Wednesday, February 20, 2008

Author Promotions

In the old days of Barbour, we published dead authors and books within series so that author promotion wasn't a focus for us. But these days it seems we are always seeking ways to make our authors more visible.

Yesterday, the three of us bloggers, along with Mary and Patrick, attended a blogging seminar put on by ECPA via the Web. We got a good overview of blogging and took away some ideas for promoting authors and books through blogs.

Is blogging of value? Yes, as long as you can gain an audience and your blog interacts with the greater blogging community. Yes, if you have something to say and post on a regular, dependable basis.

Tomorrow we go into sales training for our Fall 2008 non-seasonal product. We'll spend all day at a local lodge eating good food and immersing ourselves in presentations of new books.

Mary and Shalyn put together a neat idea for a "one-sheet" of information on each of our full-length authors to put in the hands of our sales team. Here is how one turned out.


We like these so much that we'll likely be using them for broader audiences, tucking them into press packets and key account presentations. I think they turned out well. What do you think? Would you want to read something by Kelly after seeing this? Or, is it a silly waste of time?

13 comments:

Erica Vetsch said...

As someone who often promotes Christian fiction on my blog, this picture is worth a thousand words. I feel like I know Kelly better, and this would give me lots of ideas for interview questions.

Fun idea!

Unknown said...

I think it's great. I like knowing about author's who I read.

Janet Spaeth said...

I like this a lot! Very nice. It's intriguing and would definitely pique my interest.

I'm also glad you're publishing live authors now!

JanetS

Wandering Writer said...

I'm with Janet. Glad I don't have to be dead to be published. Although that gives me an idea for another book--hmmmm.

The one-sheet looks great!

Jennifer Johnson said...

I like it too. I want to do one. hehehehe :)

Mary Connealy said...

Did you guys click on it? It gets to be full screen size and you can see all the details.
And publishing dead authors? That had to be the very dickens when it came time for him do do line edits.
I'll bet your response time was slooooooow.

Vickie McDonough said...

I think readers would love getting to know their favorite authors better. Great idea!

Myra Johnson said...

Very creative! Fun layout, enough info to be intriguing, not so much as to be overwhelming.

Jessica Nelson said...

Could you post one day on what exactly a "one sheet" is?

Mary Connealy said...

Jessica, If you want to email me at maryconnealy @ yahoo.com I can send you a sample one sheet I have.

Mary Connealy said...

I posted my own Author Personnel File on my blog.
http://www.mconnealy.blogspot.com/
I think they're so cute.

Pam Hillman said...

I love it! The layout catches my eye, and the content is interesting without overwhelming. Great job!

Crystal Laine said...

I read the blog after this one before this one (I'm catching up) and I think you should have these one sheets in all kinds of places. They are so interesting and have a pleasing layout. People like reading more about the authors. As a former book reviewer, I would have loved getting something like this in my media packets. Much more interesting than the bland sheets I sometimes received. (And I often had to do research on the author before writing up my review for the magazines I wrote for.)

Great work!