Face Time

Face Time: Promoting Yourself and Your Books at Reader Conventions

Before the launch of the first book in my urban fantasy romance series in 2009, I researched other authors’ marketing efforts. While the results of the campaigns I studied varied wildly, one piece of advice repeated consistently: Word of mouth is your friend.

But HOW do you spark word of mouth? If you twist the above sentence a little you get your answer: If word of mouth is your friend, friends are your word of mouth.

The past few Saturdays here at Romancing the Genres, you’ve heard from Pat Hauldren about growing friends like weeds, from Cassiel Knight about energizing your long-distance friends with a virtual launch party, and from Kristina McMorris about creating new friends through out-of-the-box marketing, so I thought I’d go old skool with a discussion of one-on-one, face-to-face author-reader interaction: the reader convention.

The Pros of Cons:

I’ve gone a handful of times so far to several different conventions geared toward putting readers and authors together. The con experience offers several advantages, I think, over other forms of marketing and promotion:

 1. The quality of reader

Con goers tend to be a highly valuable sort of reader: enthusiastic, voracious, outgoing and often well connected with other readers. On the whole, con goers read a lot and they want to share their love. Win them to your side and you have the opportunity to create a true fan, the sort of reader who harangues others to read you too.

 2. Showcasing brand over book

In the course of a career, most authors will write more than one book in more than one series for more than one publisher, probably in more than one subgenre. Promoting YOURSELF as well as your books gives readers a chance to (hopefully) connect with everything you write, not just one title at a time.

 3. They’re fun!

This might not seem like the most sensible criteria for making business decisions, but a weekend with readers can be a delightful reminder why we endure the trials and tribulations of publication: Because we want to tell our stories to an audience.

The Cons of Cons

1. The money
Oh, the money… After adding up airfare, hotel, meals, and giveaways, a long weekend of a con can run one or two thousand dollars. And that assumes you are sharing a room, eating on the cheap, and being judicious with your swag.

2. The other costs

In addition to the financial outlay, there’s the lost writing time and the energy expenditure. The con itself might be only a few days away from home, but the preparation for and recovery from it can easily take a week as you make goody bags, properly pack your fairy wings (I ask you, how many other business women have to pack fairy wings for their business travel?!) and follow up with the contacts you make.

If you decide to make cons part of your promotional repertoire, here are a few tips for making the most of your efforts:

1. At a reader convention, YOU are part of the entertainment.
And by you, I mean author-you. Not you-you and certainly not writer-you. Writer-you sits with a writing implement all day and often stares into space. This is not entertainment. At least not to anyone besides writer-you. You-you might be entertaining enough but the important person at a con is author-you.

I could do a whole post on creating an author persona, but the key is to think of author-you as the best, most engaging parts of you-you. With creative additions and fairy wings as necessary. This is the you who attends cons and attracts readers.

2. When you are in public, you are ON.

Cons can be tiring and stressful even when they are fun, but author-you is on display any time you are outside the door of your hotel room. (And sometimes when you are inside your hotel room if you don’t keep your voice down.) Everyone has heard of authors behaving badly; don’t be her. Be open, be gracious, and be quiet when necessary.

3.  Choose your swag wisely.
You want to put something in readers’ hands (as well as their minds) to help them remember you, but swag can get expensive, not to mention heavy when you are traveling. Without question, the best swag is your book. Give it to reviewers, bloggers and readers who seem particularly outgoing. Next best is a sample of your book and/or voice, including excerpts or free reads. Next best is high-value fun items: coffee mugs, good pens, etc. Don’t even bother with cheap pens. For the money, bookmarks are probably still worthwhile for now, but don’t expect them to be more than another “touch” on your audience’s awareness.

4. Set goals, pursue them and evaluate the outcome.

As with any promotional effort, knowing what you want to accomplish will help focus you. If you are a doing a panel at the con, what points do you want to make to inspire readers to seek out your stories? If you are hitting the bar to network, who do you want to meet and why? Make sure you follow up with people you connected with (you won’t “connect” with everyone, and that’s okay; you’re looking for like-minded souls anyway) and keep the conversation going.

5. Have fun!
Yeah, I said this already, but it’s worth repeating. Positive energy attracts the same. My critique partners call writer-me Eeyore for my unsunny disposition, but at cons I bring out author-me and she does know how to have a good time! (For proof, the photo of me in the black and red dress was taken at an RT ball last year. I practically have a lampshade on my head, the epitome of fun!) Like formatting a manuscript or writing a synopsis, face-to-face promotion is a skill you can learn. If you aren’t naturally an extrovert, practice with real friends. Your local writing group is a good start. Offer to lead a book club or do in-person writing workshops to get comfortable talking about books. And then know that everyone who attends reader cons loves books too.

If you have questions about reader conventions, please ask. And I’ll ask you one: Have you had a face-to-face encounter with an author that made you want to know more about her stories?

 Jessa Slade is author of the Marked Souls urban fantasy romance series with NAL Signet Eclipse. The third book in the series, VOWED IN SHADOWS, is available now. Though she is most comfortable sitting behind her computer, she ventures out to meet readers in the wild and giggle about man chest. 


You can find her online at www.jessaslade.com
http://www.facebook.com/jessaslade
http://twitter.com/jessaslade

Writing’s Better Than Therapy (Or Jail)

Some people make me angry—very angry. I hate bullies and racists. I despise hypocrites. I have a special distaste for goody-two-shoes who screw you over while they’re proclaiming their own sainthood.

In real life, I’ve met a fair number of people who fall into one of my wish-they-were-staked-on-an-anthill categories. We all encounter folks that yank our chains. We run into them in business dealings, in homeowner associations, in churches, in local politics, at the grocery checkout, at the doctor’s office, on a cruise.

Too often these scoundrels never get their just desserts. The bullies push through their agendas. The crooked pocket more cash. Invariably, when the hypocrites humiliate a friend, we sputter, unable to find the perfect zinger to put them in their place. That comeback arrives when we’re tossing and turning at two in the morning with a “why didn’t I think of that” regret.

Except. Except. Yes! As a writer, I can dispense justice. I can expose frauds. I can deliver razor-sharp zingers. I can make certain the gods punish the wicked in excruciatingly painful ways. I can even rid the universe of evil characters with a few clicks on my keyboard.

This is great fun, extremely cathartic, and there’s no risk of jail. I’ll admit it. Villains and injustices are among the primary drivers of my muse. Since I write romantic suspense and mysteries, that’s not necessarily a bad thing. My heroines need to be strong to match wits with these evil creations before they meet their doom.

So do I murder “real” people on the page—individuals I’ve encountered and despised at some point during my life? Yes in the sense that I try to capture the essence of their personalities. I think drawing on our experiences with people who rub us the wrong way allows us to make our villains more credible. For example, everyone knows a bully who doesn’t see himself in that light at all. His self-image is as a fighter for whatever cause he’s pushing, who won’t let the “idiots” who don’t agree stand in his way.

However, I really don’t murder, torture or defame any actual people. I’m quite careful about separating the personalities I use as a “base” for my fictional characters from the earthbound vessels they inhabited when I encountered them. In other words, my villains share no physical resemblance, habits, job descriptions or background with the individuals I’ve encountered (living or dead). Let’s say, for example, that I’ve been appalled by the actions of a male doctor who lines the walls in his office with sanctimonious platitudes, but commits Medicare fraud, and refuses to treat a gravely ill individual who shows up on his doorstep without insurance. In one of my novels, this “personality” might be transformed into a pious woman, who steals from a trust fund and verbally abuses her household help. Of course, I’ll still know who “he” is when my character bites the dust.

Naturally, there are many other things I love about writing. But righting (and writing) wrongs and injustices are very satisfying rewards in creating mysteries and romantic suspense.

When you read, do you identify your personal villains with those in a novel? Do you share the writer’s psychic pleasure in seeing wrongs redressed on the page?

The Line Between Reality and Fiction

I’ve found the line between my reality and fiction is invisible. I can cross over it or go through it at any time.

Whether standing in line for a latte’ or waiting for a streetlight to turn green I can easily zone into my characte’s, which makes them come alive. But what I find hard is to zone into life when I’m writing.

Come In has multiple characters, plots, scenes and seasons.It is my first book and it took time to develop. One of the best places for my creativity to explode was to go shopping at my favorite store, Value Village. I would purposely go there to do research and leave with bags full of ideas. And a few other things. 

I wrote my first draft of Come In with Time After Time, by Cindi Lauper on repeat. The beat and the words moved me into creating my protagonist. 

I’m thankful for my computer and all the Swiss Army knife things it can do. Back when I was a girl with a ponytail, yellow pencils were all there were. I chose to go without. Those nasty number-two pencils gave me a whooping, red indent on my middle finger and it hurt! They were like picking up a rattler. Their venomous lead was worse then snakebite. I much preferred daydreaming to writing reality stuff, and I must confess I still do.

Truthfully, blogging for me has been like riding up a dusty trail, behind an old horse that farts. My saddle ain’t broken in yet and without my good friend, Judith Ashley, I’d still be cussin’ at all this new technology.

Even though I didn’t lace up my bootstraps, suck in my gut, tighten up my oval belt buckle, and buckle down when I was a young un’ and listen real hard to my English teachers, I could have rode off into the sunset before turning grey. Instead, I’m thankful for all those years I gazed out the window and for writing by the light of the moon. The one with the silver lining. 

Daydreaming can make dreams come true.

Are you a daydreamer?

The 2 AM Art of Writing

When people ask where I get my ideas for a story my quick answer is I channel them from somewhere in my subconscious. I believe this because I get these 2 AM wake up calls with story ideas and whole outlines ready to go. The trick is getting it all down on paper before the inspiration passes. This happens to me all the time and I have a notebook filled with early morning musings to prove it. Once the idea and basic outline is on paper, I fall easily back to sleep.

The next day, I take a look at this “great revelation” and see if it can stand the scrutiny of the morning. If I still find the idea excites me then I will work on the outline, do a bit of research and then decide whether or not to move forward.

Oftentimes, I’m in the middle of another novel or project when these little brain storms drop their rain of inspiration, so I can’t start on them right away. So they will sit in my notebook, awaiting their turn at greatness. What this means is I always have a story or two waiting to be fleshed out. For me the biggest challenge is controlling that urge to abandon the current work for this new and exciting something! If I did this, nothing would ever get finished.

For example, I’m writing a new series of erotic romantic comedies. I finished the first book in the series and have just started book two, when suddenly the edits have arrived for book one. My love for my current project is so strong, that it takes great discipline to put book two characters on the shelf while I tidy up what was written months ago.

My biggest challenge is too many ideas, not enough time. Do you struggle with finding new ideas or with keeping on track with multiple projects?

Pirates, the stuff of fantasy

Why are people so fascinated by pirates?

As a child, one of my favorite rides at Disneyland was "The Pirates of the Caribbean. I loved Peter Pan, Treasure Island, and any other pirate story I found. Pirates of the Caribbean, the movie, made millions with fans divided between Captain Jack Sparrow and Will, who pretty much turned pirate to save Elizabeth. When my husband and I were in Las Vegas, we went to the (then) new Treasure Island Hotel which used to (maybe still does?) put on a great show outside with a reenactment of the navy battling pirates. When the pirates defeated the navy, everybody cheered.

Really? We cheered when the good guys lost and the bad guys won?

Are we all a bunch of sociopaths?

Nah. I think it goes back to the bad boy allure. Bad boys, and pirates in particular, are non-conformists. They have the courage to buck the system. Pirates wore blousy white shirts instead of those stuffy coats and ugly hats and white powdered wigs that fashionable English and American gentlemen wore in the 1700's. They were totally free to go where ever they pleased and do anything they wanted. And they had the money to do it, thanks to the plunder they took. And in the case of Las Vegas, the pirate captain was hunky and drop-dead gorgeous, which never hurts :-)

We think of pirates as swashbuckling hunks who carried big curved swords, laughed, loved and lived freely.

Creative, Cost-effective Promotion by Kristina McMorris

Inspired by my grandparents' wartime courtship, I penned my first novel, LETTERS FROM HOME, blissfully ignorant of the marketplace. You see, the story features an infantryman during WWII who falls deeply in love through a yearlong letter exchange, unaware the girl he's writing to isn't the one replying. Little did I know that WWII settings, not to mention books about letters, were considered a no-no at the time in both women's fiction and romance. Fortunately, it was too late to turn back. The manuscript was done, and I wasn't about to give up without a fight.


And so, when I was (more than once) told my precious labor-of-love story would "never" sell, I used that discouragement to fuel my persistence and creative, dollar-stretching strategy. First, I built a unique website, entered national literary contests to gain some accolades, and gathered endorsement quotes from unbelievably merciful best-selling authors (indeed, even before I sold the book), and when it did sell, I incorporated all of this into a full marketing plan that I presented to my in-house publicity and marketing team. I then created a media kit to accompany my ARCs, tri-fold color brochures with an excerpt (instead of bookmarks), and an interview-style video (vs. a standard trailer) that could help in pitching regional television shows.


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Fiction is notoriously known as a hard sell in the media world. Knowing this, I included 1940s recipes in the back of my novel to aid my TV show efforts, as well as discussion questions for reading group appeal. I actively scheduled book club visits (in person and via Skype), spoke at conferences and festivals and schools, established a social networking presence (including WWII sites), cross-promoted with authors of similar books, ran contests with the help of related Facebook groups and penpal/letter-writing blogs, donated nostalgic memory boxes to fundraising events, secured at least fifty reviews on well-suited blogs, and coordinated a large book launch party with B&N (where I read from my grandfather's WWII letters).


Other tactics included a fifteen-stop blog tour, on which I gave away free copies, same as on GoodReads. I ran inexpensive ads on GoodReads and Facebook, plus a few other popular reader sites that do direct e-blasts or e-newsletters. When I ran print ads, I made sure the circulation was high and the ad was visible (I submitted articles to offset the cost). And when it came to national media, although I knew it was a long shot, I sent press kits to fifty targeted editors or producers. I figured if even one of them took the bait, the effort would pay off. I lucked out; Woman's Day graciously gave my novel a third-page endorsement (and my grandmother much-deserved bragging rights!).


Now, for the usual question: Did any of this translate directly to sales? Some of it, sure. For the most part, I'll never know. What I do know is that my publishing house took notice. They slated my book as a featured title, allowed me a generous supply of ARCs and finished copies, volunteered some nice marketing efforts, and (perhaps a related result) gifted me with beautiful packaging and amazing co-op placement.


And…the more important question: Do you feel the campaign was a success? Given the number of times I consistently heard the fantabulous phrase "I've seen your book everywhere," my answer is a resounding yes. As authors, we can't control how much people will enjoy our stories (goodness knows, I wish we could!), nor the amount of support we'll receive from our publishers or the media. But where we can contribute is in brand awareness, doing our darndest to make sure readers know our books exist. Then, we simply cross our fingers and move on to write the next labor of love.


For more about Kristina and her novels, visit www.KristinaMcMorris.com


Do you have any unique promo ideas that you either would or wouldn't recommend to others?