Writers Tricks of the Trade Issue 6, Volume 6 | Page 20

WHY GETTING GREAT REVIEWS IS YOUR JOB (CONT’D)

for our own careers. Sometimes when we wait to take responsibility, it is too
late in the publishing game.
Some publishers charge the author an additional or separate fee for
marketing. Many who offer marketing packages do not offer a review-getting
package. If they do, the review their authors get is a paid-for review, which is
definitely not the route you want to go. More on that later in this chapter.
Many publishers do not even have lists of people to contact who might help
your marketing with endorsements or reviews. Further, many big publishers are
relying on bloggers for their review process more and more as print journals and
newspaper book sections shrink or disappear and as they begin to understand
that grassroots publicity—reviews or otherwise—can produce a very green crop.
My first publisher supplied review copies only upon written request from
individual reviewers. They did not honor requests generated by their authors’
initiatives. This meant that I could not count on them to supply books to
reviewers I had successfully queried for a review. Unless the reviewer accepted
e-copies (and many reviewers don’t!), I had to order copies directly from the
publisher and then reship them to my reviewers. This method is slow,
cumbersome, unnecessarily expensive, unprofessional, and discourages authors
from trying to get reviews on their own.
Publishers should offer review copies to a list of reviewers—even
unestablished grassroots bloggers—who have been responsive to their authors
in the past. And they certainly should not charge an author for review copies.
Publishers have a profit margin and publicity obtained by their authors
(including reviews) affects their bottom line, too. They should send their author
a thank you (or a red rose!) along with encouragement to keep up the good
work
Publishers should also market their books. That means that even if they are
too small or underfunded to have a marketing department, they should have a
list of reviewers to query for reviews, a list of influential people to provide blurbs
for your cover, access to book cover designers (not just great graphic designers)
who know what sells books, and a whole lot more. Ask potential publishers
about their marketing process before you sign, but—even if you feel assured
after having that conversation—it’s best to assume you may be on your own.
So, the marketing part of your book that includes finding the right reviewers
to read and comment on your book will—in most cases—be up to you and well
within your skill set after reading this book. And even when you have the luxury
of a marketing department behind you, those authors who know how to get
reviews on their own can keep a book alive for an infinite amount of time after
their publishers relegate their books to a backlist or their contract expires.
NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2016
’ TRICKS OF
THE
TRADE
Note: If it is too late toPapply
this informationW
toRITERS
the process
you
use
in
AGE 12
choosing a publisher, tactfully take hold and guide the publisher you have
through the review process. There are lots of ways to do that in this book. I