{"id":9118,"date":"2010-08-19T08:00:49","date_gmt":"2010-08-19T12:00:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shilohwalker.com\/website\/?p=9118"},"modified":"2010-08-10T20:02:10","modified_gmt":"2010-08-11T00:02:10","slug":"thursday-tips-booksellers-librarians","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shilohwalker.com\/website\/2010\/08\/thursday-tips-booksellers-librarians\/","title":{"rendered":"Thursday Tips…Booksellers & Librarians"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Thursdays Tips<\/em><\/strong>-geared toward the newly pubbed\/newly contracted author.\u00a0 Got any Qs\/comments?\u00a0 Feel free to mention in comments.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Booksellers<\/h3>\n

I\u2019ve been published since 2003, in print since 2004, but it didn\u2019t dawn on me that I could really help my career if I would do this little thing called networking<\/em> with booksellers and librarians.<\/p>\n

Yes\u2026librarians, people.\u00a0 Never, ever<\/em> neglect librarians in this business.\u00a0 I can\u2019t tell you how often I grit my teeth in sheer frustration when I see an author getting irritated because somebody picked up their book in a library, or worse<\/em>, I see them snubbing a librarian.<\/p>\n

You got any idea how many books libraries buy every year?\u00a0 The numbers are amazing-thousands, thousands, thousands\u2026and not only do they buy books, when a reader is looking to try a new author, they often look to the library.\u00a0 If they find you through the library and they get hooked, many then go on to buy the rest of your books.\u00a0 Love your librarians\u2026they are our friends.<\/p>\n

Back to networking.<\/p>\n

If you\u2019re anything like me, that might sound either really scary, or really technical\u2026or both.<\/p>\n

But it\u2019s not.\u00a0 Not really.<\/p>\n

Basically, all it involves is talking to them.\u00a0 And that\u2019 so damn easy, because think about\u2026 you love books.\u00a0 They love books.\u00a0 You\u2019ve got one huge area of common ground, right?<\/p>\n

You don\u2019t even have to make this huge buy my book<\/em> pitch, and since they get a lot of those, chances are if you just come across as a person instead of a walking sales ad, you might make a better impression anyway.<\/p>\n

Talk about books, talk about favorite authors.\u00a0 Ask if it would be okay to get a business card.\u00a0 Why ask this?<\/p>\n

Because one of the reasons you want to network with booksellers and librarians is so you can build a mailing list.<\/p>\n

Now you can buy mailing lists, yes.\u00a0 It\u2019s something I\u2019ve considered and may do at some point.\u00a0 But over the past two years or so, I\u2019ve started building my own and if I had started in 2004, it would be a pretty impressive list.\u00a0 And all it takes is collecting a card when you meet booksellers\/librarians at events.\u00a0 Ask if you can have a card, and if they give you one, make sure it\u2019s okay to add them to your mailing list.<\/p>\n

Most of them are probably already aware of why you\u2019re asking and most of them are probably delighted to get the promo-they like it, because their readers like it.\u00a0 The readers like it because the ideal way to use a mailing list is to mail out things like bookmarks and postcards\u2026keeping people informed about upcoming books.<\/p>\n

Now this is slower, a little more time-consuming.\u00a0 If you\u2019d rather not do it that way, you can skip through and either buy\/rent mailing lists or use the services provided by places like Romantic Times.<\/p>\n

Mailing lists\/services:<\/p>\n