Marketing Weekend

No matter what business you're in, you have to learn how to sell yourself. I'm a lot better at this when I'm at a corporate interview than when I'm trying to sell a book because of the normal attachments to a creative work. After all, when I go for an interview for a technical writing job, I know that the company expects a certain set of skills or personality and I have to prove that I'm capable of fulfilling their needs. With a book, I have no idea what specific things the agent or publisher is looking to acquire, what they're sick of seeing. Plus, my book is finished. It's not like I can put some sort of spin on it to convince them that it's what they want. Finally, it's something I created! I won't go so far as to say that my books are like my baby, but it is a lot more personal.

When you're looking for a new job, it takes a lot of time -- it's often said that finding a new job is a full-time job. Trying to find an agent or a publisher can be the same way. Once I get in the zone of researching people to compose that perfect, individualized letter, I can't stop. I want to know everything about all of the people on my list (which usually starts with just a couple, and grows to close to 100, depending on genre).

Many agents today accept queries via email, which is wonderful and terrible. It's great to get a quick response, especially considering that about a third of my queries still feel like they go out into the ether. A fair number of agents still say, "We'll respond if we're interested." The trouble with quick responses is that I immediately want to send out another submission. I like to have at least 5 queries out at once (obviously, only to people who accept simultaneous submissions). This brings out my obsessive side. If I let myself submit another query for every quick rejection, I'll never actually write anything new!

So I've established the first weekend of every month as a marketing weekend. I set different goals for the two books that I'm currently trying to sell: 5 agent queries and X submissions to publishers who don't require agent representation. Publishers take a lot longer to respond to submissions than agents, so that number can be anywhere from 0-3.

This weekend is a little different, however. Word on the street is that nothing gets done in publishing between Thanksgiving and New Year's. So instead of submitting queries, I'm going to post my mystery query letter to a new workgroup I've joined. Hopefully, by Jan. 2 I'll have a better letter!