#1 Best Seller. Bryan W. Heathman

book signings. Usually, all it takes to schedule an event is making that initial phone call, then following the thread until your date is inked on the calendar.

      Let the Local Media Be Your Mouthpiece

      Once you schedule your book launch event, you’ll want to make sure you invite colleagues, friends and family. But don’t neglect the local media. This is a huge piece of the puzzle, yet so often it’s overlooked by humble authors with a “Who? Me?” attitude. This is true even of retired corporate executives, professional speakers and others who’ve enjoyed success but are still tentative about promoting themselves in the author space.

      Yes—the fact that you’re having a book signing is a big event. Let the community share in your excitement. Put yourself out there, and you’ll be amazed by the return you get on your investment of time and heart.

      Contact local media outlets such as radio, TV and publishers. Journalists are receptive to submissions, and many strongly support the work of local authors. Also, don’t be shy about reaching out to the media in neighboring cities as well. The farther afield you travel, the more likely you are to broaden the scope of your celebrity.

      Local media coverage is not always easy to get, but it can be had for the right price. Often that price is simply your respect for their format. Look into the specific requirements of each of your local media outlets before you get in touch with them. You’ll find that they’re much the same across the board—with a few subtle variations on the theme. Make it easy for them to promote you, save them time, be interesting and be easy to reach.

      A friend of mine got his product featured in the USA Today by counting the average number of words per article by the journalist who covers his topic. When he submitted his article, it took the journalist very little time to modify the article for publication to her tastes.

      Working with the media is where having a press kit comes in handy.

      When you have your author bio, book descriptions and press release prepared ahead of time, contacting the media is a breeze. And when you play by their format rules, you’re handing them every reason to cover your book launch events.

      Combining book launch events with local media promotion is a great recipe for becoming a hometown hero—one that plants the seeds of red carpet celebrity and stellar book sales. I’ve seen this happen many times in my career as a publisher and look forward to reading about your success stories.

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       The Art of Branding for Authors

      NOW that it is understood how to get discovered by the media, and how to structure your book launch sequence of events, it is time to consider how you are perceived by the public. The goal is to carve out a clear piece of “real estate” in the minds of the public, so when they hear your name, they know exactly what you represent.

      The classic method of achieving this impression in the minds of the public is what marketers call Branding. In my career working with Fortune 500 companies, a team of people would spend close to a year conceptualizing a brand, designing it and rolling it out to the public. Authors often do not have the luxury of this kind of time, staff or the investment typically spent by big companies.

      But, there is hope. Countless authors have clearly established their brand in the marketplace. How do they do it? This chapter distills the complexity of branding methodology into a process that you can implement without a team of experts in the art of branding.

      So, let’s explore how to craft your brand message and set a plan to make your message stick.

Your WHY – The Essence of a Personal Brand

      “WHY do you do what you do?” This question comes to you from the young man sitting next to you on a recent flight. Like yours, his seat back is comfortably angled 30 degrees back, and his tray table is in the down position. You’ve both settled in.

      The two of you are on a first-class flight home from Dubai. Fate and a travel agent have thrown you together, and now you’re making chit-chat over strong coffee, colloquially known as Turkish coffee. It tastes good, and the caffeine/cardamom combo cuts through the morning fog of your mind. Last night’s dinner-and-drinks with your client quickly turned into dessert-and-one-too-many.

      “I mean,” your seatmate continues, “what drives you to keep giving these keynote speeches?”

      You’ve already swapped stories about the Zig Ziglar audios which you were surprised to learn were on his smartphone. His stories of singing Sinatra standards from a tiny stage where he gigged aboard a 120’ private yacht last week seem to have gone dry for the moment, along with the cucumber water in your glass. Still, the young singer seems bent on keeping the conversation going.

      “It sounds like you could just retire right now,” he says, “and you wouldn’t have to put up with these long flights and grueling schedules. Is it really worth it to be a keynote speaker? I mean, why do you keep doing it?”

      “Why indeed…” you parrot, adjusting your glasses with a thick hand. “Dubai to LA seems like a long haul this morning, I can tell you that,” you chuckle. “And I’ve got more of the same waiting for me at LAX—same hoopla, same glad-handing and photo ops. You know, I haven’t thought about that question in a long time.”

      But his question is a good one, and you feel its heft in your mind like a gold ingot in the center of your palm—rare and worthy.

      Your thoughts trail back a couple of days, back to the night you arrived in Dubai and the limo picked you up at the airport. Your client, the CEO, was already in the back seat, eager to be seen with you, arriving together at an exclusive gala at a towering hotel behind a velvet rope. The cameras and the crowds offered a heady glow of success.

      That night was capped with too few hours of sleep in your suite on the concierge level, fruit and flowers in every room, scenting the air with their heavy perfume. You found a gift from the meeting planner thoughtfully left on the entry table—a silver monogrammed business card holder and a note of thanks. It was a nice touch, if a little impersonal. Back home, there was a closet in your office that was full of things like this— chachkies and souvenirs, corporate gifts from exotic ports of call where hoards had been swayed by the words you spoke.

      But that’s not the reason. Why then?

      Your mind drifts back to your early career when you stood on the platform in a meeting hall at a local winery for 30 minutes; the audience mesmerized while you shared your best stuff. That talk was the springboard for the words you said in Dubai yesterday, and it launched a thousand opportunities for you. The warm feeling in your heart of touching the hundreds of people in that winery hall—influencing their lives—was as sweet as wine itself. You would have done it for free, but the back-of-room sales you made after the talk were a nice bonus. A whole new world had opened up for you that day.

      Now you search your memory for an even deeper answer, and a vague form takes shape. You were meeting with a publisher over a cocktail, who was an old colleague who’d worked with you on that start-up years ago. The experience is like a private joke you share between the two of you, like veterans of war.

      “Say, I’m writing a book,” you told him casually, pulse racing. “Do you think you could give me some tips on how to make it successful…?”

      Now the memory starts to flood back. You remember that you had been sweating this meeting for days, thinking your friend’s professional advice would kill your enthusiasm, afraid he would laugh at your naiveté or tell you that your ideas were too controversial. You feared that the unique and precious thing inside you—the song that only you could write—would be silenced before anyone heard it. You were afraid that taking a chance, confiding in your friend, meant that your dream must live or die at that moment. You were afraid of terminal rejection, afraid that you would depart this earth with your music still inside you, afraid