PUBLIC SAFETY WRITERS ASSOCIATION NEWSLETTER
VOLUME IX SPECIAL SUMMER ISSUE
Editor: Marilyn Meredith, mmeredith@ocsnet.net
This is your newsletter, please contribute articles, your news, book reviews, or anything else you think might be of interest.
IN THIS ISSUE:
MESSAGE FROM THE PRESIDENT
MESSAGE FROM THE EDITOR
RESEARCHING FORENSICS
PROMOTION TIPS FROM PSWA MEMBERS
MESSAGE FROM THE PRESIDENT
Thanks to all of you who have been actively participating in our list serve. In the past few weeks we've all enjoyed lively and very informative discussions about marketing, a topic near and dear to the heart of all published or soon to be published writers.
Most recently, a query from a mystery writer started another most interesting discussion about forensic science. As all mystery writers know, there is a whole lot of misinformation out there (particularly on television in the movies) about police procedures, what those who are involved in crime scene investigation really do and what actually happens in a crime lab.
While the movie and TV folks seem to get by with just about anything in this area, no matter how outrageous or incorrect, we writers know that when it comes mystery readers, they are a picky lot. If we get even the smallest detail wrong, they really let us know about it.
Fortunately for we PSWA members, our organization is filled with real experts in the areas at the heart of most mysteries - real or fictional. Because the information exchanged on the list serve has been so helpful, we're printing it out in a special edition of the newsletter. Hopefully, you will find it not only useful, but will keep the discussion going with your queries. If you are an expert in this field, we hope you will also help your fellow writers in their effort to get what the famous TV detective Joe Friday always wanted, "Just the facts, ma'am."
-- Marilyn Olsen
MESSAGE FROM THE EDITOR
As Marilyn Olsen pointed out his particular newsletter is a compilation of things about promotion and forensics that appeared on the policewriter@yahoogroups.com If you aren’t signed up for this list, you’re really missing out.
Of course I’m also going to talk about the conference because it’s going to be so great. For the first time we have a three-tiered rate schedule. For members, if you register before September 30 of this year, the cost is a mere $200. There’s another step before March 30 of 2009. Go to the registration page for the conference for details.
Besides having some great speakers—check them out here—any registered attendee who would like to be on a panel can be. A panel topic may be suggested or I am looking for law enforcement officers who’d particularly like to talk about what they don’t like to see on TV crime shows, movies and in books.
I’d also be interested in a firearms expert—or anyone who’d like to talk about same.
There is no other conference that is as friendly or fun as this one. Don’t miss out!
RESEARCHING FORENSICS
We’ll be having two forensic experts at our conference, Steve Scarborough (read about him on the website) and Sheila Lowe, a forensic handwriting expert. We had some forensic questions asked on the list and here is some of the research tips that were shared:
This is the question that was asked:
Would there be flies on a body that's been dead for three weeks? The body is locked in a Quonset hut, windows painted shut and the hut undisturbed the whole time except for the opening of a door long enough to deposit a trussed-up man three weeks after the dead body was killed there.
Our own Tim Dees offered this answer:
In response to your question - yes there would be flies, of several varieties, and there would be a lot of them. Flies lay their eggs in the decomposing flesh, and the emerging maggots consume the flesh until they become flies themselves. Maggots are actually good things to have around
sometimes, as they eat only dead flesh, and leave healthy tissue alone.
There have been several cases where people suffered open wounds far from medical care, and maggots that took up residence in the wound consumed the dead tissue and prevented gangrene. They are occasionally used in hospital settings to débride infected wounds so that the surgeons can try and fix what's left.
As the body decomposed further, other insects would come to the party. The stage of decomp and what varieties of fauna were present allow a forensic entomologist to set an approximate time-or as the process continued, date--of death.
Long before "The Body Farm" in Tennessee, the California State University system maintained the Moss Landing Marine Lab (known to us biology types as 'ML-squared") on the coast between Salinas and Santa Cruz. One of the facilities there was a yard where chordate marine animals were brought to be fed on my insects and have the corpses reduced to clean skeletons. It was generally a good idea not to spend a lot of time downwind of there.
There's a basic but accurate (so far as I know) guide to forensic entomology
at http://www.forensicentomology.com/index.html.
A really good book with lots of forensics is Crime Scene by Larry Ragle, available through Amazon. I keep it in my bookcase as a reference. --Phil Bulone
Another good resource along this line is a book by journalist Mary Roach called Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers. Believe me, it'll tell you just about anything you may want to know about dead bodies through the ages. It also has an excellent bibliography in the back of the book, should you choose to continue your research on this subject. I do not recommend it, however, as desirable reading material while you are eating rice, or perhaps anything else. Although, on the other hand, it may be a conversation starter for you if you are observed reading it in a public place.--Marilyn Olsen
None better or more comprehensive, I think, than The Crime Scene: How Forensic Science Works by W. Mark Dale and Wendy Becker (Dec. 2007, Kaplan Publishing, $19.95).
--Bob Knightly
Also, you can ask any of those questions and others like how could you poison someone and make it look like a heart attack, or the one I asked, if a person was shot and then immediately transported by horse and dumped within an hour, what would the body look like, go to http://www.doctorlyle.com
Ask away and he’ll give you a comprehensive answer.—Marilyn Meredith
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PROMOTION TIPS FROM PSWA MEMBERS
One thing I've noticed in the e-mails on this list, is that some of the members who have web-pages do not have a signature line at the bottom of the e-mail. Why not??? Its good, free promo that reaches everyone the e-mail is sent to, whether you know them or not. Free advertising! Check out mine at the bottom of this e-mail.
Even if you don't have your own web page, put down the url of the publisher who handles your books, specifically your author info at that site.
In discussions of promotions at the 2007 conference, I mentioned a website called Link Referral, where you register your site, then all you have to do is, maybe once a week, spend about a half hour reviewing other web sites- there is a 5 site limit per day. In return, those sites will reciprocate and review yours. Good exposure!
Just register your site in the entertainment-literature category. There are links that you can look at to find out exactly how it works - Oh- did I mention it is FREE???
The url is http://www.linkreferral.com
The more often you review, the higher your website will be on the list.
John Schembra www.jschembra.com, www.myspace.com/jschembra
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I've been listening to all the chatter about marketing our books. Few of us are good at it and few of us over 40 even know what we need to do in today's marketing environment.
So I took a course a few days ago on Marketing in the Arts, or some such name. They gave me a complete outline on what I should be doing in 2008. Basic, intermediate and advanced. It was a real technological wake-up call, like Tim Dees gave me back in 1990.
So here is YOUR wake-up call.
Go to http://www.dev.adcstudio.com/larac/ and you can download the entire outline in either a pdf or Word format. If y'all don't know what that means, y'all are really a dinosaur. Ask an 11 year old to help you.
Best wishes to all of you for the successful publication and promotion of your writings. –Roger Fulton, Founding Father of PSWA : http://www.RogerFulton.com
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I found that starting a blog on WordPress and doing my Internet radio shows have helped a lot in getting my name out. I've also slowed way down on doing signings at chain stores. I now focus on doing presentations at libraries, museums, etc.—Denny Griffin http://www.dennisngriffin.com
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When I was marketing the book I did on the history of the Indiana State Police, I also found that service clubs were a good market, particularly the ones like Rotary, Lions Clubs and so on that meet frequently and are always looking for a speaker. As most of these groups are business people, they have the money to spend and I found that often someone in the audience would then give me a lead to yet another group.
Another great outlet for selling books is retirement communities. They nearly all have an activities director who is always looking for programs and if you concentrate on the more upscale communities you can count on an audience of readers with money to spend.
Another good audience for me was police organizations, particularly those that had retirement parties. They often would allow me to tell a few stories from my book since it was a subject with which they were familiar and they always let me set up a table in the back of the room to sell books.
I agree about chain bookstores. Whereas they used to have public relations folks who would help you with your signings, do some publicity for you and so on, basically now they expect you to do all that and then take a big percentage from your sales.
--Marilyn Olsen
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Personally, I have a book through Publish America I do nothing with and sell only a very few. I have three through a small publisher who uses a POD printer. What I and others do here in Las Vegas is we conduct short seminars titled "So you want to write a book."
We take the aspiring author through all of the errors we made so they do not have to. Free classes to save them money and enlighten them. We do not try to sell books at these but do advertise and hand out free bookmarks and business cards. We have not done it but we are thinking of having a drawing for a free book (one of ours) to stimulate attendance.
We also do the book fairs and group signings. I keep saying 'we' because we have a group we call Wednesday Warriors because we meet as friends who read and write, drink coffee and tell lies. We help each other with ideas and solutions. Because of this group we have received some publicity, not as much as we would like but it was free. Free is good.
We operate a web site, free thru the local newspaper.
The last two items we got started through a back door. We paid too much for a booth at a craft fair, but we did get some exposure. We noticed in the local paper they always did articles about the nationally known authors. We drafted some letters addressed to the paper in essence saying we see the noted authors but what about the local ones. Then we extolled the virtues of some of the work local authors did and said we saw them at the craft fair. We suggested they consider articles about the local authors. Naturally we could not sign them ourselves so we had friends and neighbors do that and sent them in. Today we have a section of the Review Journal that is mailed free to everyone in the valley which has an article called Literary Las Vegas. So far over fifty local authors have received free publicity.
Being mostly self published, I cannot afford the time to personally handle, nor am I set up to handle, mail orders thru the internet. I made a suggestion to a local author who is. Create a business called Local Authors Marketing Online Option (LAMOO), (To the wordsmith that is MOOLA spelled differently). Lamoo handles all my internet sales orders. Incidentally, He now handles eleven different local authors. So every time someone is interested in one of their books and goes to www.LAMOOBooks.com they also see mine. I don't know if he has the idea copyrighted or not but if you were interested in getting some additional info to start your own LAMOO feel free to contact Gregory Kompes at www.gregory@kompes.com
Hopes this helps some others. If you want a topics list of what we present at our seminars, contact me.
One thingI failed to mention is my shirts. I go to a sale and buy a golf style shirt, usually $12. Then I go to an embroidery store, here it’s Embroidme and with my signature and a listing of my books they will embroider that onto the shirt. Usually $10 plus $5 set up fee (One time). I wear these shirts at all public functions involving writing. It stimulates many people to walk up to me and say "What is XXX about?" For about $25 I become a walking ad.
--Jack Miller, old investigator, new author
www.retafsa.com
To purchase any of Jack's books at a discount contact YAHOO site
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I did something similar. I bought a T-shirt and had the local print shop put my book cover on it. I made a matching book bag as well. It's a conversation starter. And, it wasn't very expensive.
Marilyn M. and I both have book cover pins with little dangling icons. Mine are grapes, a hypodermic needle, and the sun. It's all part of my book (and my name).
Thinking outside the Crackerjacks box. Finding the prize inside.
Sunny Frazier http://www.sunnyfrazier.com/ http://sunnyfrazier.com/MurderCircle/
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This is one of my favorite topics! And I am always looking for new ideas, wanting to see what other authors and publishers are doing to promote titles. Frankly, over the 10 years I have been publishing books, I have gotten more terrific ideas from authors than from publishers. And I think too, that the magic kernel that makes a certain book sell jillions is something still not identified, and it certainly isn't always money. There are all sorts of examples where big house books have had big promo budgets and a title ends up remaindered withing 2-3 weeks of its release. Plus there are examples of the reverse, books with little to no promo budget that sell big.
To be honest, one of the things I consider strongly when choosing a new title is: where does the author stand on promotion? If I don't get a sense of this through the query and other communication, I usually send out my "Marketing Development Questionnaire" for the author to complete. It is a pretty good way to get an overview and explore possibilities for the title/author vis-a-vis promotion, and also tells me whether or not the author will be an active promoter. More honesty: I really try hard to eliminate authors who I think will NOT be happy promoters.
IMHO, one of the best things for an author to do with a new book is to have a launch party. Several Oak Tree books have "come out" to elaborate fan fare. While waiting for their books to come out, authors, I think, are well-advised to begin thinking about launch party possibilities and who you know who might help bring them to fruition. Over the years, OTP has had some dandy launches. Paulette Crain's memoir of a life in New Orleans was held in the Garden District home of a friend of hers. This manse, stunning on it own merits, also had the distinction of being rescued and renovated by Anne Rice. We set the date and spread the word, and people came from all over. I sat in the foyer with stacks of the book, and Paulette signed them at the rear of the drawing room. It was pretty obvious that the book was the price of admission, but I heard no complaints.
Similarly, Patricia Sheehy, who lives in Conn. hosts an evening featuring her new book and
her husband's paintings at an historic inn which attracts a big crowd. Jim Sheehy is an accomplished artist with his own following, and we have used his art for the covers of Patricia's novels. So, she has two interest groups to draw into her book party. She starts promoting her launch party as soon as we decide on a production schedule.
Not everyone has these sorts of options, however, but that still should not rule out a party. Your club, your library, your family reunion, whatever. And while it is great to have a really successful launch party, a modest one still offers you a lot: a definite start point, which is a real plus, and an event to point to in other promo/advertising materials.
Contests are great too. Even the ones that are just a "beauty contest" are an option for getting your title information out there. For the contests sponsored by OTP, we usually put the winner information on the cover, and also put it in all the sales materials. And don't overlook the possibilities brought on by being named with the "also rans".
Another launch-point I like to utilize where possible is the attachment to another event. For example, at the PSWA conference in April, I brought three new titles. Monti Sikes, a speaker at the conference, was one of the authors involved and another was long-term PSWA member Robert Cohen. So, this detail gets worked into their media kit and other information. And yes, I'm already planning for the 2009 conference!
Speaking of media kits, you gotta have one. I agree with Marilyn that I send out very few hard-copy, snail mail packages these days, but I do create a digital media kit that can be forwarded to an interested party in a blink. As Marilyn says, it's also great to have business cards, post cards and other handouts which promote the title. Another item is what the trade calls a SELL SHEET. This is essentially a flyer, usually with a pic of the bookcover, maybe an author pic, a descriptive blurb, maybe an excerpted review or two and the how-to-buy contact information. These are also great to use when calling on shops and so on, as all the pertinent information is in one place.
A lot of traditional advertising IMHO does not work for books, for example, print ads. Perhaps when an author has the stature of Tom Clancy or Stephen King, then these are worth it, but for emerging writers, I think not. Over the years, I have taken a number of print ads, and have never been able to see any jump in sales. Sometimes I do print ads in conference brochures and book-trade publications, but it will promote the contests or the conference rather than a specific title.
I've just begun to get in the video mix, and I now have my maiden effort (a collection of the Dark Oak Mystery covers) up on YouTube.com. It's really a kick to do, to see, but has it impacted sales? I don't know. What is everyone else doing on this? Are you using videos and if yes, do you think it has promoted sales?
Billie Johnson, Publisher
Oak Tree Press
www.oaktreebooks.com
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Going to small conferences like PSWA because you really get to know the people who come.
I have a monthly newsletter which I sent out to about 500 people who’ve signed up to receive it. Mostly it’s about what I’ve been doing, writing and otherwise, and I always tell where I’m going to be promoting the following month.
A big thing everyone says is that you need to keep your name out there. It should be recognizable.
One thing I’ve done with my latest books is a virtual book tour—that’s where over a period of time you visit different blogs to promote your book. Though you could set this up yourself by visiting blog owners and asking them, I hired Pump Up Your Book Promotions with Dorothy Thompson. Each time I did one, I noticed the Amazon numbers on the book went way down. (Which is a good thing, in case you don’t know how those numbers work.)
Because of gas prices and the fact many of them will no longer allow small press authors to be on panels, I've been cutting down on the big mystery cons and doing other things. This year I'm doing and have done several book fairs, craft fairs and flea markets. I always sell books at these things.
On another list, someone detailed how they made a press kit. I used to use those press kits a lot, now except for my local newspaper and radio station, I no longer do them.
Though I still have postcards and book marks to hand out at various functions, my business card with whatever book I'm promoting and the necessary information on it, works best for me.
http://www.vistaprint.com is the best place for any of the above. They have deals at different times.
I always do book launches too and I've done them in various places:
The Springville Inn--our posh watering hole (the only one at the moment)--I gave a couple of talks and served refreshments and sold books.
A bookstore in town--no longer there.
A recreation center--no longer there.
A gift store--no longer there.
(What can I say, it's a tiny town and businesses come and go.)
Coffee shop--was the only place at the time, it's tiny, so had the launch outside on the patio.
Springville's Visitor Center, done it there twice.
For all of them I've served refreshments--usually cookies and coffee or if it's hot, bottled water.
I gave a copy of the book to both local newspapers, told them about the event, got reviews and good coverage and free publicity.
I always write a blurb about the book including why I wrote it so if they don't read it, they can use what I wrote.
I also give out a prize, a drawing for lunch for two as my guest at our local coffee shop. (They have gourmet lunches).
I'm also headed to Crescent City CA for about three days to promote the next one because part of the book happens in Crescent City and there's quite a bit about the Tolowa people in the book. I met a great Tolowa woman when I was there several years ago and two of the characters in the book are based upon her. Because there's a lot about the Tolowa and how the white man tried to completely wipe them out, and the poor treatment of these Indians today, I may get run out of town before it's all over. Hope I sell a lot of books before that happens.
Marilyn http://fictionforyou.com
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(Anyone who would like to be interviewed for the newsletter, just contact the editor at mmeredith@ocsnet.net)
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