Not all publicists are equal

Say you decide you want someone in your corner promoting your book for you. How do you pick a good publicist that will get the job done while not taking your first born as payment?

First: What are your goals? What is your budget? How much do you want to participate? Do you have a media focus (examp. radio more than newspapers)?

Get a good idea of what you want to accomplish before you ever approach a publicity company.

Before I go further, understand the difference between a publicist and an agent.

Publicist: Only gets free publicity (they do send out review copies you are responsible for providing)
Agent: Spends your money to get targeted responses.

A publicist will set up book events but will not cover the expense to rent a hall and and advertise hoping to recoup expenses at the door. A publicist will contact every media they can think of for a review or interview, but will not purchase an ad space to do so. A good publicist will sell their soul to get you results but an agent will sell yours for you instead. (OK, I'm actually kidding on that last one.) I'm not anti-agent but I think free is a GREAT thing.

When looking at publicists, look at the company's provided information but also do a web search and find forums and posts that talk about the company. If you find a large amount of complaints, walk away. If you don't find many posts that isn't necessarily a bad thing. People are more likely to tell a million people they didn't like a company than brag about one that got results.

What is the publicist going to do for you? Keep in mind they can't guarantee results but who are they going to target and why? If it isn't spelled out for you in the proposal, the publicity company isn't bound by law to do those things. The publicity contract should be tailored to your book. If it doesn't talk about the hooks specific to your book the company is intending to use, it's not specific enough. If it doesn't have a general time line spelled out, it's not specific enough.

A contract can get too specific. Avoid demanding an exact number of media contacts a publicist is going to contact for each media hook. Doing so burdens the publicist with counting contacts which takes up campaign hours. Also, this hampers your campaign because the publicist is inclined to meet the number in each hook and not contact a single media past the numbers set in the contract just so they are assured they will meet the minimum by the time the campaign is over. Also, media contacts change on a daily basis. When your proposal was written, there may have been only 132 media who are interested in the history of ear wax. By the time your campaign starts that number could have jumped to 165 or dropped to 5. Forcing your publicist into constraining themselves by numbers is simply frustrating when dealing in the dynamic world of media.

Some publicists run their companies by a set amount for each ad or interview they arrange for you. You simply choose how much publicity you want and POOF! The reviews and interviews appear! Be wary of these companies. Check the prices. Usually, they are purchasing ad space and you can purchase the ads yourself for the same amount and probably less.

You should always ask for references from a company but take them with a the knowledge you might be writing to or calling their sister/brother/mother/father/best friend. You can't always assume you are getting legit references. I strongly encourage the tactic I mentioned above and do a google search with the company name. If people are feeling scammed, they are going to say something about it.

How much is the company going to contact you? A good publicist stays in contact with the author regularly as in once a week at the minimum. I usually stay in contact with my authors daily so we're on the same page. My company represented a client who hired a publicity company before us. He didn't hear from them for a MONTH after his campaign started. He didn't know if they were doing any work on his campaign so he stopped paying them. He sure heard from them then!

He started a campaign with us shortly after the other company realized his checks weren't coming anymore. Within 2 weeks we had 3 events lined up, 4 review commitments and a radio interview in the works. His campaign was hampered by the fact that he was a POD author but he had a timely book with media worthy content. Bottom line: get a commitment from the company on how often you will hear from them.

Cost is a big factor in many publicity campaigns. Publicity companies that traditional publishers employ are typically in the 5 digit range. Since you don't have a big publisher's money behind you, this might not be the option you want to pursue. There are many companies that charge in the $5,000 per month range. The company I mentioned above is one of those. There are other companies like the one I work for that charge in the $2,000 per month range.

Why the great spread in price? I was about to give you a snide comment but I'll stay professional here. It's all about overhead. If the company is in a penthouse suite, they have to charge enough to pay for said suite. Also, if the president wants a Jaguar to impress the opposite sex, the authors are paying for that Jaguar.

If you're not a traditionally published author, those companies typically won't work for you period. The publicity companies in the $5,000 range charge as much as they do for the same reason though. It's all about overhead. If the company is in California, they have to charge more to live out there. If the company is based in rural Kentucky, the overhead is considerably less. Does a higher cost validate a publicity company's results? I don't think so but if an author really wants to pay for me to buy a nicer car, I'll sure take them up on that offer!

Good publicity companies will offer a couple different options for your involvement. The only two I would consider is all or nothing. A full campaign means you show up and smile where ever they send you. They do all the leg work, they get all the rejection, they send out all the review copies. Your responsibility is to make sure you are available for the interviews they set up for you (you do approve the dates before the dates are set) and show up to sign books. This is ideal for the busy person.

Maybe you don't have anything better to do and want to be really involved (and save money). Some companies let you purchase targeted media names and it is your job is to contact them, take all the rejection (it's inevitable), send out review copies, do all the follow up and set up all interviews. If you choose this option, you really can't go back to a full campaign. By the time you figure out you might be over your head, the leads are cold and no publicist wants to find out that a media contact already turned down a client but the author forgot to pass that along.

Do your research and ask lots of questions and you should be fine with whomever you choose. Above all, trust your instincts because it's your money.