|
Sell
more books by giving them away!
"It may seem slightly insane,” write Arielle Eckstut and
David Henry Sterry in their new book Putting Your Passion
into Print, “but giving away books can be a very, very
good thing."
You want your books to fall
into the hands of the right audience, a group that may
include the
author's colleagues, professional reviewers,
academic adopters, college and independent
booksellers, rights buyers, librarians, newspapers,
magazines, radio stations, book groups, movie agents,
directors, producers, actors, websites, and anyone else on
your in-house list who you feel may be interested in the
book's topic.
Peter Workman, the publisher of the above-mentioned book,
has this rule: "For every one book you give away, you sell
three."
When your book
is a PRODiGYtm, anything is possible!
Sounds way too expensive and unrealistic? Then try
PRODiGY (Publishers
Row
Online
Digital
Galley) – our new pre-publication book marketing service that utilizes
controlled-access digital galleys prepared in our
proprietary, secure, server-based Searchable Image Format.
Once your book becomes a
PRODiGY, you acquire many more ways of reaching the people
described above; you can use
PRODiGY now in your email, press-releases, or on websites
(including MySpace, FaceBook, Yahoo, etc.)
You can deliver now your
book either by inserting a link in your e-mail or adding it
to your and other people's websites.
Once you use it, you’ll agree that using PRODiGY to give
away your books is the only thing that makes sense.
Judge for yourself:
-
The cost is minimal and fixed, even if you give books to
tens of thousands of people.
-
Unlike with printed galleys, using PRODiGY's Control
Panel, you know exactly how many people opened your
book, how often, which pages, for how long, and other
useful statistics.
-
You can tailor the level of access to
your book's content and audience; i.e. if you are
marketing a book of recipes, you may wish to leave pages
containing recipes hidden, while letting the reader see
everything else.
-
With PRODiGY's "Rate this Title" feature, your readers
can give you instant feedback, valuable endorsements,
and blurbs to use in future promotions.
-
Those of your readers who are interested in
purchasing your book can add it to their Wish List.
-
PRODiGY's
digital galleys are time-limited, so regardless of how many
copies you give away, they will never show up on
Amazon to undermine your new book sales.
-
Your digital galley
readers may be interested enough in your book to
go to their local bookstores and place the order
for a printed copy. What a way to start creating that
all-important "buzz" needed to make a title
successful!"
Follow the
leaders
Read what Hai Tsabar, Director of Hebrew University Magnes Press, has to say about his experience with
PRODiGY:
Two weeks ago, one of the authors of our new text book Game
Theory (introduced by the 2005 Nobel Prize winner,
Prof. Robert Aumann) asked
me
to send a copy of an uncorrected proof to
another professor for review.
I used our office printer to print all 600 pages of this book
and placed it my briefcase to deliver it personally two days
later.
Meanwhile, I decided to e-mail the professor a letter
containing a link to the online edition of the book with the
request to comment and pass the message on to others in this
esoteric field.
The letter contained a special offer code, which allowed him
unrestricted reading of this title for 30 days (with the
ability to copy and print unblocked).
As of today, June 13 (2006) we had 53 newly registered
readers who opened the title and read a combined total of
545 pages.
Using Publishers Row's built-in “Rate this Title”
functionality, 16 readers left their comments, with 2
important professors submitting their endorsements.
The whole thing was more than reasonable and prepared in a day.
We are in the process of evaluating the results, but my feeling
is this new service points the way to a truly revolutionary
approach to scholarly book publishing.
The New York Times in its article "Digital
Publishing Is Scrambling the Industry's Rules" (June
7, 2006) gives another example of digital galleys
use:
"For unknown authors struggling to capture the attention of
busy readers, however, the Web offers an unprecedented way
to catapult out of obscurity. Glenn Greenwald, a lawyer who
started a political blog, "Unclaimed Territory," just eight
months ago, was recruited by a foundation financed by
Working Assets, a credit card issuer and telecommunications
company, to write a book this spring.
Mr. Greenwald promoted the result, called "How Would a
Patriot Act? Defending American Values From a President Run
Amok," on his own blog and his publisher e-mailed digital
galleys to seven other influential bloggers, who helped
to send it to the No. 1 spot on Amazon.com before it was
even published.
The book went on to hit No. 11 on the New York Times
Paperback Nonfiction Best Seller list."
As you see,
digital publishing has worked for countless publishers, but
at this point, we know the only question you have is whether
it will work for you.
Try your first
book
FREE
yourself with
PRODiGY Express
Click
here
to register and upload your books metadata and PDF files.
Within minutes, you'll receive for your approval ready to
use online edition of your book.
Use it for up to 30 days to promote your book.
The price of full-service
PRODiGY is $299 and includes basic file-preparation service
and a year of hosting (annual renewal fee is $54).
Bound
galleys
By the way, if you still need bound
printed galleys, we can do them for only
$0.03 cents per page (plus S&H $0.04, if larger then 6 x 9
trim). There is no special setup fee or minimum order
requirements; allow two weeks for fulfillment.
|
