“Book Marketing 101,” with the multi-talented former Scholastic Associate Director of Marketing Jessica Schein, will include an overview of ways to successfully
market one’s book without spending a lot of money. This includes using
Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and other social media outlets to promote
oneself and build community. It will also cover why it’s important to
build one’s personal community. Today’s marketing is not necessarily
book-specific, it is person-specific. There will be handout detailing
what authors can do online and in-person as well as a timeline. Follow Jessica on Twitter to keep up to date on her writing, and check out her Tumblr site to stay current with all her book-related projects.
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| Jessica Schein |
AN INTERVIEW WITH JESSICA SCHEIN:
1) What’s the biggest way in which marketing books has changed since you were at Scholastic?
I
actually think it’s less of a question of how marketing has changed in
the last 3+ years but how the industry itself has changed. Borders, a
major retailer is gone; social media lifted the wall between reader and
writer; and Amazon is now not only a publisher in its own right but has
been at the forefront of self-publishing explosion. When I left
Scholastic I knew of only a few self published success
stories–Christopher Paolini being the first one that comes to mind–but
now hardly a few weeks or a month goes by when I don’t hear about
someone who wrote a book, put it up on Amazon/BN.com/the iBookstore and
is now pulling in thousands of dollars a month. This changing business
model means books that would have died in someone’s drawer are now being
read by hundreds or thousands of people–and that’s a wonderful thing.
But this also makes it harder for new authors, especially, to find their
audience.
2) What form of promoting one’s own work is now considered obsolete?
Print
ads–and to some extent online banner ads. They’re costly and hard to
measure the impact of. We’re also constantly bombarded with ads that
unless they’re very targeted, or clever, or both, they’re generally
ineffective. Today it’s all about social media impact and integrated
marketing/branding–what I think of as “suggestive” and not overt
marketing.
3) What is a newly published author’s greatest challenge when it comes to marketing their work?
Getting
themselves seen and heard. As I mentioned earlier there are so many
people self-publishing now, making the market a crowded one. It’s
important for authors, both newbies and veterans, to think of marketing
as a long term investment. Getting one’s name out there shouldn’t start
when his/her book is about to or has just come out. It’s never too early
to build relationships with others in the publishing/reading community.
It’s these relationships that can make or break a writer’s career.
4) What are you working on right now?
I’m
revising a YA dual-perspective novel with my writing partner, Kristiana
Gregory, and my agent, whose comments have been invaluable. It’s about
two girls who live in the same Brooklyn house 200 years apart and the
secrets they discover about their shared family. I’m also working on a
series of e-novellas for more mature teens about a girl who goes missing
after a night of partying in NYC.
5) What is your favorite a) thing to cook, b) recent novel read, and c) place to hang out and write in Seattle?
My
favorite thing to cook salmon (the fish in the PNW is so good), but I’m
also obsessed with the Smitten Kitchen blog and I’ve tried a bunch of
her recipes (all of which are pretty easy and amazing). The last novel I
finished is Where’d You Go, Bernadette. It was hysterical and captured
the Seattle vibe so, so well. And as for where I write–I tend to work
at Porchlight or Tougo in Capitol Hill/the CD (where I live)–or my
dining room table. I recently moved into a larger apartment and the fact
that I have a dining room is the best thing that’s happened to me in a
long while. A dining room was so off the table (pun intended) in NYC,
given the cost of an apartment larger than 300 square feet.