by SJ Hodges
It’s the question every first-time author wants to ask:
“If I sell my book, will the advance even cover my rent?”
Authors, I am happy to tell you that, yes, the six-figure book deal for a newbie still exists—even if you’re not a celebrity with your own television show! As a ghostwriter, I work with numerous authors and personalities to develop both nonfiction and fiction proposals, and I’ve seen unknown first-timers land life-changing deals even in a down economy. Is platform the ultimate key to their success? You better believe it’s a huge consideration for publishers, but here’s the good news: Having a killer platform is only one element that transforms a “nice deal” into a “major deal.”
You still have to ensure the eight additional elements of your proposal qualify as major attractions. Daniela Rapp, editor at St. Martin’s Press explains, “In addition to platform, authors need to have a fantastic, original idea. They have to truly be an expert in their field and they must be able to write.” So how do you craft a proposal that conveys your brilliance, your credentials, your talent and puts a couple extra zeroes on your check?
Before you’ve even written word one of your manuscript, you are expected to, miraculously, summarize the entirety of your book in such a compelling and visceral way that a publisher or agent will feel as if they are reading The New York Times review. Sound impossible? That’s because it is.
That’s why I’m going to offer two unorthodox suggestions. First, consider writing the first draft of your overview after you’ve created your table of contents and your chapter outlines. You’ll know much more about the content and scope of your material even if you’re not 100 percent certain about the voice and tone. That’s why you’ll take another pass after you complete your sample chapters. Because then you’ll be better acquainted with the voice of your book which brings me to unorthodox suggestion number two… treat your overview as literature.
I believe every proposal component needs to be written “in voice” especially because your overview is the first page the editor sees after the title page. By establishing your voice on the page immediately, your proposal becomes less of a sales document and more of a page-turner. Remember, not everyone deciding your fate works in marketing and sales. Editors still have some buying power and they are readers, first and foremost.
Television writers call this “breaking” a script. This is where you break your book or it breaks you. This is where you discover if what you plan to share with the world actually merits 80,000 words and international distribution.
Regardless of whether you’re writing fiction or nonfiction, this element of your proposal must take your buyer on a journey (especially if it’s nonfiction) and once more, I’m a big fan of approaching this component with creativity particularly if you’re exploring a specific historical time period, plan to write using a regional dialect, rely heavily on “slanguage,” and especially if the material is highly technical and dry.
This means you’ll need to style your chapter summaries and your chapter titles as a form of dramatic writing. Think about the arc of the chapters, illuminating the escalating conflict, the progression towards a resolution, in a cinematic fashion. Each chapter summary should end with an “emotional bumper,” a statement that simultaneously summarizes and entices in the same way a television show punches you in the gut before they cut to a commercial.
Is it risky to commit to a more creative approach? Absolutely. Will it be perfect the first time you write it? No. The fifth time you write it? No. The tenth time? Maybe. But the contents and chapter summary portion of your proposal is where you really get a chance to show off your skills as an architect of plot and structure and how you make an editor’s job much, much easier. According to Lara Asher, acquisitions editor at Globe Pequot Press, it is the single most important component of your proposal. “If I can’t easily understand what a book is trying to achieve then I can’t present it to my colleagues,” Asher says. “It won’t make it through the acquisitions process.”
Your author bio page must prove that you are more than just a pro, that you are recognized by the world at large as “the definitive expert” on your topic, that you have firsthand experience tackling the problems and implementing your solutions, and that you’ve seen positive results not only in your personal life but in the lives of others. You have to have walked the walk and talked the talk. You come equipped with a built-in audience, mass media attention, and a strong social network. Your bio assures your buyer that you are the right writer exploring the right topic at the right time.
Platform, platform, platform. Sit through any writing conference, query any agent, lunch with any editor and you’ll hear the “P” word over and over again. What you won’t hear is hard-and-fast numbers about just how large this platform has to be in order to secure a serious offer. Is there an audience-to-dollar-amount ratio that seems to be in play? Are publishers paying per head?
“I haven’t found this to be the case,” says Julia Pastore, former editor for Random House. “It’s easier to compel someone to ‘Like’ you on Facebook or follow you on Twitter than it is to compel them to plunk down money to buy your book. Audience engagement is more important than the sheer number of social media followers.”
With that said, if you’re shooting for six-figures, publishers expect you’ll have big numbers and big plans. Your platform will need to include:
These are organizations or individuals that already support you, are already promoting your brand, your products or your persona. If you host a show on HGTV or Nike designed a tennis racket in your honor, they definitely qualify. If, however, you’re not rolling like an A-lister just yet, you need to brainstorm any and every possible connection you have to organizations with reach in the 20,000+ range. Maybe your home church is only 200 people but the larger association serves 40,000 and you often write for their newsletter. Think big. Then think bigger.
“Publishers want to see that you have direct contact with a loyal audience,” says Maura Teitelbaum, an agent at Folio Literary Management. This means having a calendar full of face-to-face speaking engagements, a personal mailing list, extensive database and verifiable traffic to your author website.
But how much traffic does there need to be? How many public appearances? How many e-mails in your Constant Contact newsletter? Publishers are loathe to quote concrete numbers for “Likes” and “Followers” so I’ll stick my neck out and do it instead. At a minimum, to land a basic book deal, meaning a low five-figure sum, you’ll need to prove that you’ve got 15,000-20,000 fans willing to follow you into hell and through high water.
For a big six-figure deal, you’ll need a solid base of 100,000 rabid fans plus access to hundreds of thousands more. If not millions. Depressed yet? Don’t be. Because we live in a time when things as trivial as Angry Oranges or as important as scientific TED talks can go viral and propel a writer out of obscurity in a matter of seconds. It is only your job to become part of the conversation. And once your foot is in the door, you’ll be able to gather…
Publishers are risk averse. They want to see that you’re a media darling achieving pundit status. Organize and present all your clips, put together a DVD demo reel of your on-air appearances and be able to quote subscriber numbers and demographics about the publications running your articles or features about you.
Will blurbs really make a difference in the size of your check? “I would include as many in a proposal as possible,” says Teitelbaum. “Especially if those people are willing to write letters of commitment saying they will promote the book via their platform. That shows your efforts will grow exponentially.”
So what is the difference between your platform and your promotional plan? Your promotional plan must demonstrate specifically how you will activate your current platform and the expected sales results of that activation. These are projections starting three to six months before your book release date and continuing for one year after its hardcover publication. They want your guarantee to sell 15,000 books within that first year.
In addition, your promotional plan also issues promises about the commitments you are willing to make in order to promote the book to an even wider market. This is your expansion plan. How will you broaden your reach and who will help you do it? Publishers want to see that your goals are ambitious but doable.
Think about it this way. If you own a nail salon and you apply for a loan to shoot a movie, you’re likely to be rejected. But ask for a loan to open your second salon and your odds get much better. In other words, keep your promotional plans in your wheelhouse while still managing to include:
You’ll notice that I did not include hiring a book publicist as a requirement. Gone are the days when an advance-sucking, three-month contract with a book publicist makes any difference. For a six-figure author, publishers expect there is a team in place: a powerful agent, a herd of assistants and a more generalized media publicist already managing the day-to-day affairs of building your brand, growing your audience. Hiring a book publicist at the last minute is useless.
It would seem the odds against a first-time author hitting the jackpot are slim but that’s where market analysis provides a glimmer of hope. There are actually markets considered more desirable to publishers. “Broader is generally better for us,” says Rapp. “Niche generally implies small. Not something we [St. Martin’s Press] can afford to do these days. Current affairs books, if they are explosive and timely, can work. Neuroscience is hot. Animal books (not so much animal memoirs) still work. Military books sell.”
“The health and diet category will always be huge,” says Asher. “But in a category like parenting which is so crowded, we look for an author tackling a niche topic that hasn’t yet been covered.”
Niche or broad, your market analysis must position your book within a larger context, addressing the needs of the publishing industry, the relevant cultural conversations happening in the zeitgeist, your potential audience and their buying power, and the potential for both domestic and international sales.
Choose the books for your Competitive Title Analysis not only for their topical similarities but also because the author has a comparable profile and platform to your own. Says Pastore, “It can be editorially helpful to compare your book to Unbroken by Hillenbrand, but unless your previous book was also a bestseller, this comparison won’t be helpful to our sales force.”
Limit your C.T.A. to five or six solid offerings then get on BookScan and make sure none of the books sold fewer than 10,000 copies. “Higher sales are preferable,” says Rapp. “And you should leave it to the publisher to decide if the market can hold one more title or not. We always do our own research anyway, so just because the book is not mentioned in your line-up doesn’t mean we won’t know about it.”
Finally, you have to/get to prove you can … write. Oh yeah, that!
This is the fun part, the pages of your proposal where you really get to shine. It is of upmost importance that these chapters, in harmony with your overview and chapter summaries, allow the beauty, wisdom and/or quirkiness of your voice to be heard. Loud and clear.
“Writing absolutely matters and strong sample chapters are crucial.” Pastore explains, “An author must be able to turn their brilliant idea into engaging prose on the page.”
Approach the presentation of these chapters creatively. Consider including excerpts from several different chapters and not just offering the standard Introduction, Chapter One and Two. Consider the inclusion of photographs to support the narrative, helping your editor put faces to names. Consider using sidebars or box quotes from the narrative throughout your proposal to build anticipation for the actual read.
Lastly, you’ll need a one-pager, which is a relatively new addition to the book proposal format. Publishers now expect an author to squeeze a 50- or 60-page proposal down to a one-page summary they can hand to their marketing and sales teams. In its brevity, the one-pager must provide your buyer with “a clear vision of what the book is, why it’s unique, why you are the best person to write it, and how we can reach the audience,” says Pastore. And it must do that in fewer than 1,000 words. There is no room to be anything but impressive.
And if you’re shooting for that six-figure deal, impressive is what each component of your book proposal must be. Easy? No. But still possible? Yes.
SJ HODGES is an 11-time published playwright, ghostwriter and editor. Her most recent book, a memoir co-authored with Animal Planet’s “Pit Boss” Shorty Rossi was purchased by Random House/Crown, hit #36 on the Amazon bestseller list and went into its 3rd printing less than six weeks after its release date. As a developmental editor, SJ has worked on books published by Vanguard Press, Perseus Book Group and St. Martin’s Press. SJ is a tireless advocate for artists offering a free listing for jobs, grants and fellowships at her Facebook page: facebook.com/constantcreator. She can be reached through her website: sjhodges.com.