Target Marketing

It’s been a week since Lou Turner, publisher of High Hill Press, placed ten copies of my book, Strengthen Your Nonfiction Writing, in my hands. I sold about eight last week at the Missouri Writers Guild Conference, and to be honest, I’m still trying to figure out the best way to market them.


In my last post, I mentioned literary agent Kathleen Ortiz http://www.wow-womenonwriting.com/40-20questions-KathleenOrtiz.html. She gave a wonderful presentation about creating an online presence. I’m not unfamiliar with websites, Facebook or blogging, but I’m still working on my marketing mix to maximize my time and my reach. The goal is to have my book working for me online while I’m teaching in the classroom, or researching, or doing laundry (hey, clothes don’t wash themselves, ya know!).

In the meantime, I wanted to share something about marketing and advertising for anyone who is trying to sell their work. I’m teaching an Introduction to Advertising class this semester at STLCC – Wildwood campus, and have learned a few basics that apply to both high- and low-tech markets.

The most effective way to sell your product is to target your market. Select an audience that will benefit from your work. Do you write for kids? Then target publishers and agents who deal with kids. Don’t waste your time marketing to YA publishers when you write middle grade stories, articles or books. If you send 100 queries to 100 agents who don’t deal with your area of expertise, then you are wasting your time. A few targeted queries have a much higher rate of success than dozens sent to the wrong people.

This type of research is time-consuming, but will save time in the long-run by determining your target market. Let me know how you have applied this strategy in the past.

Talk to you soon,
Mary

Coming soon: the four Ps of marketing!