On Friday, May 27 I was one of the lucky students from the Humber School for Writers to attend the Writers Union of Canada’s Annual General Meeting.
I live-Tweeted the panels I attended, so feel free to check those out on my Twitter account. Other than that, following is a brief recap of the day.
Having been under the weather most of the week and knowing absolutely no one at the conference, I woke up feeling sick and apprehensive to attend. Lucky for me, I expressed these feelings on Twitter and was met with welcoming tweets from others like Anita Daher and Nicole McGill.
I’m glad I didn’t let my shyness get the best of me. The day was fun and educational. Below is a recap of what I learned:
New Gatekeeper
with Michael Schellenberg (Knopf Canada), Nicole McGill (author), David Caron (ECW Press) and moderated by Ashleigh Gardner (Kobo Content Manager)
The New Gatekeeper panel discussed what makes books sell these days. In this market, word of mouth does and, to a certain extent, reviewers and author events.
The panel agreed that publishers typically look backwards for the next big thing. Nicole McGill stressed that authors need to be more dexterous and look forwards with their work though, beyond present day technology. She encouraged authors to play and mould technology as a creative form as well as take control of their digital rights (i.e. ask questions about what format the book will be published in, if podcasts can be made, and how much of the book’s material can be placed online). She also advised authors to stop writing in Microsoft Word, which uses a format that is difficult to translate to other devices. Instead she recommends Scrivener, which is device neutral and can publish .epub and .pdf files.
McGill uses new technology to her advantage by reaching out to young adult bloggers with currency in their world. She also keeps track of sites like Red Lemonade and Kick Starter, where authors can connect through social networking with each other and with publishers.
David Caron of ECW Press introduced ECW’s new eBook imprint, Joyland, which offers a $500 advance to authors and a 10% royalty rate for books’ electronic rights. ECW found that publishing eBooks meant they have shorter production timelines and can therefore afford to publish more. They were also able to offer promotions like the Three Book Trio which helps fund future production of eBooks.
Ashleigh Gardner explained how Kobo works directly with authors and offers them a 70% royalty rate on their books. This fuelled a heated debate, where authors asked what the incentive was for them to sign away their electronic rights to a publisher if they only get 10% in royalties, when they can get 70% doing it themselves. Some authors felt that going to a publisher with a book was, in a way, subsidizing publishers with their hard earned funds.
Caron pointed out that many people won’t review eBooks, making it more difficult to generate buzz, and publishers still need to sell 600 copies to break even on the venture – a difficult feat these days. Furthermore, publishers offer design, readership, and editorial work to their authors. “Having a publisher means having a champion, companion, and partner,” Caron said.
The panel moved on to discuss details of eBooks and ePublishing. Gardner pointed out the differences between an eBook and an actual book, one of them being the fact that you can see the entire lifecycle of an eBook – if/when people read the book and if they actually finish it. She also pointed out that epubs are getting nicer, which is a huge leap in eBook publishing since formatting is very important to some authors. With the eBook, books will also never go out of print. As a result, eBooks may be the solution to inaccessible, back listed titles.
The panel stressed that writing has always been a unique art. Whereas artists determine the pace in which their art is received, the reader determines the pace an author’s writing is read. Authors need to consider this, and consider all aspects of this new era of book publishing.
The New Realities of Book Publishing
with Anne Collins (Random House publisher), Charlotte Stein (bookseller), Michael Tamblyn (Executive VP of Content, Sales and Merchandising for Kobo) and moderated by Katherine Govier
As Anne Collins pointed out in her opening speech, “Social media is about the private desires of people.” Most people using social media want to feel like they’re connecting with someone real and therefore requires a huge investment of time and thought.
That being said, Collins pointed out that we don’t even know if social media makes a difference in book sales. In fact, it appears from author experiments that it does not. Despite this, how do we continue to value of an artist’s quiet, creative space in a world where art has to compete with 99 cent apps?
Charlotte Stein, a long-time independent bookseller, stated that she and other independent booksellers value art, but it’s increasingly difficult to foster it when competing against online sellers.
Stein also pointed out that both authors and booksellers struggle with the problems of back listed or out of print books. She warned that authors must be wary of giving away their Print on Demand rights, because POD books are often too expensive for booksellers to purchase and authors never receive the rights to these books back. She acknowledged, as in the New Gatekeepers panel, that eBooks can be one solution to selling backlist titles.
Michael Tamblyn pointed out that these days bookselling has split into two different types. Booksellers of physical books must curate physical space, personalities, and book selections, while digital booksellers must do all this in addition to being concerned with the reading experience itself (i.e. how does an eBook’s pages turn?). Now, with reading in competition with shorter attention spans and so many other things to do, reading must be made even more compelling and immersive.
The audience expressed concern over what is termed the “BookNet effect” – the ability for authors and publishers to see exactly how many books are sold. Concern was especially expressed about the rumour that publishers prefer authors with no BookNet figures as opposed to authors with existing low sales.
The panel ended off on a menacing note when Stein shared the story of buyers entering her shop to book browse, only to leave saying they would “get the eBook free.” She warned that technology already exists to pirate eBook material. “If you don’t think eBooks will eventually be free,” Stein said, “you’re crazy.”
The Writer as Promoter (Or, Who Has Time to Write?)
with authors Cathy Marie Buchanan and Russell Smith, Cassandra Sadek (Random House digital promotion expert), and moderated by Terry Falls
The first question addressed during this panel was, Why aren’t authors’ publishers doing the social media thing for them? As Cassandra Sadek explained, publishers don’t take care of social media for authors because social media is personal in nature and readers want to connect with authors directly.
Cathy Marie Buchanan, an author who expertly uses social media, advised authors that blogs, Twitter, and Goodreads are good examples of social media for writers. She stressed, however, that first time users shouldn’t try to do it all. Instead authors should pick one thing and do it really well before picking up something else. Buchanan advised that Twitter is the easiest to use.
Buchanan also stressed that social media is not merely a sounding board for authors to self-promote. She shared her 80/20 rule for social media: social media is 80% engagement and 20% marketing.
In addition to the usual social media tools, Buchanan also “Skypes” (aka calls) into book clubs reading her book and has a group on Facebook called the Fiction Writer’s Co-op – a group for writers agreeing to share each others’ work on their own social media platforms. The Fiction Writer’s Co-Op is an excellent example of writers being “all in this together,” as an audience member said. If you like a book, put it out there. The simple act of sharing your opinion is not necessarily cold, hard marketing.
An audience member also pointed out that in terms of new technology and social media, a website is good to have. It serves as a compendium of your career, and is worth squeezing onto your plate.
On the flip side, Russell Smith presented the opposite view on social media. Smith strongly stated his feelings against an author as promoter, mainly because it (A) takes too much time (B) is unseemly/beggarly and (C) shifts the writer’s relationship with art and turns it into a product.
First and foremost, as Smith said, he feels like he only has a “certain number of words a day.” Social media takes up too much time and energy.
Secondly, as Smith stated, “all this stuff about Hemingway self-promoting is crap. He wasn’t self-promoting. He was working. He was getting paid.” As Smith points out, social media is largely unpaid. By writing blog posts and articles for free, writers are taking paid work away from freelance writers.
Furthermore, when you start thinking of your readers as an audience to market to, you risk “dumbing down” and smoothing the rough edges of your work. “Products are branded. Novels are read,” Smith said.
In Smith’s opinion, social media blurs the line between selling a book and selling yourself. He asked, Is it fair for people to be judged on things said outside a piece of fiction?
Smith’s opinions met with lots of opposition, and audience members argued that promoting through social media is not much different from authors attending book launches. Furthermore, social media creates an ongoing dialogue with readers and, in a way, democratizes the written word by allowing people to say what they want and be heard.
Ultimately, the audience provided a tempering voice, especially when Farzana Doctor came to the mic and said, “Don’t fret about social media. Do the things you like. Fretting is what makes social media difficult.” In the end, stick to things that work creatively for you.
The panel ended off with reflections on social media for emerging writers – something particularly relevant for me. Panellists and authors agreed that the problem these days is that authors think they need marketing plans before a book is even finished. Doing this is putting the cart before the horse. Finish your book first. As Terry Falls pointed out, if you’re promoting yourself before your manuscript is finished, you are just drawing more attention to the fact that you have an unfinished manuscript. Finish what you want to write, then do what works for you.
wow, excellent re-cap. thank you!