Promoting author events on calendar / listings sites
Since we know readers head to Google to check up on their favorite authors, it’s now pretty much de rigeur to post information about an author’s speaking engagements online. Authors should add this information to their websites and / or social networking profiles / fan pages (and some authors with a lot of followers find it effective to Tweet about their appearances).
Also, make sure to submit information about events to various online calendar / events sites. Earlier this week, BookTour, the website that lists author events, announced a new partnership with Amazon wherein book events that appear on the BookTour site automatically appear on Amazon’s Author Pages. (BookTour still includes buy links for multiple online booksellers on their site, though, including Barnesandnoble.com and Indiebound.)
BookTour is also introducing a new service, TourBuilder, that allows you to build your own book tour. Also, for book publicists / stores / authors tired of entering events individually (or submitting them in an Excel document), BookTour will now enter events information in any format for $1 an event. Check the site for the various options for submitting author events information.
And a couple month’s back, Bookforum debuted a new website that features an Outposts tab that lists author events. Information about author events can be sent to: events[at]bookforum[dot]com. You should include the title of the book as well as the author’s name, the host venue, its address and website and the date and time of the event as well as any ticketing information (if applicable).
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Where else do you like to submit information about author events? (And more importantly, what calendar / listings sites have you found to be effective in getting a crowd to show up?)
The Book Publicity Blog 
I publish KidsOutAndAbout.com, a web site for central- and western New York State parents who want to know what is going on for kids and families in their local areas.
I love promoting children’s book author events on our online calendar and in my weekly e-newsletter; we are pleased to have a vibrant author community in this area. Everything is free to post, whether by the author, by the publicist, or by the organization hosting the event. The KidsOutAndAbout.com online calendar gets between 60,000 and 80,000 user sessions each month for western New York, so it’s the perfect place for promoting family-friendly events. Organizations or individuals post their own events directly to the calendar by completing a form at http://www.kidsoutandabout.com/event-announce.php (it comes to an admin page for me to approve before going live). Authors passing through the Syracuse, Rochester, or Buffalo areas should definitely post their book signings or other events to the KidsOutAndabout.com calendar.
I also love doing kids book reviews and author interviews; contact information is on the KOA web site (look in right-hand column for link).
–Debra Ross
Hi Debra;
I am the author of Secrets of Great Parents and Secrets of Great Grandparents.
I am looking for a book publicist. Do you know of someone
in the area.
Thanks.
Dayle
I’m sorry, I don’t personally know a publicist in western New York.
I am so enthusiastic about this new partnership for BookTour.com! I was one of the first publicists to start posting my author’s events on that site when it started and it’s been terrific to see Kevin Smokler and his team continue to expand its reach and its effectiveness as a publicity tool!
Thanks for the interesting article. It was very helpful. I’m so excited about this!
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Hi Yen,
Thanks for this piece. I’m sorry to go off-topic but I was hoping you could clear something up for me.
In general, do literary editors consider unsolicited ARCs asking them for an advance review (so it can be used in publicity materials or in blurbs) or do they only consider those they have agreed to look at beforehand?
Thanks,
Kia
Kia — Your question is actually a little confusing because a few things are getting mixed up in there.
By literary editor, do you mean book review editor? Book editors at newspapers and magazines virtually never review books before their publication dates (the exception being publishing trade magazines like Publishers Weekly or Library Journal). Or sometimes, monthly magazine reviews may come out a couple weeks before the book does because the, say, August issue of a monthly that features an August book will hit stands by mid-July. Those are the reviews we might use ahead of time in publicity materials; otherwise print reporters generally tend to respect on-sale dates of books and schedule their reviews to run when books are available to consumers.
If you’re asking whether book editors consider unsolicited ARCs, the answer is yes (although they no doubt pay more attention to the books they have requested).
And lastly, one never solicits blurbs from editors since it’s a conflict of interest — a book section editor needs to appear unbiased about books covered in their sections, which they can’t do if they’ve blurbed a book.
Hope that helps.
Yen,
Thank you for your very helpful reply.
I did mean book reviewers, yes. I was/am confused because I’ve seen many newly released books that have snippets of reviews on the back cover (e.g. “A triumph”, New York Times). Does this mean the publishers re-issue a new cover to include the review snippet? If not, how did they manage to get that review before the book was released?
I hope I’m making sense! Thanks again for taking the time out to reply. I really appreciate it.
Thanks,
A paperback book might include reviews from the hardcover edition. Or sometimes publishers will include reviews from previous books, particularly if a book is the latest in a series.
Ah, I see! The hardcover/paperback makes sense. I had a skim through my bookshelf and most of the books have review snippets. It didn’t occur to me that they all had hardback versions first.
Thanks so much.
I appreciated the “off-topic” question. I’m new to all of this and both the answer was helpful, Kia. Thanks.