I like working with our authors around the world and helping where we can. If you would like to see one of my client interactions, please read on! (They are in reverse order). Best! Robert Fletcher – CEO ——————————- Dear Robert Thank you for your email. I feel much better now knowing that I’m being looked after and have the backing of SBPRA. I gave myself Christmas off basically because in England you don’t know when places are open and intend to get started when my son goes back to school next week. There are 16 libraries in Bury all together and I now have books in 11 of them. I have been advised to avoid the main central library at the moment because the authorities have decided to close part of it and turn it into a sculpture museum. Some of the librarians will lose their jobs and the area will shrink substantially so I intend to complete the other 4 of them and then branch out into neighbouring towns such as Bolton and Rochdale. I have 2 books at the moment at home. I have lunch with my mum every week and she made the suggestion of going to Bolton and dropping in on a couple of libraries there. I will definitely visit some of the independent book stores. Unfortunately there are none in my town and are a little further afield but not that far that I can’t get to them. I am going to do a bit more research and find the more suitable ones, I know one of them networked with Hive is a post office and one is a children’s book shop so if I’m going to travel a long way I need to know if they are stocking books like mine. I have kept all my emails from SBPRA and the cost of the personal assistant was $300 retail price. I did get a discount for buying into the CMP but I would very much appreciate the value in books. I have a contact name which I received from one of the libraries to ring and arrange a talk. I was reluctant to do this at first because I wasn’t sure how I was going to get the books to take with me but now I could use these. I’m not a great lover of public speaking but I recently went into my son’s school and did a questions and answer session on being an author for his class. It was lovely and I really enjoyed it, having said that, I was still nervous and imagine it would be slightly different with adults! I will keep you informed as I go along and hopefully get some positive results. Thanks again for your support. Happy New Year to everyone. Best Regards Susan Sent from Windows Mail From: Robert – CEO Dear Susan, What a nice letter, let’s see if we can help you! We love to help people that help themselves! My notes are inside your comments below. Best! Robert Fletcher – CEO Subject: Re: SBPRA | : The Local Author Book Route + Lookup Link for US Indie Bookstores. Dear Robert Thank you for your emails and Christmas wishes. There is certainly a lot to think about. At the moment I am getting my book into libraries around the town I live in (Bury, near Manchester, England). I am donating a book to each library and once I have finished in Bury I aim to branch out to the neighboring towns which I feel is a way of getting my name out there. This however is quite an expense and I can really only manage two books per month. R: Maybe we can help you with this. How many libraries have you donated to, and how many are there total? Also, are UK libraries “centralized”? At some point the central library buyer should be made aware of your efforts and buy some books. Also, I think that any library that has taken a book should help you with a signing where you can sell a few books and meet people. If you can try that, we are happy to ‘front’ some books to you at no charge and you can pay us back after they sell. Since you are comfortable with Libraries, let’s start there together. Although exceptions abound, LIBRARIES NEED MORE PEOPLE COMING TO LIBRARIES so they should be somewhat receptive to what you are doing and having signings and readings. I found an online book store called Hive which networks with independent book stores. My book was for sale on Hive and the idea was that when you ordered it, you collected it from the nearest independent book store. Unfortunately there was not one in my town but there were some fairly near. I emailed three of them to ask their advice about selling my book in one of their stores and didn’t get a reply from any of them. Can you advise a different approach. R: If you are willing to visit them, and discuss the idea of them selling your books on consignment, my guess is that two of the three will say yes. At that time, we will work out the details with them, and all you have to do is to connect us to them. Just like libraries, bookstores NEED TRAFFIC, and we think the Local Author program is perfect for that. And, believe it or not, the bookstore might not be aware of the HIVE program, so that should be part of your discussion as well, i.e. that you are using it and people should be coming to their store. And, frankly, if you want to really seed this, buy a book through Hive and use that as your entry point to the store! Could you also give me advise on Pinterest. As someone who is selling a product do you have to go on it as a business? I can’t seem to find the answer when I look on its website. R: Kait, will you please write up an “exhaustive” answer to this question? I am sure other authors need this info as well. I took out a CMP several months ago. I did the radio show which was okay. Good From the Book Award people I received a list of competitions available several of which I wasn’t eligible for because I was English or because my book was for adults and not for children or the deadline had passed. Things change I entered one of them but after paying the fee for the list I then had to pay for entering the competition and then to send the books. I know, these things can be expensive, sigh. The 7.5 hours from the personal assistant resulted in a list of towns near to where I live which I almost certainly was more aware of than the person who sent them to me. I heard nothing else. R: I am going to give you a full credit for this in books if that is ok with you. Let me know how much this was. Thanks for speaking up. We have revamped this program and I think we can do a better job now. Getting my book made into an ebook was one of the things that was definitely worth the money. Yes, this will serve you well into the future! I am still writing nearly every day and will soon have my third book finished. Yay! I absolutely love writing but the marketing is the difficult part for me and I am reluctant as you can probably imagine to part with more money after the experience of my present CMP since I am buying books each month to put into libraries. R: I agree with the Library focus and maybe we can a few bookstores going for you too! I now read that you are “trimming the fat” and asking more money from the low performers. I find this very demoralising but, after picking myself up again, I know that I really want to succeed. Before you cut me off completely please could you help in the above matters so that at least I would have a chance of becoming one of the higher performers as I would love to become, and at the same time realise that everyone has a limited purse. R: Your email tells me everything.. you are going to succeed and there is no way we would ever get rid of you, so hang in there and keep trying. (That email did what intended, it flushed out the good ones and we got rid of the time wasters, so now we can concentrate on authors like YOU! I wish everyone at SBPRA a wonderful Christmas and a very happy New Year. R: Thanks! We wish the same for you! Now, let’s keep things moving. Suzann will get some new books headed your way and please email me as you go along. With Kind Regards Susan Having trouble viewing this email?
Comments are closed.
