The majority of “small” press authors have confused online posting in “netzines” and “electronic journals” with print publication. Their confusion, coupled with their daily posting of new material in personal blogs and social networking sites, have all but crippled the market for poetry books. As a representative at Barnes & Noble recently remarked to me, the poetry sections in their bookstores are quickly dwindling because so much free material is available online.
Why Buy the Cow When the Milk is Free?
You won’t find new poetry by Leonard Cohen or stories by Stephen King posted online for free in their personal blogs, or in “netzines” or “electronic journals.” You won’t find publishers like McClelland & Stewart or Simon & Schuster, who publish books by Cohen and King, posting their new work online either. Professional authors like Cohen and King want to be paid for their writing; publishers like McClelland & Stewart and Simon & Schuster want to be paid for printing books; major bookstores like Chapters, Bookers and Foyles, in turn, only stock authors whose books are in demand.
Posting free material online is equivalent to booksellers giving books away for free, dentists fixing cavities in exchange for kind words, or mechanics working for friendly pats on the back. As soon as you start giving your goods and services away for free, they lose their commercial value. The work also loses a certain amount of respect.
Our capitalist society is governed by the laws of supply and demand. When supply outweighs demand, the market crashes. The dwindling poetry section in Barnes & Noble bookstores is only the beginning of the collapse. The day is fast approaching when major bookstores may only carry one or two books of poetry by top-selling authors – and new books of poetry, no matter how brilliant or revolutionary, won’t ever get the chance to compete in the mainstream marketplace.
Build a Hungry Fan Base
Print publication is the single most important thing authors can do to build a hungry fan base. Print publication, no matter how sleazy or “small” the magazine, lends credibility and weight to an author – much more so than does credit in a “netzine.” Print publication puts new work into the hands of paying customers. People pay to read magazines and books. People who buy magazines are more likely to buy books by authors whose work piques their interest. When they read one or two poems they like in a magazine, hopefully, they get hungry for more.
Online posting of new material in personal blogs, social networking sites, “netzines” and “electronic journals” is the single most damaging thing authors can do to thwart potential book sales. Internet readers are notoriously cheap. They are used to reading everything for free. When “small” press authors post new work in personal blogs, it’s like throwing scraps of meat to hungry animals. Their readers get their daily fix for free. They say to themselves, “I’m not going to buy your newest book because I have read almost everything you’ve written online already.”
Material posted online is often poorly edited and weak (even in the best venues), compared to the strength and quality of material in print publications. Weak material works against book sales. A reader stumbles upon these awful poems and says “thank goodness I didn’t waste my money on that book.” The book in question, however, may be absolutely brilliant – carefully crafted, professionally edited, well constructed, but here, as with everything in life, first impressions count.
Post Online For Promotion Only
To be fair, a small amount of online posting benefits every author. As long as the posted material is strong, it’ll get readers hungry for more. When your online material becomes more than a handful of poems, or stories, or essays, however, the material starts to work against you and actually hurts book sales. Instead of reading just enough to stay hungry, your readers will glut themselves until they are fat, lazy, and the urge to buy your newest book disappears.
Online postings should be limited to promotional material. A reader who finds your work in a magazine should be able to google your name and find online content that makes them hungry for your words: reviews, interviews, readings, videos and testimonials that encourage them to buy your books.
It’s not hard to be professional about your writing. All it requires, in fact, is for you to place enough value on your work to “not give it away for free.” You need to support the publishers that support you, the distributors who represent your work, and the booksellers who market your books.
Professional authors, publishers and booksellers earn a living, in one form or another, through printed literature. Kind words like “great writing” and “well done” are always nice to hear, of course, but kudos from your blog readers aren’t going to pay your mortgage or put food on your table. If you’re not in it to sell books, you may as well abandon any dream you ever had about earning a living from your writing right now.
At the end of the day writing, publishing and bookselling are a business – and as long as you’re content posting your new work online for free, readers will be content to read it online for free.
It’s as simple as that.
