Remember the moment you first dreamed of becoming a writer?
Maybe it was high school English class studying Dostoevsky’s social commentary on czarist Russia. Maybe you wrote a story and a teacher encouraged you to submit it to a school magazine. Maybe you majored in creative writing in college, mentoring under professors who touted their M.F.As or Ph.Ds teaching the mastery of literature, language, imagery and allegory.
But none of this teaches you how to write a bestseller.
Let me be frank: I enjoy literature, not commercial fiction like Dan Brown or John Grisham. But there’s a reason why “literary” books like The Kite Runner sell better than anything by Thomas Pynchon.
So what’s the key? Marketing.
Now, you may not want to think like corporate publishers. Marketing may sound like a menacing business term. But if you grasp it, you’ll be infinitely more prepared to shop around your first manuscript. Let’s break it down:
Marketing: What it is
- Knowing your target customers and what they want
- Knowing why your product attracts your customers, and
- Directing customers to your product while monitoring your competition.
It’s accomplished through market research—obtaining feedback from current and potential customers. In the business world, companies distribute surveys, analyze trends, and study competitors.
Marketing: What it isn’t
Advertising or promotion. Advertising is not synonymous with marketing. If your product has no market, no amount of promotion will sell it. In the 1990s, Sony spent a fortune developing the MiniDisc—a high-quality diskette that could record and playback sound. But nobody wanted to switch from the CD.
So what does that mean to you, a writer aspiring to publish? Simple. Save yourself some heartache and identify who would want to buy your book before you spend years writing it.
Don’t make the rookie mistake of assuming anyone could buy your book. I mean, you’re right. Anyone could. But publishers ask who wants to buy your book. To answer that, do the following:
1. Understand your readers.
Think about it. What customer buys Metamucil? Is it the same as the one who buys tooth-whitener? Probably not. So is your book is intended for readers over 40 or for those around 18-25? And if so, is your narrative style fitting? Target audiences also boil down to things like gender, ethnicity, and even annual income!
Also, keep in mind readers read for different reasons than writers write. Some readers seek strong literary work. Some desire escapism (“check-your-head-at-the-door”). Writers, on the contrary, want to express themselves. Well, you might author a complex UFO tale as an allegory for the poor and marginalized, but if your readers want Star Wars you will lose them.
2. Understand genre.
Likely, the first thing an agent will do with your manuscript is determine on what bookshelf it will sell. Will it be filed under Sci-fi? Horror? Mystery? Romance? You may feel this doesn’t do your project justice, but publishers use genre to forecast sales. So be fluent in it.
If your genre isn’t popular right now, it’s less likely they’ll consider your book. But if the genre is popular and you position your book as a fresh idea in the market, you’re exponentially more likely to get published!
3. Matching story ideas to media
Is your idea better suited for a novel, short story, screenplay or stage play? Well, it depends. Screenplays can be lucrative, but the market is flooded. Stage plays have less competition and reliance on corporate money, but have little distribution. Novels are a purer art form (in my opinion, although I’m biased), because no one can change what’s on the page. And short stories can be published virtually anywhere—a magazine, a trade journal, a website—anywhere.
Evaluate your idea. Does it have the complexity to carry a 300-page novel? Or is the payoff too small in scope? (If so, consider the short story or screenplay option.)
Be honest. Did you come up with your vampire story by reading Anne Rice or by watching Buffy? If it was Buffy, write it as a screenplay. The horror market for fiction is completely different than for screenplays.
Also, hate to say it, but some media are dead. Novellas are antiquated, unless you can compile several into a book. Printing expenses for a book less than 40,000 words (or 200 printed pages) rarely justify an investment to publish. Why? Bookstores don’t like to carry products with little shelf presence.
4. Research markets intuitively
Lastly, do some independent market research. No need for surveys. Just pay attention. Glance at Publishers Weekly or the NY Times Bestseller List. Want to know what stories are hot? Go to the movies. Disaster was big once (Armageddon, Twister, Titanic) but now treasure hunts are in style (Da Vinci Code, Fool’s Gold, National Treasure). Just monitor yourself… don’t fall into the land of “I-can-write-better-than-that!”
Sample readers are the last step… because a reader will only read something once.
I used to work in customer service. We listened to aggravating callers jabber about what they disliked about our company. Our website sucked. Our forms were confusing. They were on hold for too long. My coworkers and I usually just shrugged it off.
One day my boss said, “I love complaints!” “Why?” I asked. “It’s invaluable information!” he cried. “Every complaint we get represents a hundred people who didn’t complain about the same problem.”
He had a point: People rarely stick around to explain why they don’t buy your product. They just move on to someone else who serves them better.
You write a chapter and someone says it’s boring or cliché or predictable. You may feel defensive. You may even shout it’s a first draft! Or I worked really hard on this! You just don’t get it! But writers don’t deserve leeway, just like readers don’t have obligation. Use their feedback to make your story more marketable. We can’t complain to customers, because customers always have the right to buy from someone else.
Does my story have a fighting chance?
Never a guarantee. Trends are fickle. Publishers hate taking risks. Nearly every concept has been done—often better than yours. Just focus on your target audience and try to keep them happy.
But try not to be discouraged. Most importantly, write what you know. Pursue what inspires you and write the best you can. Simply keep marketing concepts in the back of your mind. They’ll only help you develop your first masterpiece!
This article is part 2 of a series. Make sure to check out part 1: Yes, But Do You Want Anyone To Read It? An Intro To The World of Agents, Editors and Publishing.
Comments & Discussion
*Half of all books sold today are to people over the age of 45.
*As of 2005, romance fiction is responsible for 48% of all paperbacks sold, bringing in $1.41 billion a year.
*Women buy 68% of all books sold.
*It takes an average of 475 hours to write a novel. Fiction is considered successful if it sells 5,000 copies. Writing a nonfiction book requires about 725 hours. A nonfiction book is deemed successful when it reaches 7,500 copies sold.
http://www.selfpublishingresources.com/Booknews.htm
If you are writing to make money, here is your niche audience: Women, 45+ who read romances.
"Of the 1.2 million titles tracked by Bookscan in 2006, only 2.1% sold more than 5,000 books, 16.6% sold fewer than 1,000, and a terrifying 79.6% sold fewer than 99 copies."
http://marketingsellingbooks.suite101.com/article.cfm/book_publishing_a_horror_story
Despite all that goes into marketing a book, the reality of it is pretty grim. Writing with the sole expectation of money from a best seller has as much luck in it as winning a lottery.
"There are 5 colossal publishing conglomerates that control 80% of book sales. They are: Bertlesman (Random House), Time Warner, Rupert Murdoch's News Corp, Disney, and Viacom/CBS. Four of these are foreign owned. They won't take on a title unless it will sell at least 50,000 copies."
In my research, the numbers for fiction being 5000 and non-fiction being 7500 in sales popped up again and again. This data shows you another reality: Big publishers aren't looking for that kind of success. They want profit, so of course they rely heavily on marketing and the like. They're also not going to pick up an unsolicited manuscript from any ol' writer, even if you set up in the first paragraph your genre and marketing audience to a T.
*In 1996 and 1997 the American Booksellers Association, the Book Industry Study Group, and Publisher’s Weekly, asked adult book purchasers what were the most critical factors for buying books. Most people expect that the top reasons people buy books are book covers, marketing, price, reviews, etc. However, the three answers that stand-out beyond all others are:
1. The subject of the book
2. The author’s reputation
3. The informational content about the book on the inside flaps and the back cover were most critical"
"A book by the average author--that is, the average author who manages to find an agent and land a deal--sells just 11,800 copies, according to the Book Industry Study Group, a nonprofit research organization, and RR Bowker, a provider of bibliographic information."
(Source: Getting on the Same Page, Fast Company, November 2005 | Page 86 By: Lucas Conley)
http://www.authorinsider.com/insightfulstatistics.php
Again, a lot of the marketing does not involved the content inside of the book. A few of the Web sites I looked at had a statistic that the average number of pages read out of a bought book is 18 pages. Most don't get farther than that. But hey, if it looks good, grabs attention, and ithey buy it, who cares they don't read past your first 18 pages of work?
Second quote just gets to the rock solid truth: books on average do not sell. It takes a small publisher like the one here locally about 800-1000 books to break even. If they break even, they're happy.
Under the Radar: A Breakthrough, In-Depth Study of the Book Industry's Underreported Segments and Channels shows that, contrary to conventional wisdom, smaller regional and niche publishers contribute significantly to the overall industry. The report, released in April of 2005, reveals that approximately 63,000 publishers with annual revenues of less than $50 million generate aggregate slaes of $14.2 billion. A subset of that group, roughly 3,600 publishers with annual revenues of $1 million to $49.9 million, is responsible for $11.5 billion on the total. The study divulges that small and midsize publishers have been using routes to readers beyond the bookstore arena, often selling more books outside normal trade channels than within them. As the Davids prosper, the Goliaths consolidate.
http://www.selfpublishingresources.com/Booknews.htm
This is where you should seriously consider submitting your manuscripts if you are a literary writer. If you want your work to be published, but not commercialized, you can do some self-promotion marketing on the side once you have your work published. As I have said before, small presses generally do not use marketing as their number one decision breaker. A lot of them, due to the overwhelming 80% market share of bigger presses, survive off of art grants and contributions. Some publish works in chap-books, cheaper compilations, that give you a way to distribute your novellas and poetry. If you're the kind of writer who writes because you want to connect with readers, small presses are great for that. A lot of "successful " authors tour around the country, reading selected works, and connecting with readers. Try to be a little practical-is your novel really going to be the number one best seller of America? Probably not. But hey, once a work is published, if it is a great piece of work, it will get out there. Case in point, as written on one of the sites:
Many famous authors and their books were rejected multiple times. Publishers turned down Richard Bach’s Johnathan Livingston Seagull no less than 140 times; Margaret Mitchell’s Gone With the Wind received 38 “no’s,” while Stephen King’s Carrie was turned down 30 times. J. K. Rowling’s original work was pooh poohed by 12 publishers...guess who’s kicking themselves now that they passed on Harry Potter? And E. E. Cummings first work — The Enormous Room, now considered a masterpiece — was ultimately self-published...and dedicated to the 15 publishers who rejected it.
Hmm, I guess I don't have any real credentials for this information, except being taught by my professors how to deal with the publishing world (They're a little brighter than this article accuses them of). But I did find these interesting statistics down below!
Wonder about America’s most literate cities? Here they are ranked from 1 to 10:
Minneapolis, Minnesota
Seattle, Washington
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Madison, Wisconsin
Cincinnati, Ohio
Washington, DC
Denver, Colorado
Boston, Massachusetts
Portland, Oregon
San Francisco, California
This article and Brittany's comment were extremely informative, though. I'll be keeping an eye out for the next article in this series and in the mean time, when I have more free time, maybe I'll get around to finding the answers to those questions.
