A Novel Marketing Plan

A requirement for any nonfiction book proposal is a marketing plan. In this plan, you, as the author, must convince an editor there is an eager audience ready to pounce on your book idea once published. Additionally, you must show how you will market the book to this audience. Trust me, proposing review copies and a book tour featuring readings and signings will not get it done these days.

My agent is currently pitching my novel, Vamonos!, and she hit on the idea of offering a marketing plan for fiction editor presentations as well. A fairly unique idea. She perceives the fiction market to be squeezed and difficult for manuscript sales, and is constantly looking for new ideas to penetrate that market. She has had some success with this "marketing plan" idea recently.

The Vamonos! manuscript deals with two displaced and unsuccessful Country & Western Austin, Texas, musicians who ride their Harley motorcycles in the Mexican Desert on a journey of redemption. It is humorous adventure fiction.

Vamonos! combines Harley Davidson Motorcycles, Texas/Mexico cross-border adventures, humorous camaraderie, Mexican cultural and illegal immigration insights, college campus settings, Country & Western music, and hilarious cognitive critters into a montage of cultural diversity.

To prepare the Vamonos! Marketing Plan, I first had to break down the cultural interests of the various demographics addressed in the book. It took a lot of work, but I came up with a diverse marketing plan showing who the readership is and how to focus on each segment.

I divided the readership into General Groups composed primarily of readers of adventure and humor - genre examples: Christopher Moore, Tom Robbins, and Carl Hiaasen and Special Groups composed of Texans, The cross border Hispanic Culture, College Students, Motorcycle riders, Country & Western music Lovers.

A very specific, detailed marketing plan was then explained including lists of email address that are already developed to exploit each of these groups. The actual marketing plan for Vamonos! is over thirty double spaced pages and is very detailed. The Marketing Plan also included statistical information exploding the publisher's myth that Hispanics, motorcycle riders, and C&W music lovers don't buy books.

One early recipient of the Vamonos! presentation that included the Marketing Plan said, "I really appreciate receiving the Marketing Plan. We never get one for novels and it really helps evaluate the commercial viability of a manuscript."

Showing editors and publishers your marketing expertise and the extent to which you are willing to participate in your novel's marketing program will have a positive effect. Fiction manuscripts are hard to sell these days, but showing publishers the market for you novel and how you propose to develop that market will help you get your novel accepted.

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To Self Publish or Not

"Vanity Press!" That is the pejorative term for self-publishing I knew years ago. Granted, things have changed in recent times, and today the number of books published by the trade press and by individuals is about equal. But "Vanity Press" still hangs in my mind.

If you have the personality and marketing expertise to sell your self-published books, you can make much more money than you ever will on royalties paid by a publisher. The cost of a trade paperback (+/- 300 pages) self-published (depending on how fancy your book's format) will run from $3.00 to $5.00 each. Take out a retail margin from a cover price of $11.95, and you still can hang onto $3.00 to $4.00 per book. Compare this with 5% to 10% royalty on a cover price of $11.95, and you can see the difference. The exceptions to this generalization being, John Grisham, Stephen King, J. K Rowling, and whoever wrote the latest diet book.

The other side of that self-publishing scenario is a garage full of books.

I have a friend who self-publishes one book per year. So far they include two collections of her travelogues, a children's book, and a novel. She markets them to an extended list of friends and family and makes from $8,000 to $10,000 which offsets some of her travel expenses. Not bad.

In my case, I have in past lives been product manager over 300 plus salesmen, direct sold construction machinery all over the world, and handled all of the advertising, marketing, and selling in all of my own companies. So you might say that I am, if not uniquely, then at least well qualified to sell my self-published books. So why don't I self-publish?

This is a question I ask myself constantly. I currently have a couple of nonfiction proposals and a couple of novels represented by an agent who feels strongly that she will eventually get them sold. At what point will I finally say, "To hell with it," and self-publish? Probably never.

Strap me to a polygraph and there is only one answer that will pass for the question, "Why don't you self-publish?" God forgive me, that answer is "ego." "Vanity Press" rattles around in my head until the need for the validation that acceptance by a major publisher brings, out weighs monetary considerations.

Possibly I need professional help to adjust my perception of reality, but what about you? Why don't you self-publish? When you get past the investment considerations, and the marketing considerations, and all the other considerations, you need to ask yourself one more profound question. Will self-publishing bring me the kind of satisfaction I sought when I decided to write?

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I Have To Just Love It

The statement made to my agent last month by a publisher's editor explaining how, in these difficult times for fiction, she determines which manuscripts she carries forward, forced me to again address this issue. "I have to just love it!" was her criteria for accepting fiction manuscripts. This leads me to again ask, "Why do You just have to love it?" Wouldn't it make more sense if the reading public "just loved it?"

Which editor does their publisher and the reading public the best service? The editor above, or the editor who brings a manuscript before the dreaded editorial board and says, "I just hate this manuscript, but there is no doubt it will be a best seller and become a cult book read by college students for decades."

What the "IHTJLI" editor is saying is, unless a manuscript suits my personal biases, my literary preferences, my agendas, my background, and that one thing that my college professor drummed into me; then this manuscript has no value - to anyone.

Thus forcing the agent to carry the manuscript across the street to another publisher's editor whose personal biases, literary preferences, agendas, background, and whose one thing that their college professor drummed into them, are all encapsulated in this manuscript. This editor just loves the manuscript and their house reaps the rewards if the book is a success.

I wonder what went though the minds of the legendary thirty-plus editors who "just didn't love" Margaret Mitchell's Gone With the Wind after it became the biggest thing in history to hit the press and silver screen. What if one of those thirty-some-odd editors had brought the manuscript forward saying, "You know, I'm just not real big on Civil War stuff, but I think this story will resonate big time with the reading public." That editor's publisher would have reaped the rewards rather than number thirty-six or thirty-seven.

In the eighteen years I wrote a weekly wine column for Harte Hanks, Murdock, and Hearst newspapers I was careful to not down a wine just because I happened to not enjoy it. This is quite different from a flawed wine that must be exposed to the public. There is nothing intrinsically wrong with a wine that others enjoy and I don't.

I'm curious how many clunkers does an editor get to bring to press before their publisher decides his or her personal biases, literary preferences, agendas, background, and the one thing their college professor drummed into them, are completely out of step with the rest of the reading world.

Does an editor of a romance publisher have to love every sappy piece of romance writing set before them, or do they just analyze the story to see if it suits their readers? I think it's probably the latter, and if that's the case, then why don't the editors of other publishers take the same approach.

It make so much more sense for an editor to evaluate a submission first for the basics of grammar, then for style as it relates to content, and finally to set about determining if there is a market for the story. If the market exists, then forget that you just don't love it, and get the thing out there so the reader's can.

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Tuscaloosa, Glasgow Phillips, and Literature's Loss

A friend of mine wrote a screenplay based on the book, Tuscaloosa, by W. Glasgow Phillips. The book was published in 1994 by the Plume imprint of Penguin and received massive literary accolades, went into translations, and got a film option. A writing grant was awarded to Phillips who spent the next two years at Stanford University, ostensibly writing.

Phillips was 24 years old at the time the book published and after his stint at Stanford and a short stay in Austin, Texas, he disappeared from the literary scene into the bowels of Hollywood. Never to be seen in literary circles again.

My friend let me read his Tuscaloosa screenplay, the first and only that I've read. I liked the script, so I bought and read the book. As writers, we could only hope that any of our stuff that goes to film, comes out the end hewing to our work as accurately.

The book's accolades were warranted. However good Phillips was at story telling, he was an even better wordcrafter. His writing style was just wonderful reading, laced with poignancy and humor.

My interest was peaked, and I did some research and found that he had a book copywrited and published this year, 2007. The Royal Nonesuch: Or what will I do when I grow up is a narrative nonfiction memoir detailing his life after Tuscaloosa.

When he sinks into Tinseltown, he becomes essentially a porno hustler and any other bottom feeding activity he can scrounge, including writing, directing and acting in the Sound of One Hand Clapping. In this, his first film, he fights off Kung Fu warriors, using only his genitalia.

He also wrote, directed and acted in a snuff film. Reading this, I was so repulsed I failed to remember I had suffered through Tarratino's Hostel a few weeks ago. The only difference being that Hostel was obviously a drama while Phillips' Human Number purported to be real. A first person POV snuff film, shot hand-held while the protagonist did his dastardly deeds, was to be screened on the Internet News Year's Eve, 2000. The idea being that interest from newscasts and Internet freaks would spread the word and force it into distribution a la Blair Witch Project. To his credit he scrapped the project after it was edited, when his dad objected to the idea. A major porno distributor also turned thumbs down, saying, "We wouldn't touch that."

Some of his socially unredeeming projects like CRAPtv, Orgazmo, and a few others are out there on the Internet. He also directed Undead 0r Alive, a zombie western that got it's premier in Austin's SxSW Festival, and by all accounts was so bad it never reached theaters again. It seems that it was neither horrorific nor funny.

At a point late in his memoir, I was completely bummed out by this loser whose every decision was a disaster - socially and economically. How could someone so talented be launched with a breakout debut novel and blow it so badly? But in the end I have to say his memoir is piercingly honest, humorous, if unapologetic. He loves and cares for his mother whose dying of cancer, and he's rid himself of much of his baggage. He's worked as a writer for South Park and other TV stuff. So I feel a little more kindly toward him. His story might make a better film than Tuscaloosa.

With all the struggling fiction writers out there dying for a break, it's hard to imagine why someone so talented doesn't cut out the crap and crank out some more great fiction.

By the way, my friend is not a "wannabee" in Hollywood. He earns his keep as a film production designer. Any producers out there looking for a worthwhile property should chase down the screenplay, Tuscaloosa.

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A Bar of Soap

Dear Friend,

I realize that some may consider the content of this letter indelicate. For this reason I apologize in advance to those who find it so. But as you will read, I am unable to restrain myself from making this inquiry.

For several years a bar of soap in our bathroom went unused because of it's decorative value. It was a medium sized single bar unadorned with any wrapping or bindings. It was a mottled, darkish blue color and shaped for ease of holding with a curved, convex/concave middle and hemispherical ends. I think the shape, more than the color, made it attractive. It was essentially odorless.

I use the past tense,"was," because two weeks ago I discovered we had none of our normal bath soap and bathed with the bar of soap in question. During successive baths, embedded particles of some natural fiber surfaced, which gave a not unpleasant tingle to the skin as I lathered. With successive uses I also discovered something more important.

The particular part of a man's anatomy that he holds most dear, was . . . well, in fact, growing. A phenomenon not normally associated with advancing age.

My degree in engineering caused me to run tests. I determined that using the bar of soap more often, accelerated growth. You should believe me when I say that I am cleaner now than I've ever been.

Unfortunately, by the time I discovered the growth phenomenon, all markings regarding brand name, manufacturer, or country of origin had dissolved from the bar. My wife and I have discussed at length whether or not we purchased this bar of soap and if so, from what source. Alas, we have no recollection.

This brings me to the reason for this letter. Since we often exchange gifts with friends and family, there is a very good chance that the bar of soap was given to us by one of you. Would you spend a moment trying to remember if you ever gave us a bar of soap? If so, would you notify me from where you purchased it? I would be most beholden.

It is my plan, if the manufacturer/retailer can be located, to not only buy several cases of this soap, but also to invest heavily in the common stock of the manufacturer.

There is the nagging fear that whereas bathing more often with this bar of soap had a positive effect, discontinuing it's us might invoke a regression. I have only a small shard left of the original bar of soap, so I write this with some sense of urgency.

If you have any information that might lead to the source of this bar of soap, please forward it to me as quickly as possible. My wife will be eternally grateful.

Your friend
Bill

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New York, New York and Other Cultural Myths
originally posted: March 1, 2007

My agent, Nancy Ellis, a Californian, is in New York the first two weeks of March, pitching my second novel. I learned also today that a friend had moved to New York to take over a public relations firm. The combination of these two migrations sent me reeling back through my New York Memories.

A couple of decades ago I was in New York for a dinner meeting with the Food and Beverage Director of a potential airline client for my airline catering business. I finished dressing early and picked up a "what's happening in NY" kind of magazine in the room. A piece on cozy little New York bars talked about Chumley's 86 in Greenwich Village. The writer pointed out Chumley's was called the "no name bar" because it didn't have an exterior sign - a holdover from it's speakeasy days. Still with time to spare, I went downstairs and out on the sidewalk to "New York up," so to speak.

Note: There's no time here to philosophize about the love/hate New York syndrome that bothers both New Yorkers and outlanders. I've just never bought into all that "if you can make it here, you can make anywhere" New York stuff.

I stepped into a cool, clear January, Manhattan evening. Standing toes-to-curb, I was captivated by a city sparkling as gloriously as its post cards. A man like myself, standing curbside in an out-of-style overcoat, looking up at the buildings is a beacon to any alert New Yorker. I barely noticed the approach of the battleship class limousine. Purring noiselessly, it docked curbside with the driver's window squarely abeam.

"Need a lift, sir?" asked the driver in full dress chauffeur's uniform.

Under normal circumstances I would answer in one word, but the enormity of this situation was too much for an outlander. "Well, I didn't set out to get a limo." I said with as much poise as I could muster.

"Be glad to take you anywhere." The accent was Caribbean, the smile genuine.

"You're kidding of course," I replied, "limos don't cruise for rides -- do they?"

"Sure do," the smile was infectious.

"Most cities require 24 hour notice for a limo to keep them from competing with cabs."

"City likes us to cruise during rush hours - not enough cabs, ya know." I doubted it was true, but that's ok.

At that moment my guests walked up behind me, "Well, are you ready for a big night, Bill?"

"Sure thing, hop in." I smiled and gestured toward the limo. They froze in there tracks. It was oneupmanship of prodigious proportions. The driver was already opening the door to a cavernous luxury seldom afforded the common taxi rider.

"You're kidding, right?"

"Not at all." I smiled. "I'd like you to meet my driver . . ."

"Your driver?

"Of Course."

"Neville. Neville Comma, sir." Flawless timing as the driver bowed slightly to my guests.

Ensconced in the luxury of the limo, I caught Neville' s eye in the rearview mirror. "Neville, would you confirm our reservations with Tre Scalini." He nodded, picked up the phone, and instead, quietly called to get directions to Tre Scalini.

"Tre Scalini! That's one of my favorite restaurants," exclaimed my guest's wife. He had the questioning look of a man wondering when we had discussed favorite New York restaurants.

Exiting the limo, I hung back from my guests. "Neville, I'm a poor man, what is this costing me?"

"Tell you what. I'll go cruise for some more rides and come back about 10:45 to pick you up." He grinned that big Caribbean grin. "I'll just charge you $125.00 for the whole evening."

"Done."

After a gastronomic extravaganza and an expense account debacle, we were once again enjoying the limo life. "It seems early. How about having a drink at Chumley's 86 down in the village." I nodded to Neville who instantly grabbed up the phone, asking for directions in hushed tones.

"Chumley's 86?" My guest and his wife looked at each other and shrugged.

"Yeah. It's a cozy little place with a fireplace. Kind of interesting, really. It's called the No Name Bar because they have no street sign - a holdover from it's speakeasy days."

Now they looked at each other with that "how does he know so much about New York" look.

When we later closed Chumley's, our table had grown to include my two guests, Neville, three ex-Bostonite young lion investment bankers who complained from the next table that there were no girls in New York, and the six lovely young ladies I had invited to join us, proving there actually are girls/women in New York.

Did I get the contract? Of course. So what's so tough about New York?

Epilogue

Neville it turned out was a wonderful person and a down home philosopher of some note. I always looked him up on subsequent New York Trips. On one occasion I was seated with Neville and two Texas friends at the front window table of a small deli. The sidewalk was packed with people hurrying in both directions.

I pointed out at the crowded sidewalk. "Neville, look at all those people. Why don't they get out of here, go somewhere, and get a life?"

He leaned back, looking at the ceiling. "New York is a pretty easy place to be. You can always make somethin' off a somebody." He paused for a moment. "Actually, New York is like a giant University. Folks come here and learn stuff, then they get on back to where they come from. But they gotta be careful, 'cause New York'll getcha if ya don't watch out."

I guess that about sums it up.

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A Waist Is a Terrible Thing to Mind -- "I Shall not Want"
originally posted: January 7, 2007

I started writing about wine, and later about food, for two reasons. The editor of The San Antonio Light, Hearst's local newspaper, was a regular at my restaurant. He stopped me in the restaurant one night and asked me to consider writing a weekly column about wine.

The second reason was the problem my dad had keeping his ego intact after retiring as the CEO of a sizeable company. I decided this would not happen to me. I would become a writer as a continuing activity to shore up my ego at the end of my commercial life. Wrong! If you're reading this, you know the horrible rejection an aspiring writer suffers.

Interestingly, when I started writing about wine and food for the newspaper, everybody wanted to be my friend - at least those who sold wine or cooked food. I was a freelance writer with other business endeavors and a limited amount of free time. Still invitations from wine vendors and restaurants inviting me to multi-course meals, served with many extravagant wines, poured in. I found that I could do high-calorie lunches and dinners several times weekly by accepting all the invitations. I owed it to my readers.

My maternal family always carried a lot of weight around, and I was no exception. Ponderousity plagued me from marriage. Factor-in all my newfound friends with their caloric invitations, and my clothes began shrinking. A little bite here, a little sip there, just the tiniest drop more, and - whamo! - I looked like the Michelin Man. Even the most passionate amateur foodies and winos attend extravagant dinners only occasionally.

I found myself chewing my way through two wine-sodden multiple course meals on many days. The lucky professional and amateur gourmands shed their excesses as quickly as they are indulged. My excesses hung around long enough to be assessed ad valorum taxes.

Tired of people asking me the location of nearest Michelin Tire store, I showed up on the doorstep of The Obesity Risk Factor Clinic. With a name like that you leave the place like it was a whorehouse, looking in every direction for anyone who might recognize you. Add to this their pronouncement that I was "morbidly obese."

The Obesity Risk Factor Clinic had a great weight loss plan; you simply give up eating and drinking. The program is guaranteed. In place of meals they give you three little packets of powder. Three times a day you stir one into a glass of water and drink it. Somehow these miracle powders were supposed to completely satisfy any cravings that arise from not eating and drinking. They needed to rethink this idea, as I started eating the packets after pouring the powders into the water.

Vintner diners, wine tastings, eight course chef's menu-preview dinners, and such were now out. I would decline these until I fit through a normal width door. My resolve lasted until a friend came to town to show off his new vintage wines in the Four Seasons Hotel restaurant. Today Paul Draper is the big cheese in Ridge Vineyards, but back then he was the winemaker. I respected Paul for his wines, as a person, and as a great storyteller. Ridge's sales manager and local broker were both good friends, and they convinced me I had to go to Paul's vintner dinner. Besides it was only going to be eight courses - accompanied by the full line of Ridge wines including the much sought after Ridge Montebello Cabernet Sauvignon.

I called two people before the event. The first was John Indrurie, Food and Beverage Director of the Four Seasons Hotel, and asked that he serve me only a glass of water into which I would pour my packet of powder, and that would be my dinner. Oh, and could he provide me with a dump bucket so I could spit out the wine after tasting it.

The second call was to the Almighty for assurance, strength of will, and succor. For hours before the event I closeted myself and read the 23rd Psalm. "The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want." Now this is a thought the morbidly obese can hang onto. Armed with a packet of miracle powder and this thought, I sallied forth.

Seated at the table I felt rather self-assured, I had my powder and, as requested, a glass of water. The first course was served before I could pour my powder into the water. I repeated to myself, "The Lord is my Shepard and I shall not want." Not true! I wanted it all. Even the centerpiece was looking good.

"He maketh me to lie down in green pasta." Whole shrimp, mussels, and clams in a garlic cream sauce over spinach fettuccini. Give me a break! Well, maybe a little, before my powder.

"He leadeth me beside the still white wine." I really do owe it to my readers to report on Paul's new creations . . . and spitting them out might be misunderstood. After all, there's only a few hundred calories in a glass of wine, right?

"He restoreth my sole." Unbelievable! Sautéed Dover Sole with Lemon Capers. Get thee behind me Satan.

"He leadeth me in the paths of roast duck." It's common knowledge that oriental dishes like Roast Duck with Stir-Fry Vegetables are very low in calories . . . maybe just a morsel.

"Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no veal dish." I can't believe this! Medallions of Veal in Morel Sauce . . . of course, veal is noted for its lack of animal fat . . . "Would you pass the veal, please?"

"Thy Lobster Raviolis they comfort me. Thou preparest a table before me." Now this is going too far!
"My cup runneth over." What the hell, I might as well have the red wine. "May I have another glass of Montebello, please."

"Surely gobbiness and morbidity shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the lard forever."

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During the last twenty years Bill Stephens has written over 1,000 weekly columns and features on wine, food, travel, and outdoors for Murdoch, Harte Hanks, and Hearst newspapers. His features and contributions have appeared in national periodicals like Chef, Wine Spectator, Wine News, Wine Enthusiast, Field & Stream, and Food & Wine. He has published two short stories "The Decanter, A Christmas Story" and "Toby Tire and His Erratic Curve Ball"

At one point during his three-decade food service career, he concurrently owned and operated a leading white tablecloth restaurant, three airline in-flight kitchens, three employee feeding facilities, catered a dinner train, and his company was third largest full service off-premise caterer in South Texas.

Stephen's catering clients included Texas governors, presidential candidates, the family of the King of Saudi Arabia, The Prince of Wales, Pope John Paul II, Tom Jones, Neal Diamond, Willie Nelson, and many other notables.