Today, I found an interesting blog post about why book signings are not effective.
The author lists the following as reasons:
- Sales are short-lived
- Book stores don't market signings
- Books will be put on a back shelf – not a front table – after a signing
- Too much time and effort for little return
The author recommends festivals and book clubs as a venues for signings, and touches on the potential of virtual book tours for sales.
What do you think? Do signings work for you? Does it depend on the author, genre, location of signing?
Share your thoughts by leaving a comment.
I'd say that for signings, location and promotion matter more than anything. I'm still at the stage where I'll do pretty much any event that comes my way. I don't mind taking the time and it's better than doing nothing. I've had some lackluster signings, sure, but it doesn't make sense to me to write-off the whole thing.
Hasn't been my experience. Each signing I had, at least 50 people came and also bought. The bookstore managers were delighted. But of course I write controversial books.
Latayne C Scott
http://www.latayne.com
www. novelmatters.blogspot.com