Joe Kraynak

Amazon’s Disreputable Marketing of The Tales of Beedle the Bard

Today, I searched Amazon.com Books for “bipolar disorder.” At the top of the list? J.K. Rowling’s The Tales of Beedle the Bard. That’s weird, I thought, maybe Beedle the Bard has bipolar disorder. Maybe I should order the book to find out.

On second thought, I doubted that Beedle the Bard had bipolar disorder. I decided to look up something else totally unrelated to fiction and J.K. Rowling. So I searched Amazon.com Books for “foreclosure.” Sure enough, at the top of the list again was J.K. Rowling’s The Tales of Beedle the Bard.

Now, I know Amazon.com wants to sell books, and this is sure to be a big seller. I don’t mind having the title splashed in my face on the opening Amazon.com page or even in the margins of other pages I look at. I might even be able to tolerate a pop-up ad or two. However, when I search for books on specific topics, I expect Amazon.com to display only books that fit my topic description. Otherwise, what’s the point of having a search tool?

Current Project - Cross-Cultural Selling For Dummies

Over the past several months, I’ve been working with Michael Soon Lee of EthnoConnect, a leading expert on the topic of selling to customers from diverse cultures, and sales guru Ralph R. Roberts to develop Cross-Cultural Selling For Dummies®. We just wrapped up the writing phase of the project and are currently working through author review - when we have the opportunity to review changes and suggestions from editorial and answer their questions.

We’re developing the book primarily for salespeople who want to expand their business into any of various multicultural markets across the country and around the world. (According to the Selig Center for Economic Growth, the combined purchasing power of the multicultural market has grown from $1.39 trillion in 2000 to over $2 trillion in 2006 and is estimated to reach $3 trillion in 2011.) However, the book is useful for others, as well, including small-business owners, entrepreneurs, and any front-line sales or customer service staff. Cross-Cultural Selling For Dummies® provides readers with practical tips and strategies showing them exactly what they need to do to appeal to clientele from different cultures:

• Assess your multicultural readiness (a self-test)
• Develop basic multicultural competency
• Hone your multicultural customer service skills
• Adjust your marketing campaign to make it more appealing to clients from other cultures
• Go beyond marketing to make your entire business multicultural friendly
• Redesign your store or office to make it appeal to a broader clientele
• Adapt your product line for multicultural sales
• Meet and greet prospective clients without turning them off
• Adapt your sales presentation and techniques
• Recognize multicultural buying signals
• Acquire closing techniques that are more effective with clients from other cultures
• Negotiate with clients who may have more experience and expertise with haggling than you do
• Build your referral base in the ethnic community
• Assemble and manage your own multicultural sales team
• Discover commonly held myths about your own culture and others that may be holding you back
• Uncover a host of multicultural resources that can help you transition your business for other markets

The book will be available in bookstores by November 17, 2008 – just in time to make the perfect Christmas present, or Kwanzaa present, or Hanukkah present, or ….

Will Amazon’s Kindle Revolutionize Publishing?

As a professional writer who depends on a steady flow of royalties to pay the bills, I’m terrified by Amazon’s Kindle. Why? Two reasons. First, electronic versions of books cost much less than their paper counterparts. Second, I usually get a smaller percentage of royalties on eBooks, which is something that’s totally incomprehensible to me, but that’s how most publishers structure their contracts.

To compensate, I’ve decided to jump on the Kindle bandwagon and start selling these nifty little units. If you click on the image of the Kindle (above) or the link at the end of this post, it’ll take you to Amazon.com, where you can purchase the Kindle for a cool $399. I get 10% through my Amazon Associates account and you save big bucks on future book purchases – a win-win proposition if there ever was one.

I’m also promoting the product because I think it’s a great tool/toy:

• Paper-like screen: This isn’t like reading on your computer screen. Kindle’s screen looks like real paper.
• Lighter and thinner than a typical paperback: Kindle weighs only 10.3 ounces.
• Stores over 200 titles: You can carry your entire library around with you rather than having to choose which two books you’re going to pack for vacation.
• Order books wherever you are: The Kindle has built-in wireless capability, like a cell phone, so you can order and download your books directly from your Kindle, whether you’re lying in bed, riding in a car, or waiting to board a plane. You can order and download most books in less than a minute.
• Access a wide variety of reading materials: Over 100,000 books are currently available, including over 100 New York Times® Best Sellers; newspaper and magazine subscriptions, including The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Atlantic Monthly, and Forbes, and more than 300 top blogs.
• Obtain free book samples: You can download and read the first chapter of a book for free before deciding to purchase it.
• Long battery life: Leave wireless on and recharge approximately every other day. Turn wireless off and read for a week or more before recharging. Fully recharges in 2 hours.
• No connection charges: No monthly wireless bills, service plans, or commitments. Amazon takes care of the wireless delivery so you can simply click, buy, and read.
• Order and download books on your computer and transfer them to your Kindle: If you prefer to place your book orders on your computer, you can download books and then copy them to your Kindle using the USB cable that’s included.
• Be green: If nothing else, wireless books are greener than their paper versions. They conserve paper along with the energy required to print and bind the books and package and ship them. And there’s no paper waste from books, magazines, and newspapers that ultimately find their way into the trash.

I think Amazon’s Kindle and similar devices are well on their way to revolutionizing the publishing industry in an eco-friendly, consumer-friendly way. I dread the thought of what their increasing popularity is going to do to my bottom line, but life consists of change, and overall, I think the changes that Kindle is ushering in are going to be good for everyone.

Order Your Kindle: Amazon’s New Wireless Reading Device

What’s Self Publishing All About?

Hopefully, you didn’t arrive here thinking that I was going to tell you what self-publishing is all about. As the title of my post indicates, I’m asking the question. I’ve been in the publishing business for over 18 years now, but I’ve worked exclusively with traditional publishers and am completely clueless when it comes to do-it-yourself publishing.

Self-publishing is something I’ve been thinking about for quite awhile, so I decided to look into it. After all, when I write for publishers, I’m earning 10% - 15% in royalties. Why not explore the opportunity to earn in excess of 50% by doing it myself?

Most people who aren’t in the publishing biz (and some people who are) have an exaggerated notion of how much money most “authors” earn.

The percentages are often deceiving. With the books I write, I normally earn about 10% to 15% in royalties if I am the sole author (not sharing with co-authors). Unfortunately, that’s based on the wholesale price – the price the publisher charges the retailer. On a $20 book at 10%, I’m earning $20 x .5 x .10 = $1 per book. If I co-author the book, I split that amount 50/50 with my co-author, so I’m earning $.50 per book. That’s on a good day.

Most publishers I’ve worked with slash the royalty percentage in half on high-discount sales, such as sales to Amazon.com. If they sell the book at a higher than 50% to 55% discount, instead of paying a 10% royalty, they pay 5%. What a rip, but that’s how it’s done.

What’s the bottom line? Well, a couple years ago, I co-authored a fairly successful book. So far, over 40,000 copies have been sold. My take: a little over $12K. In other words, I effectively earned about 3% per copy or 1.5% if the percentage were based on the retail cost of the book ($19.99). Heck, the government earns more than that in sales tax!

In a future post, I’ll discuss how some authors use books to generate additional revenue – the real reason most of the people I work with want to get published.

I emailed two companies to find out more about self-publishing:

• Jenkins Group, Inc.: The Jenkins Group is sort of the caviar of self-publishing – a custom book packager that prides itself on producing books that have the look and feel of something produced by a leading traditional publishing company. Most clients spend $15,000 or more to produce a few thousand copies of a book.
• Author Solutions: Author Solutions offers a more affordable solution via print on demand. If you need to get a book out in a hurry or simply want to have your name in print without going through a traditional publisher, this may be the perfect solutions for you. Packages start at about $1,000.

Within an hour, I received a phone call from a sales rep at Jenkins Group, Inc. He’s the one who filled me in on the basic differences between outfits like his and those like Author Solutions. His recommendation was that if you’re looking to print and sell maybe 500 copies of a book and you don’t need something that’s super high quality, then print on demand is probably the option for you. If, on the other hand, you want a high-quality publication with a nice cover or you’re going to need in excess of 3,000 units, then a custom book publisher is probably a better choice. (The more books you can sell, the less you pay in terms of cost per book.)

I had the mistaken idea that these self-publishing companies took care of everything. You simply delivered a manuscript, and they did the rest – design, page layout, printing, binding, distributing the book to retailers, collecting the money, and then issuing you checks when your book sold tens or hundreds of thousands of copies. Unfortunately, that’s not exactly how it works.

The self-publishing company produces the book, and that’s about all. You then have to hire a distributor to get your book into the various channels where it can be sold. The distributor issues your checks… assuming, of course, people buy the book.

Tip: Before you even think of self-publishing, consider how you’re going to market the book. This is not an “If you build it, they will come” proposition. You need to have a marketing machine in place to get the word out about your book. For more about the factors that go in to making a successful book, check out my previous post “Publishing a Best Seller.”

I’m just starting to learn about this self-publishing thing and have yet to talk with someone from Author Solutions. As I learn more about it, I’ll let you know what I discover. Stay tuned.

If you’re in the self-publishing business or are self-published, please share your insights.

Foreclosure Investing For Dummies Wins Gold

I am pleased to announce that the most recent book I co-authored with Ralph R. Roberts, Foreclosure Investing For Dummies, has won the Gold Medal in the Real Estate (Buying, Investment, Management) category in Axiom’s First Business Book Awards contest:

“The Axiom Business Book Awards are intended to bring increased recognition to exemplary business books and their creators, with the understanding that business people are a very well-read and informed segment of the population, eager to learn about great new books that will inspire and inform them, and help them improve their careers and businesses.

Nearly 400 entries were received in this inaugural year of our contest; the largest categories in terms of participation were Leadership, Entrepreneurship, and Success/Motivation, in that order. The big winners among publishers are Portfolio/Penguin with 5 medals; Wiley with 4; and Free Press and Bloomberg with 3 medals apiece.”

All books are a team project, and the book could not have achieved such success without the collaborative efforts of the editors, graphics artists, production crew, and marketing mavens at Wiley Publishing. We thank them, the many real estate professionals from around the country who contributed material to the State Foreclosure Rules & Regulations appendix, and to our readers, who inspired us to create this book.

Special thanks to Ralph R. Roberts, without whom I would never have considered writing a book about foreclosure investing.

We also congratulate the other winners in our category: Silver Medal Winner Flipping Confidential: The Secrets of Renovating Property for Profit in Any Market, by Kirsten Kemp (Wiley Publishing) and Bronze Medal Recipient Lawyers Are Liars: The Truth About Protecting Our Assets! by Mark J. Kohler (Life’s Plan Publishing).

For more about investing in foreclosures and flipping houses, visit GetFlipping.com.

Publishing a Bestseller

I have never been what I consider a bestselling author. I’m no Stephen King or J.K. Rowling (although my initials are JK). I have written and co-authored several books that have been moderate successes, including The Complete Idiot’s Guide to PCs and Flipping Houses For Dummies. I’ve also written and co-authored several flops—Deconstructing Golden Tee Live, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to the Oceans, and Psychology Today Here to Help: The Secrets of Sexual Ecstasy.

Over the years, I’ve developed a list of the key components that contribute to making a book a market success. Each component may not need to super strong. For example, a popular celebrity can pen a bestseller without making a huge investment in marketing. The stronger each component is, however, the more successful the book.

Popular Topic

Ideally, you want to spot a hot topic several months before it becomes a hot topic, especially if you’re working on time-sensitive projects, such as computer books. In some categories, the first book that hits the shelves has a huge advantage, even if it’s not that good.

If you can’t find a wide open opportunity—a popular topic on which little or nothing of merit has been published—the next best thing is to find a topic that’s hugely popular already and try to take your slice of the pie. When we wrote Flipping Houses For Dummies, for example, several house flipping books were already on the market. We knew our book would be a success, because we believed we could write something better and that the For Dummies® brand would drive sales.

Although you can certainly write on less popular topics with some success by hitting the right niche, I think it is much more difficult. The potential market is just too small.

Strong Author Platform

Many professional writers can research and write on a variety of topics. Over the years, I have done this myself. However, nobody knows me as an expert in anything… except perhaps beginning-level computer topics, where being an expert isn’t all that important. (What’s important when you’re writing beginning-level computer books is your ability to communicate a complex topic in easy to understand language.) In other words, I don’t have a strong author platform. I don’t have a hugely popular website or blog. I don’t appear on TV. I’m not interviewed by newspaper and magazine reporters. In fact, I prefer to sort of avoid the spotlight.

Authors who have strong platforms have what I like to think of as the celebrity edge. They’ve already established credibility and built somewhat of a high-profile and a following. Whatever books they choose to write in their area of expertise (assuming the topic is somewhat popular) are likely to sell pretty well.

One of the reasons I team up to co-author books with experts in other fields is because they already have a strong platform. They provide me with what I am lacking.

What Is an Author Platform?

An author platform is the marketing machine the author already has in place before he or she begins writing the book. This can consist of any of the following (the more, the merrier):

• Websites
• Blogs
• Mailing lists
• Speaking gigs
• Print media exposure (writing or being interviewed for newspaper or magazine articles or columns)
• TV appearances (on news or popular TV shows)
• Radio interviews

Ralph R. Roberts, the lead author on several of the books I’ve co-authored, has the best author platform of anyone I’ve worked with. He is a self-proclaimed Madman Marketer and is constantly seeking and inventing creative new ways to market his products, including his books. For examples of how Ralph uses websites and blogs to promote books, check out FlippingFrenzy.com and GetFlipping.com. We also do regular articles for RISMedia and Realty Times.

Solid Manuscript

Delivering a solid manuscript is essential to making a successful book. I edited manuscripts for about five years before I started writing them myself, and I found that I could always make a bad manuscript better, but I could rarely make it good. A repaired manuscript is like a car that’s a lemon—it never runs right. The author needs to deliver high-quality, comprehensive content that is clearly worded:

• Explain everything the reader needs to know. Errors of omission are the most difficult to spot, so they rarely get corrected.
• Present the information in a logical manner. Starting with a very detailed outline helps.
• Writing is rewriting. Set each chapter aside for a day or two and revise it before delivering it to the publisher.

I used to think that if “you build it, they will come”—that is, if you write a good book, people will automatically flock to the bookstores and buy it. As long as I believed that, I was destined to be somewhat poor. Yes, you do have to write a good book and deliver a solid manuscript. This is, perhaps, the single most important part of making a book successful, but it is simply not enough.

Excellent Editing

Outstanding editors make books better. They can make a lousy manuscript passable, a fair manuscript good, and a good manuscript excellent.

In the good old days, we used to have five editors on every book:

• Acquisitions: The acquisitions editor was in charge of identifying potentially hot topics and lining up the best available authors.
• Production: The production editor managed the process to ensure the book remained on track and on schedule. This person logged everything as it arrived from the author and then tracked it through the publishing process from development editor to copy editor to production.
• Development: The development editor focused on the big stuff. Does the manuscript cover everything? Is the information presented in a logical order? Is the text even readable?
• Technical: The technical editor has traditionally been a freelancer who is also an expert on the topic. This person’s job is to ferret out any technical inaccuracies and any gaps (errors of omission).
• Copy: The copy editors check for and correct errors in grammar, spelling, and typing. The best copy editors also do some development work to ensure that everything is presented clearly and logically.

Unfortunately, I’ve noticed that some publishers, in an attempt to streamline the process and cut costs, have done away with some of the editors. In some cases, a single editor is in charge of development, production, and copy editing. In such cases, you usually see books with many more errors. I think that no one person can do a thorough job of developing and copy-editing a book; they become less careful with each pass.

Great Sales and Distribution

If people go to the bookstores and can’t find the book they want, you have a problem. That’s why it’s essential to have a publisher who can get your book into the bookstores, both online and off.

Admittedly, I don’t know very much about how sales and distribution work and how much of an effect these factors have on the market success of a book. Perhaps someone with more knowledge on this topic will stumble across this post and offer some insight.

Unrelenting Marketing Campaign

The publishing biz is highly competitive. To have your title’s voice rise above the clamor of the crowd, you have to market it. While much of the marketing comes from the author platform and publisher’s sales and distribution (not necessarily in that order), the author and publisher need to work together both at the grass roots and higher levels to spread the word. Here are some suggestions:

• Send copies of the book to reviewers in the media, including bloggers who commonly blog on the book’s topic. (Include a press release with information that makes it easier for the person to write the review.)
• Send complimentary copies to support groups, user groups, or special-interest groups who are likely to find the topic interesting. (These groups may be able to earn money by selling the book on their website or blog through Amazon’s Associates program or by making a bulk order purchase through the publisher.)
• Offer to write articles for publications that commonly carry articles related to the book’s topic.
• Offer yourself to the media for interviews. Many will send you their questions via email, so you can email your answers (if you don’t interview well over the phone or in person).
• Create your own blog or website to promote the book.
• Post comments and answer questions on other people’s blogs or in newsgroups related to the book’s topic.

The marketing opportunities are almost endless when you begin to think about the various ways you can promote a book. I haven’t even mentioned book signings and speaking engagements, for example.

Please Add Your Insights

A publisher once told me that he loved being in publishing, because it was such a “sexy” profession. I agree. I also find it fascinating. After about 20 years, I’m still learning every day. I invite my colleagues to add their comments and insights about what they think makes a book successful. I’m sure they can fill in the gaps, correct my errors of omission, and teach this old dog some new tricks.