“The old rules, it seems, are far more hit or miss than ever before… leaning more often to “miss” by a wide margin.”
Old School Book PR: Down For the Count?
What about mainstream PR, publicists and the like?
Won’t I sell a boatload of books if I land on the Today Show, Oprah, the New York Times or the Wall Street Journal?
Answer…it depends.
Ten years ago, a feature in any of these major market media outlets was the equivalent of a fast track to bestsellerdom. Not any more.
With the massive proliferation of the web, attention has become so diluted across all media, both on and offline, and people have become so much more distracted that, barring an appearance on Oprah, showing up in mainstream outlets is nice, but far from a guarantee of book sales.
Perennial NY Times, WSJ and USA Today bestselling author, Tim Ferris (Four Hour Workweek) has shared how a mention on a single blog actually sold more books than a segment on the top rated morning TV show. My own experience bears this out. Having seen a bigger bump in my amazon sales from the right online mention that I did from a review in two major newspapers and magazines.
Publishers and book industry publicists are shaking their collective noggins trying to figure out what it takes to really sell books these days. The old rules, it seems, are far more hit or miss than ever before…leaning more often to “miss” by a wide margin.
But, that’s only half the mainstream PR problem….
Even if these media outlets did spur sales, with 200,000 print books and another 300,000 self-published, POD and ebooks coming out every year, the battle to win editors’ and producers’ attention has become epic. And, push back against the old spamming press release blasts has been fierce, making the chance of landing any level of mainstream coverage (beyond the newspaper or TV station in the town you grew up in) without deep connections extremely unlikely.
If you’ve got enough juice with your publisher to have their in-house publicists really work for you, tap it. Or, if you’ve got personal connections, work ‘em. Most authors don’t, however, leaving the obvious and often taken path. Hire a publicist who charges anywhere from $2,000-$15,000 a month and the only promise you get is that they’ll “try their best,” but never guarantee a single placement.
You may get your money’s worth…but often times, not.
And, the amount you’ll have to spend ($6,000-$45,000 for a 3 month minimum) compared to the level of uncertainty about it’s effect on book sales is, for most authors, an untenable option.