As an acquisition’s editor at a New York publisher, I often speak with authors about their dreams and ambitions for their book. Many authors want their book to become a bestseller. Every business has a pinnacle of success. It is the ultimate mark of achievement. In book publishing, this mark of success is tied to winning a particular award or getting your book on a particular bestseller list. Many writers proclaim their book will be a New York Times bestseller. While it is an admirable goal, just making such a statement is another publishing myth because of the difficulty involved. It is equivalent to a brand-new actor proclaiming he is going to win an Oscar. Eventually, this actor may win an Oscar, but rarely does it happen right away.
When an author lands on the New York Times list, the achievement is forever carried with their publishing life. They are introduced as a New York Times bestselling author. In many ways, it is the holy grail of publishing to achieve such a milestone. I’ve never achieved such a milestone, but I know a number of authors who have reached this goal. Several years ago, I moderated a panel with three members of the American Society of Journalists and Authors who have become New York Times bestselling authors.
As the moderator, I pulled together the speakers and organized the session into three parts: the pitch or the proposal, the writing, and the promotion and life changes that came from the experience. I asked each speaker to pull together some tips and suggestions into a handout.
This event is at a “members only session” for the ASJA. In other words, you have to be a member of this organization (about 1400) and have registered for the conference and traveled to New York City for the event (an even smaller number). Here’s the handout for this event (www.terrylinks.com/nytwh). This document is nine pages of solid information and insight.
I encourage you as an author to continue to market your book, yet understand reaching the New York Times bestseller list is not easy or simple. Many people seek it but few attain it. For the majority of authors, it is a myth for them to reach any bestseller list—not just the New York Times bestseller list but others like the Los Angeles Times or Wall Street Journal.
In this article, I want to focus on several practical steps every author can take to help generate additional book sales on an ongoing basis. One of the most neglected areas for authors is the book launch. From working with authors on book production, the final push to complete a book and get it ready to print can be grueling. There is a lot of detail work to finalize a book for printing and when it is finished, there is a huge relief. Yet it is not a time to stop and do nothing. This silent period is called the pre-launch stage. To become an effective book selling author, it is time for you to crank even more energy into this pre-sales process.
Many authors let down and do nothing during this stage. The exceptions and successful authors will use this time to promote the pre-sales on the book, write press related materials, hire a publicist and gather a launch team or at least people to write reviews. I’m going to give you more details about each of these activities.
Create a Pre-Launch Campaign
The period when the book has been completely produced and finalized but not released into the bookstore is called the pre-sales season. As an author, one of the most effective actions you can take is to organize a pre-sales campaign. Dave Jarworski, was one of the early employees at Microsoft and the winner of the first Microsoft sales award from Bill Gates. He ran an effective pre-sales campaign for the launch of his book. After he left Microsoft, Dave and I worked together at Christianity.com. We kept in touch and Dave wrote a book about Microsoft called Microsoft Secrets (www.microsoftsecrets.com). Dave gathered unusual resources with his book such as some unpublished videos and launched a pre-sales campaign for this book. If you pre-ordered the book, and after your order, returned to Dave and told him (giving an order number for example), you got access to these extras. The pre-sales campaign drove people to pre-order the book from different bookstores.
Also the pre-sales campaign is something Morgan James can promote to our bookstore sales team who in turn promoted it to the bookstores. When Microsoft Secrets launched, the physical books were sold into the majority of the bookstores throughout North America and Canada. Authors who do not have a pre-sales campaign will sell into a limited number of physical bookstores, but because of the pre-launch campaign, Microsoft Secrets received much broader distribution than normal (and increased sales as a result).
Because a successful campaign was launched for the book, this author activity spilled into other areas such as foreign rights. At this writing, Microsoft Secrets has been sold into two additional languages besides English, Vietnamese and Simple Chinese. Ironically after 22 years away from Microsoft, Dave Jaworski rejoined Microsoft as an employee. Worldwide Microsoft has over 154,000 employees. To create this pre-sales campaign, you can study the activities of other authors and watch how they launch their books. You may need a website or other help with this process. Get several recommendations before selecting the right person to help you. The key difference maker to become a bestseller it to take consistent action to be telling people about your book and where it is available. Finally, every author needs to have a realistic view of their book and what can happen with it.
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