Meeting an Author's Greatest Challenge

Using Promotion to Avoid Publishing and Perishing

Two cannibals are having dinner and one says to the other, "You know, I don't like your publisher." "OK," the other cannibal says, "then just eat the noodles." The most common reason authors become disenchanted with their publishers is lack of promotion. Most books have a one-to-three-month window of opportunity to build sales and publicity momentum. That window opens on the publication date, when books are in stores and reviews start to appear.

Promotion and Nonfiction
If you are writing self-help or how-to books, or any kind of nonfiction for a wide national audience that will require author promotion to succeed, your ability to promote your work will usually be far more important than its content in determining the editor, publisher and deal you get for your book.

The seven most powerful words in publishing are "It's good to be back again, Oprah!" Oprah is the best thing that has happened to American writers since the invention of computers. She also symbolizes the power of publicity to make books successful. The humorist Robert Benchley once confessed, "It took me 15 years to discover I had no talent for writing, but I couldn't give it up because by that time, I was too famous." If fame or fortune is your goal, and you don't want to wait 15 years for it, give yourself a promotion.

When you submit your proposal or manuscript, include a promotion plan listing in descending order of importance everything that you will do to promote your book both when it's published and forever after.

Industry Realities
Because of the industry's growing costs and high failure rate, big publishers are less interested in nursing writers along until they write their breakout book. The role of developing writers has fallen to small presses and university presses that pay writers less but don't have to sell as many copies and so are less concerned about a writer's ability to promote a book.

Large houses are looking for writers who are ready to "pop," who are ready for the big time. Agents can only make a living by selling books to big publishers. For most nonfiction, I can tell from two pieces of information whether I will be able to sell a book to a major house: a title and a promotion plan.

The only time to approach an agent or a big publisher is when two things are in place: your proposal or manuscript is as strong as it can be, and the promotion plan for your book is as long and as strong as you can make it. Small and medium-sized publishers don't need to be as concerned about promotion so they don't require big promotion plans.

Author Options

One way in which writers are luckier than agents is that agents can only make a living by selling books to the six multimedia, multinational conglomerates that dominate trade publishing. Writers have far more options: they can sell their books to big publishers, little ones, university presses and, niche or regional publishers. Or they can self-publish their books online or off, if only to test-market them.

Depending on the size of the market for your book and your ability to write and promote it, you may want to consider the alternatives to the New York houses. You may be better off having a big book at a small house than a small book at a big house where it will be swamped in the annual deluge of books.

There are more ways to promote your books and profit from them than ever. And if you're writing to meet the perennial needs of America's readers-and you can promote your books-now is the best time ever to be a writer. Good luck!

Michael Larsen, AAR, and Elizabeth Pomada, AAR, are partners in Larsen-Pomada Literary Agents, the oldest agency in Northern California. Elizabeth is a past president of the San Francisco Chapter, and Mike has been helping with the chapter's programs since the 1970s. Mike is the author of How to Write a Book Proposal and Literary Agents: What They Do, How They Do It, and How to Find and Work with the Right One for You and coauthor of Guerrilla Marketing and Guerrilla Marketing for Writers: 100 Weapons for Selling Your Work.

Mike and Elizabeth welcome comments and questions at 415-673-0939, larsenpoma at aol.com, 1029 Jones St., San Francisco, CA 94109, or www.larsen-pomada.com.