by Maddie Day and Debra H. Goldstein
Maddie: Three mystery authors, Debra H. Goldstein, Barbara Ross, and I, recently shared the same release date from the same publisher.
Debra: We were delighted to share a book birthday for Murder on Cape Cod, Maddie’s first Cozy Capers Book Group Mysteries; Debra’s One Taste Too Many, the debut in her Sarah Blair Mysteries; and Barbara’s Steamed Open, number seven in the Maine Clambake Mysteries.
Maddie: To celebrate, we decided to throw a three-way Facebook launch party. We all write in the subgenre of cozy mystery, which has a huge and avid fan base. Why not tap into it collectively?
What’s a Facebook party? You set up a Facebook event spanning an hour or three, invite all your fans, and interact with them for the time period. You can invite author guests to the party, offer giveaways, and throw out questions to the partygoers to prompt interaction.
In our case, we each took an hour and invited four other mystery authors to grab ten-minute slots during our time period, so the fans ended up interacting with fifteen different authors. You can do one solo, too, although two hours would be plenty for only one author.
Debra: Although the three of us overlapped in terms of our genre and some of our friends, our personal worlds include many different authors, fans, and friends, so our invitations and promotions resulted in a greater and more varied attendance than individual parties would have. If a person came to support one of us or an author we invited, the person usually stayed through several, if not all, of the party’s ten-minute segments, because he or she got caught up in the excitement of learning about unknown authors and books or felt eager to have a chance to win one of the many giveaways.
A main goal for each of us was to enhance the branding of our individual names and books. Although we left comments on posts throughout the party, we emphasized ourselves during our specific hour by hosting our first and last segments. This gave us an opportunity to bookend our personal intros and books in the first segment and reinforce our names, books, and appreciation to the participants/readers in the last. Between our first and final segments, we chimed in every ten minutes to provide continuity by introducing our next guest author.
Maddie: The readers tend to love it. They can interact directly with the authors and ask questions. The guest authors get to plug their latest books and at the end link to their website, newsletter sign-up form, Facebook author page, and so on.
Debra: As hosts, we loved the exposure to different fan bases and the interaction with old and new fans.
Maddie: In addition, we don’t live geographically near each other, so an in-person party wasn’t a possibility. For this event, 123 people attended. Another 110 expressed interest. Since the link and discussion stayed live, the participants could follow the discussion later, on their own time. The party is still up; check it out!
A few issues can arise for the organizers of this kind of celebration, though.
Debra: If alone, the organizer must be a jack-of-all-trades, but we happily divided tasks by our skill sets: Edith arranged for the party site, Barb handled the graphics, and I was responsible for clean-up and giveaway logistics.
Maddie: Picking the right time slot is tricky, too. Barb and I are on the east coast and Debra is in the Central time zone, so we chose 7 to 10 p.m. EST. I’m an early riser, so I signed up for the kickoff slot, Barb went next, and Debra took the third time slot. We still had west-coast fans who missed most of the party.
Debra: Posting glitches also can be a problem. Two of our guest authors accidentally posted in the middle of another author’s string instead of starting their own, and one missed posting completely. Because we monitored and participated during our hours, we were able to tap dance for the missing author, scramble to find the ones who posted in the wrong place, instruct an author–who thought people weren’t responding–to refresh her page in order to see new comments, and catch when a comment was held up for approval (quite significant when it was one by a guest author).
Maddie: It’s a hectic event for the organizers. You are typing and refreshing constantly, checking for frantic messages from guest authors, and responding to comments. Make sure you are well-rested beforehand, and save the wine for afterward! Logistics are involved with the giveaways, too. Debra was kind enough to offer to coordinate those.
Debra: Call me a glutton for punishment. Although I had a list of each author’s planned giveaway, I kept track during the party, too, because several items were added. Authors either picked their own winner and back-up winner, or I randomly chose them. Once I was sure there were no duplicate winners, I notified the authors of who had won their giveaways, the winners with what they won, and posted a list of the winners on our party page. I also handled follow-up if the prize wasn’t received in a timely manner.
Maddie: Still, it’s a wild and fun evening, and I will gladly do it again, especially with good friends like Debra and Barb.
Debra: Count me in, too!
Judge Debra H. Goldstein is the author of One Taste Too Many, the first of Kensington’s new Sarah Blair cozy mystery series. She also wrote Should Have Played Poker and 2012 IPPY Award winning Maze in Blue. Her short stories, including Anthony and Agatha-nominated “The Night They Burned Ms. Dixie’s Place,” have appeared in numerous periodicals and anthologies including Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine. Debra is President of Sisters in Crime’s Guppy Chapter, serves on SinC’s national board, and is president of the SE Chapter of Mystery Writers of America.
DebraHGoldstein.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DebraHGoldsteinAuthor
Twitter: @DebraHGoldstein
Maddie Day writes the Cozy Capers Book Group Mysteries and the Country Store Mysteries. As Edith Maxwell, this Agatha- and Macavity-nominated author writes the Quaker Midwife Mysteries, the Local Foods Mysteries, and award-winning short crime fiction. Day lives north of Boston with her beau and two elderly cats, and gardens and cooks when she isn’t wasting time on Facebook.
edithmaxwell.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MaddieDayAuthor
twitter: @MaddieDayAuthor
Instagram: MaddieDayAuthor