by Brian Jud
Bowker | Tue Feb 21, 2017
Authors and publishers hear the word “No” frequently. It could be said by the media, distributors, buyers in retail stores or corporate buyers. However, that doesn’t have to be the final answer. People who say no to one thing may be more likely to say yes if asked again. Use that fact to your advantage in a sales situation. If your prospect says no, think, “I heard what you said but it’s not what you meant.” You can more easily get to yes when you recognize the top ten tips for getting to yes after you hear No.
1. Show how you can solve their problems. Begin with an attitude of how you can solve peoples’ problems instead of thinking about how many books you can sell. Producers want a good show for their audiences, retail buyers want products moving off the shelf and corporate buyers want to sell more of their products.
by Richard Smith
Bowker | Tue Feb 21, 2017
If you’re an author and want to stay on top of the important issues in the world of publishing — issues that affect you — you need The Hot Sheet.
With all the chatter out there, it will help you sort through the noise with stories that focus on relevant topics from across the publishing spectrum. From author success stories to key industry statistics, you’ll find what you need to know in The Hot Sheet. Click here to Subscribe to The Hot Sheet!
The Hot Sheet, just back from a big week at AWP (the Association of Writers and Writing Programs) in Washington, has a host of issues for its subscriber-authors from the publishing industry — a busy winter!
Here's the Table of Contents:
by Miral Sattar
Bowker | Wed Feb 15, 2017
Do you feel like your book is getting lost in the millions of titles currently for sale on Amazon? There’s a lot of competition for readers’ attention and that will only get more difficult as more authors embrace the freedom of self-publishing.
Did you know that you can laser focus your marketing efforts and sell thousands of books within a month of launch with virtually no email list, no Facebook friends, and no Twitter followers.
In our next LIVE ONLINE WEBINAR on Thursday, February 23rd at 12pm, Karen Dimmick will outline how she sold 1000 books and got 43 reviews within a month of launch, with an initial email list of just seven people. Karen Dimmick is co-founder of Bookthority, the host of The Book Marketing Summit, and the co-author of the international bestselling book 47 Mind Hacks for Writers. Here's what you’ll learn:
by Penny C. Sansevieri
Bowker | Wed Feb 15, 2017
Regardless of the site you’re using to sell your books, book descriptions are more important to sales than most authors realize. Many times I’ll see blocks of text pulled from the back of the book and while, in theory, that’s not a bad idea, you’ll want to make sure that your book description is powerful, and keep an eye on formatting – things like spacing, bulleting, and bolding.
Since my largest focus is on Amazon, this article is going to focus on how to maximize your book description efforts specifically on that e-tailer, but you’ll likely find many of the ideas relate to other e-tailers as well.
by Brian Jud
Bowker | Wed Feb 8, 2017
The traditional path for selling books is changing. There are more books available to fewer readers every year. Bookstore shelves are crowded with undifferentiated books viewed as commodity items, and shoppers increasingly base their purchasing decisions on price. Yet prices are increasing, not because of greater value to the reader, but because of increased costs partially due to shorter print runs.
Unfortunately, publishers continue to produce more books to sell through bookstores even though competing in this environment is increasingly less profitable. However, there is a real opportunity to create new sales in uncontested market space among non-retail buyers in corporations, associations, schools and the military.
by Penny C. Sansevieri
Bowker | Wed Feb 1, 2017
Since 2012, when it was acquired by Facebook, Instagram has grown by 400%! It may be relatively new to the social media game, but candidly, I barely remember a time when I didn’t have an account. Here’s why:
First, Instagram is easy to use. That’s a plus in anyone’s book! Also, since it’s not as ad-driven as Facebook (at least so far), it’s much more budget-friendly if your marketing budget is limited and you prefer to allocate those funds elsewhere. It’s much easier to capture someone’s attention on Instagram than on Facebook because it’s so visual. In fact, it drives 58 times more engagement per follower than Facebook, and 120 times more than Twitter. If you like statistics, you should really like these numbers!
10 Ways to Get Creative on Instagram
by Penny C. Sansevieri
Bowker | Thu Jan 26, 2017
What is the single most significant thing you can do for building your book sales or business? If you answered, “Have a website,” then you are spot on. I am always amazed at how many people jump into building their website without any knowledge of what it involves. Especially when they know how important a great website is to their business or book sales. And although design is important, that’s not really what I’m talking about. Instead, I’m talking about the goals, the mission, and understanding the principles that go into creating something that isn’t about you. Yes, your website has information about you and your books, but it’s ultimately about your users. In the end, they are the single most important aspect of how you sell your books.
by Miral Sattar
Bowker | Mon Jan 23, 2017
Start out the year on the right side of the law! Independent authors and publishers are going to love what Bibliocrunch has in store for you in January’s free webinar with special guest panelist Attorney Stacy Grossman.
Are you self-publishing a book and curious about legal issues you might face? Does your manuscript quote from third party materials and are you unsure if you need permission from the source? Are you curious about legalese in agreements? If you’re looking for answers to these legal questions (and more!), you’ve come to the right place.
Join Stacy Grossman, an attorney with more than 20 years of experience, on January 25, 2017 as she provides answers to essential legal questions, including:
by Richard Smith
Bowker | Fri Jan 13, 2017
If you’re an author and want to stay on top of the important issues in the world of publishing — issues that affect you — you need The Hot Sheet.
With all the chatter out there, it will help you sort through the noise with stories that focus on relevant topics from across the publishing spectrum. From author success stories to key industry statistics, you’ll find what you need to know in The Hot Sheet. Click here to Subscribe to The Hot Sheet!
by Mark Gross
Bowker | Thu Jan 5, 2017
The results are in. We have finalized the results of our DCL/Bowker survey, and interestingly enough, the submitted answers point to worries over quality and consistency when content goes from print to digital.
This year was our third joint survey with Bowker, and together we probed digital publishers and self-publishing authors to find trend lines across a wide swath of important topics.
As with our 2015 survey, a topic that continued to stir interest was quality, with more than 56 percent of respondents saying it was a major concern. Other concerns were “retaining formatting” (55 percent) and “errors caused by automated conversion” (46 percent).
