Why Bad Things Happen to Good Titles
In some ways, books are like humans. They enter the world as babies, full of potential and opportunity, with proud parents boasting great visions for their children’s success. But as they grow, something happens and very few become the sensation their parents hoped they would be.
The same process occurs to many titles, and their authors can never fully understand what went wrong. But you can improve the chances of your offsprings’ success by using a checklist to predict if a particular book has a chance of becoming successful. Here are general characteristics of a potential winning title:
- The industry is in a growth stage with demand, sales and profits all increasing.
- The content has diverse market attraction (mass market appeal; wide acceptability).
- Broad availability (readily distributable to markets via present or existing channels).
- Little reliance on ups and downs of economy (or able to be repositioned).
- Little or no seasonal variations.
- Customers congregated in easy-to-reach geographical concentrations.
- A unique point of difference (fills a market need; not a me-too title).
- Priced competitively and easy to produce at a marketable cost (not a lot of die-cutting, shrink-wrapping of components, etc).
- Lends itself to existing promotion and advertising techniques.
- Saleable to present customers (you already know who and where they are).
- Has a low break-even point.
- Suitable for rights sales (foreign, serial, movie).
- The author has a recognized reputation in the target niche.
- The publishing process is not hurried to meet artificial deadlines or an imposed number of titles to publish annually.
- Published with adequate marketing support planned throughout its life cycle.
- Adequate planning.
- Proper implementation of the plan
- Good production quality.
- Introduced into the right market.
- It has a good title.
- Proper forecasting.
- Proper financing. Don’t spend so much on production that there is little left for promotion.
- The author has a long-term perspective.
- Not relying on distribution channel for selling activities.
- Applicable to sell through bookstores and in special-sales markets.
- It is marketed with perpetual promotion.
Brian Jud hosts Book Central Station where you can find rated lists of suppliers to help you write, publish and market your books. Post your own reviews and add your favorite suppliers. For a free trial, go to http://www.bookcentralstation.com/trial.asp Contact Brian at P. O. Box 715, Avon, CT 06001; (800) 562-4357; brianjud@bookmarketing.com or go to http://www.bookmarketing.com
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December 8th, 2007 at 2:13 pm
I appreciate the articles you write. I feel strongly that writers miss the threshold for opportunity because they are consistently thinking”Oprah” when they should think local market first. Some of my authors are very ignorant about their writing ability. It kills me that we try to inform and provide support, like the information given here, yet the writer sees themselves as James Patterson, Terry McMillan and the like. The too often do not realize that those authors were provided a hefty budget and had outsourced a publicist. Could you please share your thoughts on the importance of editors, publicists, and agents?
thanks