An e-book full of hints and suggestions about selling a book via lectures. Chapters include determining whether your book is indeed viable to sell-by-lecutre, determining your audience, finding and soliciting potential audiences, designing a flyer and ancillary materials, and the actual talk and follow-up.
Lecturing – promoting your books via speaking engagements rather than merely book readings or signings – is not for everyone, nor is it for every book.
“On The Road With The Old Gals” is not intended nor designed as a treatise on public speaking. It is already assumed that you are comfortable in front of an audience. For some people it is a gift. For others, it is an acquired skill. And for still others, it is a dreaded ordeal, never to be undertaken willingly.
As an acquired skill, however, it is not as intimidating as it may seem, and is well worth anyone’s effort. There are public address classes offered through adult education at local high schools or colleges. And, of course, there is the well-known “Toastmasters” organizations which have made fine speakers out of the most timid!
Suffice it to say that my high school public speaking teacher gave us the three cardinal rules:
· STAND UP
· SPEAK UP
· SHUT UP
My college public address professor gave us one dictum:
· KNOW YOUR SUBJECT
They were both right.
But having decided that lecturing is a viable option for your book….
Professional Reviews
On The Road With the Old Gals
Feather Schwartz Foster incorporates her 35 years of experience in advertising and public relations into her ventures in lecturing about her first book, LADIES: A CONJECTURE OF PERSONALITIES. Thank goodness she has chosen to share her experience and lessons learned with others.
ON THE ROAD WITH THE OLD GALS is packed with information for the novice as well as the experienced author and/or speaker. Although this easy-to-read book deals mostly with lecturing, it can readily be related to book signings and other author events. Ms. Foster discusses everything from targeting and locating your audience to materials needed. She provides helpful hints concerning recording keeping, publicity, fees, and collecting money from book sales. No question is left unanswered and every topic imaginable related to speaking events is covered.
I highly recommend this book to all authors and others who may be interested in or are engaged in speaking before an audience. Informative, edifying, and easy to follow, this is one book that should be kept nearby for easy access and reference.
Christy Tillery French
Midwest Book Review
On The Road With The Old Gals
For those of you actively promoting a book, this instructive book is a must have. Feather’s other recent book, "LADIES: A Conjecture of Personalities," about First Ladies, Martha through Mamie, has given her the opportunity to speak before a wide variety of groups. She has taken those experiences and written a comprehensive “how-to” book covering all aspects of the public speaking aspect of book promotion. While this book is particularly apt for the promotion of a non-fiction book, it also applies nicely to fiction work as well.
Feather takes her reader, step-by-step through the logistics of advertising, booking, setting up, selling, follow-up, tracking and a plethora of additional, helpful information for the author who has the initiative and desire to speak in front of groups in hopes of selling books. She instructs the reader on how to use local newspapers, the internet, phone books, etc. to find potential markets. She discusses fees and how to gear your talk to interest a particular audience. She shares her trial and error findings on direct mail, how to develop flyers, and where to send them. Feather even tells how many books to pack, how to transport them, how to make change and whether to take checks.
This book is so complete, a novice speaker will feel quite confident after reading it and a seasoned speaker will undoubtedly pick up tips. I highly recommend this to anyone considering public speaking as a marketing tool. The book is available through www.epsteinpublishing.com
Read our Interview with Feather. Also on this site, Read Feather's Series, The Lecture Experience.
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