The 8th Annual Harlem Book Fair was held on July 22, 2006 on 135th Street in New York City. This was the third time I had exhibited at the fair but the first time as an exhibitor representing my main company, RJ Communications (www.SelfPublishing.com, www.BooksJustBooks.com). Previous years I exhibited as The Junior Writers Foundation, a non-profit … [Read more...]

A client emailed this week describing a book he is publishing on the current middle eastern crisis and asking my opinion. If you’ve ever contemplated doing a ‘hot’ book, you’ll know how tempting and compelling the thought can be. But there are dangers in doing a newsworthy book. It’s not rocket science to publicize an ‘evergreen’ … [Read more...]

Three important concepts are fundamental to successful book marketing. Two are fairly obvious and you probably invoke them without even thinking. First, the content and format of your promotional material should communicate the benefits your titles offer to the recipient of the message. A one-message-fits-all press release is doomed to failure. The … [Read more...]

I'm sure you can come up with all sorts of reasons for not starting your own business, the first, of many, being lack of money and uncertainty of its success. But no matter what the reasons are against starting a business, there are just as many reasons for starting one. Actually, for the right person, the advantages of business ownership far … [Read more...]

I did a teleconference a few weeks ago with people who were new in sales and new to prospecting. The focus of the call was to help participants get beyond fear and understand their prospecting process. One of the participants on the call told me that she had been given the telephone prospecting script that her team leader uses to set … [Read more...]

In Aesop’s fable of The Hare and the Tortoise, these two animals agree to a race. Everyone knows that a hare is fast while a tortoise is slow. However, during the race, the hare decides to take a rest part way through and falls asleep. As a result the tortoise wins the race. Aesop’s moral in this story is “slow and steady wins the … [Read more...]

Why Self-Publishing? Fact or Fiction: “The only reason to self-publish is because you can’t land a publisher.” Every time I hear that, I’ve gotta smile. The unspoken message, of course, is that the preferred route is to land a publisher. Well, call me crazy, but I disagree. For me, self-publishing was the first choice. I actually did … [Read more...]