Among the many parts of a writer's life that can be both headaches and delights are trips to promote books. The fun parts are meeting fans and friends and seeing new places. The tough parts are putting schedules together, financing the trip, deciding how much of your own stock to carry, and the wear-and-tear of being on the road (or in the not-so-friendly skies).
Schedules, particularly, are a balancing act. Too little to do during the course of a trip, and it may be hardly worth the making; too much, and you risk running yourself to exhaustion and opening yourself up to conflicts caused by overcommitment. You have to know your own endurance and energy level and plan accordingly. If you're traveling to an area you don't know well and won't have a local with you to help steer you around, err on the side of undercommitting yourself rather than overcommitting; you'll probably need extra time built in for the inevitable communications miscues, travel delays, and problems in finding the target locations.
If you're lucky enough to have a marketing contact assigned to you from your publishing house, treat that person well, because he or she can make your trip a lot easier or a lot harder. Marketing people can sometimes dig up opportunities for you through in-house contacts that you would have a lot of trouble arranging for yourself, especially when you let your marketer know well in advance when you plan to be traveling in a given area. (By the way, one thing that should be taken into account when planning the timing of a trip should be natural hooks into your topic or theme---if there's a festival or major event related to your book's topic or even mentioned in your book, for instance. Built-in hooks like that increase the potential interest and audience.) If you find a possibility that looks interesting---say, giving a talk at a museum or library---let your marketer know as soon as you can so that you'll be working together instead of at cross-purposes. Open communications are absolutely necessary; if you and your marketer aren't honest with each other about the limitations and capabilities on each side, neither of you will have a good time.
Marketing contacts perform another valuable service, that of making sure that books are made available for signing at your stops. Not every place you schedule will have its own bookstore or a gift shop through which your work can be sold, but getting as many places lined up as possible for which you don't have to carry your own inventory will make your life a lot easier. For sales you make from personal inventory, don't forget that you'll have to keep records of how much you paid for your stock and records of your sales, and that you will be responsible for collection and submission of any applicable sales taxes.
Book festivals that fit into your trips are excellent places to network with fellow authors and industry professionals and to meet fans. When looking at possible festival stops, don't overlook possible cross-genre opportunities. For example, Fred Kray, author of Broken: The Suspicious Death of Alydar and the End of Horse Racing's Golden Age, successfully marketed his book at venues attracting fans of the true crime genre as well as "horsy" people. Consider the possibilities at local historical societies, festivals, or celebrations related to people or places in your books. Your goal is to put your book out in front of as many potentially interested people as possible.
Don't overlook that trips are expensive, so you do want to get "bang for your buck"---just don't get penny-wise and pound-foolish. More on that next week.
Schedules, particularly, are a balancing act. Too little to do during the course of a trip, and it may be hardly worth the making; too much, and you risk running yourself to exhaustion and opening yourself up to conflicts caused by overcommitment. You have to know your own endurance and energy level and plan accordingly. If you're traveling to an area you don't know well and won't have a local with you to help steer you around, err on the side of undercommitting yourself rather than overcommitting; you'll probably need extra time built in for the inevitable communications miscues, travel delays, and problems in finding the target locations.
If you're lucky enough to have a marketing contact assigned to you from your publishing house, treat that person well, because he or she can make your trip a lot easier or a lot harder. Marketing people can sometimes dig up opportunities for you through in-house contacts that you would have a lot of trouble arranging for yourself, especially when you let your marketer know well in advance when you plan to be traveling in a given area. (By the way, one thing that should be taken into account when planning the timing of a trip should be natural hooks into your topic or theme---if there's a festival or major event related to your book's topic or even mentioned in your book, for instance. Built-in hooks like that increase the potential interest and audience.) If you find a possibility that looks interesting---say, giving a talk at a museum or library---let your marketer know as soon as you can so that you'll be working together instead of at cross-purposes. Open communications are absolutely necessary; if you and your marketer aren't honest with each other about the limitations and capabilities on each side, neither of you will have a good time.
Marketing contacts perform another valuable service, that of making sure that books are made available for signing at your stops. Not every place you schedule will have its own bookstore or a gift shop through which your work can be sold, but getting as many places lined up as possible for which you don't have to carry your own inventory will make your life a lot easier. For sales you make from personal inventory, don't forget that you'll have to keep records of how much you paid for your stock and records of your sales, and that you will be responsible for collection and submission of any applicable sales taxes.
Book festivals that fit into your trips are excellent places to network with fellow authors and industry professionals and to meet fans. When looking at possible festival stops, don't overlook possible cross-genre opportunities. For example, Fred Kray, author of Broken: The Suspicious Death of Alydar and the End of Horse Racing's Golden Age, successfully marketed his book at venues attracting fans of the true crime genre as well as "horsy" people. Consider the possibilities at local historical societies, festivals, or celebrations related to people or places in your books. Your goal is to put your book out in front of as many potentially interested people as possible.
Don't overlook that trips are expensive, so you do want to get "bang for your buck"---just don't get penny-wise and pound-foolish. More on that next week.