Subscribing to A New Marketing Theory

Rap Sheet contributor and award-winning novelist Mark Coggins (The Big Wake-Up) today adds his voice to The Huffington Post with a thoughtful piece about the changing way books are marketed:

What do the memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant and Young Junius, a forthcoming crime novel by Seth Harwood, have in common? At first blush, not a whole heck of a lot. But if you do a little research, you'll find they share at least one characteristic: the way they were first brought to market.

Subscription.

Coggins, who knows his way around both the publishing and high tech industries, has some salient things to add to this conversation:

In this age of eBooks and print on demand (POD) technologies, the benefits of the approach may not be obvious [but] releasing fewer books of higher quality for a select audience can have advantages over the mass-market-oriented, swing-for-the-fences mentality that now grips mainstream publishing.

The Huffington Post piece is here. Subscription sign-up for Harwood’s new novel begins today.