How to Write a Bestseller by Tilar J Mazzeo

Author:Tilar J Mazzeo
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780300267174
Publisher: Yale University Press

That leaves only one other topic to cover in this section: identification of the reader-buyer and data showing how many of them are out there.

In many cases, audience is covered naturally during the discussion of marketing and comps, and if you prefer to cover these items in a different order, the important thing is to cover this information, not how it’s organized. In many cases, however, it is worth addressing the audience directly and with some researched numbers in a final two or three paragraphs.

Let’s look at an imaginary example. Dr. Astra the astronomer wants to publish a general audience book in the category of maritime history and celestial navigation. She wants to write about the history of the Big Dipper and its role in shaping the world (or at least the world market) as we know it. A publisher will be able to extrapolate pretty quickly that there is a certain market for so-called big-science books, and Dr. Astra probably wants to mention that her title works in that category, especially when she’s thinking about comparable titles.

But a publisher might not be aware that Dr. Astra’s book (as she believes) is going to be of keen interest to the estimated three or four million yacht club members across America. Sailing by the stars, after all, is part of the legacy and lore of sailing. She would be wise to offer her agent and editor some data from a trade journal showing that there is a large audience waiting for this book (and already buying similar titles), that this is an audience growing at a rate of seven percent a year since 2018, and that the more than a thousand yacht clubs in the country when polled have reported that their number one wish-list priority is increasing their offerings of boating-related speaker content. That is market-specific information that a publisher might not know, and Dr. Astra is making a good business argument that her marketing plan is likely to be effective and that there is a preexisting readership that will find this title of interest. Dr. Astra, of course, will want to mention that she is a member of her local yacht club and already has interest in book-related events from three yacht clubs in her area.

What does this section of a book proposal look like? I’m going to take a cue from Dr. Astra. Here’s a sample for our Mary Ann Patten proposal.

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