This morning I received an email from Karen Rawson of 15MinuteBusinessBooks.com in response to our Conversations with Experts topic this week on using Blogs for book publishing.
Here's Karen's email:
I was just reading about something like this in the book “Next: The Future Just Happened” by Michael Lewis. A British band called Marillion that was a hit in the early 80’s. They made their comeback in 2000 thanks to the Internet. An on-line fan club formed and brought them to the US to tour. They released a CD with an insert that said, “send us your e-mail address and we’ll send you a second CD with previously unpublished songs.” They got 18,000 e-mail addresses that way. They then sent the fans an offer: Advance us the 100,000 pounds we need to cut a new record and you’ll get it early, and we’ll put your picture on our album cover (minuscule, of course). They had 5000 people paying 16 pounds in 4 days. In a few weeks, 16,000 buyers.
Then they went back to the record company that wouldn’t produce the album and said, “Tellya what. You can have the completed album and we won’t sell it on line anymore after your release date.” They got a huge royalty rate and marketing budget in the deal. All because they built their fan base first. The point of the chapter of the book was that if you connect with your audience personally, which is possible through the Internet, you’re in control. And that publishers better watch out.
This is a perfect example of 1) using the Internet to build your platform (not sure what a platform is? Check out Suzanne Falter-Barns' Get Known Now program) and client database and 2) focusing on what your customers want, then delivering it to them.
I love this story. If you'd like to get a copy of a synopsis of “Next: The Future Just Happened”, contact Karen Rawson. It's available in MP3 for $5.
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