Buzz, Balls & Hype

Listen to the Good Book News - for a change.

The new figures are out from Association of American Publishers and book sales increased 5.7 percent for the month of September with a 9.9 percent rise for the year. But the numbers that really impressed me were: "Audio Book sales posted an increase of 36.5 percent for September compared to last year's figures with sales totaling $22.5 million; sales for the whole year were up by 40.1 percent."

That's a really huge increase and I think really interesting.

Why They're Not Reading and Where to Reach Them

This new study publised at

is so important... reading between the lines... just think about ten years ago - pre the digital revolution and ask yourself what people were doing with those six hours of personal time a day... and you start to realize why booksales are so static... and also the whole article gives you alot of information on how and where marketing is and is going.

IBM Study: Marketers Must Adjust to the 'Gadget Generation'
November 08, 2007

By Eric Newman

A new study from IBM shows that media consumption patterns are changing and marketers’ dollars are following the trend.

The study found that 36% of respondents spent at least four to six hours of personal time on the Internet versus only 23% of respondents who spent that amount of time watching TV.

Of the 888 respondents in the U.S. market, 26% spend more than six hours online each, versus only 16% watching television. The findings were based on the results of a global survey of 2,400 consumers and roughly 80 advertising executives in Australia, Germany, Japan, the U.K. and the U.S.

Marketing execs are reacting. Those surveyed estimated they would increase their spend on digital initiatives by 22.4% by 2010. This includes mobile, online, interactive TV and in-game ads.

Spending on traditional ad media like broadcast, radio, print and outdoor will also increase, albeit at a slower rate. Marketers said they will spend 4.4% more on traditional advertising.

The study said marketers should be aware of the increasingly diverse digital platforms being used by consumers and effectively use these platforms to communicate impactful branded messages.

For the U.S. market, popular digital devices included MP3 players (44% of U.S. consumers own one), game consoles (38%), high definition TVs (26%), media center PCs (26%) and DVRs (24%).

Continue reading here.

Where Facebook is Facing

An interesting blog post from  on what Facebook is offering in terms of ads and what it means to movies -- since I'm linking to the movie marketing madness blog  - which is a great blog - but it relates to publishing.

 
"If you follow the marketing world at all - and that’s not an over-statement - then you’ve likely read numerous accounts of the new advertising platforms being offered by social networking site Facebook. If not here’s a quick primer:

"Facebook has unveiled a three-pronged approach to advertising on the site. First is Social Ads, which allows advertisers to target their ads based on the publicly-available data people put on their profiles. This is pretty traditional and not all that innovative save for the fact that Facebook is now admitting and embracing the idea of user data mining by advertisers.

"Second is code-named Beacon and allows companies to create brand- or product-specific profile pages. Creation of the pages is free, with the hope on the part of the company being people will interact with those pages, sending by-default-branded updates to their friends through the shared feeds. This, it’s felt, will give those updates the ring of endorsement from individuals which hopefully contains more weight than an ad. Companies can also purchase ads that run below those update items.

Finally, the Insight product allows companies to track the performance of both their branded pages and their advertising.So how can movie marketers fully take advantage of these new systems, while at the same time not honking off the Facebook user base?

(scroll down to Nov 7th at this link to read the rest)

The Graying Of Fiction

From the LA TIMES a really interesting article about where fiction might be heading...

"Tim Sandlin has written comic novels about 13-year-olds and sex, about a young mother who drinks too much and misplaces her baby, about a president who dies in flagrante delicto, leaving the nation in the hands of a coke-snorting veep.

"Then his father, Hoyt "Red" Sandlin, now 83, broke his shoulder. Sandlin, now 57, found himself doing a lot of waiting at his father's bedside -- for information, doctor visits, medication, meals.

"Sitting in the nursing home with his legal pads, he grilled the staff for salient details, many of which ended up in his seventh novel, "Jimi Hendrix Turns Eighty."

Continue reading here.

The Ad Man Answers #22

Thursday + Gregory Huffstutter = The Ad Man Answers

Q:  What are you thankful for this year?

A:   The Ad Man is thankful that reading isn't going away as a preferred leisure activity.

At least not according to the latest Harris Poll, as reported by Heidi Dawley in MediaLife...

Of course, Americans are swamped every minute of the day by this or that new technology, in this new era of media fragmentation in which diversions seem limitless: the internet, computer games, iPods, endless TV channels, and of course cell phones that do everything but tap dance.

Oh, and did we leave out reading? Yes, and we should not have.

As it turns out, for all these different toys, these wonderful new technologies, reading tops the list of things Americans would most rather do, given the choice, and by a large margin.

Not only that, reading is higher on that list than ever. Watching TV is No. 2, but a more distant No. 2. Reading is slightly more popular today than it was back in 1995.

"It is easy escapism, be it a book, the latest car magazine or a comic," says Regina Corso, director of the Harris Poll, which conducted the poll by phone in October. Harris asked 1,052 adults to name their favorite two or three leisure activities. The responses were spontaneous and unaided. That is, they did not choose from a list but were called to identify them cold, so to speak.

This was the 10th time Harris did the poll--the first was in 1995. Huge amounts of new technologies have emerged in that time, but reading has remained a consistent choice.

Back in 1995, it was actually close, with reading just nosing out TV watching, 28 percent to 25 percent. Now look what 12 years does. This time around, reading got 29 percent, while TV sunk to just 18 percent.

Meanwhile, rounding out the top five were: spending time with family and kids, which rose from 12 percent in 1995 to 14 percent in 2007; computer activities, which rose from 2 percent to 9 percent; and going to the movies, down from 8 percent to 7 percent.

Interestingly, for all the concern over health these days, interest in swimming, team sports and walking has fallen in popularity since 1995, or stayed flat. Only two fitness activities rose, working out at the gym and dancing.

Why is reading so high? There are a few things going on here, says Corso. For one thing, reading is a broad category encompassing all kinds of printed material, so that means things like magazines, newspapers, comics and books. (It doesn't, however, include reading on the internet.)

Reading is seen as a wonderful form of escapism, perhaps even more so now in our buzzing electronic world, as a chance to get away from all the buzzing.

If anything, it looks like these new technologies have come at the expense of TV. Consumers are swapping out TV time for the internet and perhaps other forms of electronic amusement, which raises a whole slew of interesting issues, as you think about it. The total time we spend with media has steadily increased with all these new media forms but the Harris finding suggests there may be a limited amount of time we can stand sitting in front of an electronic box, whatever it may be.

But here are some caveats to consider regarding these findings.

First is that respondents to polls often tell pollsters what they think they want to hear. It sounds better to say that you'd rather be reading a book than, say, spending an afternoon out at the track playing the ponies.

The other caveat is that the poll asks folks not what they actually do but what they would like to do. "A respondent could be thinking, if I had the leisure time, that's what I would do more of," says Corso.

In that sense, it's aspirational. And as we know, people are forever talking about how they don't have enough time in life to do the things they'd like. Asking people what they'd do if they had time to spare is somewhat akin to asking people what they'd do if they had a million dollars.

But all that said, there's no disputing that people hold reading in high regard.

"This may be a wonderful opportunity for publishers and magazine to tap into that. If this many people say this is one of their favorite leisure activities, they could market (these activities) differently," says Corso. "The worry is that if they don't tap into that, then I can see the numbers for computer and TV going up more."

Happy Thanksgiving, all you readers out there!

 

Gregory Huffstutter has been punching Ad Agency timecards for the past decade, working on accounts like McDonald's, KIA Motors, and the San Diego Padres. He recently finished his first mystery, KATZ CRADLE. The first 100 pages of his novel are linked here. For general advertising questions, leave a comment or send e-mail to katz @ gregoryhuffstutter dot com with 'Ask The Ad Man' in the subject line.

What Can We Learn From Purple Violets

What for all practical purposes is a "big" film (not budget wise, but with some big actors) going straight to itunes for release.  Oddly, almost no promotion that I've seen.  Is this some sort of strange testing of the waters?  If this is a what the future holds, what can   learn  about promotion (or lack of it in this case) in selling our books?

"Apple has the trailer for Ed Burns’ new film Purple Violets. It looks…well…very much like an Ed Burns movie. People fall out of love with the people they’re with, fall in love with people from their past, everyone has hurt feelings and everyone has something to apologize for. If you’re a fan of his previous movie’s you’ll like this one and if not you probably won’t. But the trailer sells it for what it is.

"At the beginning of the trailer the iTunes logo flashes, the only indication that the movie is available through the iTunes store. In fact that’s the only place the movie will be available since Burns decided not to try and reach a traditional distribution deal, opting instead to sell the movie online."

Continue reading here.

A Hand Yell for Dog Lovers

This is a must buy for any dog lover... too too funny... a wonderful stocking stuffer...

Winka loves her copy and reads it every night before bed... and her antics have gotten funnier than ever.

A Hand Yell for The Lady In Blue

Javier Sierra's novel is a terrific paranormal thriller that kept me up all night and rivited. And a great website. I'm not a reviewer so I'm not going to even try... but this is a wonderful smart suspense novel that is original and believable. Top quality writing, research and just enough magic to make me really happy.

THE DOCTOR IS IN

Dear Dr. Sue:

On June 5 of this year, I quit my day job as a network administrator/IT tech support to pursue "working with words" and shift from a job-to-make-money to doing something I love and that involves some form of creative expression (if not now, when?). I have also been giving online/phone ESL lessons to business professionals in France and other parts of Europe to eke out a living while I transition to this new life. So now, I teach for up to six hours each day (Monday-Friday) and then I piddle around the house or the Internet or the local Borders looking for inspiration to get me started on my writing career.

I think my main problem is thinking that whatever I choose to write, it has to be the right thing to write. I have a number of ideas bouncing around my skull but have yet to start any them. I think I’m also suffering from fear of success. Not necessarily huge, popular, Oprah’s-Book-Club success, but just plain old getting published success. Whether good or bad, change is hard. Further, I have been so out of touch with my creative side since becoming a mother (13 years ago) and working to support us on my own that the thought of going to all these emotionally charged places that I envision I’d need to go to in order to really write something good seems overwhelming. I’ve tried a number of exercises to get the proverbial creative juices flowing, but so far, to no avail.

I read writing blogs and search for paid writing opportunities, thinking that maybe focusing on "business" writing is the way to earn some money and experience. But then I realize that I have no desire whatsoever to do that type of writing. “Write about what you know” keeps resurfacing for me and when I think about the myriad topics from which I could choose after living in this world for 43 years, I am once again, overwhelmed. Any help would be most appreciated.

June

Dear June:

After 13 years of pressing your nose against the glass, you're now let loose in the candy store--but with the caveat that you may choose only one piece, and it must be the right piece--the one that is not only satisfying and filling, but that contains a solid-gold center.  If you weren't at least somewhat frightened and confused, I would wonder what you weren't telling me.

I would recommend taking the following steps to ease the pressure you're feeling.

First, divorce your writing ambitions from your need to support yourself and your child, at least for now. Even the best and most accomplished writers often can't survive without "day jobs." Especially when you're starting out, you need the luxury of writing what you want and need to write, without regard to the market. Some writers find that "business writing" jobs stimulate their creativity; others find that it sucks all of their best words and leaves them motivated only to watch TV and eat ice cream. It sounds as though you fall into the second camp--so give these jobs a wide berth. If your teaching work allows you the flexibility to write without draining your creative energy, then perhaps you can start thinking of it not as transitional employment but as a long-term accommodation to your goal of arranging your life around writing. Otherwise, you may wish to look for another type of work that will make it easier to write.

Second, try to start thinking of writing in terms of process, rather than product. Write about what interests you. Take risks. Assume that you will make mistakes, take wrong turns, and land on your face. All writers do.

Third, seek out instruction and company. Find a good writing class, either locally or online. An expert teacher can help you narrow down your choices and organize your ideas, and the requirement to produce  copy every week can prod you to overcome your hesitance and get to work. Classmates can inspire, encourage, and support you in this major change, too.

Finally, seek whatever level of help you find necessary. Your "fear of success" may dissipate as you become more comfortable in your new situation. If it doesn't, explore the chapter titled "Damned if We Do: The Perils of Artistic Success" in my book, Getting Unstuck without Coming Unglued. If you feel moved to, please write me again with your specific concerns about success. And if self-help books and electronic advice don't address your needs, consider finding a therapist with expertise in the creative process.

Above all, have patience with yourself. You have taken a huge, brave step. It's going to take your psyche a while to catch up. Give yourself all the tools you will need to make this work--after all this time, you deserve to do it right.

Susan O'Doherty, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist with a New York City-based practice. A fiction writer herself, she specializes in issues affecting writers and other creative artists. Her book,  Getting Unstuck Without Coming Unglued: A Woman's Guide to Unblocking Creativity, was published by Seal Press in June, 2007. Send your questions to her at Dr.Sue at mindspring dot com.

O O Oprah!

Follet is another great pick... but since I'm keeping score:

I've been keeping score on Oprah: since Jan 2005, she's picked 10 books.

All of them have been by men. Every one.

If you go back, since 2003 she's picked 16 titles. 14 of them are by men.

I'm not suggesting affirmative action here. I never am. I just continue to find it curious.

FYI: 49 million viewers watch the show every week and the majority are overwhelmingly female. More than  80% say some searches.

I've been keeping score on Oprah: since Jan 2005, she's picked 10 books.

All of them have been by men. Every one.

If you go back, since 2003 she's picked 16 titles. 14 of them are by men.

I'm not suggesting affirmative action here. I never am. I just continue to find it curious.

FYI: 49 million viewers watch the show every week and the majority are overwhelmingly female. More than  80% say some searches.