How to have a successful Signing Event

Greetings, Fellow Castaways!

I can only apologize for having been absent this past couple of months. Life stuff jumps up and gets in the way, and to tell the truth, my old enemy Depression crept in too, for a while. But these are truly no excuses. I once again apologize for being absent, and ask for your forgiveness.

I have been blessed and honored to be received at several events recently for signing events, enough for me to have a grasp on what makes a successful event. This is for my writer buds, and also for any bookworm who walks into a Barnes & Noble and sees the author table right by the front door to the store with the hopeful face seated behind it.

I do claim some authority on the subject, having seen with my own eyes as well as discussing techniques and results with store managers.

So, for readers, here it is: Writing is mind-wringing, hard work, and that author at the table is really putting themselves out there for their craft. So please do us a solid. Approach that table and at least look at the product. That does a whole lot of good for the self-image of person behind the table, and you may find your next brain-treasure! And that's the simple, one-step reader's method of a successful book signing.


Now, you writers, listen up:

1.) Show up. You're coming to work. Dress like it. Business casual works well. Look like you're educated and professional. Bring promotional material as well. There are exceptions, I'll grant you. If you're at a Farmer's Market or Flea Market, jeans would be okay. But they need to have no holes, and you should be in a button-down shirt or golf shirt in any case. I have signs from Vista Print, yard-sale sized, with my book covers on them, and a collapsible easel from Staples. Cost for a sign and easel, less than fifty dollars. The store might provide you with a table and the books, but you need something to draw attention to yourself besides that little dinky table-top sign the store provides. Bring business cards, bookmarks, and any other swag you want to give away. More on give-aways later.

2.) Sink into your persona. Look, I know most writers are an introverted, shy lot. It comes with the territory of the way our brains work. Almost every single writer I know or have ever met, struggles with social situations. So we need to have barriers in place to be able to interact with the public at large, and at a signing event, baby, you are at large and in charge. So you have a couple of "safeties" to use, to provide a degree of separation between you and .....(gasp) people (gasp) ..... First is your Author persona. Whether you use a pen name or your own name, your "Author" persona is the face you want your fans to see. The Author is out-going, friendly, and engaged. If this is not you normally, then you get to pretend you're someone else for a while. Make your Author self a character. You did it for people who don't even exist. Just extend the same thing to someone who does, at least to the public eye. Use that character. BE that character. You can do it.

3.) Use your other barrier. The other barrier is the table. You're on  one side, your fans are on the other side. Don't make that silly snorting sound and tell me you don't have fans. YOU. HAVE. FANS. People are reading your book, and if they aren't yet, they will be. If you do everything I'm laying out here, you will have made at least one fan before the end of your event. I promise you this. But you need to act like everyone in the store id your fan, whether they know it yet or not. But that table is there to keep you safe, too. It's a symbolic barrier, but it helps to keep you from panicking and running out, if you're of that sort of mind. It gives you room to be the Author, just like a stage gives an actor room to be the Character. It's your stage. Use it like one.

4.) Speaking of give-aways, don't give books. Might as well get that out of the way. You're there to sell books, not give them away.  Post a give-away, and people won't buy your book, but they'll sure as all get out sign up for your give-away. Because people like stuff that's free, and they'll pick free over something they have to pay for, every single time.If you're going to have a contest, make sure it isn't for the book you're currently promoting. Give away your swag bags. Give away bookmarks. Give away little stones with your name on them. Give away your car, for crying out loud. But don't give away your book.

5.) You're at work. Be at work. I've spoken with store managers who say most of their guest authors sit at the table writing, or texting, or Facebooking, or reading. If you do that stuff at your day job, you get fired. Do that at a signing event, and your fans "fire" you by not even approaching the table. Remember what you're there for. Writing is a business, and you need to treat it that way. By all means, have fun. But don't lose track of where you are, and what you're doing. You are there to sell books. You are there as a merchant, as a vendor, as a representative of your art, your craft. You didn't pour all that blood, sweat and tears into your book to let it languish on the shelves and servers of your vendors. You have an awesome gift to give the world, and here is where you have a chance to let the world know how they can come and live in your world for a little while. So, back straight, hands on the table, head up, eyes forward (except unless advancing on to the next step). You're there. BE there.

6.) Engage your fans. This is the next step after "Be at work." People are going to be walking around, browsing other shelves, other tables, doing "customer stuff." Be ready to talk to them. This is the hard part for me. But it's easy once I've assumed my Persona, parked at the table, and set myself for work. The first time is the hardest. Believe it or not, it's good to have some words ready. Have some different things to say, depending on the situation.

Watch people as they pass by. LOOK at them. When they look back, say hello and ask how they're doing. Probably one in four of them will come to the table and ask about your book. Greet EVERYONE who walks by within normal bookstore-voice range. Make sure they know you're there. Most folks aren't even aware of anything around them until they're well past your table. Saying hello is being polite.Asking about their well-being invites a response. In any case, and most importantly, invite a response.

When folks pick up a book at the next table, tell them, "I have your next read right here." Make sure you smile when you say that. Yes, it sounds pushy. But they are looking for a read, and you have one right there. Might as well call a Diamond a Diamond, right?

7.) Be ready for conversation. Luckily enough, folks that want to talk, will want to talk about your writing. And that, my friend, is what you're always ready to talk about. You were excited enough to write the book. Be excited about people getting excited about reading it.

I say, "Be ready," because you're going to get them all. The ones who end up buying, the ones who don't buy but you wish them well anyway, the ones who just want to talk with an author, and the ones who you really don't want to talk to. You know the type. The faux intellectuals who throw ten-thousand dollar words around for the express purpose of impressing you with their vocabulary. Just smile and nod, let them get it off their chest, and eventually they'll move on.

8.) Have fun with it. I know this is Point 8, but it should be noted that this is your Number One Priority. Seriously. If people see you having fun with the event, they will want to have fun with you. Smile a bunch, be energetic, and have fun. Did I mention "Have Fun?" Make it fun, and they will come. And don't worry about numbers. Don't stress about how many you sell, or don't sell. I have it on good authority that most local authors sell six to ten copies at a two-hour signing. I usually do ten to fifteen sales per event.

9.)Check in with the manager before you leave. Build a relationship with the manager and staff, and you won't go wrong. They'll be glad to have you back.

10.) Send the store manager a thank-you email. This is just common courtesy. Within one week after your event, send that email, and mean it. Tell them what an awesome time you had, and leave room for a future return.

There you have it, folks. There are a lot of folks who spout "the rules" and such, and not all of them know a hoot of what they're talking. But I'm telling you, if you follow these ten steps, you'll not only have a great time at your signing, you'll make sales as well as fans, and fans are a writer's best friends.

And we could all use some more friends, right?

Heroes! Part 1

Greetings, fellow Castaways.

First off, if you haven't signed up to follow the blog, feel free to join up! I'll try not to bore you too much.

This week, the concept for discussion is one that comes up once in a while when a reader asks me about my series, and that is the question of what makes a hero. It's a good question, because, after all, every good story has a hero, and they come in all shapes and sizes, from J.R.R. Tolkien's Hobbits to Jonathan Swift's Gulliver, to Robert A. Heinlein's Friday, to the Brave Little Toaster and the Beaudelaire Orphans.

So let's look at how we define the term, with a few examples, and why we see them as heroes, from the strictly obvious point of view of the kid who should have paid more attention in English Class. If anyone of you have any Creative Writing background in College or what have you, feel free to jump into the discussion (plenty of room for comments at the end).

The first and most obvious Hero Type is the Warrior.

 

Here we have a classic example. St. George, our knight in shining armor, rides in to rescue the virgin from the horrible, fire-breathing dragon. Today, our warriors are still seen as heroes, and rightly so.

These photo shows another take on the warrior image of heroism. Though no less heroes than the previous example, these men's faces show the horrible cost incurred on the title. They were Marines on Iwo Jima, one of the bloodiest and hard-fought battles of World War II. But even among this type, there are several sub-types of Hero, from those who signed up willingly, to the draftee just trying to stay alive long enough to get back home. But the significance of the title of Hero is not diminished by circumstances.

I've said once that Heroes are not born as extraordinary people; rather they are ordinary people thrown into extraordinary circumstances, just doing what needs to be done. And I could still say that, to an extent, that holds true.

I was fifteen years old, a member of my local Sheriff's cadet post. The court pulled some strings to get me in, even though I was technically too young. It seems the judge thought I just needed something to keep me busy, something more constructive than the "hobbies" that had me standing in front of him. So take it from me, I was no hero at fifteen. But my story continues:

Part of my involvement was a 40-hour First Aid course that was the most thorough training I'd ever seen, and that included my instructor training in Battlefield Aid in the Air Force (I was my squadron's instructor for three years, but that's a different story).

I was at a family party with my father and brother, standing in the back yard of one of Dad's friends, when a crash and scream came from the house. Out the back door came the young son of the host, running and screaming, holding one arm out in front of him. That arm was a shredded wreck of flesh streaming blood across his lawn (he'd put it through a plate glass window, with predictable results). That first aid training kicked in automatically, and I grabbed him. I was terrified when I saw the damage to his arm, but the part of me that knew what to do overrode the fear. I dragged him back into the house, grabbed a wet dish rag, and clamped it onto the worst of the gashes. Then I raised his arm and with my other hand, I found the artery feeding his arm, pressing it against his bone to shut off the blood flow to the arm.

I saw Mike again several years later, and he showed me the scars. They were worse than I ever imagined. But he thanked me for saving his life. At the time, I swear, that was not on my mind. I was just doing what needed to be done.

That kind of instinct defines the warrior type. They are essentially people of action. And I call it an instinct, even though training is a critical part of the response as well. My younger son is a hero, and I can see it in the way he runs to the crisis.

He was eight years old when the local Homecoming Festival closed at the end of the weekend (they still have the festival, by the way. It wasn't closing, like for good), the owner of the local alligator sanctuary was packing his inventory away for the trip back to the shop. Among the "little friends" Dave had brought with him was a five-foot American Alligator, who was a huge hit with the kids. No, he didn't take anyone's arm off, in fact he was quite docile the whole weekend. Until closing time, when Dave and his assistant tried to stuff that 'gator into a military-style duffle bag for transport.

That 'gator swung his tail around on Dave's assistant's bare back with a smack!  that I swear was heard around the world. The welt rose immediately, like he'd just taken a flogging from a foot-wide bullwhip. My boy, that eight-year-old wonder, ran ten steps to that table before I could stop him, and Dave barely had time to get one hand loose and wave him off with a panicked "NO!!!"

Shannon just can't help it. Someone screams, and he runs to the trouble. I hope he never joins the military, because he's going to find his way to the hottest part of whatever trouble is going on, and that would make a nervous dad. Yes, he's first aid trained. I can feel good with that. But he has a hero's instinct, even from the first days he could walk.

The Warrior heroes in my series are Jon Daniels and Jenna Paine. I count Jenna, because even though she's technically not a "good guy," she still counts a s hero of the Warrior Type, in that she's a person of radical action, from instinct and training.

I think I'm going to continue this discussion in future posts, because to be honest, we're getting into other territory that will take more space than just a quick blog read.

But the Warrior Hero Type is the One Who Comes To The Rescue. Whee-ha.

Talk to you next week when we take on the next type. I may even have a term for him/her.

And Ne'er The Twain Shall Meet

Good day, fellow castaways.

This week I want to expound just a little on something I said in my last post, just to reinforce a point. It occurred as I was writing that post that handing off our responsibility to the needy to a faceless government agency, isolates us not only from our duties, but from our fellow man. There are other factors as well that further isolate us one from another, and I think we can agree that isolation is not good for humans.

Credit: Isolation, by Neriak, posted on Deviantart

It's been said that Humans are communal animals. In this case, I do refer to humans as animals, because even though we are unique among all creatures on the earth, we in our basic definition, are animals as well. Which means certain conditions are so much a part of our nature that we cannot thrive without them. Interaction is one. Placing a prisoner in solitary confinement is considered among the worst punishments that can be inflicted upon a human. In fact, many studies have shown that a person can only be alone for a certain amount of time before their mind breaks, and death follows shortly thereafter. NASA even has numerous experiments on file that prove humans simply cannot survive long periods isolated from others. So at this point, I don't feel any need for posting evidence. You can simply google it and come up with page after page that prove my point. People need people. Period. Even teenagers.



Teens are strange creatures. I still remember when I was one, I sought isolation from my world. I hated being a teen. Hated being the awkward, shy boy who suffered panic attacks at the mere thought of asking a girl out on a date. Hated being bullied by those who sought to better their own social position by making others feel inferior. Hated being singled out  and ridiculed for speaking out of turn or saying the wrong thing, always a day late and a dollar short. So I sought isolation in my books. After all, a good book never judges, is always there for you, takes you away into into world
where you get to be the hero and save the day, instead of the kid in the back of the class that no one understands.

I did have two friends, with whom I hung out as well, and what did we do? We spent our time roaming the woods in Soldier's Memorial Park or out back of Fix Park, riding our bicycles around Pine Lake, and shunning society as a whole.

Anyway, teens are odd critters, who seem to seek isolation in every way they can. They use their cell phones, iPods, and the internet to remove themselves from a cruel society that they create themselves every day in the school halls. A teenager would rather text with their friend down the block than to actually go see them. A teen would rather spend hours on Facebook than spend a minute with a real person, and it shows in the collective society that we've created online in the circus that passes for social media. Unfortunately, those patterns of behavior become habits, and habits follow us as we get older. So we become hermits in our own families, virtual recluses living together, yet alone in our own little worlds.

Credit: Sylvia Hartman, 2010

We say things online that would get us a fist to the face in person, and we get away with it because that other person isn't there to confront us. We have Usernames that further remove us from accountability. We can create personae that aren't even us at all. How many Facebook pages have names like "Stupid Things People Do" or "I Hate Democrats?" There are people behind those pages, and they refuse to be held accountable to anything they say, so they get away with saying stupid, hateful,  and false things that get spread around the world in a mater of minutes. The more outrageous the claim, the faster the poison spreads.

In addition, look at what happens on our highways and streets. People in their cars, removed from direct interaction, tend to drive like idiots, in spite of a common belief on the part of most of us that we're doing just fine, and the other guy is the one who's wrong. Increased incidences of road rage bear this out. We feel free to gesture and yell and make ourselves a brain-dead zombie, because we're in our car and they are in theirs, and ne'er the twain shall meet.

So we have now officially created the most hostile, isolated culture in the world, two feet in front of our faces, and we're so ingrained in our habits that we can't break loose without intervention. We no longer feel the need to be civil with our communication, because we aren't interacting on a personal level anymore. You wonder why the internet is going crazy? Seriously, Sunshine, take a look at yourself.

So where do we go from here? How do we fix this? How can we come together as a united people once again, and do away with these factions, these divisions, this polarized isolation? I'm open to suggestions. Maybe just take an extra moment to consider the possibility that hitting "share" on that hateful rant in the form of a meme is helping or hurting. Maybe exercise the the right of other people to be wrong, and you don't have to correct everyone or everything that doesn't agree with your sensibilities.

To quote that able philosopher and all-around weird guy Floyd (I know, just go with me here), "I mean, good manners don't cost nothin' ya know."

Maybe the best thing we can do is stand up from our computers, put down our phones, and actually place ourselves in personal contact with someone on a regular basis. In a restaurant with friends, stack your phones in the middle of the table. The first person to pick theirs up gets to pick up the whole tab. Quit playing Clash of Clans long enough to share kindness with someone down your street who has a need. Rake their leaves, shovel their walk. Breathe fresh air.

We can do this, people. Make kindness a priority, and maybe we can all start getting along again.