Why are publishers so bad at advertising on TV?

By Darren E Laws

Book videos. Great to look at sometimes, but do they generate sales? Large established publishing houses occasionally dabble with TV commercials for established authors such as James Patterson, Penny Vincenzi and Stephen King but rarely do they place their advertising budget for such adverts in the hands of lesser-known authors. One has to ask is this because market research has shown that the book buying public is not persuaded by such a straightforward message, or is it solely due to expense. If expense were the issue then surely we would be seeing more low-cost options adopted by the big five, such as those embraced by smaller independent publishers using the net. Though not a new phenomenon, the book video as a sales marketing tool remains extremely popular especially amongst mainly independent publishers using the Internet. Many of these videos are inventive, entertaining and if targeted to a book buying audience should generate sales, but despite a proliferation of authors and publishers willing to invest part of their marketing spend on the production of these videos there appears to very little evidence that they generate sales at the moment.

Maybe the failure of larger publishers to explore TV and cinema advertising to its fullest extent is due to its approach when it has dabbled. Having seen the occasional attempt by various publishers one can only groan at the clumsiness of it all, and maybe it is the confusion of publishers to define a successful advertising model that works that has caused this reticence. How many adverts for novels can you remember? Now subtract those that you can remember for the right reasons…not many, eh?

Most independent publishers using ‘You Tube’ and various other Internet video outlets are showing a level of creativity that matches the efforts of its bigger brothers who have much larger budgets. How can it be that ‘John Doe Publishing’ can produce a video advert for under £200 ($400) that matches the creative output of one of the leading publishers in the world? The problem could lay with the fact that many publishers keep their advertising and marketing spend in-house, often refusing to employ outside agencies for a little creative input.

It strikes me that the joining of the written word into a visual medium for advertising novels has long been an uncomfortable fit for the established publisher. Maybe the injection of fresh ideas from independent publishers will help map a route that will drive readers to the bookstore in search of lesser-known ‘authors and publishers’ at the expense of the clumsy attempts of the publishing conglomerates. I also think the approach by the large publishing house can often reflect the arrogance of an established industry that thinks it knows best, even in the face of adversity and lack of success in terms of return of investment on its advertising spend. If at first you don’t succeed don’t give up, but for heavens sake, don’t keep repeating the same mistake and then blame the tool. The jury is still out on the success of using film or video to sell books but the net has allowed us all to play on a more even playing field and hopefully it won’t be long until a slick, inventive home produced video promoting a book captures the imagination of a vast audience, leading to those all important sales.

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The Kindle Swindle or a Myriad of Iliad?

By Darren E Laws

Nick Hornby this week raises a perfectly valid point by highlighting the exorbitant cost of electronic book reading machines. Whist the Kindle has some pretty neat built-in technology with the capability to fetch content from Amazon’s website (though not in the UK as of this moment) and a version of the Iliad (Kindle’s main rival) can also hook up to Wi-Fi to fetch content, these machines are coming in at the cost of more versatile computer hardware and lower-end laptops, all of which have greater versatility and the ability to deliver multimedia content. So the question has to be asked, is the industry serious about the delivery of ebook content or is has it misread the market. Let’s face it, given the choice of having a multi-functioning media delivery machine such as a laptop or PDA that can deliver ebook content in a legible form that is convenient; or a lump of plastic the size of a trade paperback with a dull colourless screen, which do you think would appeal most to the technically savvy readers of today?

Price as well as a little user-friendly redesigning has to be the issues that will begin to level the playing field and make the delivery of this electronic content more appealing to readers, and more importantly to engage and encourage new readers to use these machines. At the moment the Kindle and Iliad have the appeal of a 1980’s home computer, designed by geeks for geeks. There is little sophisticated or sexy about the bodies of these machines and I can honestly say there probably is not one person under 25 (maybe even 35) that would want to be seen using one in public. These machines are just not cool.

Countries like Japan already seem to have caught on to the fact, and this is born out through the uptake of mobile media content with novels being delivered directly to mobile (cell) phones that are quick to download through Bluetooth or via the Internet. Why buy a machine to read a novel when one is probably already in your pocket? Mobile phone technology is everywhere and increasingly more and more phones have Internet access. You may think it would be an unpleasant experience reading a novel on a standard mobile phone screen but most distributors of content use advanced font technology to east the strain on the eyes and make the whole experience pain free and enjoyable. A full novel can be downloaded in seconds from anywhere you can receive a mobile phone signal or through a Wi-Fi or Bluetooth portal making ease of access and sheer convenience a real plus point for mobile books.

If Nick Hornby, who let’s face it can probably afford to buy a Kindle or Iliad, thinks that they are overpriced then these machines are never going to take off and will remain piled high gather dust and awaiting a recall. I do applaud both Amazon and Irex Technologies though for making the machines in the first place. Now if only they could improve the design and make them cheaper we may all be tempted to read an ebook now and then.


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False Hopes and Expectations...Is it Time for a New Business Model?

By Darren E Laws

The current dilemma facing the publishing industry of an increased market base in the form of an enhanced global platform called the Internet, against an evolving audience which requires its fiction (and non-fiction) delivered in many different forms is challenging an industry that is pretty much set in its way. Publishing has been operating quite successfully (thank you very much) using the same business model for the past century, and now faced with a radical re-think it is struggling to come to terms with change. In the old days authors expected and received (quite deservedly in many cases) a nice fat advanced payment on the expectation that their hard work and toil would meet the expectations of their audience, who would in turn reciprocate equally by diligently going to the book store and buying copies of the said work in their thousands. This utopian arrangement existed quite happily for decades.

Now though, one has to question these ideals on the basis that technology and the internet is revolutionising and democratising publishing. Sure, every author dreams of receiving a good advance offset against royalties, but can this model be applied throughout publishing, especially when the industry is reporting increasing returns and often bad judgement of 'future' publishing stars actual earning ability. Note I do not mention potential as I am sure each author that receives a large advance does so on the basis that he or she will fulfil that potential.

Ghost written media celebrity novels and 'misery lit' (mis-lit) are the order of the day and publishers are falling over themselves to part with hefty sums, often before even checking the validity of the author or the story. Trifling matters as far as some publishing houses are concerned; so long as the celebrity stays flavour of the month long enough to see the book hit the shelves and some investment return. Watching this trend in publishing is like watching Hollywood remake classic movies because it no longer has the judgement skills to determine originality. Believe me, Hollywood nor the mountains of unpublished manuscripts sitting within publishers actually lack depth of quality, just the ability have a reader with faith in their own skills at sorting the wheat from the chaff. And so we are left with this current situation where money that could be spent in investing in new talent is handed willy-nilly to what they assume is the easy mark, the quick return. Sadly the only quick returns come from the book stores as the public becomes tired of over-hyped, over-marketed fodder made for the non-discerning. But if you are using a machine gun to hit a single target you are going to hit something every now and then and as long as the mainstream publishers have enough bullets to keep spraying and there is enough new fodder out there waiting to have their names attached to the latest celebrity novel or biography, then I guess they hope the status quo will remain.

So what is the answer; what can open the market and untap new riches of talent? Maybe the changes are already happening. Imagine for a moment a new world where the author writes a book and only gets paid for the amount of copies he or she actually sells. Imagine a world where a marketing budget is used to create demand but the books are only printed to meet that demand, and not printed by the hundreds of thousands and splurged into every book store regardless of actual demand, only to be returned six weeks or months later to be pulped. Imagine not paying hundreds of thousands of pounds to an author in a bidding war where he or she has done little to establish themselves in a market, save for looking pretty or having attended the correct schools. I am not for one moment denigrating all of the practices in place, it would be great to be in the position the large publishing houses find themselves in, of having a rich vein of new talent arriving on their desks every day. I applaud all the great work they are doing in bringing fantastic new talent to the fore, I am just questioning some unsettling practices that certain publishers seem to be adopting because they are the easy option. Remember, it is easy to choose the easy option but consider the longer term implications.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with appealing to the mass markets or even the lowest common denominator. We would all love to be in the position of selling thousands of titles, but you should at least create demand and fill demand first rather than putting all of your proverbial eggs in one basket and finding they are rotten. Are the days of huge advances, huge print runs, celeb-lit and false expectations over; sadly, not just yet, but the warning signs are there and hopefully the industry is taking heed.

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Goodbye Printed Page, Farewell Bookstore...

By Darren E Laws

Mobile content will be the new book. Digital format is, like it or not, going to
have an impact on the traditional form of a physical book. While many people reading this will undoubtedly choose not to believe that this metamorphosis is occurring and for many there is nothing that beats the romanticism of holding a book and feeling the pages turn between your fingers, the change is happening.

Future generations are facing up to the fact that there are many things that are having an impact on the world they live in and amongst these will include the mass printing of millions of books only to be returned and pulped. The carbon footprint cannot continue and sooner or later this will be frowned upon by a population that looks at the sheer amount of energy the industry wastes in a most unfavourable light.

Mobile and digital content already exists and will be seen increasingly by younger audiences as the natural way to consume content. Their minds are already being trained to deal with the problems facing them. While their parents struggle with the concept of recycling and the $4 gallon (or if like me you live in the UK £2.00 litre), they are being born into a world where natural resources are dwindling, terrorism is the new cold war, Christians are the new infidels (though I believe they were the old infidels as well) and the ice caps are melting.

So how can the publishing industry continue to sustain such a flagrant waste of energy and resources? The simple answer is it can't. Alternatives have to be explored and pursed if the new world is not to become a place that sees any form of literature as pointless and future generations turn to the XBox and wii as their only hope of cultural salvation. Digital content is the language this generation understands. They download music, software, films. They socialise on-line, meet new buddies and find old buddies. Their world revolves around digital content being fed down a wire.

Bookstores will close along with a host of other retail outlets. I am not for one moment suggesting the complete closure of the shopping mall or high street, but a commercial market that is radically different to the one we take for granted today. By this I mean the world that is happy overstocking, over-printing and using huge amounts of energy transporting product only for it to be returned and literally burned or pulped.

The new consumer will get the majority of its physical wares from an on-line portal or download it directly in the form of 1's and 0's. Not a leap of the imaginations is it? The publishing industry has to wake up and sniff the java. The methods employed today cannot continue and will not be viewed favourably ten years from now.

Print-on-Demand will help allay those fears over the next decade by producing physical content only when it is actually demanded, but the new world will embrace methods that place less stress on the environment. Currently we have the eBook, mobile phone downloads, the Kindle, various other electronic book readers, and direct web site downloads as alternatives to the printed page. I am sure as the web develops these will evolve and some may even be laughed upon as anachronistic, but the future of how we consume content will change through necessity and through the evolution of the reader.

Publish and be Damned

By Darren E Laws

There are many different disparaging terminologies used to describe the current trend of authors and publishers embracing print-on demand (POD) and independent and self publishing, most of them instigated by an industry that sees little, if any, worth in the product being produced. Is this a valid judgement on the actual merit of each of these titles, be they fiction or non-fiction. Or is it the reaction to the democratisation of publishing. Like it or not the advent of new technology and the internet has levelled the playing field, but only marginally. Yet to hear the braying, antagonistic bashing it receives you could be mistaken for believing it was the cause of all the publishing industry’s ills. Let's not kid ourselves, independent authors and independent publishers are viewed as a blip on the landscape; the ugly pimple on the backside of a beautiful butterfly. So terminologies such as 'vanity publishing' exists to denigrate all who choose to tread what can at best be called a truly exciting experience and at worst a lonely and extremely difficult path.

But this path has been walked down many times before, proving that the industry is often apt to ignoring talent, or at the very least, not always recognising it. You may know of some of these names, John Grisham, Robert James Waller, Ezra Pound, Zane Grey, Deepak Chopra, Mark Twain, George Bernard Shaw, Marcel Proust, Margaret Atwood amongst a few; all of these people reached a point in their career where there was no option but to self-publish. How vain were these people?

Of course it would be foolish to suggest that each new POD title is worthy of mainstream attention and should reach a large audience. Many only reach sales that would preclude any form of career as an author, but this should not prevent them from reaching whatever audience they do attain, using whatever means possible. Is it not for the audience and market to judge one’s validity? How many times have we seen mainstream publishers handing out large advances like candy to authors who fail to produce that illusive best-seller, even with the backing of a huge marketing budget or the kudos of a prestigous award. I saw DBC Pierre’s follow up to the Man Booker prize winning novel, Vernon God Little, ‘Ludmila’s Broken English’ sitting on the shelves of ‘Poundstreatcher’. DBC Pierre, a winner in 2003, clearly struggled to retain the sales of his prize winning début. This is not a reflection of DBC Pierre at all, but clearly an indication of how the industry works and at times fails to work.

The question needs to be asked though; at what point though does a self published author become respectable in the eyes of the industry? Jhumpa Lahiri is the latest self-published author to make the industry sit up and take notice. Her latest collection of stories, 'Unaccustomed Earth' recently topped the US book charts and is in the running for the €35,000, Frank O'Connor International Short Story prize.

Yet the publishing industry appears to be ready to jump into bed with any celebrity, regardless of talent and ability to write (and one may even speculate, read) to publish not only their memoirs, but now the increasing trend of the celebrity novel (Usually a book so ghost-written that it would take a team of mediums to trace the actual author.). Often the only time a 'celebrity' would have written anything constructive in the book would be when they hastily scribble their moniker inside for an adoring fan who probably does not know or care what involvement the 'star' had with the work, as long as their picture adorned the cover. If ever the term vanity could legitimately be used in the industry with absolute accuracy then surely it is here. At least those tarred with the stigma of vanity publishing have had the tenacity, gumption and love of writing to have applied themselves to their work and actually written it themselves, regardless of the perceived quality.

So who’s fooling who, the author that for one reason or another might not manage to get their manuscript to the top of the slush pile with a mainstream publisher and decide to have the gumption to at least tackle the market head-on, or the publisher who commissions an army of ghost-writers to churn out fodder for the masses and endorse it with a ‘celebrities’ name? While you ponder that question think about this short list of authors who did not find instant success.

Norman Mailer - The Naked and the Dead - Rejected 12 times

Richard Bach - Jonathan Livingston Seagull – Rejected 20 times

Joseph Heller - Catch-22 – Rejected 22 times (Wouldn’t you know)

Robert Persig - Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance – Rejected 121 times, and of course John Grisham - A Time to Kill - 15 publishers and 30 agents before publishing it himself. It makes you wonder what the world of literature would be like if it were not for the tenacity of many authors willing to go that extra mile and not take rejection by the mainstream industry that for one reason or another could not see worth in the work being presented. These authors took that leap of faith, a leap of faith in their own work, skill, ability, tenacity and talent. They did not listen to the voice of rejection they said “Publish and be damned”

The Dark Days Aren’t Coming, They’re Here

In a week which has seen a growing upsurge against traditional industry practices and a realisation by retailers and publishers that we cannot continue running the book publishing industry the way it has traditionally ran for the last 50 years, calls have been made from established figures for a change. The failure to embrace new lines of production and new printing methods and formats is hardly news in the publishing world, but now it would appear hands are being forced through other issues such as the rising cost of paper and escalating fuel prices. CEO Carolyn Reidy at Simon & Schuster has been reported as saying that the escalating prices have made Simon & Schuster “take a fresh look at the way we do business. Our basic costs are up dramatically." With estimates of rises in costs between 10 and 40% this year (so far) it is obvious that something will have to give. The question is what. Will these lions, these demigods of publishing finally address the way they do business or will they take the easy route and pass the charge down the line to the consumer.

Robert Miller, the founder of Walt Disney’s ‘Hyperion Books’ now heads up a new imprint at HarperCollins, he sees an area that is the bane for publishers, which is not only crazy but in this day and age, unacceptable environmentally mental. Figures from the US show that in 2005 there were approximately 1.5 billion books published and distributed to retail outlets. Out of these a staggering 465 million were returned as unsold. What does this tell us about the industry? It tells us that there is a cartel between publishers and the retail industry that is willing to absorb a system of waste and that something is drastically wrong with the process of buying books. Just for a moment stop and think about the sheer amount of energy spent in producing the books, transporting the books, having them sit around in stores being heated and cooled with air conditioning for months on end and then being returned unsold due to little or no demand. Sadly the story does not end with the books being returned. From this point books can then be shipped off to remainder outlets or pulped, both are practices which expand a heck of a lot of energy and resources.

Interestingly this week Faber also announced that it was going to reprint its ‘Classics’ line using Print on Demand (POD) technology. Is this a dry run for the shape of things to come? POD is certainly a leaner and greener method of getting books into store. Congratulations Faber, but what of this archaic returns policy. Why do retailers overstock and spend so much of its buying power leaving precious little left to experiment with indie publishers and small publishers. It is partly this short-sightedness which is leading to many shoppers turning to the internet. April Hamilton, author and publisher, describes the lamentable situation in the USA in her latest blog post – No,Mr. Murdoch : that was a movie, this is a book. “Thanks to over two decades of consolidation, the U.S. publishing industry is now lorded over by just six media mega conglomerates, Viacom, Time Warner and News Corp. among them. If these names sound familiar, it’s because they belong to the artistic visionaries who brought us The Moment of Truth TV show, virtually every Adam Sandler movie ever made, People magazine and much more of the same. They’ve made a lucrative science of cranking out the media equivalent of junk food: over-packaged, over-hyped, disposable distractions that never turn out to be quite as satisfying as they looked in the ad, and sometimes even leave you feeling a little guilty.”

Hamilton’s point is that this is an industry that refuses to face some harsh realities that it should be addressing. At present it is happy to churn out a billon point five books and see nearly 500 million returned and then bleat about rising costs. The responsibility lies with every single area within the industry to address over-stocking, address over-printing and address itself, before owning a book becomes a dirty habit, something to be ashamed of. Imagine, you are the owner of the latest hyped blockbuster, but in this green world word gets out about the carbon footprint, the waste of resources due to mass production, the gallons of fuel spent driving those books back and forth to the retailer only to see millions of copies burned or pulped in the greatest funeral pyre since the dark days of the Second World War. Maybe you would turn to an eBook rather than be seen holding a copy while sitting on a bus or travelling on a train, or you would open a Kindle and sneer at the person sitting opposite holding a carbon relic of the past. Books are a thing of beauty, a physical bond develops between reader and storyteller, but can the world and the industry continue to afford such a waste. POD provides a book on demand; it is as simple as that. If there is no demand there is no sales, which is sad but at least there is no waste.

Word of Mouth or Word of Pen...Has the Internet killed the Book Review?

Twenty years ago the power of the book review was the difference between a best-seller and a place in the obscurity bin with a sale sticker slapped across the front. Book reviewers held a position of power and high respect in the industry, but over recent years the need to obtain reviews from the mainstream press has diminished.

The arrival of the Internet has broadened the market for publishers and opened hundreds of new channels for small publishers so their books can gain recognition against the established market. Internet portals now specialise in areas of fiction and non-fiction, and many readers turn to these channels before opening ‘The London Times’ or ‘The New York Post’. The word of the new reviewer is 'Word of Mouth' (WOM) and the new reviewer can be you or me. The interesting thing is the influence and position of power is shifting and becoming more democratic.

A recent report showed that traditional book reviews only counted for 5% of sales, of course there are obvious exceptions. But if you look at the phenomenon of 'WOM' and see how powerful it can be, it becomes clear that a change in how people disseminate information and trust what friends, colleagues and even complete strangers are saying over traditional reviewers has occurred. WOM played a huge part in the success of JK Rowling and the Harry Potter series of books. I am sure reviewers from the traditional press would love to take claim for her success, but in reality it was WOM and children passing the word to their friends and family and via sites such as Amazon and social networking on the Internet that made this series such a worldwide success.

Now with the development of Web2.0 and social networking playing such a part in surfers daily net habits, authors and publishers alike would be mad to ignore the possibilities open to them. The term viral was coined on the web long ago and it is as apt a word as any to describe how quickly something can become hot on the web. Sites such as Shelfari, Goodreads and MySpace provide a platform for independent authors and publishers to get their product known and create a buzz. Chatrooms, forums, and messaging add a further dimension that gets people talking about books.

Publishers are also getting wise to the existence of You Tube and other video portals to make video promos. Many of these films are creative and appear to have a higher budget than the minuscule amounts of money actually spent. The book industry has traditionally ignored using film or video to promote its books but now new publishers are embracing every new method to get books in front of people and talking.

The Weblog or Blog is now one of the key ports of call for many readers wanting to know about their favourite author or genre. Many bloggers have taken on the mantle of the ‘new reviewer’ and their word is often trusted beyond that of established journalists. The reach of the blogger is global and for an author to receive a favourable review on a respected site can translate to not only sales but also that all-important WOM.

So where does the traditional reviewer sit in this new world of opportunity. Has he been consigned to the equivalent of the bargain bucket in terms of usefulness? No. A good review in a traditional magazine, newspaper or journal still translates into sales, maybe not as many as in the past but there is still the kudos element which all authors and publishers want associated with it. Believe it or not though, it is not all about sales, though they are important. It is all about word of mouth, which is no more than today's buzz word that encompasses 'product and brand' profile. WOM gives authors and publishers recognition. For the small, independent publisher this can be achieved with more frequency, through more channels and with greater scope on the net. After all, and here is the challenge; are the New York or London Times going to review the latest novel from Darren E Laws or will they stick with the established authors such as Stephen King. No prizes for guessing.

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