I’m back from a busy weekend at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books. What a great event for authors. SPAWN (Small Publishers, Artists and Writers Network) had the equivalent of two booths and we arranged space inside for our members to sell their books. Some sold quite a few books. (I sold out of Publish Your Book and Promote Your Book.) Most members made some amazing connections. Here are some of them:
• An editor from a major magazine wants to write a story about one of our author members.
• One member made contact with representatives from several book clubs. She has decided that her book would be a great book club book.
• Another member connected with someone who wants to recommend his book to her clients and students.
• One member signed up new clients for her business.
• We handed out dozens of SPAWN member applications and signed up 3 members on the spot.
• I collected contact info from several great sources for upcoming issues of the SPAWN newsletter.
• We handed out around 250 SPAWN Catalogs of Member’s Books and Services, which means that many of our members’ books are being noticed and maybe ordered.
• Likewise, I met dozens and dozens of authors who expressed an interest in my editorial services.
• And we learned new marketing techniques and ideas for new publicity forums from one another.
You cannot go out in public with your meaningful nonfiction or entertaining fiction book or even a lovely children’s book, without making some worthwhile connections. So I hope that all of you with books are seeking out public appearances, becoming known through social media and following up on the people you meet while out and about.
I expect my Amazon sales to rise after the exposure my books got this weekend. Publish Your Book and Promote Your Book were very popular. Now hundreds more people know about them. To some people, a lower price (such as Amazon can offer) is more valuable than the author’s autograph. And that’s why we need to have our books for sale everywhere and why we need to use a variety of avenues through which to promote our books.