On The Business of Selling Books

You’ve heard me say that books sell through sweat equity…

The advent of print-on-demand book services has exploded, resulting in an oversaturation of books in today’s book market. There are, quite literally, more books being printed than are being read. The hard reality about selling books is that new titles have less than a 1% chance of being stocked by a bookstore. For every new title that’s published, there are anywhere from one hundred to one thousand other titles competing for that same shelf space.

It has never been more important than now for authors to effectively self-promote their work. Books printed by those authors who don’t or won’t tirelessly self-promote their work are destined for obscurity. Although book distributors can open the doors of opportunity, even with their support, the onus remains upon authors and publishers to capitalize on those opportunities. This means that every author and publisher must have a detailed and comprehensive book-marketing plan.

Allow me to use a real life example of someone who is the gold standard for an author taking charge of their career and being intensely proactive. Nobody knows the business of what it takes to sell books better than John Yamrus, whose most recent books Doing Cartwheels on Doomsday Afternoon and Can’t Stop Now (both printed by PageMaster) are presently available in the PageMaster bookstore as a discounted bundle package.

John Yamrus has been publishing books for a long time. In fact, since 1970, in addition to having work published in hundreds of magazines, John has published eighteen volumes of poetry, two novels, and countless broadsides. Additionally, John’s work has been studied at both the high school and university levels. When asked what advice he could give young authors about being successful, John replied “Do something every day. Write something. Submit something. Edit something. It doesn’t matter what—but DO something every day. Make it a part of your life and sooner or later, things will add up and you’ll get to your goal.”

These words are a business plan that John puts into practice each and every day. John is always submitting new work for publication in magazines, sending his books out for independent review, appearing on radio and television programs to promote his work, recording new videos to be posted on YouTube, agreeing to countless interviews—and when something new comes along, you can bet that if John sees value, he’ll be the first one to throw his hat into the ring. John is a workhorse when it comes to promoting his work and promoting those who invest their time, energy and money to help him achieve his publication goals. When authors ask him (and they often do) “Why do you do it?” John just looks at them like they’re crazy.

outside my window

the neighbor’s
cutting his
grass,

the guy
across the street
is hosing down
his driveway

and there’s a kid
going up and
down the
block,

hanging flyers
on mailboxes.

that’s just
the kind of day it is…

nothing
out of the ordinary.

nothing
memorable.

just like
this
poem.

but, it all still
needs to be
done.

the flyers,

the driveway,

the grass,

and,
most especially,

this poem.

i’m pretty
sure

that’s the
way

it
works.

—from CAN’T STOP NOW!

Listen to John’s most recent radio appearance here and read the review of his newest book here.

John Yamrus exemplifies what tireless promotion means—his work ethic is what it takes to make it in the business of selling books.

In John’s words, “Do something every day.”