Irish Marketing Journal Volume 31 No 1 January 2005
Fiction Factory
What makes a bestseller these days? The quality of the writing? The author’s track record? The PR machine backing things up? Whatever it is, as Yvonne Gordon discovers, the marketing of books is a lot different to the marketing of conventional consumer brands.
In recent years, it’s been hard to avoid the hype surrounding publication of each new Harry Potter novel, in a series that has made author JK Rowling a multi-millionaire. We read enviously of the huge publishing and film rights deals signed by Cecilia Ahern before publication of her first novel PS, I Love you. At the end of last month, The Da Vinci Code remained at number one in the Irish fiction bestsellers list, having been in the charts for 38 weeks in a row.
Four of the books in the top-five fiction bestseller list are by Da Vinci Code author Dan Brown. How much of the success of his other books is due to the success of The Da Vinci Code? How many people bought Ahern’s debut novel to see what all the fuss was about?
It’s impossible to work this out, but what we do know is that publishers and book PRs work hard behind the scenes, using a range of techniques to ensure that the books they represent have the best chance of finding their way to the top of the charts and onto our bookshelves.
Publicity is the most vital element of the book marketing mix, according to Michael McLoughlin, managing director of Penguin Ireland. "Marketing in the book business is very different from other consumer marketing in Ireland," he says. "Publicity is the key factor. We have a full time publicity manager in-house - all publishers have in-house PRs because it’s a constant business."
Achieving publicity in a business where the media are constantly looking for material sounds like a PR’s dream. The media request authors and books for reviews, features, interviews and contributions so coverage in newspapers, television and radio is almost guaranteed on a daily basis.
But for book PRs, this is where the competition starts, from the fight for column inches to the fight for shelf space in the shops. To achieve both, they work hard, targeting the media and trade buyers. "Unlike most consumer businesses we don’t have to fight hard to generate coverage for books in general but we have to fight hard to get coverage for our books," says McLoughlin.
McLoughlin started in the book trade not long after studying marketing in college. He was with Irish publishing house Poolbeg Press for four years before leaving his role as marketing manager to set up his own PR consultancy in 1994, working with a prestigious client list of Irish and UK publishers. In 2002, he opened up the first Penguin publishing office in Ireland.
McLoughlin now runs this and with his two editors and publicity manager, he continually sources new writers, growing the Irish business for Penguin and bringing Irish books to an wider international audience, through the Penguin global network.
The jacket of a book is another vital sales tool. "The old adage about not judging a book by the cover is rubbish," says McLoughlin. "Everyone judges the book by the cover and it’s critically important to get the packaging right."
Is there a formula for the jacket? With some categories, most definitely. For commercial fiction, or ‘chick lit’, the name of the author is nearly more important than the title of the book. The main target – women aged 16 to 40 – "like something different but something along similar lines every time, so there are messages that you’re try to get across consistently," says McLoughlin.
For example, the name of author Sinead Moriarty on the cover of her bookThe Baby Trail is in giant type, giving the consumer the subliminal message that it’s somebody they ‘should know’ of or maybe ‘have heard of’, even though they won’t have because this is her first book.
The jacket is so important that publishers like Penguin work closely with book retailers and wholesalers on it, months ahead of publication. Collaboration with booksellers, who can tell them what their customers want, is important to publishers.
As well as the jacket, the size and format of a book - hardback or paperback - can also influence the buyer’s decision. Hardbacks, the more expensive of the two, are popular as gifts, particularly at Christmas, when they achieve their best sales.
Publishing a hardback and then following with a paperback six or even 12 months later also gives publishers two chances for a hit - the paperback might attract a different market. However sometimes a publisher will publish both formats simultaneously or publish straight into paperback.
Pricing is also a huge factor. McLoughlin says that price varies depending on the book and even on the number of pages. Although there are standard book sizes, there are no ‘set’ prices. "We hope to get the price the market will bear," he says.
He emphasises that decisions on format, size and price vary because every book and every author is different. "There’s a lot of variables in this business," says McLoughlin. "It’s not like cornflakes, where the box is the same constantly and you’re tweaking it all the time and the product inside stays the same."
Working on the publicity plan, supplying proof copies to the press months in advance of publication and liasing with booksellers (wholesalers and retailers) is all part of the job of Cormac Kinsella, full-time publicity director with publishers agents Repforce Ireland.
Inviting an author to meet the trade – for example arranging a dinner where the author meets with booksellers – is an important part of the job. Kinsella also arranges for authors to speak at trade conferences, which are usually held once a year by publishers so that editors can present titles for the next six months to the sales force. "Some authors can give the essence of a book quicker than the editor can," he says.
Before working at Repforce, Kinsella was events manager at Waterstone’s bookshop (where he edited Waterstone’s Guide to Irish Books, 1998), so he has experienced the trade publicity system from ‘both sides’.
"If an author has a strong personality, it’s good to get them out to meet people," says Kinsella, who has worked on publicity campaigns for books by Colm Tóibín, Chris Binchy, Jon Ronson, Sophie Dahl and Shane McGowan. He often spends the day with his clients, chaperoning them between various media appearances and interviews.
In publishing, as in any market, knowing your audience is key. Kinsella recalls a recent example where US publisher Sonny Mehta, of Random House, changed the title of John McGahern’s book, That They May Face The Rising Sun to By the Lake for the US market, as the original title would not have had the same connotations across the Atlantic. Mehta also sent the book to the wives of all the reps. Kinsella thinks this was good marketing.
Book launches are another way of getting publicity (as well as selling books) as they are frequently mentioned in media social diaries. In-store book signings can work well. When Nigella Lawson was in Ireland last year, as well as appearing on The Late Late Show, she did a book signing. As a result, says Kinsella, there were two pictures of her in that weekend’s Sunday Independent. "If someone’s on such a large vehicle as the Late Late, it’s good to make the most of it," he says.
So what about awards? "Winning an award can make or break a book," says Kinsella, recalling the positive sales effects that being shortlisted for the 2004 Man Booker Prize had on Colm Tóibín’s bestseller The Master.
Kinsella says that publishing publicity work has a lot in common with marketing in other sectors. "A lot of it is knowing the product’s strengths and going for it; knowing the weaknesses and not talking about them."
So what does the future hold for book selling? Irish publishing is experiencing many changes. The arrival of publishing giants Penguin and Hodder Headline in Ireland two years ago has meant more players pitching to bring out books and competing for shelf space.
Consumer habits are also changing. Supermarkets are selling more ‘non-food’ products like CDs and books and this is set to grow. Newsagents and convenience stores now stock racks of books. Internet sales have had their effects on the market, with websites like Amazon making it easy to source books online. So easy in fact that Amazon last month enjoyed its busiest every day’s trading, logging worldwide orders of 2.8 million units. The traditional bookshop hasn’t disappeared though - browsing on the web can never replace the leisure experience of browsing in a real bookshop. Nevertheless, space is at a premium.
McLoughlin thinks that as a result, there are fewer books being published. With bigger publishers getting bigger, it’s proving harder for smaller publishers to get on the shelves. Although retailers are increasing promotional spend, they’re spending it on fewer titles. Getting shelf space for ‘non-bestsellers’ is particularly difficult.
Kinsella has noticed a huge rise in ‘personality-based books’, written by sports stars and reality TV stars. "The Jordan book did really well," he says. "It’s a very interesting comment on the state of British culture."
However at the end of the day, no matter what the trends, publishers are looking for the best writers. "That’s all we’re interested in," says McLoughlin. "It’s up to us to package the book and the author, but unless the actual book delivers, it’s a waste of time."
"The best marketing for any book is word of mouth. Unfortunately, you can’t manufacture it," he says. "It only happens on a small number of books every year. The Da Vinci Code this year. Mark Haddon’s The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time last year. Next year it’ll be something else," he says. "Every publisher hopes it’ll be their book."
© Yvonne Gordon
