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Book Marketing Tip of the Week
May 1, 2007: Cheerio's Birthday, Law Day USA

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In this issue . . .
-- Book reviews; Shelf Awareness
-- Book Business magazine
-- Book intros on websites
-- Eight options in publishing your book
-- Reader Views Kids
-- Viral Marketing Hall of Fame: Book author and publisher inducted
-- Peer Publisher Partnership Program

Book reviews: Shelf Awareness
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A few issues ago, I featured the name of the new children's book reviewer at Shelf Awareness. In an issue right after that, I updated the info for her. Apparently some of you missed that change. Here it is:

Jennifer Brown will be doing children's book reviews and news for the Shelf Awareness daily ezine. Send review copies to her in care of Shelf Awareness, Jennifer Brown, Children's Book Reviewer, 304 West 75th Street #11C, New York NY 10023; 973-953-0304. Email: brown@shelf-awareness.com. Web: http://www.shelf-awareness.com.

Please note -- as with any other major book reviewer for the book trade -- they only review NEW books. I'm surprised that I have to repeat that here. But, if you have NEWS about your book to convey, that can be sent at any time. But it has to be real news, not a new printing or such, but real news.

Here is Shelf Awareness's statement about book reviews:

“We aim to review books 2-3 months ahead of publication, and, alas, even then we only have room for one children's book review per week (that's 52 books out of 9,000 published annually).”

Essentially, these statements also apply to Publishers Weekly, the New York Times, Library Journal, Booklist, Horn Book, New York Review of Books, VLS, School Library Journal, Wall Street Journal, Newsweek, US News & World Report, Time, People, etc. Although many of these, of course, do more than one book review a week, they still want to review only new books. For older titles, you need to go for news, interviews, articles, resource listings, etc.

Book Business magazine
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Book Business is a monthly magazine about the book publishing business. It features interviews with book publishers and marketers as well as stories about successful marketing initiatives from publishers, especially new web initiatives. To submit story ideas, contact Book Business, Noelle Skodzinski, Editor-in-Chief, 1500 Spring Garden Street #1200, Philadelphia PA 19130-4094; 215-238-5341; Fax: 215-238-5457. Email: nskodzinski@napco.com. Web: http://www.pubexec.com.

Note: You can go to their website to sign up for a free subscription to this magazine. They always have some great articles on marketing books.

Book intros on websites
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Kevin Weeks, author of The Street Life Series, has a wonderful intro to his series on his website at http://www.thestreetlifeseries.com. His intro is hosted by streamhoster.com.

Eight options in publishing your book
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You have eight options in publishing a book:

1. Self-publishing. Getting your own printer, publishing your book, and marketing it. That's how I've published six editions of 1001 Ways to Market Your Books.

2. Set up your own publishing company. For example, my company: Open Horizons.

3. Print-on-demand printer. You self-publish but you use a POD printer to produce copies 1 to 100 copies at a time. For example, Lightning Source or AdiBooks.

4. Print-on-demand publisher. You pay a POD publisher to publish your book. For example, iUniverse, Lulu, Xlibris, Infinity Publishing, etc. For example, Infinity publishes John Kremer's Self-Publishing Hall of Fame (also available as an ebook download from BookMarket.com).

5. Sell rights to a small publisher and let them publish and promote your book. For example, New World Library, Santa Monica Press, etc. I sold the rights to High-Impact Marketing on a Low-Impact Budget to Prima Publishing (now part of Random House).

6. Sell rights to a large publisher and let them publish and promote your book. For example, Simon & Schuster, Random House, etc. I sold rights to The Complete Direct Marketing Sourcebook to John Wiley.

7. Self-publish your book only as an e-book. For example, my new ebook on distribution: Book Marketing 105: Choosing a Book Distribution System — This vital mini-guide includes criteria for deciding how you
will distribute your books. Also includes complete information on 30 book distributors, 4 library distributors, 89 book publishers who also distribute for other publishers, 3 sales representatives to the chains, 27 bookstore wholesalers, 34 library wholesalers, and 23 Spanish-language wholesalers. Plus a sample book distribution contract. Ebook download, $30.00.

8. Blog your book. Rather than publishing your book on paper, you could simply blog it using a free or paid online blogging service. I'll be doing several books like this in the coming months.

I could easily write a book on these eight options. In fact, if I were to write the book, I'm sure I'd come up with three or four more options.

Reader Views Kids
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Authors Access, a live author forum (http://www.authorsaccess.com), also includes the following online services:

Reader Views: http://www.readerviews.com featuring online book reviews from readers.

Reader Views Kids: http://www.readerviewskids.com featuring kids reviewing children's books.

Inside Scoop live: http://www.insidescooplive.com featuring live author interviews (as compared to interviews with dead authors :))

Check out the above websites if you want to get involved by providing review copies or author access.

Viral Marketing Hall of Fame: Book author and publisher inducted
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MarketingSherpa.com just inducted a book author and a book publisher into their Viral Marketing Hall of Fame for 2007. All ten new inductees have interesting stories to tell, but I think the book author and book publisher stories are the most useful for most of you to read. Check it out at: http://www.marketingsherpa.com/article.php?ident=29947.

In their latest weekly newsletter, they also offered a chance for five readers to win a copy of 1001 Ways to Market Your Books by me :))

I donated the copies, and they would certainly be willing to give away a copy of your business or marketing book as well. Follow the guidelines found on the page below, where you can also sign up for a free copy of my book: http://www.marketingsherpa.com/article.php?ident=27166.

Peer Publisher Partnerships
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Peer Publisher Partnerships, Dawn Matheson, Bumble Bee Productions, 725 Watch Island Reach, Chesapeake VA 23320; 757-410-9409, ext. 707; Fax: 757-410-9409. Email: dmatheson@bbpmail.com.
Web: http://www.bumblebeeproductions.com. Offers a wide range of co-op and other advertising programs for authors and publishers.

If you took part in only a few of their programs, you could easily spend thousands of dollars that may or may not be well spent. Make sure any advertising programs you participate in fit into your comprehensive marketing program. Before spending a lot of money promoting your books, work your Kremer 100 list and work it hard.

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