My president’s letter for the BAIPA News [January 2009]

I read an article the other day about a fine classical musician playing his Stradivarius violin in the subway in Washington DC during rush hour. The experiment, by the Washington Post, was filmed to see what would happen.

The violinist, Joshua Bell, played for 43 minutes while 1097 people passed by. The environment he was playing in was at the top of some escalators with a shoeshine stand and a busy kiosk selling lottery tickets, magazines and newspapers nearby. Nothing happened for three minutes – when someone actually looked at him playing. He got his first donation soon after. No one even stopped to listen until six minutes had passed. In all, seven people stopped to listen for at last one minute — 7 out of 1097. Less than 1%.

He collected $52.16 ($20 from the one person who recognized him) compared to the more than $1000 per minute he can command for playing in concert halls. Out of 1097 people who walked by, 27 gave money, 7 stopped to listen and 1 recognized the musician.

What was going on? What, you might ask, does this have to do with my book or my publishing company? It has to do with context and where you play your music, where you promote your books. Joshua Bell was playing music people expect to hear in a totally different environment – the subway was not his usual venue and the audience was not his usual one and the energy, the expectations were completely off-kilter.

The marketing terms for talking about these issues might include target audience (who do you want to hear your pitch, your music), the medium (where do you want this message to be placed – magazine or bookstore) and overall context – who is doing what where when they see or hear your message.

These are important issues to consider when you are looking at your options. Are you going to spend time being interviewed by a radio host whose audience is interested in romance novels and you are selling a book about business? Are you going to spend time speaking to a workshop full of dreamers when you are selling tax advice? Or are you standing in a subway playing classical music to a distracted audience during rush hour?

It’s fascinating really to think about what environment you want to be in, which ones will work better for you, where your music will be heard the way you want someone to hear it. You might think everyone will buy your book and that it appeals to everyone under all circumstances. I guarantee you, that is not the case. Even if your book is truly important to the survival of the planet, there will be those who, even if interested, won’t get your message – because they won’t know of it, because they won’t hear it the way you think you’ve said it, because the place or time or associations with the book will connect your book to something they don’t like. You can’t please everyone, so don’t expect to. But you can often control the context in which some will find out about you.

If the subway is the right place, go for it. But if it isn’t, find the right context – it matters.

Article link: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/04/AR2007040401721.html

My president’s letter for the BAIPA News [January 2009]

You know you have to do it. You know books won’t sell without it. But what if you are a reluctant marketer?

What if you hate selling? Promoting yourself? What if you are shy? Or can’t imagine doing any of John Kremer’s “1001 Ways to Market Your Books.”

Egads, what do you do then?

First, take a deep breath. Second, find a support system – one friend, a BAIPA member, a PR or publicity person. Find someone you can connect with on this topic. For those of us who are reluctant marketers, and I am one, it is hard, if not impossible, to do this alone. Sometimes it’s even contrary to our nature.

Next, make a bunch of lists: what you can do – and what you can’t; what is easy for you to do – and what isn’t; what you’re good at – and what you aren’t; what comes naturally to you. Maybe it’s just one thing. Maybe you can blog online. Maybe you can speak in front of groups. Maybe you can talk on the radio. Or read your stories to children. Maybe you already know all about book groups.

Maybe… well you see where I’m going with this. And what Kremer’s book can help you with is to see possibilities. It’s not a to-do list. You don’t have to start on page one and do all 1001 things.

Finally, make a list of what you hate to do (or think you would hate to do) to market your book. What are those tasks that actually make you nauseous when you think about doing them?

As you build these lists, be honest with yourself. See where the positives overlap and where the negatives overlap. Sit with it. Find one or two things you can do fairly easily without a huge investment of time, energy, and money. If at all possible, identify something you think might actually be fun.

And finally, do some brainstorming to figure out who your natural allies might be. If this is too hard to do alone, find someone who’s good at this to help you generate ideas that you can follow up on later.

For me, there are many things about marketing and selling that I hate. I hate networking. I hate selling – “Please, won’t you buy my books?” I hate spending time even thinking about selling my books.

But, what I can do is blog. I can do a podcast. I am not afraid of technology, so I can use online tools. I can read out loud in public and stand in front of groups and give a workshop.

And I can change the language around this process. And sometimes that’s enough — Don’t call it selling — call it building community. Don’t call it networking — call it finding your natural allies. Don’t call it selling out – call it finding your audience.

Spend some time finding those few things you can, and even like to, do. The effort is worth it.

Another letter for the BAIPA News [December 2008]

It matters to us in the book world that people read, or don’t read, books. We have all read the sad statistics* about books and reading, such as:

• 58% of US adult population never reads another book after high school
• 80% of US families did not buy or read a book last year
• 42% of college graduates never read another book
• 33$ of high school graduates never read another book
• 57% of new books are not read to completion

And yet… our president-elect, Barack Obama, reads books. And there is a great picture of him (http://papercuts.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/05/21/what-obama-is-reading/) at the airport in Bozeman Montana – he has his finger in a book to mark his place. What a great image!

Why does this matter to us?

Books are important. Books are about ideas and about communicating ideas. Some have called Obama brilliant, curious, and prepared. I believe books are part of who he is and who he has become. Reading is a critical act and helps train our brains to be critical as well. Words allow our minds to imagine things as we read, where pictures and TV and videos can often limit this activity.

It matters because the president leads us by example. Others will copy him. More people will read books because he does. The fact that he reads books and talks about what he reads and his staff talks about what he reads makes me believe that the statistics about reading books may well rise over the next few years. They may even rise in our poorer communities. He even admits he reads books more than once. This has to be good for everyone in the book world.

There also seems to be a book bubble right now. I see books by the left and the right and everything in between – by reporters and professors and intellectuals.

It’s good to know many are reading books and that books seem to be in the news more now. But, in some ways this doesn’t really affect us. We still need to go through the steps of publishing – making sure our books are written, edited, designed, and produced professionally. And to succeed, we need to market our books and our authors well.

But what it does do that helps us is perhaps give us confidence that we are moving into a time when books matter, when ideas matter, when thoughtful consideration of issues matters. This is true no matter your point of view. And this is true for fiction as well as non-fiction. I find myself interested in what progressives and economists and conservatives have to say. I find my brain lighting up with all these points of view and this sense, this deep sense, that all these words printed on pages matter and I am at a feast.

What a great time to be in the book business!

* Sources for statistics about books, the book industry and reading:

http://www.parapublishing.com/sites/para/resources/statistics.cfm

http://www.bookpublishing.com

Another letter for the BAIPA News [November 2008]

What is the value of an organization? For many BAIPA members it is our monthly meetings, our annual daylong workshop, the sharing of our experiences. It is very much about community, which I’ve written about before. But one other way an organizations is valuable is the other organizations it has relationships with.

BAIPA has some long-standing relationships that are worth talking about, again. And we are looking to develop more relationships that will benefit you, our members.

So, today, I’m going to talk about IBPA, WNBA, and SPAN. At the end of this article are the web addresses for these three organizations, where you can go to find out more about them, sign up for their newsletters or become members yourselves.

WNBA, Women’s National Book Association, is our most powerful sister organization. The speaker at our last meeting, Joan Gelfand, is their National President and Joan spoke to us about her winding journey through publishing. WNBA invites us to all their events and gives us the member discount to attend. The have meetings sporadically, but somehow members seem to network all the time anyway. They have developed a very strong local community and are connected nationally by their other regional chapters. They have a mix of traditionally published and independently published authors and they support literacy efforts in a big way. Several BAIPA members belong to WNBA and that membership is discounted because we are BAIPA l organization is based in New York, local chapter is based in San Francisco.

IBPA, Independent Book Publishers Association, is a very large, national organization, based in Southern California. Formerly called PMA, IBPA in my opinion has the best set of programs and services for small publishers like us. They have distribution programs, review submission programs, and marketing programs of varying size. They send email alerts when something happens in the industry or when someone is asking for submissions or information – which gives us a chance to participate early and not have to do all the legwork ourselves. Nationally known figures like Brian Jud are active participants in their email lists. And they have a long list of discounts for things that are relevant to publishers, such as distributor discounts, subscription discounts (i.e. 50% off Publishers Weekly), publishers liability insurance and health insurance. They offer educational resources like PMA University at BEA (Book Expo America) and Mini-U seminars with their affiliates, and online webinars as well. BAIPA is a regional affiliate (there are 28 more across the country) and IBPA has a wide variety of members nationally – from authors and publishers to book professionals to vendors. IBPA is based in Manhattan Beach, CA.

SPAN, Small Publishers Association of North America, focuses on advancing the interests and expertise of independent publishers and authors through educational opportunities and discounted services. Their benefits educate, save you money, and help you to gain access to book distribution channels. They divide these benefits into four main categories: 
Information and networking; 
Production, shipping, and distribution; 
Marketing; Lifestyle and business. SPAN’s newsletter is one of the best, containing many relevant articles and resources. They are based in Colorado Springs, CO.

BAIPA is just one node in the network, there are others. These three organizations bear looking at more closely – for local community, for resources, for programs that can help you be a more successful publisher. Let us know if you find these affiliate organizations helpful – or if you don’t. With your feedback, we can make our relationships better and make them work harder for you.

Check them out!

• IBPA, Independent Book Publishers Association: www.ibpa-online.org/
• SPAN, Small Publishers Association of North America: www.spannet.org/
• WNBA, Women’s National Book Association: national – www.wnba-books.org/ | local - www.wnba-sfchapter.org/

Another article for the BAIPA News [October 2008]

Last month I wrote about the author-editor relationship and the emotional component of that relationship. It occurs to me that as you build your publishing business, this is just the first among many relationships you will develop along the way.

Many of us are authors as well as publishers and this discussion applies to you as well. When I think of famous artists, there are very very few who achieve great success without help, without a team effort. I think of Picasso and Monet and I think of wives and brothers, and cousins and agents who believed in them, who ran their businesses. That’s how we need to think about our business – as an author or as a publisher.

We need to think about building our teams. It’s critical. Sometimes your team is a spouse or a partner; sometimes it is a mix of vendors and customers. Whatever way you look at it, there will be a team to manage all the pieces of the publishing puzzle.

So, how do we go about doing this? One of the most important pieces of consulting I do with my clients is to get into a truly thoughtful discussion about what they want to do themselves and what they do not want to do themselves. I make them ask questions like: What is my role? What will be the roles of others? And who will these “others” be?

I know, for myself, that there are tasks I do not want to do even if I am able to do them. For those, I need to find team members. One example is marketing – I can help others figure out their marketing efforts and I can see patterns in their projects and can elicit what they are good at and what they can do – but I’m not so good at doing this for myself. I am a reluctant marketer. So, I need to build my team to balance that lack. I am now working with a couple of different people to help me see my own path.

On the other hand, while I am a writer and an author, I also love to design books. In this case, my team for book design is just me – my author self working with my book design self. But, even in this process, I usually ask someone else to take a look along the way to ensure I can still see the forest and to provide an outside perspective. I do this when I write – I ask others to read my work and provide feedback. And now I do it for book design as well.

For the business end of things – the management of inventory, the management of distribution and sales – I find other team members. My interest, my passion, and my skills are in the area of creation and production of the book itself. I want the other pieces to work, but I don’t want to do them.

You, on the other hand, will have different likes, different skills, and different aversions. As we move along this path, we find those we like to work with and those we can lean on and those who do their work so well we can’t imagine doing things without them.

Take some time to figure this out – it will make your publishing business go more smoothly and will help your authoring business do better, and you will be happier and more satisfied. 

Do what you’re good at, what you like to do, and find others to do the rest. This is a business and you need to manage it, even if you don’t perform all the tasks yourself. You are in charge of the team and you need to manage them.

Given the constraints the bailouts and the economy will have on the new president, it seems that we should look at, first, what we can do that will cost no (or little) money. Please share other ideas!

• Release the scientists (let them communicate with other scientists, let them speak — i.e. Jim Hansen of NASA on climate change)
• Review current rules and regulations and start enforcing the ones that fit our vision
  • FDA
  • EPA
  • Fed Reserve
• Make all government transactions more transparent and more understandable

• Plan to use the bully pulpit to stake our positions, challenge the public, open our arms, speak to the world
• Review all subsidies; identify those that need to be re-focused; enforce oversight that already exists; make transparent; determine how to re-focus on future vision
  • Auto industry
  • Ethanol / corn industry
  • ADM, farm,
  • Oil industry (i.e. keep some subsidies but only if they are used for green/ future)
• Identify those in the pentagon who can look forward to helping us figure out how to use our military most effectively, as last resort, not first resort
• Begin legal process to close loopholes
  • Enron
• Hire Al Gore as energy / environment/ climate czar (across departments and agencies) [cabinet level position]
• Ask for reports and assessment from professional bureaucracies on how to get us back on track
• Tell Americans and the world the truth
  • Economy
  • Global interconnectedness
  • Climate change
  • Education
  • Health care
  • Price of energy
• Ask us to do something specific
• Talk to the mayors and governors who are way ahead of the Federal government on critical issues: energy, climate, environment, health care, social justice – ask for their advice on how to best support them and get our of their way (beyond money)
  • CA
  • NY
  • WA
  • OR
  • Seattle driven commitment (To date, 884 U.S. mayors have signed the Mayors’ Climate Protection Agreement to meet the Kyoto Protocol standards by 2012 per Washington Post 10/7/08 – If They Came Here… Tuesday, October 7, 2008; Page A21)
• Ask for a panel / study of prisons and how to reduce % of our populations that is in prison
• Ask for a symposium of far left and far right to identify common ground on major issues
• Close Guantanamo
• Review progress on Katrina
• Review and recommend health care system that focuses on prevention rather than disease
• Recommend new cars and rental cars don’t have headlights on during the day
• Recommend that cities and buildings review and reduce light pollution
• Review subsidies and tax rates and refocus benefits for companies that hire in the US and keep jobs in the US
• Review economic aid to other countries to make sure that we are getting our fair share of aid, recommend reductions especially if they are not focused on education and self-sustainability (see recent article about Indian programs)
• Review subsidies and tax policy for charities that provide no benefit to US (all offshore efforts, especially the big ones like Gates / Buffet)
• Review and recommend compensation policies – and work it through tax benefits – to re-balance workers and executive pay – so economy will function better – if economy is based on shopping, we need more shoppers out of debt
• Approve CA + NY + 15 other states resetting auto emissions standards – Fed so far has resisted.
• Identify and reward companies that are leading in global warming, renewable energy, Slow Food, LEED initiatives.

Another article for the BAIPA News [September 2008]

The relationship between author and editor is probably the most highly charged relationship in the publishing process. As an author you are giving your editor permission to change your story. You are turning your baby over to another person who can change the meaning, the voice, even the essential nature of your manuscript.

In many cases, this is a very good thing. In business books in particular re-structuring the manuscript can make it stronger. And often your editor has a better handle on the marketplace and can help you tap into that marketplace more directly.

For others of you, your manuscript is part of you. It is personal and intimate and you may feel vulnerable when reading it, showing it to others, pitching it, or asking for advice.

What this means is that, when you have an emotional attachment to your book, you need to understand how to manage the process when you may be feeling vulnerable. You are critical to the editing process and need to maintain some semblance of control. You need to know what is essential to you about your book (i.e. the main message, your voice, the plot, the characters, the hero’s journey, your point of view on politics or business). What will you do if your editor wants to change these critical elements in ways that you do not buy into?

Before you hire an editor, find out as much as you can about his or her prejudices and see where your book falls into that spectrum. Remember that your editor is only one person with one opinion.

I am currently reading a colleague’s novel and I find myself saying over and over “Are you sure I am the right one to read this novel?” It’s not that I don’t want to be helpful because I do. It’s not that I don’t want the job or the money, because I do. I have confidence in my ability to help and offer valuable insights and direction, but with this particular book and because I know my own prejudices I wasn’t sure I was the right choice. He had said “The novel is experimental (always a clue that it might be too out there for me) it is dense and shifts time frames, it is sort of science fiction and might be confusing until the end. You might have to read it really slowly to understand all the layers.” Yikes!

So, I started, and I saw that working in phases would be good. After reading about 85 pages we met and again I indicated I might not be the right person because I am not the target reader who would buy this book. I am a woman, not a young man. While the time shifting wasn’t a problem, the fact that I couldn’t identify the hero’s journey or quest was a huge problem. And none of the characters connected with each other emotionally. One of my prejudices is that I like books with a character I can relate to; I want the protagonist to be on a heroic journey; and I want the hero or heroine to face challenges and somehow deal with demons or change over the course of the novel. And I want some level of emotional awareness and connection. I expressed these feelings to the author. He still wanted my input, and he now knows where I am coming from, so he can evaluate my suggestions within that context.

So, what does this mean to you? Be aware of your own feelings as you move through the process. Be aware that your editor is just one person with one opinion and there are other opinions out there. Recognize that the editorial process is important and take the time to do it right. If you feel vulnerable ask someone to be your sounding board, a neutral third party as you feel your way along. Be willing to stop and find someone else if your first selection for an editor does not work. Recognize that this is a highly charged situation and proceed thoughtfully. Keep asking yourself the question: Has my editor improved my work or just changed it? If your editor has strengthened your work, be happy. This is the job you hired her to do.

Many think we in the book world are an endangered species. That in the brave new world there will be no books. It reminds me of radio in the 50s when television hit the country. It was going to be the end of radio. Oh my gosh, with pictures on TV who would want to just listen to a radio. And radio did suffer. Their audience declined, the industry moaned and groaned. And today with satellite radio and the Internet and podcasts and rss feeds, radio (audio programs) is thriving. That’s what happening to publishing.

Books aren’t going away. Bookstores won’t disappear completely, but there will be a transformation. We don’t really know what the future will look like, but we do have inklings.

We need to think of ourselves in larger ways – like oil companies need to think of themselves as energy companies, we need to think of ourselves as content delivery companies. Yes it’s still publishing,
but books, printed books, are only one way to deliver the goods. Many of us in BAIPA are already doing this, and that’s great. Keep going.

Whether it’s fiction or non-fiction, what we want are readers and people who buy our content. Do we really care if they buy a printed book, an ebook, or an audio book? I don’t.

For many of us, the printed book will remain the ideal – it’s a great delivery medium and I love the feel of a book in my hand. I love reading books. There is something intimate, physical, and personal about the whole process. I love having walls of books as my main decorating style.

Talking about content doesn’t sound as romantic as when we talk about printed books, but it’s real and it can make you money. Figure out how your audience, your readers, wants to get your content and then provide it – in some cases it may not even be printed books. Just like some audio media is not radio in the traditional sense.

Some of us may have one book or one idea – so take the opportunity to deliver this idea, this content in as many ways as makes sense to you. Check out Lee Foster’s web site http://www.fostertravel.com/ to see how one member is managing his content.

Another letter for the BAIPA News [July 2008]

Being an author and a publisher can pull at us in different ways – and being small, independent publishers means that there are dozens of tasks we need to complete on a regular basis. Some days I get up gung-ho and step right into the external tasks on my plate – calling people, making connections, negotiating, asking for help. And some days I turn off my phone and write or read. I used to fight this. I used to push myself to make those calls or I’d get angry with myself if I couldn’t sit down and read a manuscript or write.

These days I try to be gentler with myself. I not only recognize that my energy is different at different times, on different days, but that the energy needed to write is very different from the energy needed to negotiate a contract.

I’m looking at this as externally focused activities and internally focused activities. The internally focused activities are quieter for me; they are tasks that are more intimate, more about me and the task and don’t involve others, at least while I am doing them. The external activities often involve others, whether I am talking to a client, a bookstore owner, networking, or attending a conference.

It is hard for me to combine internal and external activities in the same block of time. Some days I can get up and write – and then move into outward facing activities. Others can get up and face outward – and toward the end of the day go inward and write or design. But, I usually like to break these down into larger blocks.

An agent I met at a writing conference said he scheduled Thursdays at home and that was the day he read manuscripts. It was, for him, an “a ha” moment. He recognized that he could not read the manuscripts fairly when he was at his office where the phones were ringing and people could interrupt him. Sometimes we need thoughtful quiet time and sometimes we thrive in high energy environments, multi-tasking, and interruptions.

Watch your own energy patterns and use them to your advantage. We are all different with our needs for solitude and being out among others. Find out what works for you and then let yourself use your own rhythms to your best advantage.

Another of my letters for the BAIPA News [June 2008]

In my email yesterday, I got the Writers Digest newsletter and the subject line read “Push Past Writer’s Block” – it made me think about how we begin to move, how we begin after a fallow time, how we are able to act when it all seems so hard.

Taking these steps, these positive steps – I call them baby steps — is important. And it’s equally important to acknowledge taking these steps, whatever they are, to move you onward.

I must confess I don’t respond well to the word “Push” because it speaks to me of effort, Herculean effort, and it feels so very difficult – like pushing rocks uphill. When this happens, we may need to sit back and breath before moving again. Writer’s block resembles any creative block, and for me, any block that gets in the way of the things I want to do, or need to do – whether that is writing something on a blank page, calling that book store to find out about how they treat local authors, or asking a friend to look at my book….

I get curious about sayings – and I start to wonder – what is a “Baby Step” anyway? How big is it? What does it mean when an adult takes a baby step? I realized that often when we talk about taking baby steps it can be heard as derogatory – as a negative comment on someone’s inability to do something that appears to be easy – pick up that phone, write a few words on a page, ask for support. But if you really think about what a baby step is – to the baby it’s a very big deal. That first step, or that small step – when looked at from the perspective of a baby – and the size of a baby – that little, almost insignificant step – is huge.

Today, I love taking baby steps. And I speak with friends about taking one step at a time. Putting one foot in front of the other. And what’s so interesting to me is that after taking that first difficult step, the others don’t seem quite so hard. And sometimes we can get into a rhythm and a speed that makes our doubts and our slow starts seem like distant memories.

At one of our meetings someone talked about this whole business of independent publishing as being a marathon. And what is a marathon but a whole series of individual steps. Give yourself credit when you take a step. Give yourself special credit when you take a baby step. You deserve it. Whether it seems hard or easy, acknowledge these little, terribly significant steps.

To read the Writer’s Digest article on Writer’s Block

To get the Writer’s Digest newsletter