PR and Marketing Questions Answered Part VI: What’s New in 2022
By Ann Marie Nieves | February 14, 2022 |
Credit: Canva
Several years ago in a campaign wrap-up call for an author’s first self-published book (she had a few books with big houses in previous years), she commented to me that she was disappointed by the lack of blogger reviews I had gotten for her novel. Fair enough – most of the bloggers that had covered her in the past either hadn’t responded to my outreach, expressed that they had too much on their plate, or were nowhere to be found. When a book is self-published, publicists often receive a different response from media and influencers, so the quiet didn’t weigh on me heavily. When I told my client we had secured and paid for a BookBub deal that lead to more than 27k downloads and dozens of favorable Amazon reviews in just a week’s period of time, creating a halo-effect for her previous works and introducing thousands of new readers to her work, she said nothing except to ask what was BookBub was. (It was in our proposal and letter of agreement.) Some months later, I heard she had gotten an offer from one of Amazon’s publishing imprints for that very same book. Bravo!
Let’s break this apart.
-We were at a turning point in the blogging world. The reason for my poor showing on the blogger front was perhaps less about me doing the work and more about the fact that bloggers weren’t doing so much blogging anymore. Hello #bookstagram
-BookBub was founded in 2012. Think about when you first started using this influential platform. For any author that has gotten a BookBub deal – how thrilled were you?
-Amazon started its publishing arm in 2009 and launched several imprints in its first two years. And that was over a decade ago. I love the idea of more authors having a shot at living their dreams, but what does it mean for PR?
This morning I was listening to David Bowie’s song CHANGES. I love Bowie–the oddity, the wandering, the uniqueness, the fact that he was always ahead of the time, THE CHANGES.
Here in book world, you may have noticed some of the changes–popular books out of stock, less attendance at Zoom events, publishers not wanting authors to do virtual bookstore events, delayed shipments, authors creating their own platforms on social media, lots of Instagram Live programming, less reviews, not much differentiation of books in media coverage.
As we head deeper into 2022, here’s are some things to consider about PR and marketing. As usual, I had a little help from my friends in the biz.
M.J. Rose, Founder of Authorbuzz; Co-founder Blue Box Press; Bestselling novelist (current book out is The Fashion Orphans with Randy Susan Meyers)
We are finding with so many more books being released than ever before, one of the most important new developments is that the book’s Amazon page is more important than it ever has been.
There’s a limited amount of information any marketing can impart. Ads interest people in the book but what sells the book is the book description and reader reviews and excerpt on the Amazon page.
So what is key? The book description needs to help the reader know quickly if the book is for them or not. Not adjectives about how good the writing is or how profound (insert any other word) but rather what kind of book this is.
You need to tell the reader – hey if you love this author and that author – this book is for you – to give them examples – to explain. Then the description needs to be no more than 3 -4 tight and powerful paragraphs.
Here is an example of one that works so well:
In the vein of The Time Traveler’s Wife and Life After Life, The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue is New York Times bestselling author V. E. Schwab’s genre-defying tour de force.
A Life No One Will Remember. A Story You Will Never Forget.
France, 1714: in a moment of desperation, a young woman makes a Faustian bargain to live forever—and is cursed to be forgotten by everyone she meets.
Thus begins the extraordinary life of Addie LaRue, and a dazzling adventure that will play out across centuries and continents, across history and art, as a young woman learns how far she will go to leave her mark on the world.
But everything changes when, after nearly 300 years, Addie stumbles across a young man in a hidden bookstore and he remembers her name.
Sherry Goldman, Founder and President of Goldman Communications Group, Adjunct professor in public relations at The City College of New York
2022 will see a continuation of the digitization of information and its ability to reach audiences. Over the past few years, we have seen many print media (newspapers and magazines) go out of business as advertising shifted online and younger audiences prefer to get information on their phones. Many more media have opted to cancel printed issues and transition to online only. Just this past week, six more well-respected magazines, including Parents, Health, Entertainment Weekly, and InStyle, announced they were no longer going to print issues of their magazine. No more issues delivered to your mailbox, found on newsstands, picked up and flipped through in doctors’ waiting rooms, and passed among friends and colleagues. This disturbing trend means reduced earned media opportunities for clients and the ‘cache’ of being published diminished in many clients’ eyes. Online is often shorter reads, mostly only seen by followers, less remembered and memorable, and finding longevity based on click rates – challenging for companies, organizations, and authors to have their messages seen, heard, remembered, and acted on. While we can bemoan this, this digitization is here to stay, so we have to adapt and find ways to harness its power and reach.
Lori Edelman, Social Media Director, Get Red PR
One of the changes we’ve observed is that the bookstagram community, as a whole, is much less interested in non-fiction books than in past years. More specifically, books about leadership and personal growth are a tougher sell.
It’s also really important for authors to consult with a professional in social media/digital marketing several months (and longer if possible) before their book publishes. Everyone has questions about Instagram and TikTok, both very different platforms. Before you panic, it’s important to understand if these platforms are right for you. There is a lot of bad advice out there, so if you can allocate some of your marketing budget for an initial consultation about social media with a professional perhaps it will ultimately save you time, money, and stress.
We are in the midst of a massive shift in how people use Instagram (especially Reels) and TikTok, and perhaps more importantly, who uses each platform. The bookstagram community has really embraced Reels in a way they hadn’t before. And, simultaneously, many Instagram users have started new #booktok accounts. While these newer #booktokkers have much less engagement than users who started using the platform early on, they will inevitably have an impact.
Is there a trend or a change you’d like to discuss? Drop it in the comments.
Ann-Marie Nieves (she/her) is the founder of Get Red PR, and an award-winning communicator with experience across a broad range of industries in both the business-to-consumer and business-to-business sectors. She has experience within all communications platforms including public relations, advertising, marketing, copywriting, website development, community relations, and social media.
Thank you for this practical, down-to-earth post. The speed of change can be dizzying for some of us (well, like me) who grew up in a pre-digital age. Just as we’ve made the slow adjustment to one form of outreach (translation: self-promotion)—voila, it’s over, replaced by another. It can be pretty daunting, especially when all we want to do is write. The big learning for me, as I start to ramp up for my third novel, is to decide what I can handle myself and what I can/should turn over to the professionals. I find that I’m drawing the line in a different place for each book, as the landscape changes. and each book suggests different possibilities, so thank you again!
That’s absolutely right – each book suggest different possibilities. That’s what’s so exciting about our work!
Thanks, Ann Marie,
If there is one thing I’ve learned in my limited time in this industry, it’s how quickly things change. There may have once been a process that was seemingly set in stone, but now it appears everything can change with the introduction of a new app. Being media savvy enough to keep up with the changes is a challenge unto itself. Thanks for your informative article.
Right?! Remember Clubhouse? It was the hottest thing last year. I haven’t been on it in months!
Honest question here: how many people who AREN’T editors or agents actually buy as a result of comps, especially for self-published work that is cross-genre, and how much of the fad for comps is driven by the ease of lifting pitches to agents and editors? I’m suspicious that comps are really a fad for sales to publishers and not a proven technique for reader sales.
I like comps when the comparisons is a well-known book, movie, or tv show but tells how it is different. For example, Harry Potter in space or The Breakfast Club but one of the kids is a murderer. Whenever, I read a book described as “this book meets this book”, I’m like…Meh.
As a reader, when I’m looking for a book I don’t want the description to tell me it’s like such and such an author or book because so many times I’ve never heard of them. I want to know the story, the subject, the meat of the book. That’s one of my pet peeves about book descriptions. I’ve vowed not to include them in my book’s description. Maybe I’m wrong and will have to change my ways but I’m looking at how readers might see them.
Thank you so much for tackling this topic, Ann-Marie. The publishing landscape is constantly changing, and I appreciate your perspective here — and your colleagues’ perspectives, too!
What’s missing for me in this discussion is the impact of algorithms in book recommendations and sales. How can an author’s or publisher’s PR or marketing efforts have an impact when, online, books are recommended to readers by AIs? I am curious to know. Thank you.