Marketing: Things I Learned by Working at the Telephone Company

Happy Wednesday, everyone! Today, we're talking about marketing and some things I learned from my time at two different telecommunications companies. Ready? Grab that pen and notebook and let's get going!

I was lying in bed this morning, my brain ticking away, and for some reason yet unknown to me, my brain attacked my past work experiences in the telecommunications industry. Yeah, okay, I was thinking about marketing and how different approaches yielded different results. For reasons of anonymity, I'm going to call them Company A and Company B. In both companies, I was a customer service representative.

Now, I worked for Company A in 2003ish. I had over a month of training before they'd even allow me to get near a real telephone and consumer. What I learned in training was how to provide customer satisfaction, and how to sell, sell, sell.

You see, Company A gauged performance on sales and disclosure. Problem solving was tickled, but we didn't get down and dirty with how to listen and respond to issues the customer was having. No, we were taught how to turn those issues into sales.

What was unique about Company A is how they taught us to approach the pitch. If you called in with an issue about having a prank caller, I would offer you XYZ product that would allow you to see who was calling and block them or offer you a number change (for a fee, of course).

When a customer called in wanting a cell phone, I was to listen and ascertain how fancy that phone offer should be. Was it someone who appreciated all the bells and whistles, wanted something basic, or wanted the latest and best thing on the market so they had a certain level of status socially? I then sold them a product based on their needs/desires.

Even if you called in and didn't want a cell phone, I was told to prompt you for a story about a scary experience where you had a flat or were worried about your teen. Then, in order to soothe your fears, I was to sell you a mobile device.

There were only three hard and fast rules: 

1. Don't piss anyone off (because a satisfied customer tells maybe ten people, but a dissatisfied customer tells anyone who'll listen).
2. Don't lie (that's lawsuit material right there). 
3. Don't hang up on the customer no matter what (see item one).

I worked for Company B in 2006ish. I had nearly three months of training, the last of which was done talking with actual customers while a coach sat nearby to answer questions or provide guidance, before I was allowed "out on my own." I was trained on how to make the customer happy and give accurate information.

Company B rated performance on customer satisfaction, problem solving, and accuracy of information given. Period. We were taught how to make our customers giddy.

This company's unique approach was not in the customer having the latest and greatest gadget or upgrade, but having the plan that was right for their usage. If you didn't sell anything, that was okay. They wanted people paying for exactly what they needed and no more.

Why? They were looking at it from a retention perspective.

You see, customers aren't profitable for at least two years. If you can't keep your customer around, you lose oodles of money. So, it was still needs based, but it wasn't about the upsell.

I was told to examine every customer's account and make sure they had the plan that worked best for how they used their phones. If that meant removing a product, then so be it. When you hung up, you knew Company B had your back and wasn't trying to price gouge you.

There were only two hard and fast rules:

1. Listen closely and provide the best customer service possible.
2. Don't get belligerent or hang up on the customer no matter what.

How does this pertain to book sales?

I'm getting there! Hang with me.

What hit me after I had a little while of contemplation was: Both companies were after customer satisfaction, but one focused on sales while the other focused on retention. Each method worked (they're both huge companies), but the difference in the people working there was astronomical.

At Company A, everyone in the office was on some kind of antidepressant or anti-anxiety medication.
At Company B, everyone was genuinely happy. Every single day.

So, here's what I'm getting at with my lengthy retelling:
If you create a novel that's well written, well edited, and tells a great story, you'll be able to sell it because the level of reader satisfaction rises. Those readers will keep coming back because they know you'll produce a great product and you care about their experience.

But you have to market according to why those readers need to read your book.

Marketing and selling are just phase one. Reader satisfaction is the biggest chunk of pie imaginable. So, focus on the reader and writing a book you know will bring them back for more, and you'll be selling oodles of novels in a short amount of time.

My question for you today is: Why does a reader need to read your book? Give me your best pitch in the comments!

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

Using Groupon for Book Sales

Happy Wednesday, good people of the blogosphere! Wow, do I have an awesome idea for you all today. Strap yourselves in and grab a cup of coffee, because this is gonna be one wild ride!

As I often do, I was thinking of new and innovative ways to sell/market books. I have a friend named Eva Pohler (find her on Facebook here), and this idea comes from a little snafu she hit a little while back with Barnes & Noble booksellers. No, this doesn't trash B&N (I love that store!); it's just information about what happened with her books. Plus, if you've encountered this particular problem, it might be information about how to unload books.

I'm gonna start with Eva's story, and work my way up from there. Stay with me, folks!

So, Eva wanted to have her book in a brick and mortar store (don't we all?), and she decided that was her goal for 2015. Please understand, when Eva goes after something, she goes after it; nothing gets in her way. Gosh, I admire that. Anywhoooo... So, she speaks with someone from B&N and they tell her, in order to stock her books, those titles need to be returnable.

Quick aside: Books are the only (yes, only) retail merchandise that's returnable for a 100% refund. How crazy is that? Okay, back to the story!

In order to make a self-published book returnable, you must go through a company like Lightning Source. Eva did that, made the book returnable, and B&N ordered a great number of copies of her titles.

Needless to say, she came home one day to find boxes and boxes of her books sitting on her doorstep. This is where my idea begins. I only told you enough about Eva's tale to give you an idea of what we're dealing with: tons of books sitting in your living room that you have no way to sell.

For the rest of Eva's story, check out the interview she did with S. M. Boyce here. It's a long video, but it might save you some money someday, I suggest you check it out.

Moving on!

I started thinking: How the heck is she gonna sell all those books? Marketing is difficult enough without a crapload of inventory sitting in your house. If Amazon can't sell them, how can you?

Enter Groupon. Why this never occurred to me before, I have no idea. But it's been a growing platform for sales for years. If you find yourself in a position like Eva did, why not create a Groupon to help move that stock?

I did a little digging before I started this post, and creating a Groupon is free.

But how the hell does Groupon make money, Jo? I know they charge you something! And how can I guarantee they won't oversell my stuff and me end up scrabbling to get more?

Great questions! I asked them, too. From their site: Groupon charges a marketing fee that's a percentage of the revenue from sales. You can set the number of items available, and they'll only sell that many Groupons. For answers to other questions, check out the FAQ here.

Now, the big question here is (you totally knew I'd look this up, right?): How many people actually buy Groupons? Here's an article from 2011 that gives a pretty good rundown of the numbers then. The projected growth is off the charts (no pun intended). Yes, that's billions with a B.

Can you imagine your book in front of that many people?

It's a huge marketing opportunity, and we Indies have to always be looking for the new idea in marketing. I love my iPhone, and I have Groupon. My husband and I use it often (browsing there created this idea). But I never looked at it as a market for books until now.

*face/palm*

Has my head been up my arse all this time? Or have I just never thought of it because it hasn't been done by anyone else? Either way, it's time to try something new, don't you think?

You may start here. Good luck!

What do you think? Will you try it?

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

Publishing News Hubs

Happy Tuesday, good people of the blogosphere! I'm stepping outside the box a little today and giving you all some insight to where people go to find their publishing news. Perhaps you'll want to check them out! Grab your pens and notebooks and let's get going!

I got the following numbers by running a little poll on Facebook. Sixteen people answered (myself included), so the data isn't great, but it's something to go on. These results might surprise you.

First and foremost, with a whopping twelve votes:

Now, this isn't limited to the newsfeed, though that was specified by one person. It's author groups, pages, and whatnot that top the list.

Second, we have printed or digital publications such as:

InD'tale Magazine (1)
Publisher's Weekly (2)
USA Today BOOKS section/Thursday edition (1)
Writer's Digest (2)
The Writer magazine (1)
Digital Book World (1)

Amazon Newsletter (1)
Galleycat (1)

Coming in third, there's blog subscriptions.

Five people said they get their publishing news from blogs they found on Google, subscriptions, or the ones on popular sites like Writer's Digest.com.

With two votes each, e-mail and Twitter come in fourth.

Lastly, there were three items with singular votes:

word-of-mouth
forums like Absolutewrite
Createspace's page

So, what does this tell you?

For me, it says I might be marketing wrong. I do plenty on Facebook, but I need to branch out into printed publications.

Where do you get your publishing news? Are these numbers a surprise?

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

Book Backmatter

Happy Tuesday, everyone! Today, I'm gonna talk a little about what you need to do in your book's backmatter. Yeah, that stuff that comes after the novel ends. So, grab your pens and notebooks and let's get going!

Open up that document that contains your book. Pan over until you get to the end. What do you see?

For most authors, you probably see something that looks like this:
About the Author:
K. Littlegross is...

Then maybe social media links.

After that...?

How about we change the way you think about your book's backmatter. Everything that comes after the last page of the story is considered backmatter. If someone just read all the way through your book, chances are they like your writing. If they didn't, they would've quit reading a long time ago (unless they're just one of those people who can't stand not finishing something they started).

Let's use that to your advantage, shall we?

On the FIRST page after your book ends, try adding something like this:

"Thank you for reading my (novel/short story/serial/etc...). I hope you enjoyed it. If you wouldn't mind, would you kindly leave a review? Not only does it help others gauge the book's worth, it also helps me know what I did right and what I might be able to do better. Readers are the reason I write! I love hearing from fans."

Give them a way to subscribe to your newsletter and tell them why they should. Do you do exclusive giveaways in your newsletters? Mention it! Or, ask them to like your amazon author page. Don't forget the LINK!


Now, here are a couple of other things to include before your About the Author page:

• An excerpt from another work of yours (don't forget the sales page link at the end!).
• An excerpt from a fellow author in the same genre (don't forget the sales page link at the end!).
• Acknowledgements (I suggest putting this in the back so it doesn't interfere with the sample percentage).

These are things to include on your About the Author page:

• Your author photo (resize to small [72dpi], please)
• Your bio
• Your bibliography (don't forget to link them to the sales page!)
• Perhaps a review quote or two
• One synopsis from a book in a similar genre you've written
• Awards you've won for writing
• How to find you on social media
• Another request for that review

Why should these things be in this order? Because a reader will get bored wading through author "stuff" unless they've become super fans.

You'd be surprised at how much difference these little things make. Remember to update past books when you publish something new. It isn't difficult, and it'll keep your fans coming back for more.

How many of the above do you implement now? Were you aware of what you could do with the back of your book? Tell me about it!

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

Marketing Plans

Happy Tuesday, everyone! I know you've probably heard the term Marketing Plan a billion times, but do you really know what it means to have one? Do you even know what a marketing plan is? Well, today I'm gonna do my best to lay it all out there. Heck, you might even get a handy checklist by the time it's over. Grab those pens and notebooks and let's get going!

Definition of Marketing Plan (from Wikipedia):
Marketing strategy is the goal of increasing sales and achieving a sustainable competitive advantage. Marketing strategy includes all basic and long-term activities in the field of marketing that deal with the analysis of the strategic initial situation of a company and the formulation, evaluation and selection of market-oriented strategies and therefore contribute to the goals of the company and its marketing objectives.

In author layman's terms: Marketing Plans are goals you set for the launch or publication of a novel, and it includes details on how you'll keep it selling long term.

You need a marketing plan so you don't just throw your book out in the world and hope it hits someone who might enjoy it. Yeah, I've done this. I imagine you have, too.

So, let's go over the things you need to think about when you're halfway through your novel and the things you need to answer once it's off to the editor. You can do these things while you work on your book!

Grab a sheet of paper (if you haven't already) and write down the following questions:

1. What's my book about?
2. What genre is my book?
3. What age is my target audience (Don't write all - be specific)?
4. Will more males or females enjoy my book?
5. What other books will they have read?

Now that we have those questions down, let's go into some channel specific stuff. Next:

1. Where does my target audience hang out?
2. What social media do they use most often?
3. What activities do they enjoy?
4. Who would they most likely get a book recommendation from?

Let's say my book is about a young skater boy trying to escape the oppressive dictatorship his family has endured for hundreds of years. Genre is young adult urban fiction. Target audience are males between the age of thirteen and seventeen who've read Outsiders. They hang out at skate parks, hip coffee shops, and restaurants like McDonald's after school. They'll read books suggested by friends or forced by teachers.

Make a list of things you can do to get your book in front of those readers. Be detailed. Examples:

Advertisement:  I'll put an ad on my car that appeals to skateboarders and go to McDonald's every day for an hour to have a coffee and write for an hour. My car will be parked in the lot in a highly visible area. I'll put free bookmarks at every hip coffee shop within a fifty mile radius of my house and replenish them weekly. I'll put an ad on the local teen radio station with my blurb.

Social Media: I'll post images of skateboarders doing cool tricks with a link to my book and a twenty-five word blurb every week on Instagram. I'll use Twitter to increase hits by having my photos auto-tweet.

And so on. Also, write down what you'll do with folks you know. E-mail list, friends and family, etc...

After you've done all of the above, create your launch plan. Start four to six months out. It should look something like this:

24 Weeks out -

• Schedule author interviews with blogs
• Start posting to social media about what's coming
• Blog about writing the book

16 Weeks out -

• Finalize list of bloggers willing to help (yeah, they schedule way ahead of time)
• Add the book to Goodreads with a release date

8 Weeks out -

• Have cover designed
• Order swag and vehicle imagery
• Contact radio station

6 Weeks out -

• Send book to beta readers
• Ask for ARC reviewers

4 Weeks out -

• Send book to editor
• Schedule Facebook party and collect giveaways

and so on.

As you can see, it's a long and arduous process to properly launch a book.

I found a couple of apps that may help you along the way! They're all about creating a business plan.

Get them here for iPad and Android. They're called: MyBizPlan and MarketMyBiz

How do you plan for a launch? Share!

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo