My publisher had a double-wide booth at an outdoor book festival this past weekend and invited authors to staff it in two-hour shifts to promote and sell their books. I was more than happy to sign up because I never had been to a big literary event like it and thought it would be a fun experience. Overall, I would say it was good because I learned a lot about how to sell books at street festivals and got to meet some local authors with shared interests. I try to learn something useful about being an author when doing these types of events, and I had two big take-aways from this one.
Lesson # 1: Sell on the first day, but not too early. I signed up for the Sunday morning shift several weeks in advance, and in retrospect that wasn't the best time to sell books. When the official schedule became available I saw that other authors I knew were all going to be there on Saturday, and it turned out that was the only sunny and warm day of the weekend. Of course weather is going to be a factor, no one wants to walk around in the rain or cold trying to buy books, but day and time turned out to be more important. I went to the festival on Saturday afternoon to get a few books signed that I had already bought, and the authors I talked with said that the morning had been dead and things didn't start to pick up until after lunch. When I was there the streets were full and it was a lively place with all the stages having full crowds for readings and author interviews. Fast forward to Sunday morning when I had my shift at the booth and the streets were mostly empty the entire time. It had been misting earlier, so that might have been a factor, but being there at 10AM on a Sunday was also probably a big reason for the reduced turnout. Everyone who had wanted to go to the festival went Saturday, and any Sunday attendees probably were going later in the day. It seems obvious now, but it wasn't something I thought about when I signed up. I did end up selling one copy of The Magic of Deceit, and any time someone buys a copy it makes my day, so I hope they enjoy it. I was also able to hand out a few business cards, which got me thinking about attracting interest at live in-person events.
Lesson # 2: Little freebies can be useful, but be intentional about what you offer. For pulling people from the street into your booth, the bowl of candy was the most common thing that I saw over the weekend. What I also saw was that it did a great job of bringing kids to the table, but anyone who could actually buy a book much less so. I brought business cards that had the cover of my first novel printed on one side and my website on the back. I laid some out on the table alongside copies of my books. For the people that I talked to on Sunday I always put a card in their hand and told them that if nothing else they could use it as a bookmark for something they picked up at the festival. Not as exciting or immediately rewarding as a mini candy bar, but at least with a business card there might be a chance my books get a second look after the event is over.
My writing for the month was considerably less than I would have liked, but in line with what I anticipated given my other commitments at work and at home. Only 2k words written for the month, with a total manuscript draft total sitting at just under 22k words. Slow going for sure, but at least a bit of incremental progress. More encouragingly, I got the edits back for my short story contribution to Ed Willett's sci-fi anthology Shapers of Worlds Volume V and things look good. He let me know the illustration that will accompany my story is being drawn now, so hopefully in the next month or two I'll be able to share a preview of it.
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