Book promotion survey results

June 29th 2007 at 10:25 am

Mindy Klasky did a survey on how people buy books and got hundreds of responses back.

Now, it’s not hard to realize that people responding on an LJ or blog will rate electronic finding means fairly high. That being said, I still find the results useful. Any information is more than what we have.

Not too long ago I suggested that this would be a great thing for SFWA to do but got comments back about how hard it would be to do, how biased the data, and was generally discouraged that I would ever see something like that done there, so I put it on my list of surveys to run here at some point in the future. So I was super-chuffed to see Mindy run it. In this day and age you can get some useful data by just getting enough people to link something. Props to the mighty pipes of the internet.

The results line up with RWA and other general book surveys, with the top 3 being:

1. Previous familiarity with author’s other work
2. Recommendation of friend
3. Reading about book on another person’s blog or website

Paperback Writer also jumped in to talk about Promotion That Doesn’t Suck as a result of the survey. Why, because spam emails, postcards, and widgety stuff was last on the list.

Her point was that you should look for fun stuff to do that lines up with your strengths.

And I totally agree.

On the other hand, unlike PPW, I actually enjoy going to conventions and making readings and signings part of my fun things to do. I really enjoy signing stock, meeting booksellers, and meeting my readers in person.

Seth Godin talks about needing to find the people who will spread the word about your book, and that initial find has to come from somewhere.

How will someone ever be previously aware of your book, or a friend have read it to recommend it, or someone blog about it, unless they first read the book?

The first three items are already ‘rolling’ transmissions. They rely on someone having read the book already, which is a closed loop. That isn’t the author’s problem, the problem is getting someone to a) hear about the book and b) buy the book.

Getting reviews can be tough as well. My attempt to fix that is things like trying to get as many copies, even if by my own nickel and hand, to people in review locations as I can. I spend a lot of time and energy on that.

So stripping those out we’re left with these:

Reading about book on author’s blog or website 246 (64.2%)

Reading first chapter of book online or in store 242 (63.2%)

Cover art 241 (62.9%)

Cover or flap blurbs (promotional quotes) 221 (57.7%)

Published (print or electronic) book review 216 (56.4%)

Attending a reading or signing event with author (including a convention) 205 (53.5%)

Bookseller or librarian recommendation 163 (42.6%)

Now since our readers were biased towards the web, I would safely discard the first one there as a bias until we were able to do a survey aimed outside the blog readership who took this poll (while not discounting it as a useful tool).

That leaves reading the first chapter, the cover art, and the blurbs as the next 3 effective ways you can gain readers who would be able to contribute to the big three ones (recs, previous familiarity, general enthusiasm).

As an author, you have minimal control of the art. Light a candle and pray, even if you’re a nonbeliever. It’s worth a shot through sheer butterfly effect, right? (I say this as someone who’s been given beautiful covers thanks to the incomparable Irene Gallo and my wonderful editor Paul Stevens). But you can control the first chapter! Make it a knockout, test it with readers, test variations with readers, etc. The blurbs? You may or may not have control, but if you’re someone who is well known and friendly and professional, you might be able to get lucky there, I’d think.

Here are the next.

Contest sponsored by author or publisher
29 (7.6%)

Receiving postcard in mail from author
15 (3.9%)

Receiving promotional email from author
22 (5.7%)

Receiving toys or other promotional gimmicks from author
11 (2.9%)

Obviously, focusing on these comes after you’ve tried to get the best blurbs you could and written the best damn first chapter you could. But look, they do affect some people. 22 people did actually respond to getting a promo email.

If they end up being lifetime readers, how many people will they recommend your book to? Or how many more books will they buy?

While it doesn’t look effective, these people did come on board thanks to these lesser efforts.

I think the mistake some newer writers make is focusing on these too much, but I think, like a diversified stock portfolio, these high risk promotion items, if not a huge time and financial sink, can pay off by finding you new readers who then play into your top three promotional results.

I do have a widget of my own. I give away free magnets. I like them because they’re somewhat practical. They hold up crap on your fridge, I know they’re useful because I take them from businesses and use them for my fridge. If I ever need my lawn aerated, I know just the place. Some of my friends are dubious, but the magnets have paid for themselves. One bookseller at a very large chain store told me, a year and a half later, that she’d dropped the magnet on her file cabinet’s front after meeting me. Every once in a while she’d see the magnet, then check and see if my book was in stock, and if not, reorder.

It wasn’t a huge number of books, but the cost of the magnet being well under a quarter, and my royalty on each book being made being a bit more than a quarter, that paid for itself.

So yeah, you’ll get me to stop offering magnets when you pry them out of my cold, dead hands!

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