Q –

My book, a young adult fantasy, is listed on the websites of Amazon and Barnes and Noble. It was self-published by 1st Books (now AuthorHouse) in October 2020. While at one time I marketed it a little, sent it to newspapers for review, it was part of a book club, and it is on Good Reads, I stopped following up. Since that time, I have received over 20 requests from marketers, some very persistent, to represent the book. Frankly, I have never known what to do with it.

On Friday, I received a call from Steve, then David – (979-232-2398). They knew the name of my book and what it was about (I think). They have a decent website with writers who aren’t bad. www.worldwidepublicists.com. For whatever the reason, I did speak to them and considered going with their services. Then my family and I did further research into them (I told them I receive your newsletter, about scamming and such) and found the whole thing fishy. I wrote to Worldwide this morning and rejected their offer to promote my book (David, David Smith by the way, both of these guys are “Smith” – I don’t think so). I might be contacted still by David on Friday, although I asked him not to call.

I am writing to you, Angela, because I trust you and respect your industry knowledge. I suppose I don’t want to take my book down from the sites because … well … it’s there. I reread it yesterday, and frankly, it holds up and I believe it to be good. By the way, I did contact AuthorHouse about two years ago, and received no satisfaction (nor any royalty checks if there are any or have ever been).

I suppose I am exhausted and/or beaten down by this process. As you can see from my website, I am far from a newbie writer.

Can you look into Worldwide Publicists just for my piece of mind (and others, since it seems that they are a start-up). Is there anything that I can/should do with my book? At the moment I am at a standstill, as the magazines I contributed to for years have gone under (Dig, Renaissance and the like).

Thank you, Angela, for any advice you can give to me.

Ellen S.

A –

Any so-called “publicist” who uses spam or telemarketing should be avoided at ALL costs. If they are using those methods to promote their own services, imagine what they might to do the reputations of you and your book. And, only desperate marketers use spam and telemarketing, which speaks volumes.

The Internet is FLOODED with these types of characters right now.

For your book, I recommend 90+ Days of Promoting Your Book Online PLUS 55 Dos and Don’ts of Book Selling. Anyone who wants a free copy of the latter can CONTACT ME. 🙂

If you are looking for a legitimate book publicist, CLICK HERE.

RELATED

• BACK ON OUR SOAPBOX! REPEAT AFTER US: “Real Publicists and Literary Agents Do NOT Spam Authors!” by Angela Hoy and Brian Whiddon
• COMPLAINTS about Your Online Publicist / YourOnlinePublicist.com / (YOP)
• “An online book publicist won’t stop calling me! How can I REALLY make them stop?”
• A publicist called me about ‘republishing’ my book. What’s up with that?!”
• “A marketing company says my book was ‘endorsed’ by movie producers but they want $5K! Is this too good to be true?”

Read More "Ask The Expert" Articles