From: Julie <juliecummins_at_earthlink.net>
Date: Thu, 06 Feb 2014 11:02:13 -0500 (GMT-05:00)

Charles, an excellent approach-- smart and viable.

Julie Cummins

-----Original Message-----
From: Charles Bayless
Sent: Feb 6, 2014 9:40 AM
To: ccbc-net_at_lists.wisc.edu, jane@kidslikeus.org, 'Christine Taylor-Butler'
Subject: RE: [ccbc-net] A "no cost" way to support diversity at ALA, IRA and other conferences - An alternate view

I would like to offer an alternative perspective on the No “cost” way to support diversity.  I think what is being suggested is probably counterproductive but there is a far more productive alternative that could be pursued.  My experience is that no cost solutions are usually closely correlated with ineffective solutions and are likely to have unintended consequences if there are any consequences at all.  My specific concern is that this approach that is being suggested is a little like yelling at the call center tech support guy because your printer won’t work when the real decisions affecting you were of course made by other people elsewhere.  It might momentarily make you feel good to yell at the tech guy, but it doesn’t actually solve the problem. 

 

The people who staff booths at sales conventions are rarely the decision-makers.  They are usually junior sales and marketing people.  They very rarely have any involvement or knowledge of the MS acquisition, editing or marketing processes and decisions.  If you ask them a question, they will always attempt to give you an answer but if it is outside their domain of knowledge, they will give you their best guess answer but not actually “the” answer.  That’s because they don’t know the answer.  If you want to know why publishing firms aren’t publishing the books you want and expect to see, go to the acquisitions and editorial people, not the booth people.  That takes time and effort but is far more likely to be effective. 

 

I am not saying that there are never executives at the booth or senior sales and marketing people with deep knowledge.  Sometimes there are.  But usually not. 

 

I have managed large sales organizations in the past (not in publishing).  Yes, customer messages do come back from conventions into the executive suite but with a high attrition rate and often a high distortion rate.  Comparing the amount of customer information I got when I attended conventions myself and manned the booth, versus the amount (and quality) of information I got when I just sent my sales people, I would estimate that the attrition rate of quality information from customers is about 80-90%. 

 

More importantly by far, though, is that businesses tend to prioritize information from the customer much more highly than information from intermediaries and advocates.  Like Willie Sutton, they go where the money is.  In other words, sales trump opinions.  Sales are the Signal and opinions are Noise.  The most effecive way to get businesses to pay attention is to bring them real sales opportunities.  Short of that, it is just market noise.  “I have talked to 23 librarians in Pittsburg libraries who have cummulative acquisitions budgets of $250,000 and they say their number one priority is to acquire more diverse books with X,Y,Z attributes.  They are targetting $30,000 of their budgets for those type of books.  What do you have that meet those criteria?” – That will get you attention and calls back.  More importantly, if the sales pan out, it will change what that publisher chooses to publish.  “I think it is important that you have more diverse books and I will attempt to shame or humiliate you until you publish what I want to see.” – All the sales rep will take away from that is Market Noise at best, and Nutjob at worst. 

 

The junior sales and marketing guys staffing booths may not know the answers but they are people too.  Convention booth work is exhausting and often unrewarding.  Answering the same questions again and again, long stretches of standing with no one there followed by rushes where there are dozens of people trying to get samples or get information or give you a sales pitch themselves.  It can be immensely frustrating.  If you don’t want to do the work that is likely to make a difference but still want to leverage booth time, then there is an alternative to that as well.  Pick a time when it is slow, bring a drink or snack for them, treat them like a person, express interest in them and their job, and then edge around to a general non-accusatory inquiry about why there aren’t the types of books you are seeking.  I’ll guarantee that they remember that respectful treatment because it is so unusual and out of the norm for a convention.  And it might even make it back to the decision makers.

 

This is an immensely complex issue that is not easy to solve.  There are no “no cost” solutions.  Someone has to do the hard work of ginning up demand to which publishers will respond.  If you do that, you will move the needle.  Haranguing, discomfiting and humilating booth people is more likely to alienate than solve.  In my opinion. 

 

If you really want to be part of the solution, I think the most effective thing you can do is to be a bundler.  Before going to the convention, make the rounds to your local libraries, public and school.  Find out their acquisition budgets.  Find out their perspective of the importance of diversity and multicultural books and how much money they are committing to acquiring those books.  With that information, you will get a lot of booth attention.  Without it, not so much. 

 

Charles

 

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Received on Thu 06 Feb 2014 10:02:33 AM CST