April is National Poetry Month. In today's author success story, I'm interviewing author and poet Debra Winegarten about her success in promoting her book "There's Jews in Texas?" through local events.
Welcome Debra. You posted a photo of your signing at Austin's Bookwoman bookstore on your Facebook page, and I couldn't help but notice the giant $160 check in the photo, made out to Bookwoman. What's the story there?
On my birthday, I decided to run a Facebook promotion and asked my friends to buy a total of 54 books, one for each year I've been on the earth, and for each book or ebook sold, I would donate $1 to Bookwoman. The promotion turned out to be so successful (I think I sold 12 books the first day I posted it), that I decided to continue running the special up to my book launch -- and ended up selling 80 books. I then decided for even more fun, and to support my local independent bookstore (one of the last 12 feminist book stores left in the U.S.) I would match the donations, 1:1. Hence, the check for $160. Fun!
That's a great story! Tell us more about the signing at Bookwomen.
For invitation purposes, I did a combination Facebook event page invitation, and good old-fashioned postcards. I ordered oversized postcards from Vistaprint with my book cover on one side, and information about the event on the other. I also put my website on the postcard and told folks if they couldn’t attend the event but wanted the book, they could order from my website. I received three orders that I know of from the postcard.
The event was magical. About 40 people came, filling up every available chair. There were people from my synagogue, Austin Writergrrls, women I didn’t know who read about the signing in the Chronicle and brought friends, members of my critique group, people from the UT Astronomy Department where I work, and many members of the Austin poetry community. I even had a friend in Israel Skype in – we gave her a front-row seat and talk about a trooper – it was midnight in Haifa when we started and 1:30 am by the time we ended, and she stayed up for the whole event.
I read new poetry as well as a few poems from the book, talked about my other three books, my writing career, and encouraged folks to buy “There’s Jews in Texas?” We laughed a lot and cried a little, I took questions from the audience, and then we went to book buying and signing, as well as gobbling up goodies from the veggie and cheese trays from Central Market. I think we sold 34 books, with some folks buying multiple copies, always a good thing.
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