Michael Legat recommends that both publishers and authors should emphasise strong ‘knowledge of the customer’ (p.96) and ‘personal enthusiasm’ (p.96) towards the product in order to successfully generate sales. Listed are some examples of social media campaigns and uses within book the publishing industry.
Frania Hall maintains that use of large social media sites is to ‘get in touch with their markets directly to understand them better’ (p.128). Mich Turner is a cookery author that actively uses Facebook to contact and update her followers about her actions. She currently has 25,086 likes on Facebook, indicating a strong following of fans and potential readers. A Facebook campaign was devised to promote Turner’s book Mich Turner’s Cake Masterclass that included a cake-decorating competition in order to win an afternoon with the author and signed books for runners-up. The competition was popular, receiving over 500 entrants (Mullish, 2011).
Another use of social media is the creation of additional content to tie-in with a publication. Science-Fiction publisher Orbit Books created the widget Blondesweeper, a variation of the popular minesweeper game, for their Blonde Bombshell book by Tom Holt. It was accessible via their website www.orbitbooks.net, Facebook and Twitter and its popularity can be seen in that it was played 3,300 times (Missingham, 2010a). Linda Bennett argues that publishers who exploit widget technology for particular titles can expect to increase sales of those titles by between 7% and 17% (p.71). In Orbit Books’ example, interest for their product was generated by after completing the game players were granted access to the first chapter of the book (Orbit Books, 2010a). Players were further encouraged to share their high scores through their social media accounts in a competition to win a selection of Tom Holt books.
As well as using the large social media sites, publishers are increasingly creating their own social media websites, forums and blogs in order to keep in touch with their readership. Publisher Caffeine Nights is one of many publishers that have their own blog. The C.E.O. of Caffeine Nights Darren Laws claimed that blogging is ‘a great communications channel [that] offers an opportunity for dialogue’ between customer and publisher (Laws in Missingham, 2010b).
So is it really worth it to use social media for marketing campaigns? Michael Legat’s argument that authors and publishers commonly must step into the roles of ‘salesmen’ (p.95) to promote their books themselves is proof that a strong need for marketing exists. Facebook was founded in 2004 with the mission to ‘make the world more open and connected’ (Newsroom, 2014) and publishers are keen to take advantage of this way to stay connected to their readership base. Many authors nowadays publically use social media to generate a following and Caffeine Nights advises each of its authors to ‘use social media wisely’ (Laws in Missingham, 2010b).
Word Count: 549
Bibliography:
Bennett, L. (2010). PA Guide to Going Digital. London: The Publishers Association.
Hall, F. (2013). The Business of Digital Publishing. Oxford: Routledge.
Holt, R., 2013. Twitter in numbers. The Telegraph [online] Available at: <http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/twitter/9945505/Twitter-in-numbers.html> [Accessed 5/11/2014].
Legat, M., 1995. An Author’s Guide to Publishing. London: St Edmundsbury Press.
Missingham, S., 2010a. Case Study: Orbit Books talk social media. The Bookseller [online] Available at: <http://www.thebookseller.com/futurebook/case-study-orbit-books-talk-social-media> [Accessed 5/11/2014].
Missingham, S., 2010b. Case Study: Publisher Caffeine Nights on using social media. The Bookseller [online] Available at: <http://www.thebookseller.com/futurebook/case-study-publisher-caffeine-nights-using-social-media>[Accessed 5/11/2014].
Mullish, J., 2011. Case study: Digital/social media campaign for Mich Turner's Cake Masterclass. The Bookseller [online] Available at: <http://www.thebookseller.com/futurebook/case-study-digitalsocial-media-campaign-mich-turners-cake-masterclass> [Accessed 5/11/2014].
Newsroom, 2014. Facebook. Newsroom. [online] Available at: <http://newsroom.fb.com/company-info/> [Accessed 5/11/2014].
Orbit Books, 2010. An Extract from BLONDE BOMBSHELL. Orbit. [online] Available at: <http://www.orbitbooks.net/an-extract-from-blonde-bombshell/> [Accessed 5/11/2014].