For the series I’m working on now, I’m planning some splashy promotions, like doing a video teaser on-line, and perhaps having a game on the website tied into the books.

And my father also recognizes your name now, because when we were in Borders Express, he took note when he saw your books. You’d been in there and signed them. And one of the staff overheard us talking about it and joined in. I think he said he went to high school with you, so he liked to promote your work whenever he could.

Re: cons.
While Amazon rankings are not the be-all, end-all of book sales, and nobody can explain what they really mean, they are an indicator of a certain level of interest in your book. On the weekends I attended conventions last winter, my amazon rankings shot up from the 100-200K positions, to closer to 12K–where the book debuted on the day of release. So, yeah, conventions are the only promotional thing I can point to that clearly and definitively created interest in my book.

The thing to keep in mind about book signings is that the purpose is not really to sell books that day, it is to establish relationships with booksellers (who may later hand-sell the title because they’ve met you), to get your name and title in the local & internet media, to create signed copies which are more likely to be placed on special displays (endcaps, tables, gift ideas, etc.). I had a book signing where I sold one copy. Lousy, right? However, the local paper ran an article. . .they reviewed the book, and said nice things now reprinted on the cover of book 2. None of which would have happened if I hadn’t done the time at the store.

There is a calculus to deciding on these things. For a writer who is making a comfortable living at his craft, the calculus changes, but for those of us who must still do the Day Job routine, it’s not just the immediate expense of doing the con. If like most people you get two weeks of paid vacation a year, you can chop it up into long weekends and do ten cons without loss of a day’s pay. Of course, that means if you have any other vacation plans, you’re either screwed or you have to be willing to be docked for them–or you simple cannot take off. The expenses entailed here are now not only fiscal but emotional–mainly, your partner (if any) who may be supportive, but not that supportive as to give up a trip to Vegas or Niagara Falls or Whereever on the off chance that con attendance will pay off. It might, it might not.

All of us probably have one or two conventions a year which we would attend regardless. Parties, friends, a favorite city–none of this counts in the book keeping I’m talking about. It’s all those new ones, which may or may not be conventions you would ever return to.

Unless I’ve been lied to to my face, I’ve said a few occasionally interesting things at cons, but my blogosphere presense vis-a-vis con reports by attending fans is remarkably…absent. So this is more a matter of timing, alchemy, a phase of the moon, or what have you than anything reliable.

Please understand, I’m not complaining–I would gladly attend half a dozen conventions a year if I could. I make these points in the context of a writer’s promotional strategy. How many eggs do you put in which basket?