Promotion of a new author

by: John Eide

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Date: Sun, 24 Jan 2010 Time: 3:24 PM - 0 comments

Books published in a the new way, promoted on the Internet, pitched at the Cannes Film Festival and maybe read on the new Book Readers.

Year 2010. Publishing is changing, fast. The modern author, in this new publishing era, does not even bother sending a manuscript to a Literary Agent. Better to send it to a professional editor, who will comment on characterization, the plot, the start, the middle section, and the end. The author will then correct accordingly or ignore comments. Then it is the proofreader's turn.Book being ready, the publishing phase, is the easiest of the whole process. Several hundred different POD (Print On Demand) companies worldwide will take on the task, creating a cover and back cover, producing an ISBN number, providing all the necessary help to get the book ready with a nice, professional feel. Yes, one single book can now be produced with full color cover and unlimited pages - removing the cost of having stock, which could easily end up in the author's garden shed or garage, not being sold.

But the publishing revolution does not stop here. It's a fact, that the general buying public are not aware of the new book published via POD so it is absolutely essential for the author to get visibility or awareness for the book. There are some book publicists who work independently and are not bound to publishing houses. One of these companies started some years ago from the idea by one man, who put a team of experts together to research how to create awareness for an unknown author and a new book. Gradually the team moved on to create a proper promotion campaign, called Book Promology, which today is sold in the UK, US, Canada, Australia to POD publishers, mainstream publishers and mostly to individual authors. In end of 2008 the financial crises hit the book trade badly and maybe more than other sections, the promotion of new authors were hit badly. Sales slumped to hardly anything. In November 2009 this changed and the trade is now nearly back to normal. One of the internal professional reviewers reads the book, decides on keywords, checks the synopsis and forwards the finished review to the author or publisher for comments. Adding that to an interview with the author, a press release, a bio provided by the author, info on how to buy the book and a couple of pictures, the seven-page web site is ready. The site is focusing on the marketing of the book. Advanced tag and keyword technology is used to attract the people interested in the story-line for the book. Registration on hundreds of search engines take place follwed by making the Google Adwords campaign ready. The book promoted is placed on the two largest book price comparison sites, together with a registering on the eight most applicable social websites with an audience of many hundred millions. Social Media Marketing is now a growing factor and some author runs their own 'shop' there, creating a steady sale of books. The company includes a three-month one-to-one support.

New authors, new books and the Cannes Film Festival. One of the most interesting 'product', for promoting books is the presentation of new books at the Cannes Film Festival. This campaign ensures that the new book is placed in the hands of selected film producers, experienced in the subject of the book. The books are hand delivered one by one to film producers at the Festival. A list is produced a few weeks after the Cannes Film Festival, enabling the author to follow up, with personal letters after six weeks, to hear the view of the producers. Nowadays, at the Cannes Film Festival books are also considered for DVD or for terrestrial television production, without having been made into a main film, creating thereby a bigger and more dynamic opening for the new author's book. Book Promotion representative has presented books at the Film Festival for many years and knows the way round this very busy marketing place where last year1.1.000 films was up for sale.

Latest news. Amazon has launched its wireless book reader called Kindle DX with a 9.7 screen. A very impressive hand held, thin computer, able to hold over 2.000 books. Sony Reader Tactile is also on the market. A simply beautiful product. Within days Apple is expected to launch it own version based on Ipod technology. Hewlett Packard's reader is also anticipated within days. These new Readers are expected to be a new and very exciting market for new authors. Electronic Readers had been launched eight years ago without success, but then they were clumsy, heavy and very restricted. Now they have become easy for the eye to read and even better than reading from white paper, also in strong sunlight or badly lit places, which is an astonishing achievement. Now, in 2010 it's all different and time has probably come for gradually changing the way we read books, documents, magazines and even newspapers.