When designing the layout of your book- do not forget the blank order form!
Book Printing Tip by Tilly Rivers
Placing an order form in every book is an inexpensive way to increase sales of your title(s). This order form can be designed in a number of formats, from a gift certificate for friends … to a listing of your titles … to a coupon for a free bookmark (or other gift) with order title xxx … to an order blank headed by the question, “Did you borrow this copy?”
Order blanks encourage orders from customers who first saw the book in a library, at a friend's house, or on an associate's desk. Other orders will come from repeat buyers who are purchasing extra copies as gifts for friends.
Such order forms are now quite common in most mass-market paperbacks, especially in the genre titles such as science fiction, western, and mystery novels. For example, Gregory McDonald’s Fletch, Warner had two pages of advertisements for books, one page listing four other Fletch titles by McDonald, the other page listing ten titles by P. D. James.
Dover Publications routinely includes listings of other related titles in their various lines of books.
Why not consider hooking up with another author and cross promoting? If your book is a Western for example, you could add your author friend’s romance novel information, and vs. versa. Pick an author whose title is linked- yet not your direct competition. For example, you have written a children’s book about George the Friendly Bear- an author you know has written a book about the Habits of Bears. You can even tale it one step further and partner up the sales process by ‘bundling’ them- buy both books for x $.
Janet Martin of Redbird Productions reports that most of the orders for their Cream and Bread book are placed via the order blanks in the back of the book.
To build interest in forthcoming titles, Bantam prints 16-page previews of upcoming titles in related books. For example, they printed a 16-page preview of a Nero Wolfe adventure written by Robert Goldsborough in the reprint editions of Rex Stout's original Nero Wolfe series. You can also do this with author friends- if they wish to add a small excerpt or summary of their prose in the back of your book create a win-win situation where they either pay for extra pages to print the excerpt- or you ‘trade’ page print costs- yours for theirs!
One problem with printing actual order forms in the back of your books is that bookstores do not look kindly on such blatant advertising for direct orders. Obviously, they would prefer that the reader come to them for any additional books. If your book is sold primarily through bookstores, you might want to replace the order form with a simple listing of your titles and prices plus your company name, address, and phone number. Or print your order form on another page besides the back page, for instance, right after the index. Besides, many libraries put their return card pocket on the back page.
If your books however are mostly sold online- be sure to add the website on the order blank!
One further comment: Never offer quantity discounts in your books, especially not to consumers—not if you want to sell your books in book-stores. Booksellers rightfully resent those who offer consumers better discounts than the booksellers can possibly offer. It's okay to say that quantity discounts are available to volume buyers (25 or more copies); just don't list the actual discounts. Direct readers to write to your company for the information.
About the author: Tilly Rivers is a national known best selling author, public speaker and radio host.
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