Introducing Red Button Publishing

Today I'm delighted to welcome Caroline Goldsmith back to Strictly, talking about new publishing venture Red Button Publishing.

What exactly is Red Button Publishing?
Red Button Publishing is a brand new digital fiction imprint. We are looking for new and exciting writers to work with us. Just like a big red button, we want fiction that is irresistible. We are currently accepting submissions via our website and we hope to make our first writers’ works available this Autumn.

What services are you offering writers? We believe that it takes a team to make a book work. My business partner, Karen Ings, and I have nearly three decades' worth of experience in trade publishing and this is what we can bring to the mix. We can offer full editorial support and collaboration. We will give your book a great cover design and create imaginative marketing material. We will work to promote our titles through our website and via social media, ensuring that every Red Button book has the best chance of meeting the right reader. We also understand that many writers dream of seeing their books in paper format, and we recognise that digital publication can often be a stepping stone to a conventional publishing deal. With this in mind, we will act as literary agents for any of our writers if approached by mainstream publishing houses. We are passionate about fiction, and unlike other companies, we will not charge any upfront fees to read or publish your work.

For writers who prefer to self publish we can offer bespoke services including editorial feedback, proofreading, cover design and digital marketing material and advice on digital publishing and marketing.

What sort of books are looking for – any particular genres or types?
We are happy to consider fiction of any genre. We have already received a variety of submissions including thrillers and literary fiction. Give us a try!

What made you want to set it up? Karen and I have known each other for over ten years, having worked together previously. We are passionate about fiction and about publishing. The digital market opens up a wealth of opportunity for writers but we think there is still a real need for the skills and experience of those who have worked in the publishing industry and really understand what makes books work. We want to use our skills base to make some really great reads and get more writers to their audiences.

Tell us a little bit about your background and that of your business partner?
Karen has worked as an editor in trade publishing for fifteen years, commissioning for the last ten. Recently she has worked freelance for companies like Quercus and Penguin. My background has been in a variety of roles, including sales, marketing and publicity for companies like Aurum Press and more recently Dorling Kindersley/ Penguin Group.

How do you see the company progressing?
We want Red Button to become synonymous with great fiction and we want the writers associated with our brand to realise their full potential.

Many people see the current publishing industry as in decline – do you agree? How has the market changed since you started out and how do you think it will change in future?
We’ve seen so many changes to our industry during the span of our careers. Digital has certainly been the biggest change for some time and has already changed the way the industry functions. The direct relationship between reader and publisher is becoming more important and more open. What you should realise about the publishing industry though, is that in the most part, it is run by people with a real passion for books. It’s not the industry to join if you want to make your fortune! These people have skills, creativity and experience that are crucial to the production of quality literature. Publishing will adapt and change but as an industry, it will survive in one form or another.

What is the number one piece of advice you would give to writers who are trying to get their books out there, either through a publisher or on their own?Always, always work with an editor.

Caroline Goldsmith
@redbuttonpubs
redbuttonpublishing.net

 

Guest post: Justine Solomons of Byte The Book

Justine Solomons of Byte the Book kindly agreed to answer some of my questions... take it away, Justine!

Tell us a little about Byte the Book…Byte the Book is a writing and publishing collective with authors at its core. We champion quality writing and embrace opportunities to connect writers with readers in the digital age. Our website seeks to raise the profile of new and established writers and illustrators, while connecting with readers through reviews and discussion forums. Offline, we run networking events for publishers, writers, agents and developers, and book clubs for readers.

The Byte the Book community also encompasses a wide range of complementary services to support its members, including consultancy, PR & marketing, sales partnerships, courses, and editing.

What’s your own background and how did you get started with BTB? I have always had a passion for books; both writing and reading and, more recently, I developed an interest in publishing. I spent nine years working in business development for an IT company, during which time I indulged my passion by writing, enrolling in various writing courses and groups, and co-founding a company set-up to publish shorter fiction, www.apisbooks.com.

In writing groups I was often impressed by the quality of my classmates’ work, yet unimpressed by the lack of opportunities for them to make money. I felt that there must be a way for the writer to profit directly, rather than through existing routes, and thought that I could use my understanding of how technology has disrupted other industries’ business models to help make that happen. So I came up with the concept of a collective for writers who support each other, both online and offline, to publish their writing. I quickly realised that I also needed to bring in readers to balance this ecosystem. 

In 2011 I quit my job, registered Byte the Book as a company and started building the website. I also took various consultancy roles in the publishing industry to help build my knowledge of the business. I launched the website, networking events and book clubs in April 2012, and it’s grown from there.

Who do you envision as your target audience?
Essentially Byte the Book consists of two overlapping audiences: readers and creators.

The latter forms the nucleus of the Byte the Book membership - those that come to the networking events and take an active part in the community. This is mainly made up of aspiring and established writers, publishing professionals, agents, editors, developers, illustrators, entrepreneurs and investors who want to understand more about new digital opportunities.

The website reaches both audiences. There are book reviews and impartial recommendations for readers as well as information on how to find or set up one of our book clubs. The site is also a place for writers and illustrators to showcase their work and for agents to discover new talent.

Our book clubs are free and open to anyone who wants to chat about books. I’m also working on creating a more specialised book club for writers.

How do people get involved?Byte the Book is an active community that welcomes new members. Anyone who is interested can book to come to a networking event or book club here.

Writers can send in a short story or excerpt and we’ll consider it for the writers’ showcase. Writers interested in reviewing books should also get in touch.

We’re looking to add editors, illustrators and other publishing freelancers to our network, so they should get in touch and, ideally, attend a networking event.

What has the reaction been so far – has anything surprised you?

Overwhelmingly positive. I’ve been amazed how quickly our name has spread in the industry and how well-attended our events are. Writers have found agents, people have found work, and the attendees have been very positive about the calibre of speakers, topics and networking opportunities. We’ve had over 3,000 unique visitors to the website since it went live and we are now starting to generate revenue through membership subscriptions, sponsorship and tickets for the networking events. My biggest surprise is how quickly it has all grown.

Have there been any learning curves on the way – anything you’d do differently?It has all been a very steep learning curve but it also feels as though I’m incorporating all my past experience. Sometimes I wish I’d started BtB earlier, but then I realise that I probably wouldn’t have been ready to do it then. 

Many people think mainstream publishing is in crisis – do you think it will survive the digital revolution?
It’s in flux, not crisis. An evolution more than a revolution: not unlike the Guttenberg press automating production, which meant monks were no longer required to handwrite manuscripts; and not unlike Allen Lane taking books to the common man with the first Penguin paperbacks. New technology and social media allow more access to more content and connect readers more closely with writers. These advances broaden the publishing landscape and present huge opportunities for writers to earn more from their work. As Joanna Penn said at a Future Human event recently,  ‘The readers, not the publishers, are now the gatekeepers’.

At the moment there is still a stigma to digital-only publishing; do you think that will change?Yes, I do. I think it is a mistake for people to separate “Digital” from “Traditional”. Technology adds new and alternative routes to market and any successful author or publisher should be embracing the most relevant combination of routes for them. Personally, I prefer to read digitally, but it’s the ideas in books that are important to me, not the format of those books, and I’m keen for those ideas to be delivered efficiently to as wide an audience as possible.

How do you see Byte the Book progressing?I’d like it to become a one-stop-shop for writers to realise their writing ambitions: the place to get support and professional advice on their work, to learn how to embrace new technologies, to find an agent or publisher, or advice on self publishing. And we envisage both readers and writers coming to Byte the Book to find out about new books and to connect with like-minded readers.

It would be great if, in years to come, people view Byte the Book as a company that has broken down barriers in publishing and contributed to the democratisation of the book in the digital age.

 

Justine Solomons, Founder of Byte the Book

justine@bytethebook.com
@justinesolomons
@bytethebook
#bytethebook
http://www.linkedin.com/in/justinesolomons

Marketing the Intangible - Chris Chalmers

Marketing the Intangible. Or How I Unleashed My E-novel on a Largely Indifferent World.

If anyone ought to have an inkling of how to sell something that isn’t actually there, it’s me. I’ve spent a fair few of my 20-odd years as an advertising copywriter selling mortgages, pet insurance, mobile phone tariffs and a dozen other things that don’t, in any physical sense, exist. And isn’t that also the case with an e-book? Don’t be fooled by that sexy little thumbnail on Amazon – beyond the boundaries of your digitally generated Kindle screen, there’s nothing there at all...

Chris Chalmers, author of Five to One

I was thrilled to be published, of course – it had been a long old slog, as it is for most of us. But when I heard that Five To One had won a debut novel comp run by a digital publisher and was going to see e-print at last, there was no stopping that irksome voice at the back of my head from popping a few champagne bubbles with the words:  Oh, well you’ll not be signing any copies of that then...

It’s true, e-publication comes with one or two drawbacks that the print-endowed are spared... Elderly relatives ask you endlessly when your book’s out in paperback... There’s no wobbly stack of copies to manoeuvre an hour early into readings, so you can bag the best spot on the table... And as you sound out your local bookshop for a little light publicity, they look at you like you’ve just suggested squatting in their window and gnawing on the ankle of a tethered E. L. James. (On second thoughts, they’d probably go for that on grounds of brand-appropriateness – hers, not mine...)

So how do you publicise an e-book? Answer: You take stock of what you’ve got and you run with it.

Non-fiction’s easier, obviously. Write a book about Ju Jitsu and, a few clicks on from Google, you’ve got the email address of every club in the UK and beyond.  With fiction, it’s harder to find your audience. But, as a clever publishing friend of mine pointed out, my novel had one thing going for it: location, location, location... Five To One is set in London SW4, and it traces the path of four lives that converge when a helicopter crashes on Clapham Common at 12.55 on a sunny afternoon.

Aha, Clapham Common! Kindle-Central if ever there was one...

Back on Google and four days later I’m taking delivery of 5,000 full colour, double sided postcards, just perfect for pushing through letterboxes and signing for adoring fans. Admittedly the latter hasn’t happened much, and even the former was stymied by the approximately 30% of doors in Clapham South that sport that very un-sporting NO JUNK MAIL sticker (...Junk? My book? How very dare they...) It’s taken three, day-long expeditions – two sunny, one sodden – but nearly all have now been distributed round those chi-chi streets fringing the famous  Common. How my pavement pounding has translated in terms of sales I don’t know for sure, but I did notice a definite blip in the Amazon rankings within a day or two of each door-drop.

On top of that, I’ve inveigled myself into readings and onto author panels at venues as diverse as the Royal Festival Hall, The Hootenanny pub in Brixton and The Ivy Club in WC2. I’ve had an article in Writing Magazine (where I came across the fateful competition in the first place; hey, it may look like Woman’s Realm but it’s all good stuff...) I’m now on my fourth local radio interview, and continuing to blog, tweet and FB myself into the consciousness of as many people as possible. That said, the social media thing is one area I don’t feel I’ve mastered yet. I’m like a wasp trapped in a jam jar, making lots of noise that I’m not convinced is projecting very far.

And naturally I’ve taken gratuitous advantage of my advertising roots, by touting a 30 minute presentation round agencies called Published at Last – a Tale of 9 Years, 4 Books and the Small Matter of an E-revolution. Ad agencies like a bit of show-and-tell with their lunch on vaguely arty topics from the outside world (it makes them feel less guilty) and, like everything else, it’s a useful for getting the word out... It’s also furnished me with another nifty publicity idea courtesy of a member of the audience – namely, slipping my Five To One postcard into bookshop copies of John Lanchester’s Clapham-set Capital.

I haven’t had the bottle to do it yet, but it’s a good wheeze. And any other suggestions welcome...

Five to One, by Chris Chalmers

About the writer:

Chris Chalmers arrived unexpectedly following a Beatles' concert at Southport Floral Hall when his mum was induced by the stomping. He's travelled to 40 countries, swum with iguanas and proposed marriage in front of 60 elephants. He was also once the understudy on Mastermind (sadly, no one tripped on the green room stairs). His first novel, Five To One is now available on Amazon and he’s currently looking for a home for the next one. More information at www.chrischalmers.net.

Guest Post: On digital publishing from an industry insider - and lapsed writer

I started my twelve year career in publishing in the heady summer of the year 2000. Working in books was the only logical career choice for me. Prior to this I wrote. I wrote all the time. I finished my first self-illustrated episodic story, about school bullying, at the age of ten. I completed a “novel” at aged fourteen, inexplicably about the mafia (I am not even Italian) and containing perhaps the most unconvincing sex scene in the history of literature. Until “Fifty Shades of Grey” was published, that is. At university I continued, writing heartfelt poems about unrequited love, frustrated intellect and bohemian stuff. Then, I got my first job in publishing and the writing stopped.

It wasn’t just seeing the brutality of the slush pile first hand that caused me to change my views. Wandering the halls of the annual book fairs, I couldn’t help but be astounded and somehow disheartened by the sheer number of books that are published every year. How, I asked myself, can my voice be heard above all this noise? And then, there are those writers, those brilliant voices, that inexplicably fail. As a publisher, you believe in the writer, you believe in the book, you promote the hell out of it and yet still the copies just don’t sell. And at the end of the day, that is what publishing is, the business of selling books. When books don’t sell, they are remaindered, they are pulped, they are listed as out of print, they are forgotten. Suddenly it seemed a bit pointless to be churning out my mediocre words into a clearly disinterested world. So rather than add to my piles of unread prose, I hid my writer’s heart away.

This is not to say that I have spent the last decade in bleak despair. Publishing is one of the most vibrant and exciting industries to work in and right now it is going through a period of immense change. For decades publishers have acted as gatekeepers for what is and isn’t read. Unpublished writers were, for the most part, unread writers. Digital publishing means that writers, instead of poring over endless rejection letters, can put their work out there - and what better way to get the attention of those distant commissioning editors than a bestselling Kindle novel? Of course, self-publishing is in no way a sure-fire way to success. If anything, the clamour of voices has become louder and harder to navigate. But the digital world has given us one thing: more opportunities to reach our readers.

So, armed with this sliver of hope and opportunity, I have slowly been starting up my writing hand again. It’s been hard. I am rusty, wracked with self-doubt and a heap of healthy cynicism, but I am doing it. I am writing.

Caroline - an industry veteran now 'jumping the fence'

About the writer:

Having spent twelve years in the publishing industry, Caroline Goldsmith has spent her life surrounded by books. She has worked in sales, publicity, marketing, rights and contracts and has spent more time at bookfairs and hauling suitcases full of hardbacks around Europe then she cares to remember. She has now left publishing to embark on a new life in the country, where she plans to rekindle her long-neglected writing habit and finally unleash that novel that has been hiding in her on an unsuspecting world. You can follow her adventures on her blog These Are My Days, or on Twitter @goldcaro