Beyond the Book Podcast: How to Turn Book Signings into a Full-Time Income

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First, I have a PSA and an, an exciting one. Author Marketing Superpowers is right about to launch. It's 50 essential concepts to supercharge your income and readership with beautiful illustrations.
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Now, the illustrations are gonna be available on the physical cards that are coming out on Kickstarter. You can back the Kickstarter at the link in the description. It's going live in the next few days.
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But I'm giving the e-book and audiobook away completely for free to all of you. If you follow the Beyond the Book podcast, either on YouTube or wherever you listen to podcasts, the audio and video will be uploaded there.
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Likewise, I'll also be sharing the e-book with everyone on my Author Sidekick newsletter, which you can join for free in the link in the description.
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Super excited for it, and depending on when you're listening to this podcast, if it's sometime in the future, Marketing Superpowers book might already be live.
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It really distills everything I've learned marketing my own 12 science fiction novels, helping thousands of authors, reaching readers, building community of super fans, and working for MrBeast over the last six or seven months and learning how the largest creator in the world grows.
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So I've got a lot of insights to share with you, and they're distilled in some really cool, very easy to understand superpowers that you can pull out at any time and reference back, and hopefully will just allow you to grow faster and that will make you happier and live a better life as a storyteller.
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Now, we have something fun to talk about today, something that I've been very curious about, which is how do you make a living at book signings? How can you actually make really good money doing book signings?
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Now, I've talked to multiple authors, multiple author friends who've told me they made, like, $1,000 in a weekend at places like farmer's markets, places that I wouldn't even suspect authors were even at, never mind making really good money.
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And it made me think, "How can I do this? I wanna do this." I remember when I went to my first signing, I maybe made, like, $120 in my first day. I had my first book out.
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But then when you counted travel costs, which was, like, maybe $20 in gas, when I counted in, like, my actual book sales, printing costs of it, I maybe was left with $70, which I was happy with, okay?
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That was a victorious day, but it was a far cry from hundreds of dollars day. Then I did a bigger signing, a con in Rochester, New York. I had to travel to it, and I made $480 in book sales off of one book in two hours.
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I should've brought a lot more copies of that book. I probably could've done, like, 1,000 plus easily in revenue. Now, I had a lot of expenses traveling there, and I ended up losing money on the whole signing.
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Ended up meeting a lot of great fans. It was well worth it.
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But I wish I had known then the economics behind book signings, how to be able to find the right events, be able to price your books correctly, and bring the right amount of books that you can actually make money.
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I did not do that in the past, and although signings weren't a disaster for me, they certainly weren't the victory that they could've been.
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And today, I'm bringing on a very special guest, Anna McCluskey, who has some incredible experience at signings. She's done signings throughout pretty much all of Pacific Northwest, and is an urban fantasy author who
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really, that's one of her primary ways she markets herself. Like, Kickstarter and then events tend to be Anna's bread and butter, and really how she gets herself out there and her stories in the world.
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And she has so much incredible insights about how you can actually pick the right events, how you can prepare,
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what books you should be ordering, what you should be pricing your books at, and then once you're at the event, how you're able to actually reach as many readers as possible,
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make money, make a profit, and grow your fan base. It's an amazing episode, and I'm very grateful for Anna for coming on and hanging out with us. Be sure to listen to the end because it's packed with insights.
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And with all that said, let's get into this episode of the Beyond the Book podcast, where we always explore how to help you make money beyond selling books the normal way.
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We try and help you break the rules of publishing so that you can build the business of your dreams. Even if book signings aren't for you, and they certainly aren't for everyone.
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Some of us might not live near cities that have signings. We might not be in a specific place with our health or with our job that allows us to have the free time or flexibility to attend signings.
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So if you're in that boat, and trust me, I've been in that boat as well, it's okay.
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You're gonna learn a lot from this podcast because one, you might do events in the future, and two, even if you never do events, the same principles that allow you to succeed selling at events can help you sell in other online communities, sell at online events, and just even make your book marketing, your product page, and your messaging more effective.
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It's gonna be a lot of fun. When we go beyond the book and put our readers first, a whole new world of opportunity opens up. Let's go beyond the book to some awesome events today.
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Anna, it is so amazing to be here with you today.
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We go back a long way in this industry, and I've always loved being able to work with you and all of your insights on many things in publishing, but today with a focus on, I know one of your particular strong suits, which is selling books at events.
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And before I even dive into
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how we can all sell books at events and what that can look like for us as authors, I'd love to hear a little bit about your author journey, and specifically how you've been able to sell your books at events. Yes.
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I write urban fantasy, which is a genre that does really well at, like, comic cons and fan expos and things like that, very, like, nerd-centric sort of things. So it just made sense to me to start with.
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I live in Oregon, so I'm doing, like, the Rose City Comic Cons was where I started. And then when I first decided to do that, I applied for the big con, and then I was like, "You know what?
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I should do some smaller stuff first."
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[laughs] And I actually, I run a local writer's group here in the mid-Willamette Valley, and so we were meeting at this gaming coffee shopFor a while, which unfortunately is no longer there, but they were doing these little craft fairs every month that were very like, again, nerd focused.
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And I decided I was just gonna set up a table at one of those. As it turned out, that weekend was like, something else was going on in the area, and so like it was very small.
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There were four of us set up in this craft fair. My mother-in-law bought one of my books, and then one other pers- But it was, in a way, it was perfect because it was just a practice run.
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It was in a place I felt comfortable, it was small, and I'm pretty introverted, so it was nice to just not have to be on for... When you're at a con, it's three days of eight hour, 12 hour days of just person.
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And so it was cool to ease into that.
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And then I think a couple weeks later, I did, like, another market that was, again, a local, smaller, and that one was significantly bigger than the Citadel Oasis Craft Fair, but it, it was still small, and at that one, I did make a profit, and that was really a great feeling.
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And more than that, I connected with people. You talk about we're selling our books at events, but for me, that's the gravy.
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It's great to sell the books and it's great to make a profit, and in fact, obviously I'm not gonna go back to an event that I haven't made a profit at, but it's more about the connection with the readers for me.
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And I think that's a virtuous cycle, too, because the people meet the author, and you're really happy to meet them, and you're excited, and you wanna talk about what other books you've read and, or they've read, and what kind of stuff they like, and, like, why they decided to talk to you in particular with all these other authors around, and they connect with you, they get excited, they read your books.
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And so it's this virtuous cycle and, yeah, it's fun.
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Like, when I think about that second market that I was just talking about, at the very end of the day, there was this guy walking by and I'm, I will talk to every single person who walks by, whether they look like my target market or not.
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And it was the end of the day, and I was tired, and this guy's walking by, and he's, I don't know, probably in his late 50s, early 60s, long, greasy hair, and a hippie kinda guy, and I'm just like, "This is not my target market," but I'm just like, "Hey, how do you feel about fantasy books?"
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And he stopped, and he started talking about his daughter, who he, his ex has been keeping her away from him, and he's really upset about it, but she loves fantasy books, and she's a teenager, and she's, "Would your books be good for her?"
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And I was like, "Yeah, absolutely. I have plenty of teen readers." And so he bought an entire series. And then a few months later, I was doing another event locally, and I, I recognized him.
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I said, "Hey, how's your daughter?" And he was just, like, blown away that I remembered, and he was like, "I sent her the books. I never heard from her about them, but I'm gonna buy your other series."
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And so he has now bought my entire catalog, 'cause I have two series. Soon to be three, but yay. And yeah, it's, like, that connection. That connection is really great. Wow.
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So what a cool story to have someone gifting their books, or your books, and I think that's a really interesting thing to note is, like, you could be seeing someone who might not, quote unquote, "look like your type of reader," which they, first of all, might be.
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Yeah. We always think, oh, they don't seem like the type of person who'd be into these books, but you never know. But then the second part is maybe they have someone in their life who would be. That is so interesting.
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Now, I wanna go to the one key thing you mentioned, which is that you are an introvert, which I think most writers share in that.
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But with that, what a scary thing to do to then get up in front of people at a signing and sell, in person to people, talk about your stories in person. How do you make these sorts of cons work as an introvert?
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Especially when, like, you've referenced some eight and 12 hour days. That feels like it could be really draining. Yeah. So I have a couple of advantages in that area, I must confess.
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So for one thing, I spent a good 20 years working in the food service industry, and even before I did author events, I did events as a food vendor on behalf of cafes that I worked at. I catered events. I was a bartender.
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I was a barista. I, I tried to be a server for a while, but I'm not good at approaching people. For me, this works well because it's the same as bartending or baristing.
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There's a table in between me and the people, and they're approaching me. But yeah, so I have that background of putting on this character of this is my public face.
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And when I say it's a character, I'm still being myself, but I'm being this version of myself that is focused on being of service to people, I guess, and if that makes sense.
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And then the other advantage I do have is, um, a background in theater as well. So that kind of also reinforces that idea of a character.
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But I would encourage, you know, authors who don't have those advantages to think about it in those terms, you know? You could always take an acting class, for example, online, like that would be super easy.
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Or do an improv course at like your local community center or something. I think that would be really helpful for anybody who wants to do events.
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And then as far as the fact that I worked in food service, even if you haven't done that, you've interacted with food service workers.
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Think about last time you went to your favorite coffee shop, how the baristas behaved toward you, toward other customers, bartenders, servers, whoever.
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Even retail workers, although it's a different kind of vibe, I think.
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But that kind of, they seem to be really happy to see you, whether they are or not, and they, very focused on you are the person I'm talking to right now. We're gonna have a pleasant conversation.
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And I think that can really be applied to author events, of each person who approaches your table, or even who just walks by your table, that's the person you're interacting with right now, and you're going to have a pleasant interaction, damn it.
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And I think that energy can really make or break a, an event.
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Yeah, no, the energy is key, and I can see it, especially if someone's walking up to you, this sort of, okay, we're here, I'm gonna give this person my full attention.
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But you also have said a few times, like, if someone's just walking by, you also talk to them.
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If someone's just walking by, not necessarily looking at your booth or just glancing at it, but not walking over to it, how do you approach that conversation with them?Yeah, so I just say, "Hey, how do you feel about fantasy books?"
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That's my hook. And that can work for any books. How do you feel about romance books? Or if you're at a romance convention, how do you feel about second chance books?
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Like, whatever your trope is, whatever your subgenre is. I use fantasy because even though my subgenre's urban fantasy, a lot of people who read fantasy read across the board, and it's just, it's a shorter sentence.
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Like, the less you can say to b- draw someone in, especially as they're walking past, and I'm not doing this for people who are, like, clearly on their way to somewhere.
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Like, at a big con, you've got people who are just like- Yeah... I gotta get to this panel or whatever.
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But people who are browsing, even if they're not pausing, you can just wave them over, and sometimes they'll just go, "Mm," and that's fine. You move on to the next one.
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But, like, I've legit sold books to people who, when I say, "How do you feel about fantasy?" Go, "Oh, I don't really like it." Like, I've sold books to people who've said that.
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You know, I'll start talking about, like, my one series that's more of, like, almost a paranormal rom-com kind of situation. I'll be like, "What about this? Do you like this?"
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Or I've had people come over and, again, be like, "Oh, I don't like it, but you know what? Like, my sister-in-law is a really big fan. Do you have a bookmark or whatever?"
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And you never know if that's gonna pan out, and if nothing else, that person has had a good interaction with you.
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And so when they talk to their sister-in-law, they're gonna be like, "I don't know anything about these books, but she seems cool." And this is obviously pure speculation.
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I don't have anybody who's come up, up to my booth and been like, "My sister-in-law said you were cool," but I think that's...
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Although I have, ooh, I did have somebody, this was, like, one of my favorite moments at any event. So I was at Pride Fest a couple years ago.
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I'm selling my books, and the booth next to me was, like, I don't know, soaps or something like that.
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It was just all local queer-owned businesses, and this person was standing at the, the next booth over, just browsing, and they glanced over, and they did a double take, and I was like, all right, book lover, yay.
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And so they come over and I got my little spiel ready, and I was like, "Hi, how's it going? How do you feel about fantasy books?" And they lean in, and they go, "Did you write these?" I was like, "Yeah."
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And people are often astonished that you've written books, so I didn't really think anything of it, but I was like, "Yeah, I'm Anna. These are my books." And they go, "I love your books." And I was like, oh.
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And then they started talking about how their brother had bought my books at another local event or bought one of them, and they read it, and then bought the rest online or whatever, and I was like, "I've got some merch.
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Do you want some merch?" [laughs] Yeah. And I just, I just stuffed a bunch of stuff at them. I was so excited. I was like, "Here's a pin, and here's a little lens cleaner. You can pretend it's for your sword."
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And some stuff, you know? [laughs] That's the best, getting to...
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Now you've now turned that, that person who already loved your stories into someone who's just, they'll always remember that moment that they're like, "Wait, that's actually the author. The, that's Anna. Whoa."
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And I guess that's another funny thing too, like, readers don't always know what you look like if they haven't seen you before. Yeah. So it is a surprise. That's really cool.
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Now, going to one of the first things you said, you mentioned you go to nerdy events or obviously places where you could find fantasy readers, urban fantasy readers, Comic Cons, et cetera, right?
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I can see those events being great for you. I might see those events being less great for a thriller author, for maybe someone writing nonfiction.
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So out of curiosity, do you think there's certain genres that do better at event selling, 'cause there's more events and more signings geared towards them? Or have you seen events for almost every genre out there?
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Yeah, I have definitely seen events for every genre out there. First off, there are events that aren't even book events that you can go to. I do a lot of, like, craft fairs, makers market.
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I've seen authors at farmers markets.
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I've never personally done one, but I feel like that would be really good for a small town romance author or something that appeals to a wider audience, something that is potentially...
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Think about where your readers are. If you look at your target market and go, you know what? These people are probably shopping at farmers markets. Go to a farmers market. Christmas markets are really great for books.
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I've done a fair amount of Chri- Christmas markets. Obviously, those are only happening November, early December, but if you can get into a couple there. There's art festivals.
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In the summertime, a lot of small towns will do these big art festivals that draw in people from all over the surrounding areas. Sometimes towns will do them every week.
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Sometimes towns will do them once a year, things like that, and you're probably going to be the only author there, or one of two or three, depending on how large the event is, and sometimes that can be an advantage too, because anybody who likes to read is gonna come to your booth.
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And then there's other festivals too. There's really niche ones, like, you've got, like, strawberry festivals. Maybe you have a character who is a strawberry farmer.
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That's very specific, but thinking outside the box that way can be really beneficial. There's UFO festivals. If you write space opera or first contact or something like that, those would be fantastic.
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Ren fairs are really good for epic fantasy writers. I haven't done a ren fair.
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I've heard of other urban fantasy authors doing ren fairs because, again, it's just nerdy, but, but I think for an epic fantasy author, that would be phenomenal. I've seen steampunk festivals.
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I've seen, there's Facebook groups out there that are, like, if you're, I'm a member of two Willamette Valley based Facebook groups that are just connecting vendors and ev- event organizers.
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So people will post, "I'm having this event such and such a date at such and such a place. Here's the application." Or you can post, "I'm an author of such and such genre.
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I'm looking for places to go," and organizers will comment and go, "Yeah, you know what? You'd be a great fit for my market next month," or whatever.
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I do these markets sometimes called The Market for the Strange, that's, like, just oddities, so that's a very niche kind of thing that really doesn't apply to most authors, but does to me.
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So whatever you're writing, there's gonna be something that is geared toward you.
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Whether they know it or not, whether you know it or not, you're gonna be a perfect fitAnd then again, there's those general kinds of makers markets, Christmas markets, et cetera.
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Also, bookstores will have, sometimes they'll want just one author to come as a signing. A lot of bookstores will have little book fair kind of things too every once in a while that have five or six authors.
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Usually they're not huge, but that's again an advantage because there's not as much competition. Not that you're in competition with your fellow authors, but- Yeah, that- So yeah, there's...
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If you're not writing Comic-Con te- style books, you can still sell at events, absolutely, 100%. That's so cool to hear.
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And I also know a few authors who have, they, they end up becoming friends, but they'll contact a local restaurant and end up getting in touch with the manager, and the rest- the local restaurant might say, "Hey, yeah, on Fridays we'll have the live music at 7:00.
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You can sign from 6:00 to 7:00." And as all this foot traffic's coming in there, they're just, "Hey, there's an author here. Why not show up?" And they can then advertise that to get people to come in.
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So thinking outside the box is exactly right. And you gave me so many, like, wild ideas. Thinking of all the different categories, how would you recommend someone, like, actually go out and find these events?
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Like, just Google blank maker fairs in X state or X city? Yeah. So think about what kind of radius you want. Are you willing to travel 50 miles? Are you willing to travel longer distances?
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Are you just looking for something in your particular area? And then Google that area, whether it's the city you live in, whether it's the region, the state, however long you are willing to travel, and then Google.
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You can try craft fairs. You can try makers market is another big one. Artisan fairs, art fairs, craft fair. You can also say book fairs, author events, bookstores.
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You could call bookstores too and say they're probably aware of what kind of authorly sort of events are going on, if that's specifically what you're looking for. You can call local bookstores, say, "I'm a local author.
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I'm looking for events. Do you know of anything, and also do you want me to come and do a signing?" Kill two birds with one stone. You can also look on the websites of event venues.
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A lot of times they will have upcoming events. Some of them will be events that are already full and you can't apply for them, but those are often recurring events as well.
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And you can look at this and go, "Okay, this market happens every three months. I'm gonna apply for the next one." And a lot of times they'll have a link on there for the event website.
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That will give you where you can go to apply. There's also, like, local groups. You've got community boards at coffee shops. You've got Facebook groups.
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You've got Nextdoor, Meetup, all kinds of groups like that that can be focused on just what's happening in your area, and that can be really helpful as well. Incredible.
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Yeah, that's so great and so many different places to start there.
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And now I'm thinking to myself, as I'm building out this list of potential events, maybe now looking to go, uh, apply to some places, or some places obviously have different booth fees, which we can talk a little bit more about, like, the economics of this in a second.
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But what I'm really curious about is there's that friction of going to your first event.
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Like, you're at this point where I know you've at least got some signage, you've got some merch and swag, you've got some books on hand, or you could order some more books on hand.
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You have your own process for this is how an Anna McCloskey signing works, wherever I do that signing. Maybe you adjust it.
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But for an author who's, like, just getting started with events, they probably don't have any of that.
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So what would be your advice to someone who's, "Okay, I wanna dip my toes into signing, but I don't necessarily wanna go out of pocket and spend hundreds and hundreds of dollars on all the signage and all the bells and whistles.
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If I, I could eventually do that if I decide I like it." But for that first signing, how do you recommend getting started? What do I need to bring as an author to my first signing?
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Yeah, that's a really good question, and it drives me crazy when people try and act like you need all of this stuff for an event.
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And, like, it is, like you say, it's nice to have that stuff, and eventually you do wanna have that stuff.
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But I have been to plenty of events where I've seen people around me selling, you know, books or anything else, and they literally have a table with a cloth on it and their stuff, like, that they're selling. That's it.
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Awesome. And they're selling things. Like, that's fine. You can totally do that. My first event, I got a banner, like one of those standup banners, which are not very expensive, by the way.
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You can get them from Vistaprint. They're not great quality, but it's I think $200 for the banner, which can be prohibitive. And so if you don't have $200 to spare, then don't fucking worry about it. Just- Yeah... go.
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You can get a tablecloth. The tablecloth that I use for my things, and people are always like, "Oh, you should have a custom tablecloth that has your branding and everything."
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I got this tablecloth from Big Lot for $3, and I'm still using it. It's gray and white, so it stands out against everybody else who has black. And those aren't necessarily my branding colors.
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I use a lot of purple in my branding, but I, who cares? Nobody who is coming to these events is, "Her tablecloth is gray." No. [laughs] Like, they're not gonna not come up to your table, you know what I mean?
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And if anything, like I say, you can stand out because a lot of people at these booths have so much stuff going on, and so it's like if you're a little bit simpler, you can stand out a little bit.
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So the setup that I use now is I have this gray tablecloth.
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I have this little, like, wooden crate thing that I picked up at a thrift store for, I think, $5 that I put, like, some books in, so it's like a little display thing. And then, like, on top of it, I put my bundles.
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So I have, like, my two series, and I'll tie each series together with a ribbon to show, like, these are complete series and also indicate that, like, you can buy them as a bundle.
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And then I have each of my series laid out at the front of the table as well, so people can pick them up easily and look at them.
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And I have a, a sign that has a QR code for my reader magnet, and then to follow me on Facebook, Instagram, and Kickstarter. And I think that's it.
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That's all I really put on my table, and it can vary from place to place.
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Some events are more merch friendly, and so I will put out some enamel pins and things like that.But for the most part, I hold those back in case somebody asks for them, but I don't necessarily put them out.
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Oh, and then I do have a little rack of little cards that I use to sell e-books. I just have a code on the back that people can download the e-book once they've bought the card. But yeah, that's it.
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And then behind me I have my big banner thing, but- Love it. Yeah. What you do need, I will say, is some kind of point of sale situation. That you absolutely need for your first event. Although, actually, no.
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I have a friend who did their first event with just Venmo, and to be fair, they were sharing a table with me, and I had my point of sale, so any time somebody was like, "I don't have the..."
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They were like, "You know what? Go talk to Anna, she'll help you out." And so I, I would ring it up. But you don't have to. Like, you can have...
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I've seen people with just, like, a QR code for Venmo and one for PayPal or whatever. Like, you can totally do that. But it is better probably to have the point of sale. So I use Square. It's free to s- get started.
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You can just download the app, sign up for an account, and they, they take money out once you've sold things. It's like a percentage. It's pretty standard. Um, they'll send you a free swipey thing.
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If you want the tap and, and insert one, you have to pay for it, but I think it's like $10. Um, but you can also, like, if you have it on your phone, y- people can tap on your phone. It's real easy.
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Um, it's 2025, like the technology is there. It's easy to do. You can take credit cards, you can take cash, you can... I always tell people whenever they come up and go, "Do you take such and such?"
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Any way you wanna give me your money, I'll take it. So yeah, just have a variety of ways to, for people to pay, and that's really it. And books. You need books.
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Yeah, yeah, the books is huge, and that advice around, like giving people permission to like, hey, you don't need to get all decked out and fancy, you just need to spend $3 on, or some- around $3 on a tablecloth.
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And then obviously, and we'll talk about ordering inventory, 'cause that's important. Whatever product you're gonna sell, you need to have there. Which of course makes sense. But that's it.
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This isn't a massive investment out of pocket. It's your time, it's your energy, and that's big. Um, but you don't need to spend all that money. And I love that you bring up Square, and like point of sale.
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That's, I think, really important.
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But I, similar to the authors that you've noted doing PayPal and Venmo, at my first signing back in 2018, it was at a teen book festival in Rochester, New York, and I literally, yeah, I think it was just Venmo and cash.
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I had nothing set up like that. And I'd say that like the, what sold the books at the signing were, was my energy and was people's interest in talking to me, 'cause I was talking to people.
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It was not the, you don't have like X way to pay. Yes, you should go set, get set something up like Square, 'cause it's easy and simple. I wish I knew about it back then, 'cause it, it was around back then.
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I, I found out about it soon after. But you can easily go and do these things yourself. There's almost... It's almost so easy to get started that if it's interesting to you, it can be a really cool thing.
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But then there is the question of how do we make our money back in these events? I love your kind of framing of it. Like you view it like marketing.
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The goal isn't necessarily to make money, but the goal certainly isn't to lose money. But obviously if you can make money, that's a great thing. So I'm with you on that.
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But then thinking about that, what have been some of your best events in the past, and what have been some of your worst events?
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'Cause I think the first, and before we even think about how much books to order and all of that is like, where do we even... What even looks like a profitable event? Yeah.
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So to me, and this is obviously gonna vary for everybody, but to me a profitable event is if I make back booth fee plus $200. And that's a very baseline thing.
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Like that is, it is rare that I do that badly, that I only make back booth fee plus $200. I- And that's on book sales. Yeah. Let's say you sell it for 15, the printing cost was five, that's in addi- yep.
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Yeah, that's net sales. Beautiful. Not gross. Perfect. But yeah. The thing is, like these event planners generally know how to set their booth fee.
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Like they know, you can look at the booth fee and gauge how large of an event it is gonna be, if that makes sense. And there are exceptions to that.
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I've definitely seen events where I'm like, I, there's no way in hell I'm gonna make back that 150 plus $200. No, come on.
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But a small event should be $75 tops, and then of course you have cons, which can run in like the 300 to 600 range, depending on what the event is, what kind of table you're getting.
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'Cause you can get the regular tables, you can get the corner tables, which I don't recommend, although I did accidentally. They, they put me on a corner table for a con, and that was pretty sweet.
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But I wouldn't pay for it. And another thing you can do too with those big cons that have the higher threshold of booth fee, is you can share a table, which I usually do.
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I have another, I have an author friend who lives in Portland who I share a table with at the large cons. I pay the booth fee. She doesn't contribute to it.
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But you can definitely have somebody split it, and then her contribution as far as my booth goes, is that she helps with the sales, and she's not like a serious author. She just has a hobby kind of situation.
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But, um, it's really easy to split those fees, and that's generally encouraged by the event. The splitting fees? Brilliant. Yeah.
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Like I wouldn't do it for a small market, but for a big con, like honestly, it's worth it to me just to have somebody else at my table.
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Because like I can get up, and I do a lot of panels at these events too, so I can go do my panel, and I don't have to worry about, "Oh no, somebody's gonna come by.
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I'm gonna miss these sales," because Jamie's there and she's selling my books as well as hers. And vice versa. She can get up and use the restroom or get some food, and I'm selling her books too.
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When you pick a person to share a booth with-You wanna make sure that your books are different enough that it's not weird for you to [laughs] like sell their books.
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We both write urban fantasy, but hers are like, they've got some romance in them, and mine don't, and so it's if somebody comes up and they're looking for romance, I'm not gonna try and sell them my book.
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I'm gonna be like, "Hey, talk to Jamie," because I want the reader to have a great experience. So I would recommend same genre, different tropes kinda thing for that. I feel like we're getting off topic, though.
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We were talking [laughs] about managing costs.
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All that's so important, though, 'cause it's one of the key ways to manage costs is working with, work, working with another author, and I think you shared some awesome advice on working with authors, and I'm, I'm really with you on the event fees too.
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It, it's a lot about gauging. Like a higher fee doesn't necessarily mean you're not gonna make your money back.
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It's more so about looking at past traffic, if you can talk to vendors who've been there before, if, if you're able to see past vendors. But then I- That reminds me, actually.
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Another really great way to find more events is to talk to people at the events you're already doing. Mm-hmm. Because chances are, if they're at one event with you, they're in the same niche as you.
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What, even if they're not selling books, I've definitely found some really great events just by talking to my neighbors, and I do this other market every couple months. You should... You'll do really well there.
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And then I pass along that same advice to other people if I see somebody who I think will do great at an event, and especially if they're just starting out. I love, "Hey, you're gonna do great. Let's talk about do."
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I love that. That's s- that's such great advice. Like lean on the people around you. Lean on your creative friends.
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They don't have to be writing books, but whatever they are creating and, and selling at these places is a good spot.
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Now, inventory is the next question, 'cause I think that's, for me, it's been challenging for me to gauge in the past. I certainly have ordered too few books for an event.
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I've ordered too much, which too much is weird, because as long as you can afford the too much, you can always sell too much at a later event.
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But I have ordered too little, which was disappointing, 'cause it felt like money on the table. So how do you gauge inventory? And I know you have multiple series, so you gotta think about book one, two, and three.
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You've got bundles going on. Yeah, walk me through how you think about ordering books and inventory ahead of an event. Yeah. My goal with inventory is always to almost sell out. Not quite sell out, but almost sell out.
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I do bring along cards with QR codes to a Google Form if somebody wants to order a book that I don't have on me.
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If I sell out of, of say, the rest of a series and they can only buy book one, I will have them scan it if they want to fill out the form, and then I will order those books for them.
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They'll pay for them there, then and there, and then I'll send them to them. I've only had a couple of people take me up on that, but that's a couple of sales I wouldn't have made.
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I tend to, I used to try to switch it up for different events of okay, this is a smaller event, I'm gonna order s- smaller amount.
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Now I just have the same amount on hand at all times, and I just bring everything to an event, because you never know.
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I did, the first time I did a Pride Fest, I didn't think I was gonna sell very much, 'cause I was like, "Nobody's going to Pride to buy books. I'm just gonna meet some cool people, and it'll be great," and I sold out.
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Yeah, I do well [laughs] at said. So ever since then, I'm like, I'm not gonna try to guess. I'm just gonna bring the same amount, and that doesn't apply to large cons.
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I do bring about twice as many books to a large con, like a three-day event. But like for a market, I bring 15 of each of my first in series.
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So I have two series, so that's 30 total of the, the first in series, and then- Okay...
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10 each of book two, because you have a lot of people who will come up and say, "I bought book one at this last event," and they wanna buy book two.
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I haven't found as many people coming up and saying, "I bought books one and two. I want book three."
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I think once people get to book three, they'll order it online or whatever, 'cause they're that, they're invested at that point. But I do sell a fair amount at this point of book two.
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I didn't at first, obviously, because people hadn't bought book one yet. But so now I do 10 each of the book two, and then five each of the rest of the book, books three, four, five, or just three if in the trilogy.
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Yeah, and then I have little cards for e-books. I sell maybe two or three e-books per event, but it doesn't take very much to just bring the cards, so I still do it. Yeah, so that's my inventory for a small event.
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Like I said, a con I'll bring about twice.
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And then I also will put little cards in the back of each of the book one, uh, so that if somebody buys it, it takes it to, takes them to like a, it's got a QR code, it takes them to like a secret page on my PayHip account that is a discount on the rest of the series, and then I put a link on that page, too, in case they decide, "You know what?
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I just wanna buy book two." That'll take them to another secret page that is just, it only goes from that page to just book two, again with a discount.
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And that is really great for, A, selling more books, and B, tracking read-through, because the only way somebody can get to that page is by the card that came in book one from an event. Brilliant. The card is so awesome.
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It's, yeah, you're basically able to say, "Oh, okay, I know I sold 50 of book one out of, at various events," at, at, at the minimum what your read-through is, because of course you could have people not using a QR code to still buy it, but at least you have a, a minimum, which is really cool.
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Now, my last question really is, okay, so I now know what kind of books to order, or at least the amount of my books to order.
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Would you say that you need to have three books out to come out to a signing, or if you have just a book one you'll be fine? Yeah, no. You can have a book one.
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Yeah, I, I have, I, I know plenty of people who have gone to their first event with just one book, and, and killed it. And I think- Yeah... part of that, too, is that you're a new author. Nobody's seen you before.
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Like, that's intriguing. So yeah, I think you can have one book. I would probably not count on making a profit at that event if you only have one book, if that makes sense.
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Because you're not gonna get anybody buying bundles. But itI, I would certainly hope to break even, but I might not count on making that, like extra $200, if that makes sense. Yeah.
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'Cause I, I do sell a fair number of like full series and full set at events, and those, that makes a big difference. Selling one book to one person as opposed to eight books to one person. Yeah. Yeah.
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When it brings your average order value up, so you're able to have less readers come in, but make the same amount or more money. So that- Mm-hmm... it's a huge difference.
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But great to hear that you can still get started building the reader base ultimately, because it sounds like your events build each other.
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If you go to the same event a couple times in a row, you actually get to continue doing better 'cause more people see you, they'll buy future books from you. I love it.
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So then the last, last thing really is just the pricing. What do you price your books at? What do you see other authors price their books at? What would be your recommendations for pricing?
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Obviously, 'cause primarily this is all print, mostly paperbacks, although I guess authors are also selling, they could be selling hardbacks too. So that actually is interesting because I have found...
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So at the, the last event I did, the last large event I did I should say, I had a few copies of my upcoming book, and when I told people, "This is the only place you can get it, this isn't out yet," it sold.
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And so- Sold... I'm planning to start doing special editions of my books, like hardcovers and...
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You can, so I get most of my books printed through IngramSpark, and if you do one page of color in IngramSpark, they charge you color for the whole book. But I found out that BookVault doesn't do that.
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And so I had a special edition printed just to see what it would look like from BookVault, and I didn't do any of their bespoke stuff.
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I just did, I put a color map in the beginning that I had left over from a Kickstarter campaign.
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I did colored pages at the beginning of each chapter with mystical smoke happening, and then I did in scene breaks, instead of just three asterisks, I did, I have these symbols of the mage system in my books, the different, three different kinds of mages.
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And so I did those three symbols, and it turned out really great. And this is costing me a dollar more than printing them through IngramSpark. And they're special. They look fantastic.
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And so I'm gonna start, I just did it for one of my books just to see, but I'm gonna do it for all of mine, and I'm gonna bring them to events and, or to cons and say, "This is a con exclusive special edition."
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And I'm not commissioning a new cover or anything like that, but I think it's gonna do really well. And I've seen people doing hardcovers that are, like con exclusive.
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I've seen people doing alternate covers that are con exclusive, and I think that's a really great thing to do for like large events. Genius. Because the people at those events are looking for special things.
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That's why they're there. They can buy your books online. They don't need to go to a con. They're looking for an experience. Oh my God, I love that so much. You're, yeah, that's an amazing strategy.
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And yeah, what would you price like a hardback versus a paperback at a con? So I've played around with it a little bit. What I started out doing is, so I, I have my books priced online at 15.99 a piece.
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And so what I started out doing at cons is selling them for $20 a piece
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and putting an e-book card in them, so it's added value, 'cause it really doesn't cost me any- I think those cards cost me like seven cents to print. Obviously, an e-book doesn't cost me anything to produce.
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So put the card in there and say, "These are $20 here," and they're signed and everything like that too. I got away from that, and I started just charging $15 because it was just like an easy number.
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But I think I'm gonna go back to 20, and I haven't decided yet if I'm going to put the e-books in again or just say, "You know what? This is the con price."
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But for the special editions, I'm definitely gonna charge a little bit more, possibly $25. Uh, and then for a hardcover, it depends on your printing prices.
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I haven't, I don't have any hardcover, so I haven't costed it out, but like however you price your print book regularly, I would just... You want it to be an even number, so it's different from online.
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Obviously, you want it to end in 99. At an event, you don't wanna deal with change and stuff. [laughs] So, um- Even numbers. Yeah... yeah, even numbers are good.
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I would probably, and I should be doing this, I should be pricing them higher than my regular price, 99 cents less. But it was just like [laughs] it's easy, and it's, so that's what I've been doing.
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So now I'm like, I'm, I'm rethinking, so you should ask somebody else what they do, 'cause I'm [laughs] really not good at this. No, it's- I'm good at everything else. There, there's an art to it. It's, you're right.
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It's, you gotta do it basically in increments of five mostly. Like you're gonna do 15, 20, 25, 30. The bundle could be three books for 50, three books, 45, 40.
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Like you wanna do increments of five 'cause people are gonna have fives, tens, and 20s the most.
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Uh, if it's cash, my, my hunch is that depending on what your printing cost is for the hardcover versus paperback, you wanna make sure you have the same margin, if not more, on the hardback. Yeah.
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So make sure you're doing that.
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And the other thing too with pricing is you can always tweak things around, but I think you're exactly right, Anna, in that there's something special about getting the signed copy, about the con experience, where you don't have to be afraid to go more expensive.
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It can be less expensive than your normal retail price, 'cause it is a different experience. You, you have more freedom with the pricing, and you could technically adjust it for the next con as well.
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Like you don't have to say, "This is my con pricing forever." Yeah. So I think if anything, seeing your thought process is even more helpful than you just saying, "Here's the pricing." I love it.
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And this was an absolute master class in going to events, finding events, and being able to grow a readership through events.
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I am so grateful I got to be able to chat with you and that we all got to learn from you, and I know you're doing some really special and exciting things in the author community.
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So I'd love if you let everyone know what you're working on now and where we can find you. Yeah. So I just launched this newProject about a week ago, or I guess a week and a half or so now, called Rising Quill.
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Basically, I've observed that in the author, in the indie author space, there's so many amazing people who are focused on helping authors build an author business, successful author business, and that's fantastic and I love that.
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I love to see that. But there's very little out there that's focused on helping writers craft amazing books, and so I wanna help fill that void. So to that end, I've started a community, it's called Rising Quill.
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I decided to start it on Discord because it felt like authors are either on Facebook or Discord, and I hate Facebook, [laughs] so I decided Discord is the way to go.
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So if you can put the link to that in the show notes or whatever, that would be- Yeah... really fantastic, Michael. But yeah, so it's open to any author, and it's very focused on empowering each other to
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improve our writing craft. So I've got channels in there for every genre. I've got channels in there for different sort of styles of writing, past tense, present tense.
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I even have one that's sort of experimental stuff where if you're writing a future tense or, like, second person or things like that, you can find other people who are doing that, too. Like me, I'm weird.
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And then I'm gonna start planning some retreats and workshops online and in person. I'm gonna do some small summits. And yeah, I'm really excited. I just launched it.
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There's 35 people in there right now, and many of them are very enthused, but I would love to see more people who are enthused, 'cause the more we have empowering each other, the better it'll be.
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And yeah, so I'm excited. Incredible. I'm so excited for folks to join. You can find the link to join Rising Quill on Discord in the description below. And
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I, I know knowing you there's gonna be many fun things to come that you haven't even dreamed up yet that are gonna be really great for the writers in that community, and I'm excited for folks here to have the chance to be a part of it.
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Anna, thank you so much for being here. You'll also find the link to Anna's books and website below, so you can check that out.
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I know that you regularly run Kickstarters, and you have a lot of knowledge about a lot of different areas of this industry, so I'm sure we'll have you back at some point to talk about either events part two or maybe something else related to going beyond the book, 'cause you have quite, quite the wealth of knowledge there.
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But thank you so much for your time today. This was lovely. Yes. Thank you. All right. [laughs] That's it for this episode of the Beyond the Book Podcast.
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If you haven't already checked out Author Marketing Superpowers, please follow the campaign on Kickstarter.
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If it's live, then I'd love for you to go and support it and actually get some of the physical benefits and some of the extra bonuses, because Author Marketing Superpowers is literally, like, this beautiful deck of cards.
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Think of it as a course, but in card form. It's awesome. And like I said, the course is completely free because the audiobook and e-book are free everywhere.
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Those are coming out shortly, if they're not out already, depending on when you're listening to this. I'm so grateful for all y'all's support.
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It's really, like, my first, I wanna say, big launch since coming back to the industry after being with MrBeast for a while, and I'm really excited for you all to see it.
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I would love to hear your feedback, and there's gonna be more fun stuff to come.
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I have, I think, about one interesting launch planned each month through June, and then I'm taking a little rest from building things out and focused on refining what's here.
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So there's a lot of exciting things coming the next couple months, and I think it will be really helpful and potentially even game-changing for some of you. So enjoy this little gift from me. Like I said, it's free.
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No pressure to go support the campaign, no pressure to hold the physical cards, but I think you'll want to, 'cause the art's pretty beautiful.
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So you should go to the campaign page and at least check it out, 'cause you'll enjoy looking at the art. And if you wanna hold it, and you wanna actually have the cards as your deskside sidekick,
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then I'd be endlessly grateful. And speaking of Author Marketing Superpowers, there's one superpower in specific called double dips that I wanna share with you.
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A double dip is when you do something that has more than one benefit. An example of it could be writing your book and then live streaming the process of writing your book so readers can enjoy it with you.
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But I wanna give you a double dip right now, a really fun one. So AuthorNation is the biggest indie author conference in the world, and it's taking place this November in Las Vegas.
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I have been going to Vegas for author cons for now feels like my whole life, but more than five years, and I'm actually helping volunteer to work with ReaderNation, which is the reader signing tied to AuthorNation.
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And here's the double dip. If you come to Vegas the first week of November, you not only get to go to an amazing author conference, but you also
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can sign at ReaderNation and be able to maybe experience your first signing, or if it's not your first signing, be able to level up your signing game with us.
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So the link to ReaderNation and AuthorNation is in the description below. You can apply for ReaderNation, and you also can come join us at AuthorNation. And if you have any questions, let me know.
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I'd love to hear what y'all are planning to do, especially if you're coming to ReaderNation, 'cause I'd love to help you brainstorm. So please feel free to reach out to me.
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I'm very happy to hop on calls and try and help y'all think through how you're approaching ReaderNation and how you can reach more readers and make it a great experience.
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I've volunteered at various writing conferences now for five years, so it feels really cool to be part of this conference and this community and help out in the ways I can.
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So yeah, I'm really excited for this event and really excited to maybe, potentially, have you a part of it. With that said, have an amazing rest of your day. And as always, don't forget, together we are boundless.