A new look, a new name to the blog

Changes to the Blog

“The only constant is change.” – I forgot who said this.

If you been following this blog, you’ll see that I’ve made some changes to better reflect what this blog is all about. I hope these changes will draw some more folks into the fold so that we can have a more lively discussion about what’s working and not working in the book marketing world.

Word of Mouth Marketing (WOMM) – is old school still the way to go?

The marketing world continues to praise the Internet as the end all, be all platform to get the word out about your product. However, the numbers don’t agree. In fact, overwhelmingly, the numbers state that good old-fashioned word of mouth marketing (WOMM) is still king:

71% Face to face

21% Phone

3% Email

2% Instant Message

1% Online chatroom/blog

1% Other

Sources: McKinsey & Company 2010; Keller Fay Group, 2009

What is WOMM? Let’s say a friend of yours tells you about a new book. “I just read The Brink by Mark Fadden and it was awesome. It was so suspenseful and fast, I found myself reading as fast I could to keep up with the action. There’s also this part about a lost Constitution article, and there’s tons of Federal Reserve history and a secret society called the Bilderberg Group that I never knew about.  You’ve got to read it!” We all have had that conversation, right? And we all have purchased something based upon that friend’s recommendation, right?

I just listened to the  “Pass It On : Small Business Success Through Word-of-Mouth Marketing” webinar from PRWeb and Fizz Corporation. In it, Fizz’s Ted Wright explains how to identify what he calls “influencers” and to use them to share stories about your products, which will hopefully drive up sales. Wright also talks about how to use social media in WOMM. Whatever you are selling, or whatever business you are in, this webinar will help you with your WOMM campaign. Check it out at: http://event.on24.com/eventRegistration/EventLobbyServlet?target=lobby.jsp&eventid=243086&sessionid=1&key=1C7936E31879AFE35EACDEEB245B2C66&eventuserid=40733644

The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step,

Rest easy tonight my friends, but stay hungry tomorrow… 

****************************************************

Here’s what readers are saying about Mark’s latest thriller The Brink:

“I finally had a chance to sit down and read The Brink–all the way through in a day and a half. The story is gripping, even frightening, and you capture the suspense in the rhythm of your prose. In places I was reading so fast I felt like I was in the chase! I’ll put it on the shelf next to my signed copy of Lonesome Dove, in the gallery of great contemporary writers!” – Bob H., Amarillo, TX

“He’s the next Dan Brown.” – Arlene D., Southlake, TX

“Truly a pager turner for me. I could not put the book down. Every time I thought I had figured something out, the next twist came up. If you like conspiracy theories, you’ll love this one.” – Sharon L, Houston, TX

Want to start reading The Brink right now? Download the eBook version from amazon.com for less that $10 at http://www.amazon.com/The-Brink-ebook/dp/B003OYIEPC/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2&s=digital-text&qid=1284567122&sr=8-2 or bn.com at http://search.barnesandnoble.com/The-Brink/Mark-Fadden/e/9781450210492/?itm=1&USRI=mark+fadden.

Order a signed copy of The Brink as a keepsake for yourself or as the ultimate unique gift at http://markfadden.com/buyabook.html

reat Dispatches from the literary trenches

September 19, 2010

Ron Paul – “This is much bigger than the Great Depression” interview

With this weekend being the 2^nd anniversary of the 2008 Wall Street meltdown, here’s a video of yesterday’s Tom Sullivan show where he interviews Congressman Ron Paul, who has long been a relentless champion of fixing the devastated US economy through sound financial principles.

“Capital comes from savings, it can’t come from a printing press,” said Paul. When asked his prediction about the economy, Paul said, “it’s going to get a lot worse. This is much bigger than anything in the history of the world. Never has a world economy been run on a total fiat currency controlled by us, of course by the dollar. It has horrendous debt that has to be liquidated. And so far no one wants to do that. We have to return to sound money. We have to turn off the printing presses.”  

Paul’s latest concern about the role of fiat money in the global economic crisis is just one of the pieces of my latest novel, The Brink. Certain to be the year’s most controversial thriller, The Brink takes readers on a breathless race from the wilderness of northern Mexico to the center of power in Washington, D.C as a fugitive cop and a brilliant beauty try to uncover the link between a lost article of the Constitution and a ruthless secret society whose goal of total global financial collapse has already begun.

Order a signed copy of The Brink as a keepsake for yourself or as the ultimate unique gift at http://markfadden.com/buyabook.html

Writing and marketing your novel: A glimpse from the trenches

August 24, 2010

Day 71 of 365

Books sold so far (May and June 2010): 246

In this issue:

• Writing topic – To Prologue or Not To Prologue?
• Marketing Topic – Google AdWords, Day 3 and Yippee!

Writing topic – To Prologue or Not To Prologue?

So now that my kids are back in school, and I have some more peace and quiet around the house (I work from home, which meant a lot of late nights during the summer to churn out freelance projects while I was “Mr. Mom-ing” it during the day – but I wouldn’t have given up a second of it.) That means it’s time to start churning out the next novel. My main intention of this blog was to provide a chronology of my book marketing efforts so you could see which worked well and which crashed and burned. However, since I’ve decided to write another novel this year, I will be blogging about that effort in the “Writing Topic” section. So, if you are a budding novelist, or know someone who is, I’ll be kickstarting the old noggin tomorrow to get it in shape for the next novel.

That brings us to tonight’s topic – you lika da prologue-a? Prologues typically set up the main story by providing some backstory info. Sometimes, it will be an event that happens later in the book, like a juicy murder scene or some breathless action event. Some critics say that prologues are signs of a weak book. Like a crutch, the prologue props up an otherwise lackluster story that can’t stand on it’s own. It is the prologue that hooks the reader, and then drags them through misery for the next 400 pages.

I vacillated back and forth between prologue or no prologue for the next book. It’s a murder mystery and the opening murder scene was, I thought, some of my best work. It was its own separate scene, so I decided it must be the prologue. Then, I thought about what Stephen King said in On Writing, about how you should “kill your darlings, kill your darlings, even when it breaks your egocentric little scribbler’s heart, kill your darlings.” The scene really didn’t fit because the pace wasn’t there and it had no ties to anything else in the story, so out came the sickle and slice! Thank you again Mr. King for lighting the way.

Marketing Topic – Google AdWords, Day 3 and Yippee!

Yesterday’s post mentioned that I changed up the ads. And viola! It seems I may be getting better at this AdWord stuff.

Here’s the new ad:

• Bilderberg Thriller
• Uncover the most staggering
• conspiracy of our time.
• http://www.markfadden.com

I got quite a lot of hits pretty quickly and my $10 a day budget was topped out before I knew it. Here are the keywords associated with this new ad and the # of clicks for each: “Bilderberg” 9 clicks; “Bilderberg Group” 4 clicks; “New World Order” 18 clicks. Again, the sinister secret society in the book that our hero and heroine are running from are based on the real-life Bilderberg Group, which is said to be planning a One World Government through a combination of efforts including bankrupting the world and social engineering. During the Xmas holiday season, I’ll ramp these ads up a bit.

I also created a second ad. With Labor Day right around the corner and people looking for a good Labor Day read, I am trying to direct them to my amazon page where they can get the book 22% off and get it shipped in time for Labor Day.

Here it is:

• Need a Labor Day Novel?
• Finish this award winning thriller
• on your vacation & get it 22% off!
• http://www.amazon.com

Why the “finish it on your vacation” part? Simple. One thing that people have been commenting on about The Brink is that it’s so fast paced and “unputdownable.” One customer review stated that he finished it in a day and a half!  If people are looking for something to take them away over Labor Day, which is only 3 days, they want something they can finish. It makes them feel like they accomplished something in those three days. If not, they feel like its yet another task on their to-do list if they have to finish it once they come back off vacation and into the real world. Of course, that’s just my theory, and it could be a naive one. I guess only time will tell if the ad works or not.  

Keywords on this one include: thriller books, crime thriller books, new mystery books, mystery and thrillers, and good mystery books. I just created it in the past hour, so no info yet. Stay tuned until tomorrow’s post.

There is one problem, though. Since the ad is small and doesn’t allow for many words, I can’t tell customers that once they order it, they can then go to markfadden.com to get their book signed for free. And ad about buying a signed book will also be a huge part of the xmas ad campaign.      

The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step,

Rest easy tonight my friends, but stay hungry tomorrow…  

Writing and marketing your novel: A glimpse from the trenches

August 23, 2010

Day 70 of 365

Books sold so far (May and June 2010): 246

In this issue:

• Writing topic – Could I have a side of pommes frittes with my bildungsroman?
• Marketing Topic – Google AdWords – the only constant is change

Writing topic – Could I have a side of pommes frittes with my bildungsroman?

I was actually going to talk about the topic, “Should novelists try to educate through their work?” But after going back through old posts, I realized we already covered that one. But as I was researching one of the greatest ‘teaching novels,’ To Kill a Mockingbird, I came across a fascinating word: bildungsroman. The official definition of bildungsroman in Wikipedia is, “is a genre of the novel which focuses on the psychological and moral growth of the protagonist from youth to adulthood.” We Americans refer to it as the ‘coming of age’ story. Now, the YA genre is filled with novels dripping with bildungsroman: the aforementioned To Kill a Mockingbird, Huckleberry Finn, Treasure Island, the Harry Potter and Percy Jackson novels, and Great Expectations, just to name a few. But, does that mean that it must only occur in YA novels? I never found the German word for adult novels where the characters also “come of age” during the story, but as I thought about it, I’ve always connected with those characters that mature psychologically and morally during the story. What about you? Are the flawed heroes your favorite? What are the books that contain their stories?    

Marketing Topic – Google AdWords, the only constant is change

Last week, I started doing ads on Google AdWords. As I mentioned in a previous post, while Facebook allows you to include a pic with your ad, Facebook doesn’t track which keywords are working for you, and which aren’t. Facebook only allows you to send your ad out to one group of people, say ones that listed, “reading” as a hobby. With Google, you can get really specific. For example, my ad last week was:

• Red-Hot Relevant Thriller
• Did the Founding Fathers foresee
• the demise of America?
• http://www.markfadden.com

The keywords I listed, in order from most to least clicked were: “double-dip recession” 7 clicks; “financial crisis” 4 clicks; “award winning thriller” 2 clicks; “best political thrillers” 0 clicks; and “US bankrupt” 0 clicks. My daily budget is $10, and I have a maximum bid of $1 per click.

I’m changing up the ad and the groups of people that will see it.

Here’s the new ad:

• Bilderberg Thriller
• Uncover the most staggering
• conspiracy of our time.
• http://www.markfadden.com

The Bilderberg Group, which is the secret society referred to in the novel, has been in the news lately. Both Rush Limbaugh and Fidel Castro are talking about them. Anyway, I’ve changed the keywords associated with this new ad to “Bilderberg”; “Bilderberg Group”; “New World Order”;  and I’ve kept “financial crisis”; “award winning thriller”; and “best political thrillers.” I’ll have some new numbers for this ad in tomorrow’s post.

Until then, I’ve got to go play tooth fairy tonight. Anyone got a good idea about the going rate for the 2^nd tooth?

The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step,

Rest easy tonight my friends, but stay hungry tomorrow…  

 

Here’s your chance to rip apart a book marketing campaign and caress its beating heart

July 27, 2010

Day 43 of 365

Books sold so far (as of the end of May 2010, which is my first official month – sales reports in this industry lag big time!): 157

In this issue:

• A new blog format
• Writing topic – The Breakup of the US
• Marketing topic – Amazon.com drops the ebook bomb

 A new blog format

While I created this blog to discuss the adventures of trying to market a book, there’s been some interest in also talking about the writing side of producing a book as well. So, we’re starting a new format here at ND that might just inspire some more interaction. ‘Cause you can’t market something that ain’t been written down, right?

So, for the foreseeable future, the posts will be broken down into two topics – one on writing and one on marketing. As always, comments are always welcome. So let’s jump “write” in with a couple doozies…

Writing topic – The Breakup of the US

Michael S. Rozeff is a retired Professor of Finance living in East Amherst, New York and the author of the free e-book Essays on American Empire. He posted this article on the break up of our national government states, i.e. the states shouldn’t be “united” any longer. Now whether you agree with this or not, as a writer, this idea should immediately sets forth a slew of plot possibilities, setting possibilities, etc.  While this article hits somewhat close to home with my latest novel, The Brink, some other questions that popped to mind are:

1. Could these individual states go to war? Could this spark a war with the other countries that we owe money to, seeing that with no more federal government, there’s no one to pay our massive bills.
2. Fast forward 100 years. Are certain “staters” restricted from passage to other states. What would that mean in terms of character relationships? (the whole Romeo and Juliet thing)
3. What if it happened and then one person tried to make the USA come together again? What factions would want to stop him or her?
4. As far as settings go, would an end to the federal govt mean a beginning of total societal chaos? Would it be like the post-apocalyptic world in Cormac McCarthy’s The Road? Or would it be business as usual?

 Thoughts? Opinions? Suggestions? Comments? Let’s bring it people!

 Marketing topic – Amazon.com drops the ebook bomb

A recent Wired magazine article stated that, “Amazon sold 180 e-books for every 100 hardcovers last month and it sold three times as many e-books in the first six months of this year as it did in the first half of 2009.”

Besides the notion that based on that info, I should change the topic of this blog to “ebook” marketing, rather than “book” marketing, what does the notion of ebooks being the wave of the future mean for our book marketing efforts. Should we stop promoting the hardcovers and paperbacks? Should we even do signings in stores anymore? Or should we concentrate all of our marketing efforts for the ebook crowd? Could there be a way to “sign” an ebook? Or maybe make a video intro for an ebook made by the author that readers could watch before reading the ebook?

Tonight’s topics are like Mike Tyson giving you the one two punch and then chomping on your ear for a bit, huh? I told you they’d be doozies.

 Let the comments begin!     

 The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step,

rest easy tonight my friends, but stay hungry tomorrow…  

 

So what does it take for a virtually unknown author to sell books? Get a front row seat as Mark Fadden blogs about his marketing hits and many misses on the way to sell 5,000 copies of his latest thriller, The Brink, in one year.

July 21, 2010

Day 37 of 365

Books sold so far (as of the end of May 2010, which is my first official month – sales reports in this industry lag big time!): 157

In this issue:

• FB ad round-up – let’s look at the numbers  
• More changes to the website and a preview to search engine optimization

 FB ad round-up – let’s look at the numbers

The “economics” ad just a keeps on suckin’. Here’s the FB ad that was targeted at users who like economics:

 Could a novel come true?

A fugitive lawman uncovers the link between a secret society’s plot for financial Armageddon & the FED, based on REAL economic numbers.

 And here are the numbers:

Date	Imp.	Clicks	CTR (%)	Avg. CPC ($)	Avg. CPM ($)	Spent ($)
07/21/2010	1,072	0	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00
07/20/2010	7,011	2	0.03	0.57	0.16	1.14
07/19/2010	684	0	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00
Lifetime	8,767	2	0.02	0.57	0.13	1.14

 I think folks from as far away as Russia (oh yes, according to my godaddy.com site analytics, I’m huge there) could probably smell the stench of failure on this ad. But, it’s staying up until the end of the week, because I said I would keep it going that long, and by Neptune’s trident I am a man of my word!

 Fortunately, my other ad is still going strong. Here’s the ad:

 Electrifying new author

Tired of the same plots & the same characters? Read the intro to this award winning thriller and never see the world the same again.

 And here are the numbers as of 10:45pm tonight:

Date	Imp.	Clicks	CTR (%)	Avg. CPC ($)	Avg. CPM ($)	Spent ($)
07/21/2010	133,158	15	0.01	0.59	0.07	8.90
07/20/2010	87,886	36	0.04	0.56	0.23	20.00
Lifetime	221,044	51	0.02	0.57	0.13	28.90

 51 total in two days with 15 new today. The CTR % (click through rate) dropped off, but that’s to be expected since the same group (people who like books) are seeing it over and over (by the way, there are 560,900 people in that group). I asked the question last night how I can leverage the seeming popularity of this ad. I didn’t have a chance to give it much thought today, but it’s still pinging around inside the old melon.

 

More changes to the website and a preview to search engine optimization

I took the opportunity to look at my godaddy.com site analytics last night and saw something interesting. There was a steep drop in the number of visitors over the last few days. It started around the time I changed up the language on the site to reflect more of my personality, which sounded like fantastic advice coming from my social media Moses David Meerman Scott in his book The New Rules of Marketing and PR. So, to make the sight more fun, I sprinkled the site with what I thought were snarky, smart assed, and what I thought were funny comments here and there. But, when people are looking for at a thriller writer, they don’t want Flopso the Clown. Like I said in last night’s post, they are looking to you to solve their problem. They need a good book. They want a thriller to thrill them. They don’t want a thriller writer trying to be funny.

My website is something that I, like many other people that use primarily websites to broadcast their information, continue to struggle with. There are in the neighborhood of 124 million sites on the Internet and literally billions of web pages. We want to stand out and we stand out by providing great content. But how?

I was thumbing through the July/Aug issue of Inc. magazine today and it was like the editors were reading my mind. There in front of me was a whole pull-out section on website search engine optimization, or “SEO.” How to get your website seen! Drive more traffic to your site! Fantastic. I’ll need some time to really dig into it, so that’s hopefully a topic for tomorrow night. Until then… 

 

The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step,

rest easy tonight my friends, but stay hungry tomorrow…  

The Nightstand Diaries – 1 year, 5,000 books, and an (almost) anything goes approach to marketing a political thriller.

July 13, 2010

Day 29 of 365

Books sold so far (as of the end of May 2010 – sales reports in this industry lag big time!): 157

In this issue:

• Hello, my name’s Mark, and I’m a FB ad-dict
• Changes to the website 
• Double-dip recession – will it make The Brink prophetic?  

Hello, my name’s Mark, and I’m a FB ad-dict

My day started with creating two FB ads. By tonight, I got 6 hits on one (The next James Patterson?) and zero on another. So I took out the dead weight and changed back to my most successful ad so far (Read a thriller anywhere!) and created another one. So, I’ve got three running currently. Here they are:

Chillingly current novel

Preview the year’s most controversial thriller and get a 40% off coupon at your local Borders bookstore good through July 17th.

Read a thriller anywhere!

Get the most controversial thriller of the year delivered to your desktop, laptop or smartphone in seconds for $7.13. eBooks rock!

 The next James Patterson?

“Action & heroism keep readers turning pages.” – ForeWord Review. Uncover the most staggering conspiracy of our time, & get it 28% off.

 The James Patterson ad is targeted at people that like James Patterson, about 360,000 people. The other two are targeted at people who like to read, about 4 million each.

I went on my godaddy.com (my web host company) account and tried to look at the site analytics to see if the facebook people are buying books once they leave my site, but I have yet to find information on that. UUGGHH!  Does anyone know how to get that info?

Anyway, all told, I’m in for about an hour on jacking around with these ads today, which includes creating them as well. Budget is $20/day for each. I promise I’ll let them ride until tomorrow’s post so we can analyze the numbers.

Changes to the website 

I also visited my godaddy.com search engine optimization page last night and today. What a butt whoopin’. 3 hours of slogging through the steps to get the right keywords associated with the site so that search engine “spiders” will recognize them when people search for books. You might say 3 hours seems like a lot for just coming up with keywords, but I’m old and I have to learn what the heck I’m doing before I actually do it.

I also made some changes to the site, mostly the home page to make it more like my personality. I reread some of David Meerman Scott’s The New Rules of Marketing and PR last night and today and he said that you should put some of ‘you’ into your site. So I did. Check it out and let me know what you think.   

Double-dip recession – will it make The Brink prophetic

Take a look at this recent article from Robert Reich about the probability of a double dip recession. If that happens, it will cause the U.S. government to come to the rescue with more bailouts, and that means more deficit spending and more debt.

Without giving too much away, (I already gave a huge hint as to who’s involved in the conspiracy in the book on the front cover) the double-dip resembles the ‘event’ the bad guys in the book use to begin their plan to take over the world. Funny how life resembles art, right?      

The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step,

rest easy tonight my friends, but stay hungry tomorrow…  

 

The Nightstand Diaries – 1 year, 5,000 books, and an (almost) anything goes approach to marketing a political thriller.

July 12, 2010

Day 28 of 365

Books sold so far (as of the end of May 2010 – sales reports in this industry lag big time!): 157

 In this issue:

• Recap on the Lewisville Borders signing
• A new FB ad with a new angle
• Good Morning, Texas!  

 Recap on the Lewisville Borders signing

 First, the numbers:

2 hours (1-3pm) – time spent at the signing

# of books sold – 10

# of stars of the restaurant where I could take my wife for dinner with my profits from the signing – 3, but we went to Twisted Root Burgers instead and saved the rest for running shoes to run off the fat-tastic calories of said meal.

But, here are arguably the most important numbers:

# of bookmarks handed out – 38

# of news outlets that got the following news release after the signing – 4:

 Lewisville is on ‘The Brink’

Lewisville Borders hosts local author for a book signing

 

Stephanee Talley of Lewisville with Mark Fadden

Even though there’s already a copy of Mark Fadden’s latest thriller in his house, Bret Talley had to buy his own copy. “My wife already read it, and has been on me every day, telling me I’ve got to read this book, but she keeps lending it out to other people,” Talley said. “So I came here to buy my own copy.”

As part of his summer DFW book tour, author Mark Fadden stopped by the Lewisville Borders book store on Saturday to talk about and sign copies of The Brink. In it, a fugitive cop and a brilliant beauty must race from Mexico to Washington, D.C. to stop a secret society’s plan for global financial Armageddon. The plot, which relies on real-world economic theories and financial numbers, took Fadden over a year to research before he started the rough draft. “I wrote the book a few years ago after I began listening to economic experts telling us how dire our country’s financial condition is. It’s truly frightening how some of the aspects of the book are actually coming true as the condition of the world’s economy gets worse.”               

The Brink, which is Fadden’s third published novel, is not only enjoying stellar reviews from critics and readers alike, the book has won two awards from its publisher and Fadden has been called a “masterful storyteller,” by a Writer’s Digest reviewer.

 “The signing went really well,” said General Manager Marion Orso. “Mark sold several copies and brought in a lot of traffic.” During the Lewisville Borders visit, Fadden talked with several customers about the writing process. He also got many questions about what he’s doing to market the book, a subject that he covers in his blog The Nightstand Diaries, which can be read at www.markfadden.wordpress.com. “While getting a book published is an enormous achievement, it is only when our books become part of our readers’ lives, when they enjoy them during their commute or read them as part of their ‘me’ time ritual before going to bed, that we as writers have truly reached our goals.”

The Lewisville Borders staff already invited Fadden back during the month of October, when people begin shopping for Christmas. Fadden has several more stops throughout DFW on his book tour, including The Book Carriage in Roanoke and the uptown Dallas Borders store. Readers can log onto www.markfadden.com for tour dates and to preview Mark’s books.  

And let me share a little nugget here. A few years back, I attended an evening with James Patterson at Bass Performance Hall in Fort Worth. One of the stories he told is about one of the first signings he ever did at the World Trade Center. He was sitting behind a table in the middle of the busy hallway with books stacked around him, and not one person stopped. And speaking of zero sales, my mother clipped an article for me about book marketing. Leon Hale, a long time writer for the Houston Chronicle recently shared this memory of signing of similar success:  “I appeared for a book signing and two people came, and one of those was the publisher’s rep. And the other one didn’t buy a book.” Hale’s blog is at www.blogs.chron.com/leonhale.

I see signings as a way to reach people with more information through 2 ways: one, through news releases and two, periodically wandering through the store and handing out as many bookmarks as you can during the event. Not only can you get coverage from local papers and PR wire services alike before the event, the real money shot comes after. A signing gives you a chance for a photo op with a fan and a quote from the book store manager, which is PR gold. Plus, I updated my FB wall with the news release and had one person buy an ebook from that and it reminded a friend of mine to buy a couple of books as well. The news release is my favorite marketing piece because it works on so many levels.  

All told, I spent around 8 hours on the Lewisville signing, which is broken down as follows:

• Scheduling the event (time on the phone)
• Creating the news releases (pre and post event)
• Creating and getting in-store posters printed
• Contacting local news outlets and sending them the releases
• Taking the posters to the store and meeting the staff before the event
• The book signing itself

 Just remember. The signing isn’t just about the signing. It’s another way to get your name out there in media-world.

 

A new FB ad with a new angle

As July is my Facebook ad month, I ran an ad for the Lewisville signing. And while 62 people clicked on it, not one who was there mentioned anything about the ad. I might try one more for the Borders signing I’m doing in Allen, Texas on July 30, but if that doesn’t hit, then ads for signings are done.

I also changed the “US const. article found!” ad, which went nowhere fast, with the following one:

read a 5-star thriller!

 

Get Mark Fadden’s latest, a 5-star customer reviewed thriller, in eBook for $9 or get a signed copy at markfadden.com.

 It’s still being reviewed, but it should get some significant #s by tomorrow.

 

Good Morning, Texas!

 A little birdie told me that she and her business partner got on Good Morning, Texas, a TV show on our local ABC affiliate. The birdie’s name is Alicia Segal and their business is called Simply Done Gifts. Anyway, here’s the email I sent to the GMT contact (for the sake of brevity and your eyeballs, news releases are not included, you’ve already read them in previous blogs):

 I’m a local author (Colleyville resident) who is currently in the midst of a book tour in the DFW area. Alicia Segal of Simply Done Gifts has been on your show and gave me your email as the person to contact about coming on Good Morning Texas.

 My latest political thriller, The Brink (published in May 2010), follows a fugitive Texas Ranger as he helps a brilliant beauty race from Mexico to Washington, D.C. to stop a secret society’s plan for global financial Armageddon. While I began the novel over three years ago, including completing a year’s worth of research into economic theories and real-world financial numbers that I use to make The Brink more realistic, the financial firestorm that continues to sweep across the planet dovetails almost directly with the plot. Chillingly current to say the least.

I have a signing coming up on Friday, August 13^th from 5-7pm at the Dallas Uptown Borders store and I thought an appearance on GMT that morning would be perfect way to promote it. To get a better feel for an angle you might use in a segment, I’ve included a few recent news items below:

1. The press release for the Uptown Borders signing.
2. The latest news release from a signing I did on Saturday at the Lewisville Borders bookstore.
3. An article about me winning Saks Fifth Avenue’s “Father’s Day Honors” Award in 360 West magazine.

 I’d love to visit with you about a possible appearance on the show. You can check out more about me and even preview the first 22 pages of The Brink at www.markfadden.com. Please let me know if I can provide you with any more information.

 Thanks so much for your time. I look forward to hearing from you.

 Best,

 Mark

 The email took me about an hour to put together, so not much time for what could potentially be a huge ROI. It would be awesome to get on TV. I just hope I don’t puke on the set from nerves…

The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step,

rest easy tonight my friends, but stay hungry tomorrow…  

 

The Nightstand Diaries – 1 year, 5,000 books, and an (almost) anything goes approach to marketing a political thriller.

July 9, 2010

It’s named “The Nightstand Diaries” because in terms of publishing a book, it doesn’t mean squat that we’re published. It doesn’t mean squat that our book is on a bookstore shelf. It’s only when someone takes our book home and reads it – as a way to relax on a lounge chair, pass time on a subway, or as the last mental exercise before putting it on the nightstand and going to bed – that we become a part of our readers’ lives. With this notion in mind, I invite you to come along as I try to do that very thing. My goal is to sell 5,000 copies of my new novel The Brink over the next year using mostly social media with a limited marketing budget. And this is an interactive blog, so if you have good marketing ideas, or want to critique mine whenever I do something stupid, let’s hear it! So, without further ado, let the book marketing madness continue…

Day 25 of 365

In this issue:

• Today’s FB numbers
• Reminding folks about tomorrow’s signing
• Giving blood and feeling woosy

 

Today’s FB numbers

 Numbers didn’t budge since yesterday. The ad “US Const. Article Found” didn’t “click” with people. And I haven’t had a click on the Lewisville Borders signing since I changed the ad pic from the cover shot to my ugly mug pic. I changed it back and am letting it ride until tomorrow afternoon.

 If you’re in the Lewisville, Texas area tomorrow between 1pm and 3pm, come give us a kiss.

 Reminding folks about tomorrow’s signing

 I spent about 30 minutes today reminding my FB friends who live in the area as well as the folks I sent invites to (the library staff, area media contacts) about the signing tomorrow. One of the library staff folks mentioned that their mystery book club will be doing The Brink in September and they bought 6 copies for those folks. DON’T FORGET about the book clubs in your area. They can help BIG TIME to spread the word about your book!

 Giving blood and feeling woosy

I gave blood today and then had a few cocktails to kick off the weekend. Not the best deicison, but a fun one. Salud!

The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step,

rest easy tonight my friends, but stay hungry tomorrow…  

 

The Nightstand Diaries – 1 year, 5,000 books, and an (almost) anything goes approach to marketing a political thriller.

July 8, 2010

It’s named “The Nightstand Diaries” because in terms of publishing a book, it doesn’t mean squat that we’re published. It doesn’t mean squat that our book is on a bookstore shelf. It’s only when someone takes our book home and reads it – as a way to relax on a lounge chair, pass time on a subway, or as the last mental exercise before putting it on the nightstand and going to bed – that we become a part of our readers’ lives. With this notion in mind, I invite you to come along as I try to do that very thing. My goal is to sell 5,000 copies of my new novel The Brink over the next year using mostly social media with a limited marketing budget. And this is an interactive blog, so if you have good marketing ideas, or want to critique mine whenever I do something stupid, let’s hear it! So, without further ado, let the book marketing madness continue…

Day 25 of 365

In this issue:

• More Facebook campaign changes  
• How important is book cover design?
• Make your book current – The looming banking crisis, round 2

More Facebook campaign changes

If the number of folks that have clicked on my FB ad about the Lewisville, Texas Borders signing this Saturday actually show up, we’ll sell out of books and I just might go 2 for 2 as far as having the most successful signings at 2 different Borders stores! Here’s the running total:

Campaign	Daily Budget	Clicks	Impressions	CTR%	Avg. CPC	Spent
Lewisville Signing	$20	40	155,632	0.03%	$0.62	$24.83
US Const Article Found	$40	1	22,505	0.00%	$0.72	$0.72

Lewisville Signing – I got 29 out of the 40 clicks today, so I decided to change my budget for tomorrow to $40 (since it’s the last day). I also changed the pic on the ad to my mug shot from the book cover.  The copy is the same:

Preview

Lewisville Borders Book Signing

 

Like thrillers? Need a unique gift? Visit Lewisville Borders Saturday, July 10, 1-3pm and get the year’s best thriller signed!

 The other ad was a complete DOG!  A reminder of what it looked like:

 

 I got 1 stinkin’ click out of 22,505 impressions!  That sucks! So I changed it to this:

 Preview

US Const. article found!

 

Join a fugitive cop as he discovers the unthinkable link between a lost Constitution article and a plan for global financial Armageddon

  I stayed with the “reading” target group and when they click on the ad, they will go to my site, but they are not taken to the home page. Rather, I’m taking them straight to the preview page where they can hopefully get immersed in the story right off the bat and then click on one of the store links at the bottom of the page to purchase the book.

 How important is book cover design?

 Tonight I must again reference the “Pimp My Novel” blog. Eric asks a great question in his blog today: Just how important is the book cover? As a publishing industry insider, he comments on everything from size of the cover to the artwork affecting how it will get show on store bookshelves. I, for one, think people can, and do judge books by their covers. Covers need to show a lot about the book, but not give away the kitchen sink. For The Brink, I wanted to show that, at its essence, it’s a story of two people running for their lives. So I’ve got the man and woman running in the center of the book. Pull back from that, and you see the shot of the Federal Reserve building in Washington, D.C. looking ominous in the shadows. There’s a reason for that, but you know why I can’t tell you. Then, if you look hard enough, you can barely make out the script from the U.S. Constitution. That’s there because the book starts off with a secret article of the Constitution being found, and almost stolen. Finally, the gold and silver colors of the lettering were used for a reason, those colors mean something to the plot. I was very pleased with the design folks at iUniverse. I emailed them what I wanted the cover to look like with all these elements, and they hit it out of the park.

 My advice is to spend A LOT of time thinking about your cover…draw it out in pencil on a piece of paper, then put it away for a few days, let the image marinate in your mind.  Come back to it, make corrections, then show it to some friends you trust will give their HONEST opinion. Show it to your agent, editor, and maybe even take it to your local bookstore for a “man on the street” survey. Like Eric the novel pimp says, the cover’s gotta pop!

 Make your book current – The looming banking crisis, round 2

 Before I started writing The Brink, I noticed that novels that sold well took advantage of current events. Case in point, one analyst said that one of the reasons The Da Vinci Code sold so well is that it came out just as the stories about the Catholic priest abusing children started breaking. The Hunt for Red October did so well because it came out during the height of the Cold War, and when asked, then President Ronald Reagan said it was the book that he got under his Christmas tree that year. (Talk about right timing!)

 I’ve always been interested/horrified at our country’s financial leadership, or lack thereof. I thought that one of the ways I could make people take notice of just how bad our debt situation is, was to write a thriller about it. I mean, how many people would read an economist’s 400 page thesis on the Ticking Global Financial Time Bomb? But, how many people would want to read a thriller about two people running for their lives as they try to uncover a global financial conspiracy? I’d take door #2 as well.

 If you want to follow the looming disaster that is our current international financial system, a great blog I found is The Baseline Scenario. The blog’s authors also wrote a book entitled 13 Bankers. I’ve yet to read it, but it’s on my list and will hopefully be on my nightstand soon…     

 The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step,

rest easy tonight my friends, but stay hungry tomorrow…