figure will grow to 15 million in 2012! That’s a lot of competition.

So how do you get your book noticed?

Slowly and with great determination, patience and effort. There is no other way around it. If you want your book to be read and reviewed, you have to reach far and wide in the media landscape. You have to be prepared to send out many review copies, and you have to wait. Following-up with the media outlets is essential, but you can’t force people to read and react to your work. You have to change your approach, think of different angles and find ways to make your story newsworthy. You have to think like a journalist and constantly scan the news for appropriate angles or areas where you can offer expertise.

The more coverage you can accumulate, the more news-worthy you will be to other media outlets. You are building “buzz.” You are building a brand. But it does take time. There is an old joke said by actors that it takes decades of hard work and dedication to become an overnight success. The same can be said for authors. The most successful publicity campaigns last for years, not months. Don’t expect to get readers and fans right out of the gate. Many times we read about instant successes and yes, they do happen. But people also win the lottery. If you want to be realistic about the process, you have to be prepared to do the work. You are building an audience slowly. Most “break out” authors have been working at this tirelessly for a very long time.

Publicity is like planting a seed. You have to nurture it, give it plenty of time and attention and it will grow. It just takes time and a lot of effort.

Seth Godin to No Longer Publish Traditionally

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Seth Godin, entrepreneur, author, public speaker and media expert, has made a decision of great significance and it is geared toward the publishing industry. He has decided that Linchpin, his 12th book, will be the last book he publishes traditionally. Here is an excerpt from his blog where he explains his decision,

Authors need publishers because they need a customer. Readers have been separated from authors by many levels–stores, distributors, media outlets, printers, publishers–there were lots of layers for many generations, and the editor with a checkbook made the process palatable to the writer. For ten years, I had a publisher as a client (with some fun self-published adventuresalong the way). Twelve bestsellers later, I’ve thought hard about what it means to have a traditional publisher.

Traditional book publishers use techniques perfected a hundred years ago to help authors reach unknown readers, using a stable technology (books) and an antique and expensive distribution system.

The thing is–now I know who my readers are. Adding layers or faux scarcity doesn’t help me or you. As the medium changes, publishers are on the defensive…. I honestly can’t think of a single traditional book publisher who has led the development of a successful marketplace/marketing innovation in the last decade. The question asked by the corporate suits always seems to be, “how is this change in the marketplace going to hurt our core business?” To be succinct: I’m not sure that I serve my audience (you) by worrying about how a new approach is going to help or hurt Barnes & Noble.

My audience does things like buy five or ten copies at a time and distribute them to friends and co-workers. They (you) forward blog posts and PDFs. They join online discussion forums. None of these things are supported by the core of the current corporate publishing model.

Since February, I’ve shared my thoughts about the future of publishing in both public forums and in private brainstorming sessions with various friends in top jobs in the publishing industry. Other than one or two insightful mavericks, most of them looked at me like I was nuts for being an optimist. One CEO worked as hard as she could to restrain herself, but failed and almost threw me out of her office by the end. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t heartbroken at the fear I saw.

All a long way of saying that as the methods for spreading ideas and engaging with people keep changing, I can’t think of a good reason to be on the defensive. It’s been years since I woke up in the morning saying, “I need to write a book, I wonder what it should be about.” Instead, my mission is to figure out who the audience is, and take them where they want and need to go, in whatever format works, even if it’s not a traditionally published book.

So Seth Godin, a man famous for predicting trends, analyzing market strategy and understanding the psyche of the modern American reader/buyer/seller is taking a formative stand and bravely going in a new direction with his work.

Seth Godin Talks Publishing

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In an interview over at 26th Story, Seth Godin talks about free content and the publishing industry. Should the publishing industry go the way of the music industry? Could it be the best move ever made? Here is what Godin had to say about it.

The market doesn’t care a whit about maintaining your industry. The lesson from Napster and iTunes is that there’s even MORE music than there was before. What got hurt was Tower and the guys in the suits and the unlimited budgets for groupies and drugs. The music will keep coming. Same thing is true with books. So you can decide to hassle your readers (oh, I mean your customers) and you can decide that a book on a Kindle SHOULD cost $15 because it replaces a $15 book, and if you do, we (the readers) will just walk away. Or, you could say, “if books on the Kindle were $1, perhaps we could create a vast audience of people who buy books like candy, all the time, and read more and don’t pirate stuff cause it’s convenient and cheap…” I’m a pessimist that the book industry will learn from music. How are you betting?

Read the rest of the interview here.

Sifting Through the Chaos

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I was recently reading through Seth Godin‘s Permission Marketing when I found a quote that struck me as particularly poignant. It was actually in the introduction written by Don Peppers.

The truth is your whole problem comes down to a question of time and energy, doesn’t it? Technically, life is easier for you than it was for your parents, because so much of the drudge work is now done by machines. But for some reason you’re busier than ever, isn’t that right? And doesn’t it seem as though every day you get still busier?

How can this be? Simple. Because there are so many more claims on your attention, that’s why. You’re already overloaded with an embarrassment of opportunities to absorb your time and expend your funds doing things, watching things, using things. But every day even more opportunities are presented to you.

I think this is an interesting and common question. With all the steps we are taking forward, are we getting lost and overwhelmed in Web 2.0? Or are we just opening our eyes to a tremendous amount of opportunities? An “embarrassment of opportunities?”

UPDATE: I found an article in the Columbia Journalism Review titled Overload! that covers this topic.