“If you build it, they will come…” That proves to be true about a baseball diamond carved out of a cornfield in Iowa in William Kinsella’s novel, SHOELESS JOE, which became FIELD OF DREAMS, the film. And it is equally true for authors about creating and sustaining a platform.

The word “platform” began rearing its head in publishing circles about a decade ago, and it is not going away. It is what you need to snag an agent, what you need to attract a publisher, and what you need to be published successfully.

So, just what is a platform? Why do you need it?

A platform is who you are, what makes you uniquely qualified to write about your subject, who you know, and the venues and means you have already established to reach your market.

Why do you need a platform? To cut through the noise–the noise in the culture. To stand out among the 150,000 new books published each year, in addition to the ones that are already established. Yup, it is a jungle out there. You are competing not only against books, but a myriad other choices reader’s have about how to spend their time: 200 tv channels, internet, ipod, etc.

In earlier days, the writer wrote, the publisher published. The publisher was an expert. Today, publishing is a partnership. A partnership between the author and the publisher, each of whom brings particular strengths to a common venture. The marketing and selling is a joint venture. That is why the more elevated your platform, the more appealing you are to an agent and to a publisher.

The elements:
*Who you are—your credentials, your affiliations, your expertise. If you are writing on a subject on which you are not a recognized expert, you can become the expert through the original research and point of view that you bring to the subject. You may be known locally, or to a particular constituency. You can also collaborate with or cite the experts who validate who you are and what you are writing about.
*Who you know. In the course of your schooling and your career, you may have come across people who have become well known in some way that can help you gain support for your work. You may have networks, organizations, associations.
*How to reach your market— First of all, you need to know who your market is, then establish a dialogue with your market, test your ideas.
How? Through your website (a statement of who you are), how you draw traffic to your site and use it to establish a relationship with potential readers, public speaking (from rotary clubs to national conferences), media experience, knowledge of associations, organizations, publications. In the age of social media, it is essential for an author to have a presence through a variety of tools, such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. Use these tools as a means of not only communicating who you are and what your work is about, but also to connect with your audience. These are interactive media. For example, if you are on Twitter, don’t just try to gather followers—follow your followers and from time to time, comment on their tweets.
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So…what impresses me as an agent? That wherever you are on the trajectory, you have a vision to carry yourself forward. If you are at A, how do you get to B? From B to C? In other words, however developed your platform, keep expanding it. Demonstrating to me (and to potential publishers) that you understand that this is part of the marketing effort will be persuasive.

Many prospective authors think that once they have sold their book, they can start building a platform. Wrong! The time to begin building a platform is now.

Make sure your query letter to an agent, and your book proposal, touches on all of these platform elements, in addition to selling us on your idea.

–Joelle

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Jonathan Grayson, Ph.D., Director of the Anxiety and Agoraphobia Treatment Center and an assistant clinical professor of psychiatry at Temple University Medical School, will be awarded a “Lifetime Achievement Award” at the next meeting of the Annual Conference of teh International OCD Foundation. This will be the second time that Dr. Grayson will receive this honor. Grayson is the author of FREEDOM FROM OBSESSIVE-COMPULSIVE DISORDER: A Personalized Recovery Program for Living with Uncertainty, published in 2003 by Jeremy P. Tarcher/Penguin. The book provides a revolutionary and compassionate program for breaking the cycle of overwhelming fear and endless rituals that plague the more than 6 million OCD sufferers, which was featured in an Oprah one-hour special, also with Dr. Phil. Daniel Gottlieb, host of NPR’s Voices in the Family declares: “Dr Grayson…writes about [OCD] with the mind of a scholar and the heart of a healer. Anyone who is plagued with chronic anxiety, and destructive rigid behavior should read this book, and listen to what it says.”

Congratulations to John Temple, author of The Last Lawyer: The Fight to Save Death Row Inmates, which has won The American Society of Legal Writers’ 2010 Book of the Year.

The book follows the story of Bo Jones, and begins in 1987 when an elderly bootlegger was shot to death in Duplin County, a poor rural region in eastern North Carolina. Nearly four years later, Bo’s ex-girlfriend–a sometime prostitute named Lovely Lorden (really)–told police that he was the killer, and on her testimony alone, Jones was convicted and sentenced to death. The Last Lawyer is the true inside story of how a disheveled legal genius named Ken Rose and his diverse band of investigators and lawyers thwarted Bo’s death sentence. Readers get to know Ken’s staff, like Sara, a social-worker-turned-investigator, witnesses like the lazy prosecutor who first tried Bo, Ken’s opponents like the colorful and sharp DA as well as Bo himself, a man who is difficult and delusional but a man who must be saved.

Intrigued? Find out more at the author’s website: http://johntemplebooks.com/index.php

What could be better than Botox? A few years back I wrote an article for the New York Times Magazine about Raisa Ruder, a Russian born aesthetician who contended that her all-natural beauty potions could take on Botox any its ilk any day. Hollywood agreed: Raisa has used her Ukrainian grandmother’s tried-and-true recipes on everyone from Madonna to Kelly Preston to Nicole Kidman.

Her get-gorgeous-for-less tricks were too good not to share, so we teamed up to write a book, BABUSHKA’S BEAUTY SECRETS: Old World Tips For A Glamorous New You (Grand Central Publishing). The recipes are easy, quick and inexpensive.

Here’s one our favorite summer recipes:

Strawberry Scrub
Keep your hands and feet feeling fresh and renewed with this homemade scrub.

9 strawberries
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon sea salt

Mix all the ingredients in a blender on high for about 2 minutes. Now massage into the hands an feet for 10 minutes. Rinse it off and pat dry. Strawberries contain a natural fruit acid that is fantastic for exfoliating.

Sometimes in this crazy industry a dose of reality is what’s needed. Berrett-Koehler’s President and Publisher Steve Piersanti sent me this blog post recently as an accompaniment to an insightful rejection letter on a submission.  While I was less than thrilled that our project was turned down, I did feel that this very smart publisher’s analysis of our business, backed by hard numbers, was something that authors might find interesting.  Steve’s “10 awful truths” are mitigated by the 7 strategies for counteracting them at the end of the post.  It doesn’t help any of us to get depressed about the state of publishing but fortunately, we can learn to position our books more strategically.

Thank you, Steve, for your wisdom.  I can’t wait to find a book to sell you!

Joelle

THE 10 AWFUL TRUTHS ABOUT BOOK PUBLISHING by Steven  Piersanti, President, Berrett-Koehler Publishers

1. The number of books being published in the U.S. has exploded. Bowker reports that over one million (1,052,803) books were published in the U.S. in 2009, which is more than triple the number of books published four years earlier (2005) in the U.S. (April 14, 2010 Bowker Report).  More than two thirds of these books are self-published books, reprints of public domain works, and other print-on-demand books, which is where most of the growth in recent years has taken place.  In addition, hundreds of thousands of English-language books are published each year in other countries.

2. Book industry sales are declining, despite the explosion of books published. Book sales in the U.S. peaked in 2007 and then fell by nearly five percent between 2007 and 2009, according to the Association of American Publishers (April 7, 2010 AAP Report).  Similarly, bookstore sales peaked in 2007 and have fallen since, according to the U.S. Census Bureau (Publishers Weekly, February 22, 2010).  The major bookstore chains have been especially hard hit, with a 12 percent sales decline between 2007 and 2009 (Publishers Weekly, April 12, 2010).

3. Average book sales are shockingly small, and falling fast. Combine the explosion of books published with the declining total sales and you get shrinking sales of each new title.  According to Nielsen BookScan – which tracks most bookstore, online, and other retail sales of books (including Amazon.com) – only 282 million books were sold in 2009 in the U.S. in all adult nonfiction categories combined (Publishers Weekly, January 11, 2010).  The average U.S. nonfiction book is now selling less than 250 copies per year and less than 3,000 copies over its lifetime.

4. A book has less than a 1% chance of being stocked in an average bookstore. For every available bookstore shelf space, there are 100 to 1,000 or more titles competing for that shelf space.  For example, the number of business titles stocked ranges from less than 100 (smaller bookstores) to approximately 1,500 (superstores).  Yet there are 250,000-plus business books in print that are fighting for that limited shelf space.

5. It is getting harder and harder every year to sell books. Many book categories have become entirely saturated, with many books on every topic.  It is increasingly difficult to make any book stand out.  New titles are not just competing with a million recently published books, they are also competing with more than seven million other books available for sale.  And other media are claiming more and more of people’s time.  Result: investing the same amount of effort today to market a book as was invested a few years ago will yield a fraction of the sales previously experienced.

6. Most books today are selling only to the authors’ and publishers’ communities. Everyone in the potential audiences for a book already knows of hundreds of interesting and useful books to read but has little time to read any.  Therefore people are reading only books that their communities make important or even mandatory to read.  There is no general audience for most nonfiction books, and chasing after such a mirage is usually far less effective than connecting with one’s communities.

7. Most book marketing today is done by authors, not by publishers. Publishers have managed to stay afloat in this worsening marketplace only by shifting more and more marketing responsibility to authors, to cut costs and prop up sales.  In recognition of this reality, most book proposals from agents and experienced authors now have an extensive (usually many pages) section on the author’s marketing platform and what the author will do to market the book.  Publishers still fulfill important roles in helping craft books to succeed and making books available in sales channels, but whether the books move in those channels depends primarily on the authors.

8. No other industry has so many new product introductions. Every new book is a new product, needing to be acquired, developed, reworked, designed, produced, named, manufactured, packaged, priced, introduced, marketed, warehoused, and sold.  Yet the average new book generates only $100,000 to $200,000 in sales, which needs to cover all of these expenses, leaving only small amounts available for each area of expense.  This more than anything limits how much publishers can invest in any one new book and in its marketing campaign.

9. The digital revolution is expanding the number of products and sales channels but not increasing book sales. We are in the early stages of an explosion in digital versions of books and digital sales channels for books and portions of books.  However, early indications are that the digital revenues are replacing traditional book revenues rather than adding to overall book revenues.  The total book publishing pie is not growing, but it is now being divided among even more products and markets, thus further crowding and saturating the marketplace.  And although some digital costs are lower, other costs are higher while price points are lower – making digital profits even slimmer than print profits thus far.

10. The book publishing world is in a never-ending state of turmoil. The thin margins in the industry, high complexities of the business, intense competition in a small industry, rapid growth of new technologies, and expanding competition from other media lead to constant turmoil in book publishing.  Translation: expect even more changes and challenges in coming months and years.

STRATEGIES FOR RESPONDING TO “THE 10 AWFUL TRUTHS”

1.  The game is now pass-along sales.

2.  Events/immersion experiences replace traditional publicity in moving the needle.

3.  Leverage the authors’ and publishers’ communities.

4.  In a crowded market, brands stand out.

5. Master new sales and marketing channels.

6.  Build books around a big new idea.

7.  Front-load the main ideas in books and keep books short.

I have vivid memories from the launch date of my first novel (Some Assembly Required, Touchstone/S&S) of sitting at my kitchen table with a glass of wine, reading congratulatory messages from long lost friends who’d received my email blast, while simultaneously (misguidedly) checking Amazon numbers. I had written the book. It was out there, and aside from some local events that had been scheduled, the rest was a waiting game.

Flash forward a whopping two years to the launch of my second novel, Summer Shift (Touchstone/S&S), which came out June 1^st,, and the different planet I now find myself on. This time around, I’ve barely had time to celebrate. There have been entries to write for my new blog, guest blog appearances, promotional giveaways to concoct, multiple trips to the post office to send out books, Facebook pages to create and manage, email blasts and even “tweets.” It’s been a whirlwind of activity. But this foray in to self-promotion has also been rewarding. Aside from the warm feeling I’ve gotten from the friends I’ve reconnected with and new fans that continue to trickle in, I also feel strangely empowered.

What I choose to put out there via social media helps people formulate a more cohesive sense of who I am, which ultimately enhances the relationship they have with me through my books. And, it allows me to continue the dialogue initiated through my writing.

Both of my novels are set on Cape Cod, and so, like my book cover art, my author website and other communications have a coastal feel. I have a blog on the site that I contribute to once or twice a week called Lynn’s Bucket of Shells. It’s a forum for all kinds of topics, with the common thread of Cape Cod running through each. I’m fortunate to have this niche, my books being set in a popular tourist destination. People want to read about what it’s like to live here, and I’m able to share that with them. The blog allows me to be not just an author, but an authority on all things Cape Cod.

I have my personal Facebook page and my author page. I notice some author friends post exactly the same messages to both pages. I like to keep them slightly different, sharing most book-related news with fans of the author page, since they’ve opted in. I think one key to using Facebook successfully is providing value in your messages, be it information, or something funny, witty or wise, as opposed to posting your horoscope or something about it being rainy. It’s important to cultivate a consistent voice, which I’ll admit comes pretty naturally for me because it’s my voice. Therein lies the key. Be yourself.

(As for Twitter (@lynnbonasia), well I have yet to figure out how to successfully tap this venue, though I look forward to tweeting from the beach this summer, if only so I can write off a new bathing suit.)

In the end, it remains to be seen how much all of this will impact sales. But sales aren’t everything. For we authors who have to let go of our writing and characters with the publication of each book, throwing all that love and hard work up to fate, social media gives us a way to continue to develop characters, in this case, ourselves as authors.

I was speaking with one of my favorite editors this morning, Michael Flamini at St. Martin’s Press about how hard agents work on nonfiction proposals with their authors before ever submitting them to publishers.  “Oh, I can tell,” said Michael.  “I can really see a change over the past decade.  So many proposals are just fabulous!  They have everything!”  By “everything,” Michael was referring to a strong, well-defined author platform, a marketing plan, a clear sense of who the audience is for a given book, a detailed analysis of how the proposed book stacks up to similar or competitive books.

I was both grateful to hear that editors do recognize and appreciate what goes into the proposals and dismayed that if all other agents and authors were working as intensively as we work with our authors at our agency, then how much higher will the bar have to be raised to stand out in the future!

Indeed, sometimes it might just be easier to write the book than to write a brilliant proposal!  Even in those instances when an author has given me a full, well-written manuscript for a book, I have asked for a proposal.  “You can’t be serious,” the author sure must think.  But I am!  Editors alas do not have the time to read your entire manuscript.  First, they need the proposal to help them to decide if they want or should get involved in reading the manuscript.  Of course, there are always exceptions, but it helps to provide the editor with a proposal as a guide, as a kind of business plan for the book.  The more clearly an author and agent can articulate a vision for a proposed book, the higher the chance that the editor will give it serious consideration.

And no matter how well crafted the proposal, the editor may still have a different idea about the slant or the positioning and occasionally ask for yet more work to be done on the proposal before bringing it into their board.  I always welcome these opportunities because it shows that the editor is engaged and investing in the project.  At the end of the day, unless an editor wants to fight the good fight, it is always easier to say no.

So, if you are an author, do your homework before approaching an agent. And once you are working with an agent, if you’re asked to do more, do it are serious about getting published.  That collaboration is just the first step in a long collaborative process that just may result in a published book!

Joelle Delbourgo & Associates’ own Molly Lyons was interviewed by Jeff Rivera for GalleyCat:

http://www.mediabistro.com/galleycat/how_to_find_an_agent/what_lit_agent_molly_lyons_is_looking_for_158042.asp

It is sometimes said that it is harder to find an agent than it is to find a publisher!  And there’s some truth to it.

For would-be authors, though, representation is a must these days. For one thing, publishers count on agents to screen submissions for them.  If they dealt directly with authors on a regular basis, they’d never have time to publish the books on their list.  Publishers cultivate relationships with the agents whose taste and business practices they trust.  And agents, in turn, cultivate relationships with editors who acquire in those categories or types of books they are most likely to represent.  Even in the age of email and voicemail, publishing remains a relational business.  Authors hire agents in part for their rolodexes.

But there is much more to representation than an agent’s contacts.  An effective agent keeps up with industry changes, which these days are rapid-fire.  As companies merge and purge, redirect their lists, develop new strategies and policies, succeed and fail at publishing the books on their list, the agents who deal with them keep abreast of the chaotic landscape and what it means for their authors.

Literary representation is not just about selling a single work by an author.  It is about having an overall plan that you, the client, and the agent are committed to.  When you agree to work with an agent, you want to be sure that that agent understands and cares about who you are, what you are writing, where your writing falls in the spectrum of your overall identity and goals, and what you hope to achieve in the future.  You want to work in partnership with an agent to articulate a strategy to establish you and your work, and to grow the audiences for it.

I often tell clients that literary representation means exactly that:  I will “represent” you, which is to say speak for you.  I will advocate for you and your work every step of the way through a complex process. Sometimes that starts with the seed of an idea for a book, or the beginning of a plot line.  We will shape the material together.  I will share with you how I plan to approach publishers and who those publishers are.  I’ll keep you informed throughout the selling process until we hopefully find the right publishing partner for you and make a sale.  I will work through the contract negotiation literally line by line through what are increasingly complex documents, watching out for your interests every step of the way.  Once the book is sold, the relationship shifts somewhat to a bond between the author and the editor. But a good agent is always ready on the sidelines to advise, problem-solve and move the project forward when challenges arise, as they almost inevitably do.  In fact, I often tell clients that you may have a hard time getting rid of me, as I will care about your book through its hopefully long life.

An agent today also has to think abou the author’s “brand”–a much overused term. Even fiction writers to some extent can potentially have a brand.  In other words, it is important to know where your work fits in to the arc of everything a writer does, and to help make those connections clear.  Each book says something about the writer, his work and his audience. That is why it is sometimes confusing when an author decides to switch genres or messages.

What do agents want?  The answer differs for every agent, of course, but speaking for myself, I want clients who represent me. Sounds strange, doesn’t it?  But think about it. Every time I send an editor a proposal or manuscript for consideration, I am telling that person that I think this material is worthy, something of quality, something to pay attention to.  If I abuse the trust that an editor puts in me to identify the right potential books for that editor, I may use up my capital with that editor.  I believe most agents would agree with me that we are proud of the books we represent and feel that we are making a contribution above and beyond just selling another book.  I’m excited when I can help to midwife a new idea that enters the culture or bring a rich reading experience to thousands of readers.  If I were just a pure seller, I might as well sell high fashion at Bloomingdale’s–something I’ve considered!

As an agent, I seek out clients who are professional, respectful, who do their homework.  My favorite clients tend to be hardworking, gracious, articulate, kind, and appreciative of the hard work that the agency does for them.  These clients research the agency before ever sending us anything to review.  They send us polished work.  One memoirist, for example, spent thirteen years writing her manuscript and then hired a top editor to rework it before it ever hit my desk.  I took her on and asked her to work with yet another editor before sending it out to publishers. The good news is that the book sold, and part of the reason it did was because of the blood, sweat and tears that went into it–and it showed!

I also look for work that is unique.  A distinctive point of view, an arresting voice, a unique plot twist, cutting-edge research:  these are some of the things that make me look up and pay attention.

I always suggest to authors that they work hard on their cover letters. These create a first impression that can make the difference between getting noticed and a form rejection.  Check out an agent’s website. Find out if what genres that agent represents, whether the agent prefers to be contacted by email, letter or phone.  The little things count!

Finally, remember that agents, even busy ones, are looking for you.  We do want to find you and we are thrilled when the right potential clients find us!

We are having a fantastic start to 2010 with seven exciting books launching in January alone. While we love all of our clients, a special place goes to Geeta Anand this month, the brilliant and beautiful Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative Wall Street Journal reporter. Anand’s book THE CURE: How a Father Raised $100 Million and Bucked the Medical Establishment in a Quest to Save His Children inspired the film, EXTRAORDINARY MEASURES, which opened nationwide on January 22, starring Brendan Fras er and Harrison Ford. Based on the true story of John and Aileen Crowley, parents of two young children who were diagnosed with a rare genetic illness, Pompe disease, the book and the film tell the remarkable story of a race against time to find the cure against insurmountable odds. Refusing to accept the fate that there was no medicine to treat Pompe, and that as a result, their children had only months to live, the Crowleys teamed up with a scientist whose theoretical research indicated that a treatment was possible. The father, played by Brendan Fraser, and the scientist (a composite character), played by Harrison Ford, form an improbable and at times contentious partnership that results in a medical breakthrough that no only saves the lives of the Crowley children, but when administered in infancy, can control the symptoms in others.

Geeta Anand first came to me seven years ago with the seeds of the story that would become the film and the book. She reported on the Crowleys in two front-page stories in the Wall Street Journal, which led to a book proposal, a book sale to publishing’s legendary editor/publisher, Judith Regan at HarperCollins, and an immediate movie sale, which is highly unusual. With the help of one of the most amazing film agents in the business, Howard Sanders at United Talent Agency, a deal was struck with Sony Pictures, with visionary producer Michael Shamberg at the helm, and Harrison Ford.

It took incredible courage for both Judith and the team at Sony to take on the subject of devastating illness and a story that involved an intricate medical and business plot. But those who did commit, including Amy Baer, now President of CBS Films, who ultimately helped to bring the film to the screen, understood that at the heart of the story is a couple who would not accept fate, and the human story of a family that has sought to find the positive in every single day as they strive to give their children as full and rich a life as possible. Today, Megan and Patrick Crowley are doing well. While they will always be in wheelchairs, their organs, which had been seriously compromised by the disease, are functioning well. They are mainstreamed in the public schools in Princeton, NJ, where they live, and they have friends, parties and sleepovers.

HarperCollins has released the paperback edition of THE CURE to coincide with the release of film, and our agency has also licensed editions in Italy, India, Japan and Korea which will be published later this year as the film is distributed internationally.

Congratulations to Geeta Anand, who first brought national attention to the story, and to John Crowley, who we represented for the film deal, and who has been a partner in our publishing venture from the very first day.

Check out www.thecurebook.com and follow @thecurebook.com on twitter.

The remarkable story of one father’s struggle to find a cure to save his very sick children, the subject of Geeta Anand’s THE CURE (HarperCollins), comes to the big screen in your neighborhood with the release of EXTRAORDINARY MEASURES, starring Brendan Fraser and Harrison Ford. Anand is a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist who first reported on the story of John Crowley and his family for The Wall Street Journal.

From THE CURE“I think Aileen wants me to leave, [John] said, his voice hushing slightly. I don’t think I’m the right guy for her. I work all the time. I’m no fun anymore.” Ed thought of Aileen on his last visit—pale and desperate, begging him to make John stay—and couldn’t stop himself from correcting his friend. “I know Aileen doesn’t want you to leave, he said, reassuring but firm. I know Aileen needs you and the kids need you…Maybe you should just set aside your issues…and focus on the kids.” John hung up and sat silently in the parking lot for another hour. He knew what Ed wanted him to do, but he didn’t know what he, John Crowley, wanted to do. Well, that was not entirely true. He did know: he wanted to escape from a life with two sick children and nurses and a wife who seemed in denial that everything was terrible. But was it the right thing to do? John…looked up through the front window and watched the full moon beaming down on his face… Moments later, the car’s engine revved up, and it accelerated out of the driveway onto the interstate—…heading home.