Brandwashing

Tip of the Day: A huge thank you to everyone who's liked our Author2Author Facebook page!

I've been reading Brandwashed by Martin Lindstrom, all about why we buy what we buy. He has some interesting thoughts. Basically, consumers are overwhelmed by choices. Marketers spend a lot of time narrowing down our choices so we'll buy more. That's the point of a bestseller list. It gives you the illusion that there are really only 20 books you need to worry about choosing from. It's also the point of e-book sites' "Top Staff Picks" (usually the top staff picks are the songs, movies, and books who have PAID to be the top staff picks).

In one experiment, Lindstrom went into a major bookstore chain and asked the employees to get rid of six of the seven display tables up front. Within a week, sales went up by 2%.

People want to buy curated things, things that have been approved, and no amount of corporate money carries the weight of good recommendations. People trust consumer recommendations more than anything else. No wonder we've been hearing about book recommendation scandals.

So what are we supposed to do to market ourselves? We can't fake scarcity in the e-book world; there will always be enough copies. But we can get people talking about us. We can tweet our good reviews and get people to like us on Facebook. (Lindstrom is huge believer in the power of Facebook.)

But I'm very, very curious to know if it's better for an author to have all her books on sale or just one of them. Sometimes B&N offers an author of the month (Nook Spotlight), and all of his or her works go on sale electronically. (Again, B&N is narrowing choices and creating the illusion that everyone will be reading these books.) Sometimes they only offer one of the author's books on sale. Right now their Spotlight author is Lynsay Sands, and it looks like her first book is on sale for 99 cents and her other books are on sale for $4.99. So it looks like B&N is hedging their bets: all her books are on sale but one is really, really on sale.

Also, e-book or ebook? I'm happy either way.

-- Kate, Miss Perfecting the Pages