Fifteen Seconds

Sheriff Nate Turner was killed from an unknown assailant. 

And he begs St. Peter to send him back to find his killer. 

In this saga of a Black run-away slave, soldier, cowboy, and lawman in the old west. 

That’s my fifteen second pitch, or what commonly called in the writing/publishing business the elevator pitch. 

In our monthly writers guild meeting last night we had as our guest a publicist who determines the worthiness of the book and strategies for launching a publicity campaign to garner those sales that every writer hopes to garner. 

As with any writing endeavor, and this is if you are in the “business” of writing and publishing your works, costs money. It’s something I have struggled with since getting my first book published through a vanity press, self-published through Amazon and lately published through a hybrid publishing format.  

Just in marketing my books alone, has cost me over $10,000. That’s money that I have yet to recover. Publicist is a whole different animal from marketing. The publicist if he is honest and legitimate will tell you point blank if the book you’ve written is even worth the effort. Then, he’ll read the manuscript and give you an honest assessment on what strategies he will throw out there to do a proper book launch campaign. On average, from $2,500 to $7,500 depending on the publicist. 

This person, whose name is Joe Marich told us if we are serious about the business of writing, because there are three different types and if you are in that third category then there are ten questions you need to ask yourself: 

• Is the story you want to write really and truly a story worth telling? Can you explain why you think so? 

• Or, for a nonfiction: Is this book offering new and pertinent information or presented in a new way that we honestly and truly need? 

• Why should anyone care about this specific book? What Makes it different? 

• Will this book be of interest to a large group of people? 

• Which very specific group will be most interested in this book? [Hint: It is absolutely, positively not “everyone.”] 

• If you were given a five-minute interview on let’s, say Today, what exactly and specifically would you talk about that’s connected to the book? 

• Is there an over-arching theme to the story? 

• How many books do you expect to sell? 

• Do you have a budget to hire PR/Marketing pro, or purchase advertising? 

• Do you have social media presence or a website? 

According to this publicist, you need to have an outline because they can tell within the first 30 pages if your book was outlined. If not, then the book reviewers and media professionals won’t give it media coverage. 

The answers to my books have been, yes, maybe, yes, maybe, not sure, yes, at least a hundred copies, not really, yes. 

I don’t outline. I’m a pantser and unlikely to change my approach because I don’t like wasting my time and effort outlining plot and character development. I write as I go because then I can stop and read and think about how this character will react to a given situation. 

So, here is the nut and bolts of trying to get your book out to the masses. It’s not for the amateur writer who just likes to put ink on paper. It’s for those people serious about what they do and expect a decent return on their investment. 

If you are like me then you have your work cut out for you. If you are just starting out or just like writing for the thrill and fun of the adventure, then you have something to look forward to in your endeavor.