Separate from BookTok and Oprah-esque book clubs, here are the only places where coverage of a book assuredly leads to sales (albeit for a particular type of book, respectively):
Wall Street Journal
Fresh Air
CBS Sunday/60 Minutes
Rogan
Of course having a celebrity seen reading your book also works. The book the Eagles receiver was seen reading on the sidelines of a playoff game sold more than a hundred thousand copies afterwards.
In a very surprising turn of events, a poet interviewed by Megyn Kelly recently saw appreciable sales from the experience. What a strange sentence to have written.
I always knew that independent bookstores account for a small percentage of book sales. But, after three decades of publishing, I recently learned from an indie bookstore owner that it's around 5%. It reiterates what I already knew: If Amazon and its 80 to 85% of market share hasn't noticed you then you aren't going to be a bestseller.
Definitely. When I said booksellers can move books, I was thinking more about the the difference between a few hundred and several thousand for, say, a literary short story collection. B&N is a good chunk too still. There's an anthology I was part of that still sells decently years later basically entirely because a few B&Ns feature it. But, if we're talking true bestseller status you have to be moving a lot on Amazon.
I've found no evidence that a NY Times review sells a book, and a NY Times ad is an ego-boosting waste of time. But if a book hits the list, that can cause others to buy it, there being a huge segment of readers who just read what's on the list (and thus bestsellers can continue to be bestsellers because they're bestsellers, not because they're any good).
World events can cause books to become bestsellers too, but that's incidental.
In my experience, my last novel got a rave in the NYT and was listed as a best SFF book of the year in December. Both times I got a bump, but it was not a huge bump. Certainly didn't make me a bestseller or anything.
I think your list is right. I should have added big TV shows or massive podcasts sell books. Otherwise, review coverage sells books through ubiquity. If you write a novel that is raved about in not just the NYT but also NPR, WP, Vox, Slate, etc. then you might see a really big sales move.
Yes, that repetition can definitely lead to sales the same way that ads making a repeat impression can. Also, yes, a Times review can lead to a bump thanks to awareness, but I'm talking about a huge, hit the list bump.
Oh, it also helps if someone says, Don't read this book. The negative recommendation by someone hated, is how Trump has made a raft of bestsellers (when I published Cliff Sims's TEAM OF VIPERS we counted on it, and he came through) and Facebook caused CARELESS PEOPLE to sell 100K copies (that said, CP is fan-freaking-tastic and might have sold very well anyway).
“What does sell books?” Readers. Do you know the state of readers in the classroom? Even in “good” schools? None. As an educator, all I get is emails from former students that time in my classroom is the last time they ever read for pleasure or analytically without being forced to think alongside this or that ideology.
Any writer who is not following what’s happening in classrooms, and I don’t mean left or right bans, is really out of touch with all of it.
First off, I loved METALLIC REALMS. Really unique and special. I'm mad at myself for reading it so fast. Bravo, friend.
Second - not to put a finer point on it, but newspapers have always absorbed content from syndicates, even entire sections. I remember doing it a lot when on the copy desk at my local paper's international edition. You need to fill space. The big problem now is, like you note, there's no oversight. There's no book editor at most places saying, uh, no, this doesn't even exist." And since the hosting paper gets "copy edited, ready-to-print" content, then there's no desire to even double check. Papers are so understaffed, they're beyond the point of curation, which is really tragic. Kathleen is right. This will happen again.
In my experience as a publicist, and now as an author who is very involved in his own book PR, I will fall back on one of my favorite little ditties: publicity can only create AWARENESS, not sales. There is no fact or stat that can show you how PR equates to sales, at least not comprehensively. For many people, they need to have a book mentioned to them a few times to even consider buying it. Which is why a blanketing PR approach - where you do every little hit, no matter how small - is a decent strategy, because it just gets you out there. That said, there are maybe a handful of places where a press hit will surely move copies. A NYT profile. NPR Fresh Air, etc. These are certifiable home runs that mean copies will move. So, my advice to someone starting out is to not bank on the home run - but collect as many singles and doubles as you can. Eventually, you'll score some points. Will it make you a NYT bestseller? No. But it gives you fodder for social - which, in relation to publicity, AMPLIFIES awareness. You need something to say, sure, but social media lets you say it louder.
So, what, aside from book boxes, celebrity book clubs, a BookTok miracle, or a media Hail Mary will sell books? It goes back to the publishers. It comes down to marketing. Marketing spends, more often than not, equal sales. This shows your publisher is invested in your work in various ways - placement in bookstores, sending you to events/festivals, ads on social or newsletters or websites. This is the publisher saying "this book matters, and we're spending money to make sure it does." It lets certain books cut the line or get in view of readers more easily. They pay money to put your book where they know readers go, and then track to see if they bought the book. This is where the real data exists, and it's something I wish more people talked about.
An old boss of mine, who over saw publicity for our department where I was on staff said it best: Publicity is free marketing. Marketing is publicity you pay for.
Publicity is great, and it feeds our egos and gives us stuff to post about and shared by our friends, but the thing that will literally (and discernibly - you get the data!) moves copies comes from the publisher, and it's a conversation you have to have with your publisher months before the book goes out. What's the marketing spend? Is this a lead title? What can we do to help with this in terms of social ads, newsletter placements. etc? It's a tough convo because you're basically asking for an allowance, or if you're NOT a lead title, you're basically being told your book is not a priority. But it's better to know where you stand a few months out of release, so you as author can course-correct YOUR time and efforts to help, than complaining after the fact. So many folks conflate "marketing" with publicity and they're very much different things - and they expect different results.
Sorry to come on here and rant! I love this newsletter and feel really simpatico with your work, though, and I felt compelled to chime in.
And yes you're right that I really left all of marketing out of my post. I suppose I was thinking more about publicity since authors are typically more involved in that and the types of books I write (and most of the ones I read) have never received big marketing budgets. But marketing--especially for bestsellers--is huge.
(More and more, I think authors really benefit from learn about and being involved in publicity and marketing as much as possible... I need to focus on that more.)
I've been involved in book printing, indie publishing and marketing for a while now. Alex I'm curious in your experience about the efforts of pushing for collaboration and offers from publishers? Perhaps the easiest example would be: If I create a series of 30 reels to promote the book will you put ad spend behind my organic effort? Etc etc.
It's hard to generalize about this, but I do think you're best served trying to see how to complement or augment your publisher's efforts. Tell them the sites where your readers are, so they might invest in ads there, vs "can you amplify a reel I made."
Thank you for your insightful article, Lincoln. Wow, those stats are staggering! I'm with you... I have a hard time keeping up with everyone who writes in to us and it is small in comparison to the "big guys" who are surely buried in an avalanche or requests. Appreciate your candid thoughts!
I would like to mention (and spoiler, I work there) the Southwest Review has made a pretty big effort to publish more book reviews, both in print and online. We’re not the biggest magazine in the world, but we’re trying to do our part.
Great book and great review. I think in all the doom of everything people forget just how many amazing books are being written and published. A lot of crap too, sure, but the good stuff is really *really* good. As dismal as publishing is, we are living in a time of riches, if we can just get those books to the surface
I keep thinking about something @kathleenschmidt wrote on her Substack: that rather than desperately trying for traditional press coverage or praying that their books end up going viral on tiktok, big 5 should have been making their own thing. literally everyone has been complaining about goodreads for two decades- big five could have gotten together and built the next goodreads because i dont think GR is particularly good at selling books, and Storygraph is more about tracking. It could have been a giant thing that combined social media, book clubs, promotions, highlighted authors, etc, AND they wouldnt have to pay for goodreads giveaways.
Anecdotally (as a bookseller at a large indie bookstore), large podcasts also give a sales bump. Most of the time, it's not going to cause something to become a bestseller (even just in our store), but I'll certainly notice when 5 people in the same week ask for a book that we'd otherwise sell maybe 1 of in a month. When 99% Invisible was doing a readalong of The Power Broker, we kept running out of copies to sell, which is kind of insane for a 1300 page book about NYC development in the 1970s.
Being a local author sometimes also helps, though that requires a lot of reputation building. There's a local journalist/nonfiction writer who's gotten national acclaim for his reporting, but recently-ish started writing fiction. Apparently they don't sell well at all nationally, but those books are very consistent sellers at our store. I assume this is because he's been a fixture in local/state reporting for decades, and thus the local papers will actually put out articles about his new novels. His readers definitely skew older. At least once a week, someone older will come in with a literal newspaper clipping asking for the book discussed.
I've had the most success personally selling books that are in niche categories. I get ignored a lot when I suggest my favorite new YA title, but have a much better sales rate for handselling my favorite literary criticism/writing reference books. The target audience really makes a difference there.
With regards to TikTok, going viral seems like such a crapshoot that I'm not sure it makes sense for anyone to plan for it.
This was a great article. More and more I see the culture turning away from novels and toward other kinds of media. It's sad to see, but as a writer it's also a wakeup call to perhaps direct more energy to other forms of storytelling. The project of mine that's received the most attention by far is my fiction podcast, and believe me, it's by a landslide. That tells me to spend more time there, right? But the problem is, it's the thing that not only makes zero money, it actually costs to produce. It's a bit of a puzzle, one I'm hoping to find the solution to.
Maybe I'm too young or living in the wrong areas and in the wrong circles but I can't find anything much about Lit Mags or reading at all IRL that's not here or another social media. Some kind stranger have recommended online Mags to me in the past but honestly I'm yet to find one that covers my interests as a reader.
As a consumer this lack of good publicity in any form for books (aside from the odd BookTok darling) makes it nigh impossible to find something good or new from an author if they're not already established or buying into the latest book trend I really dislike it.
If proper book columns or a modern equivalent returned I'd be VERY onboard.
Appreciate all this! I do think though that TikTok shouldn’t be so easily dismissed as only being relevant for genre book sales — lots of contemporary literary fiction’s sales fates have been determined on there using real strategy not just organic chance
You're probably right! I don't know as much about it (not out of looking down on it as a platform, just because I'm moth maxed out on platforms and don't like filming myself)
You mention booksellers here, and I will second that. In my experience, booksellers and book sales reps are the unsung heroes of the industry. I've had two books in my 20+ year career as a novelist that bankrolled my other years of writing and publishing more "quietly received" books. In both cases, my publisher launched the novel with a private event--me, two other authors, and a group of book sales representatives and booksellers in a room, eating and drinking together.
I never had an American publisher send me on a big book tour. I mostly toured locally, in Northern California, where we have an incredibly robust indie bookstore community. I've been grateful to be reviewed throughout my career in the ever-narrowing lineup of newspaper book sections, but a review can't match the magic of a rep putting a book in the hands of a bookseller, who puts it int he hands of a reader.
The only things that reliably lead to book sales are, one, a personal recommendation and, two, the desire for social acceptance. To the latter point, I suspect that if three women are having coffee, and two start talking about a book the third hasn't read, the third will promptly order it so she can be part of the conversation. Meanwhile, mediocre white men buy books by conservative celebrities as totems and badges to demonstrate their adherence to the cult; they don't, I suspect, actually read them or even care what they're about beyond knowing that the books validate their bigotries and idiocies.
"book reviews have marginal impact on sales." Yes. But the number of Amazon and Goodread reviews has a huge impact, The higher the number, the more sales.
Separate from BookTok and Oprah-esque book clubs, here are the only places where coverage of a book assuredly leads to sales (albeit for a particular type of book, respectively):
Wall Street Journal
Fresh Air
CBS Sunday/60 Minutes
Rogan
Of course having a celebrity seen reading your book also works. The book the Eagles receiver was seen reading on the sidelines of a playoff game sold more than a hundred thousand copies afterwards.
In a very surprising turn of events, a poet interviewed by Megyn Kelly recently saw appreciable sales from the experience. What a strange sentence to have written.
I always knew that independent bookstores account for a small percentage of book sales. But, after three decades of publishing, I recently learned from an indie bookstore owner that it's around 5%. It reiterates what I already knew: If Amazon and its 80 to 85% of market share hasn't noticed you then you aren't going to be a bestseller.
Definitely. When I said booksellers can move books, I was thinking more about the the difference between a few hundred and several thousand for, say, a literary short story collection. B&N is a good chunk too still. There's an anthology I was part of that still sells decently years later basically entirely because a few B&Ns feature it. But, if we're talking true bestseller status you have to be moving a lot on Amazon.
I would add The New York Times to your list.
I've found no evidence that a NY Times review sells a book, and a NY Times ad is an ego-boosting waste of time. But if a book hits the list, that can cause others to buy it, there being a huge segment of readers who just read what's on the list (and thus bestsellers can continue to be bestsellers because they're bestsellers, not because they're any good).
World events can cause books to become bestsellers too, but that's incidental.
In my experience, my last novel got a rave in the NYT and was listed as a best SFF book of the year in December. Both times I got a bump, but it was not a huge bump. Certainly didn't make me a bestseller or anything.
I think your list is right. I should have added big TV shows or massive podcasts sell books. Otherwise, review coverage sells books through ubiquity. If you write a novel that is raved about in not just the NYT but also NPR, WP, Vox, Slate, etc. then you might see a really big sales move.
Though there is a feedback loop here. Books get a lot of attention and sales, and that makes such venues writes about them.
Yes, that repetition can definitely lead to sales the same way that ads making a repeat impression can. Also, yes, a Times review can lead to a bump thanks to awareness, but I'm talking about a huge, hit the list bump.
Oh, it also helps if someone says, Don't read this book. The negative recommendation by someone hated, is how Trump has made a raft of bestsellers (when I published Cliff Sims's TEAM OF VIPERS we counted on it, and he came through) and Facebook caused CARELESS PEOPLE to sell 100K copies (that said, CP is fan-freaking-tastic and might have sold very well anyway).
“What does sell books?” Readers. Do you know the state of readers in the classroom? Even in “good” schools? None. As an educator, all I get is emails from former students that time in my classroom is the last time they ever read for pleasure or analytically without being forced to think alongside this or that ideology.
Any writer who is not following what’s happening in classrooms, and I don’t mean left or right bans, is really out of touch with all of it.
First off, I loved METALLIC REALMS. Really unique and special. I'm mad at myself for reading it so fast. Bravo, friend.
Second - not to put a finer point on it, but newspapers have always absorbed content from syndicates, even entire sections. I remember doing it a lot when on the copy desk at my local paper's international edition. You need to fill space. The big problem now is, like you note, there's no oversight. There's no book editor at most places saying, uh, no, this doesn't even exist." And since the hosting paper gets "copy edited, ready-to-print" content, then there's no desire to even double check. Papers are so understaffed, they're beyond the point of curation, which is really tragic. Kathleen is right. This will happen again.
In my experience as a publicist, and now as an author who is very involved in his own book PR, I will fall back on one of my favorite little ditties: publicity can only create AWARENESS, not sales. There is no fact or stat that can show you how PR equates to sales, at least not comprehensively. For many people, they need to have a book mentioned to them a few times to even consider buying it. Which is why a blanketing PR approach - where you do every little hit, no matter how small - is a decent strategy, because it just gets you out there. That said, there are maybe a handful of places where a press hit will surely move copies. A NYT profile. NPR Fresh Air, etc. These are certifiable home runs that mean copies will move. So, my advice to someone starting out is to not bank on the home run - but collect as many singles and doubles as you can. Eventually, you'll score some points. Will it make you a NYT bestseller? No. But it gives you fodder for social - which, in relation to publicity, AMPLIFIES awareness. You need something to say, sure, but social media lets you say it louder.
So, what, aside from book boxes, celebrity book clubs, a BookTok miracle, or a media Hail Mary will sell books? It goes back to the publishers. It comes down to marketing. Marketing spends, more often than not, equal sales. This shows your publisher is invested in your work in various ways - placement in bookstores, sending you to events/festivals, ads on social or newsletters or websites. This is the publisher saying "this book matters, and we're spending money to make sure it does." It lets certain books cut the line or get in view of readers more easily. They pay money to put your book where they know readers go, and then track to see if they bought the book. This is where the real data exists, and it's something I wish more people talked about.
An old boss of mine, who over saw publicity for our department where I was on staff said it best: Publicity is free marketing. Marketing is publicity you pay for.
Publicity is great, and it feeds our egos and gives us stuff to post about and shared by our friends, but the thing that will literally (and discernibly - you get the data!) moves copies comes from the publisher, and it's a conversation you have to have with your publisher months before the book goes out. What's the marketing spend? Is this a lead title? What can we do to help with this in terms of social ads, newsletter placements. etc? It's a tough convo because you're basically asking for an allowance, or if you're NOT a lead title, you're basically being told your book is not a priority. But it's better to know where you stand a few months out of release, so you as author can course-correct YOUR time and efforts to help, than complaining after the fact. So many folks conflate "marketing" with publicity and they're very much different things - and they expect different results.
Sorry to come on here and rant! I love this newsletter and feel really simpatico with your work, though, and I felt compelled to chime in.
Thank you so much, re: Metallic Realms!
And yes you're right that I really left all of marketing out of my post. I suppose I was thinking more about publicity since authors are typically more involved in that and the types of books I write (and most of the ones I read) have never received big marketing budgets. But marketing--especially for bestsellers--is huge.
(More and more, I think authors really benefit from learn about and being involved in publicity and marketing as much as possible... I need to focus on that more.)
Totally! Wasn’t trying to be critical - I just think people lump marketing and publicity together and they’re very much apples and oranges
I've been involved in book printing, indie publishing and marketing for a while now. Alex I'm curious in your experience about the efforts of pushing for collaboration and offers from publishers? Perhaps the easiest example would be: If I create a series of 30 reels to promote the book will you put ad spend behind my organic effort? Etc etc.
It's hard to generalize about this, but I do think you're best served trying to see how to complement or augment your publisher's efforts. Tell them the sites where your readers are, so they might invest in ads there, vs "can you amplify a reel I made."
Thank you for your insightful article, Lincoln. Wow, those stats are staggering! I'm with you... I have a hard time keeping up with everyone who writes in to us and it is small in comparison to the "big guys" who are surely buried in an avalanche or requests. Appreciate your candid thoughts!
I would like to mention (and spoiler, I work there) the Southwest Review has made a pretty big effort to publish more book reviews, both in print and online. We’re not the biggest magazine in the world, but we’re trying to do our part.
Yes, you guys are doing great work. You published my good friend Adrian Van Young on the excellent Hellions recently!
Great book and great review. I think in all the doom of everything people forget just how many amazing books are being written and published. A lot of crap too, sure, but the good stuff is really *really* good. As dismal as publishing is, we are living in a time of riches, if we can just get those books to the surface
I keep thinking about something @kathleenschmidt wrote on her Substack: that rather than desperately trying for traditional press coverage or praying that their books end up going viral on tiktok, big 5 should have been making their own thing. literally everyone has been complaining about goodreads for two decades- big five could have gotten together and built the next goodreads because i dont think GR is particularly good at selling books, and Storygraph is more about tracking. It could have been a giant thing that combined social media, book clubs, promotions, highlighted authors, etc, AND they wouldnt have to pay for goodreads giveaways.
Anecdotally (as a bookseller at a large indie bookstore), large podcasts also give a sales bump. Most of the time, it's not going to cause something to become a bestseller (even just in our store), but I'll certainly notice when 5 people in the same week ask for a book that we'd otherwise sell maybe 1 of in a month. When 99% Invisible was doing a readalong of The Power Broker, we kept running out of copies to sell, which is kind of insane for a 1300 page book about NYC development in the 1970s.
Being a local author sometimes also helps, though that requires a lot of reputation building. There's a local journalist/nonfiction writer who's gotten national acclaim for his reporting, but recently-ish started writing fiction. Apparently they don't sell well at all nationally, but those books are very consistent sellers at our store. I assume this is because he's been a fixture in local/state reporting for decades, and thus the local papers will actually put out articles about his new novels. His readers definitely skew older. At least once a week, someone older will come in with a literal newspaper clipping asking for the book discussed.
I've had the most success personally selling books that are in niche categories. I get ignored a lot when I suggest my favorite new YA title, but have a much better sales rate for handselling my favorite literary criticism/writing reference books. The target audience really makes a difference there.
With regards to TikTok, going viral seems like such a crapshoot that I'm not sure it makes sense for anyone to plan for it.
Perhaps the most terrifying Twilight Zone episode if I have the picture pegged correctly.
This was a great article. More and more I see the culture turning away from novels and toward other kinds of media. It's sad to see, but as a writer it's also a wakeup call to perhaps direct more energy to other forms of storytelling. The project of mine that's received the most attention by far is my fiction podcast, and believe me, it's by a landslide. That tells me to spend more time there, right? But the problem is, it's the thing that not only makes zero money, it actually costs to produce. It's a bit of a puzzle, one I'm hoping to find the solution to.
Maybe I'm too young or living in the wrong areas and in the wrong circles but I can't find anything much about Lit Mags or reading at all IRL that's not here or another social media. Some kind stranger have recommended online Mags to me in the past but honestly I'm yet to find one that covers my interests as a reader.
As a consumer this lack of good publicity in any form for books (aside from the odd BookTok darling) makes it nigh impossible to find something good or new from an author if they're not already established or buying into the latest book trend I really dislike it.
If proper book columns or a modern equivalent returned I'd be VERY onboard.
Appreciate all this! I do think though that TikTok shouldn’t be so easily dismissed as only being relevant for genre book sales — lots of contemporary literary fiction’s sales fates have been determined on there using real strategy not just organic chance
You're probably right! I don't know as much about it (not out of looking down on it as a platform, just because I'm moth maxed out on platforms and don't like filming myself)
Great write up. Adding your book to my substackers to read list!
You mention booksellers here, and I will second that. In my experience, booksellers and book sales reps are the unsung heroes of the industry. I've had two books in my 20+ year career as a novelist that bankrolled my other years of writing and publishing more "quietly received" books. In both cases, my publisher launched the novel with a private event--me, two other authors, and a group of book sales representatives and booksellers in a room, eating and drinking together.
I never had an American publisher send me on a big book tour. I mostly toured locally, in Northern California, where we have an incredibly robust indie bookstore community. I've been grateful to be reviewed throughout my career in the ever-narrowing lineup of newspaper book sections, but a review can't match the magic of a rep putting a book in the hands of a bookseller, who puts it int he hands of a reader.
The only things that reliably lead to book sales are, one, a personal recommendation and, two, the desire for social acceptance. To the latter point, I suspect that if three women are having coffee, and two start talking about a book the third hasn't read, the third will promptly order it so she can be part of the conversation. Meanwhile, mediocre white men buy books by conservative celebrities as totems and badges to demonstrate their adherence to the cult; they don't, I suspect, actually read them or even care what they're about beyond knowing that the books validate their bigotries and idiocies.
I'm obviously not the only one despairing the fact that nobody wants to read my books or talk to me about them.
Please keep writing these: they are invaluable.
I'm publishing my second novel in July: I didn't know it was "Substack Summer"!
"book reviews have marginal impact on sales." Yes. But the number of Amazon and Goodread reviews has a huge impact, The higher the number, the more sales.