Do you know what you are selling - marketing part 2

So in the last marketing post I covered the difference between marketing and sales.  But now I want to know, do you know the point of your marketing campaign?


A lot of authors don't seem to know the point.


There are 3 ways to market your book.  Pick one of the three and use that as the starting point for your marketing strategy. Because (and here is the important bit) the method you use will depend on your goal. It will utilise different techniques, and it will net you different results.

• market your title
• market your name
• market your publishing company* 

*sorry, pet peeve, a publishing imprint is a sub-division of a larger publishing company  wikipedia. You own a publishing company or small press, not an imprint.

Title

  You can market the title of your novel (or, alternatively, the title of your series). I was on about book 4 or 5 before I realised Kelley Armstrong's series was called Women of the Underworld. There was no indication on the books that the series had a title.

On the other hand, Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series  has a very distinctive Series name. In fact, the name has been so well presented that it is practically a brand. Every new novel starts with a blowing wind which is not the beginning because the wheel of time turns, it has no beginnings or endings. Additionally each new book is presented as Wheel of Time whatever number whatever title. And throughout the story characters reference the Wheel of Time.

 

You can do this with either your books title or your series title. You can market it to the point where everyone knows it. Sometimes viral marketing (word of mouth) will run with a title, and that's what gets marketed whether you want it to or not. (Which is why Dan Brown's novels released before DaVinci Code were reissued with new covers pointing out he was the author of the DaVinci Code).

Of course, on rare occasions you can market a character. At such times it is a good idea to include the characters name in the title. There are a few examples of this (such as Hannibal the Cannibal or Sherlock Holmes). The most recognised example, of course, is:

Name

You can turn your name into a brand. There are a lot of authors who have done this, and you can spot them because the next book is always introduced as "Author's book."

Examples include John Grisham's The Firm or Michael Crighton's Jurassic Park. The most successful author to use this form of branding is, of course, Stephen King. 

Publishing Company

You can brand your companies name. This is unusual to the point of practically never being heard of. There are only a few occasions when this has been used. It is mostly used when there are a lot of similar books by loads of different authors, and readers want a particular style or genre of book rather than following a certain author's work.


Examples of this would be Harlequin Romance or The Black Library (publishes fiction set in the World of Warhammer).


Okay this feels like its getting long. I have a lot written past this point, I'm going to cut it and use it for a second post which will come online in a few days. It involves the pros and cons of the methods described above.

The Typography of Book Covers

Here are some book covers by debut authors or unknown authors.

Now okay the thumbnails are small, but the similarities are easy to spot.

First of all, how many of these books have you heard of?  I've heard of the one on the end, that's it.  I'm very intrigued by the first two.  Definitely by the first one.

So, some interesting covers.  Number three is very generic (a fantasy that has people on horseback riding through the mountains.  My Gods, I must buy this at once.  Yeah, not so much...)

But what do they have in common?

Try some more covers, not all fantasies this time.

Do you see what they have in common?

In the first four pictures, the book title is given far more importance than the author's name.  Because the title is the selling point in these cases.  "Oh, Fallow Blade," says the bookshop browser.  "I wonder what that's about."  In the second lot of four we see a shift to "Oh, the next Terry Pratchett/Dan Brown/ whoever book.  I have to buy that."

The Unique Selling Point or USP (seriously, if you want to market your books effectively, you will need to learn marketing.  And that means learning things like USPs and how to do market research and so on) alters in the second batch of books to be about the author.

Interestingly, even by book seven, Harry Potter was still considered of far more importance than JK Rowling.  That's the power of branding.

So, for the debut author it seems that you're title should be at the top of the book.  Should it?  Readers are subconsciously targeted by the layout of your cover.  If you give your name all the attention, it might suggest to readers that you are far more well known than you actually are.  And having the readers subconsciously thinking "Hmm, this is a popular author," can't be a bad thing, can it?

Oh, and it's not lying, it's marketing.  Well, it is lying, but marketing IS LYING.  And we are having to compete with companies that have multi-million pound turnovers per annum.  We need whatever help we can get.

What do you think?  Where's the title going on your next book cover?

These book images are all copyrighted.  I don't own the copyright.  I have used them simply for illustrative purposes.  I am not claiming to be the author or publisher of any of these books.  If you are the author or publisher of any of these books and you wish me to remove the image, please email me at Chriskelly82*AT*aol.com, replacing the *AT* with an @.

Thank you.   

 

Pick my Title

Yes, that's right; this is your chance to influence my title.  I have 2 options and can't decide, so I'm soliciting other opinions.


Oh, and if you'd like to read a synopsis, please go to the Pleasure and Death page by clicking the link above. 


So...



1) The Guns of Pleasure and Death



2) Pleasure and Death


Post a comment, let me know what you think.