Tom Gregory, President of Infinity Publishing recently asked me to get in touch with Leonard A. Renier, author of Learning To Avoid Unintended Consequences, to discover what he has been doing to sell his book—because his book has been a consistent seller, month-after-month, for the past year. Whenever an Infinity title takes-off and hits our radar scope, we want to learn what the author is doing to make those book sales happen.  Then we like to look at the author’s marketing plan to explore what Infinity can do to augment such successful efforts.  We can’t develop and implement a marketing plan for each of the over 2,600 titles we have in our unique Just-In-Time book publishing system.  However, when a book is a steady seller, we want to learn what the author has been doing to successfully promote their book so we can look at ways to help them sell more—and to share what we learn!!!

I called Leonard at his Michigan office only to learn he was doing a weekend seminar in Florida and would be returning to the office on Monday.  His administrative assistant assured me he would call me soon after he was back in the office.  I explained to her that I was calling to find out what they were doing to sell so many copies of his book.  She took me by surprise when she said she didn’t think Mr. Renier was doing anything special to sell his book.  I found it difficult to believe that he could have sold almost 3,000 copies of his book in just over a year without doing anything special to promote it.

When I had an opportunity to talk with Leonard, he was amazed to learn that he had sold that many books and that I was actually calling to ask him what he was doing and to learn how Infinity could help him.  Yes, we really do explore how we can get behind an author with a book that’s proving to be an ongoing seller.  We earn our profit selling books.  Therefore, we have a vested interest in our titles when they grow to be steady sellers.

The odds are a mainstream publisher wouldn’t be interested in initially publishing Len’s book because he takes some major jabs at several sacred-cows of consumer financing.  Also, the financial climate is prone to make rapid changes that would most likely result in the traditionally published book being out-of-date before its release date.

So it was with an ever-improving sales history of presidential interest and as an expression of Infinity’s vested interest that I was talking with Len to learn what he was doing to sell his book.  Now, if Leonard was amazed by the nature of my call, then I was totally dumbfounded when he told me he’s doing absolutely nothing to market his book!!!

Nothing???  Nothing!!! Nothing is the short answer I give when an author asks what Infinity will do to market their book. Nothing is my reply when I’m asked what will we spend to launch an author’s book.  Nothing is the quick come-back when you’re asked what you’re doing and you’re doing something but you’re not saying what the something is you’re doing so you say you’re doing “nothing!”  Leonard had to be doing something, because unless you’re a famous, well-known author, you’re not going to sell 3,000+ books in about a year by doing nothing.  Nothing indeed!!!

I asked about his book marketing plan.  He explained he has been thinking about working up a marketing plan to augment what he says about his book whenever he’s presenting a financial seminar.

Seminars???  Yes, of course, seminars and speaking engagements produce back-of-the-room sales!!!  He was creating a buzz for his book as part of his seminar presentation.  The buzz from the people who bought his book found valuable information in the content and then they went on to tell others about Len’s book and by their shared words, the news was spread - the almighty power of word-of-mouth advertising that money can’t buy, but it sure helps to sell lots of books.

Although he didn’t have a formal marketing plan for promoting his book, Len incorporated all the right elements into the concept of his book.  I asked him to write about his book to help our authors understand what he did that’s been creating the book buzz that continues to work to sell his book:

"After twenty-five years in the financial services industry, I have a deepening concern about the direction we are heading as a country and the impact it will have on everyone financially.  Unfortunately, traditional financial thinking is not confronting issues that are certain to change our everyday lives.  Tremendous demographic changes in the next 3,000 days will impact government taxation, government benefits, government debt, interest rates, retirement plans, and medical coverage.  All of these issues will impact our ability to earn, spend and save money in the future.

In my book, I wanted to create clarity.  I needed to communicate the often difficult-to-understand financial concepts but make it easy for everyone to understand.  I wanted the readers to be involved in a deeper thought process.  To do this, I used “everyday life” examples to expose some of the myths and half-truths that, in the past, have been the foundation of traditional thinking.

I believed that in reading Unintended Consequences, the average reader could save thousands of dollars in their lifetime.  I made a decision to increase the price of the book above the suggested retail price.  The price of knowledge should not be the same price as a burger and fries.  What is the rate of return in investing $17.00 in a book that saves you thousands of dollars?  Don’t make a mistake of under-pricing your ideas.

I really didn’t have a formal marketing plan except for selling the book at speaking engagements.  The book sold well simply by word-of-mouth.  In trying to figure out why the book was selling this way, we did a buyer’s survey.  We found out financial professionals were buying the books and giving them to their clients.  So we started to market the book to financial professionals.  This marketing included comments from the people who read the book.  This created additional sales.  Financial people from across the country started to order the book in quantities—anywhere from 10 to 100 books at a time.  With larger quantities, we offered speaking engagements at luncheons and dinners sponsored by these professionals.  We started an e-mail database, and started corporate training at small businesses during the lunch hour and created software outlining the ideas in the book.  The levels of marketing continue to grow.

In talking to John Harnish at Infinity Publishing, he suggested a second edition of the book.  This keeps the book current.  It also keeps our clients aware that we intend to maintain this book as a good marketing tool for them.  It also gives us an opportunity to proofread any changes we will make.

Since writing the book, my speaking engagements have increased.  In March of 2004, I was asked to speak at the Federal Reserve of Chicago’s Money Smart Week.  They have asked me to return to speak in April of 2005. Not only will we be doing a second edition of Unintended Consequences with Infinity, but I will be releasing a new book this summer.

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