Professional flyer to advertize book to big chains.

Monty, this isn't the board to be seeking this kind of assistance. (And I'm scratching my head trying to figure out which one might be....)

Let's try Story Research.

Hi Monty, i come from a sales and marketing background. Our company (in promotions) policy was to never ever use leaflets/flyers as a way of promoting anything. This was based on a company success/conversion rate of less than 0.02%. Thats a huge amount of time and cost and hassle for a tiny return.

I know nothing about book promotion specifically and only a small amount about PA, but in your shoes i would hit anywhere and everywhere LOCAL to you, try and get in the local papers, try and get in the local libraries (offer to sign books etc, maybe cutting the library in on it) offer to give a talk in local schools on creative writing. With regards local bookstores, try to get in one with another author or two. Noticed the emphasis on LOCAL? (maybe you had plans for that anyway)

Now if PA are allowing you to contact major bookstores, PHONE the stores first! its hard and painful, but do it, our companies results were along the lines of 2% with calls as compared to the flyers rate of success! Tell them that a flyer will arrive very soon. Call them on the day you think the flyer has arrived and remind them. Call them a few days later if they don't respond. For every ten stores you p*** off hopefully someone will be impressed by your drive and determination and give you a chance. I would also consider sending "something" other than a usual flyer. i noticed your book features weaving, would it be possible to make the flyer look like its been weaved on cloth with some kind of printer template? Even consider sending out something useful, so the stores don't just bin whatever you send. Cardboard coffee cup placemat, match boxes, bookmarks or the like. Depends on your budget of course, but in my experience of flyers are dead money.
Once again, i know nothing about promoting books but whenever i see the word "flyer" i feel i have to say something, having been on the receiving end of some pretty steep costs with nothing to show for it.
Good luck anyway Monty, i wish you all the best.

Sorry Monty, just noticed the "PA"in your post. I think you should ignore anything i wrote above. I really do wish you good luck now

Monty, I hate to tell you this, but there is nothing you can do to promote your PA book that will help you. PA's policies and reputation make it next to impossible to get into bookstores, and flatly impossible to get stocked by a chain. No one in publishing is going to trust PA's new supposed returns policy, which they all recognize as a crock. I'd advise you not to trust it either. Don't buy a single copy of your book. It will not work out well. Ask the people who thought they were taking advantage of PA's supposed partnership with the New York Times. This is just another way to get ripped off.

aka eraser said:

Monty, this isn't the board to be seeking this kind of assistance. (And I'm scratching my head trying to figure out which one might be....)

Let's try Story Research.

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No, let's not. This is a request for promotion advice.


EDIT: And that's why I moved it to Announcements... Wait there, I'll go fetch help!

If you want to get stocked by the major chains you'll have to get in touch with their book buyers at their regional or national headquarters. They'll request that you fill out a form and submit a copy of your book with it.

In four to six weeks they'll tell you "Sorry, no." It'll be a form letter.

Ask the manager of your local B&N, Borders, BAM, or whatever for the proper paperwork and who to send it to. They should have it ready to hand you.


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Actually, spending money to advertise PA books is just wasting money. You'll never see it back.

Figure how many copies you'll have to sell to make back what you spend. Ask yourself if it's realistic that you'll sell that many copies.

PA's royalties (when they can be bothered to pay them) are low by anyone's standards. Publishers in general take the lion's share of the income from a book because they're using that income for the promotion and marketing (among other things). Authors aren't expected to pay for those costs out of their royalties.

Returns vs. National Stocking

Monty said:

In October PA will be allowing me to promote my book to major bookstores as a returnable book.

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Are you sure you aren't in the "glitch" area where your book isn't available for return yet? I'd hate to see you spend money that you don't have only to find out that your book still isn't returnable.

Get it in writing from PA first. (Also look at the other stipulations stores like B&N have regarding nationally stocking a title. Returnability is only one of those road blocks.)

cj

aka eraser said:

Monty, this isn't the board to be seeking this kind of assistance. (And I'm scratching my head trying to figure out which one might be....)

Let's try Story Research.

Click to expand...

(EDIT: Whups. Don't know where it was originally. I think this forum is just fine for asking this type of question.)

Regardless of your publisher and your methods, there are many resources for templates for flyers/brochures. Most software comes with design templates, many are available on the web for free/cheap. I'm not sure most authors would have this type of stuff handy, and if they put in the time/money to do up their custom design, they probably wouldn't hand it over.
Many authors use a full colour business card, front & back, with their book info on it. May be more acceptable than a flyer.

Never let it be said that we would refuse you information just because we don't like your publisher's business practices. If you really do want to spend the money for flyers, the best places (and cheapest) places to print large quantaties I've found are:


4 Over 4.com. These guys put out an excellent quality product in a very short time.

Earthly Charms. This company does all sorts of author promo stuff (they do bookmarks and postcards, but they don't handle flyers.) Promo is their primary business. You can also get really nice "Autographed Copy" stickers really cheap (like $5 for a roll of 100!)

Good luck, if you decide to go forward!

Monty said:

Does someone on this board, hopefully one of the Mod's our a member of the Mod Sqad have a design for a flyer I could send out to Major chain bookstores to try and get them to stock my book?

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IMO, even if you have a commercially published book, sending flyers to bookstores (chain or independent) is not a good use of money or effort. It's like newspapers and press releases--stores get a ton of these things, and I would bet that most of them aren't even glanced at.

- Victoria

victoriastrauss said:

IMO, even if you have a commercially published book, sending flyers to bookstores (chain or independent) is not a good use of money or effort. It's like newspapers and press releases--stores get a ton of these things, and I would bet that most of them aren't even glanced at.

- Victoria

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I can tell you first hand that they get tossed by bookstores. We have too many catalogues by publishers that we deal with regularly to go through to even worry about random faxes from publishers we've never heard of.

cj