The adventure of publishing books

[DISRAELI]

Are you on any other social media sites?

Check to see if you can add a link to your books in a signature file (I don't do this with my own books because this really isn't the target audience).  I have a few sites where I'm active and have around 1500 followers (both sites combined.)  I usually see sales from announcements and updates there.  Not many, mind you, but a few.

No advice on the agent, however.

Well, I'm offering answers to questions on sites like the Reddit subforums and Biblical Hermeneutics Stack Exchange. On both sites, I have a Profile where my books are listed. I can't do much promotion on the main pages, of course, except when I can say "This is the argument used in my book", but I'm sure that just being active there at least promotes "brand recognition".  However, entering theological discussion brings as much notoriety as fame. Only this morning someone called me "Satan" for observing that Jesus named two commandments as more important than the others.

Thanks to the past history of the Rogue Nation group, I'm also the only active member on two otherwise abandoned Proboards forums. I've been plastering book promotion all over both of them, and they both get a small flow of daily visitors. I think there's a webpage somewhere alerting people to board activity and making them curious.

[quintessentone]

Well, I'm offering answers to questions on sites like the Reddit subforums and Biblical Hermeneutics Stack Exchange. On both sites, I have a Profile where my books are listed. I can't do much promotion on the main pages, of course, except when I can say "This is the argument used in my book", but I'm sure that just being active there at least promotes "brand recognition".  However, entering theological discussion brings as much notoriety as fame. Only this morning someone called me "Satan" for observing that Jesus named two commandments as more important than the others.

Thanks to the past history of the Rogue Nation group, I'm also the only active member on two otherwise abandoned Proboards forums. I've been plastering book promotion all over both of them, and they both get a small flow of daily visitors. I think there's a webpage somewhere alerting people to board activity and making them curious.

I find it disgusting religious people think it's acceptable to bully and call people 'Satan' instead of simply discussing their reasons why they disagree with an idea. But, I guess, it comes with the territory of putting yourself or your ideas 'out there'.

[DISRAELI]

Update. A Google search on Christian PR firms offered a number of options. The first non-sponsored entry (on reflection, I've just realised, i ought not to be ignoring the sponsored ones) was in Tennessee, which won't work for me on the other side of the Atlantic. The next had "Faith" in their name, and their site encouraged people to "put your faith in us", but it appears that Google has been wrong-footed and they do not specialise in religious matters. I haven't yet heard from the next one, perhaps because they are religious enough to want to check out my Christian credentials first. They call themselves "Catholic and Christian", in that order, and if they notice that my history of the prophets is written "from a Protestant viewpoint", that could be enough to put them off.

Not wanting to delay initiatives on my own account, my online activity before this one was making enquiries about exhibiting at the Christian Resource Exhibition in October. The rapidly filling plan shows that it would have been a mistake to leave it much longer.

Meanwhile, I have been sending out free copies of the book (carefully rationed, because I didn't get more than a couple of dozen). Review copies to Evangelical Times, Premier Christianity, Christianity Today, and The Christian Century. Used the supplied postcards as a kind of "compliments skip" (which may have been the intended use anyway). Also free copies, with some of the order forms, to the principals of selected Bible Colleges and Theological colleges, the stand-alone colleges rather than theological departments of universities (who will be more academic in their recommendations), and focusing on the more evangelical ones. This will resume when I've re-stocked on the right sizes of jiffy bags.

[DISRAELI]

The headline news this week is that I have booked myself in as one of the exhibitors at the Christian Resources Exhibition at Milton Keynes in October. I think there's a good prospect that even the event pre-publicity will be worth its weight in gold. Since the "name of company" field was mandatory on the booking form, I am now on their official spreadsheets as "Unorganised Individual", which ought to be a gift to anyone with journalistic instincts. I may be likely to appear at one end of "We have everybody from X to Y" statements.

I've been sending out remaining copies of PPP to various institutions and persons, including my bishop. Leaving one for myself and a spare, so that I don't find myself without a copy of my own book, like poor J.R. Hartley of "Fly-fishing" fame. Older UK television viewers will get this reference. I think that finishes the mail shots for the moment. I had thought of sending out order forms to rural deans, as I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, then thought college Christian Unions would be a better idea, but now I'm holding them back for the display table at Milton Keynes. The same for the copies of the other two books.

And I'm now starting to build a small following on Twitter, by reviving my old practice of adding a different quote from the book each day, giving curious users a reason to come back and check the latest. At the moment, this is on the level of rising one by one from 40 followers to 50, but it's a start.