Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Going Global - Guest post with Author Stephen Tremp

Today's guest post is with my blog buddy Stephen Tremp, author of two successful books: Breakthrough and Opening. Here Stephen shares tips on going global.


Rachna, thank you for hosting me today on my Grand Opening Tour! I’m very excited to visit Rachna’s Scriptorium and your amazing group of followers. My topic is Going Global!

Our world is becoming much smaller. Borders are disappearing. We have the ability to communicate to anyone anywhere in real time. Example: as writers, we can research people and places for our works. Need to know what a particular hotel or restaurant in Singapore is like? Just read Yahoo! user reviews and you can write an accurate and descriptive scene that will make that chapter come to life for the reader!

 Global Characters
It’s important to develop characters that are from different parts of the world. I have characters from or with a heritage to India, Korea, China, and Japan among other places. Living in southern California, a mosaic of people from around the world, this is vital to writing a novel that people can relate to. And it’s a great way to target a much wider audience.

Global Marketing
The British once clamed they had an empire in which the sun never set. Because of this, much of the world speaks English. Approximately 350 millions people speak English as their primary language and 600 million people as a second language. World wide, about 1.8 billion people speak English.

This opens up large markets outside the U.S. for writers like me. The blogging community is awesome in that I can connect with amazing people like Rachna and we can share our works and ideas with each other and those who we connect with.


Airport Bookstores
Airport bookstores (especially international airports) are a great way to get your book to people and places all over the world. Have you ever noticed the continuous line of people at the register buying books at these places? There are three major airports within driving distance (Los Angeles, Orange County, and San Diego) that I am working with.

Street Sales
I used to have book signings at a Borders Books and Music near Orange County Airport. People with long layovers would stop in to buy books. It was a small goldmine. Lots of sales and lots of people from around the world buying my book!


But Borders is now out of business. So I took my cause to the streets. I can set up shop with the same sign I used for Borders book signings and sell them to the locals and tourists (I live in southern California). There’s no overhead except the gas to drive there and a cup of Starbucks coffee. I’ve sold books to people from Europe, Asia, India, even the Middle East. Tourists from Japan seem to love my book.


Translating to Another Language
Has anyone had their books translated into a different language? I’m considering translating Breakthrough into Japanese. I’m wondering about the cost. If I can do this for a reasonable price I’d like to move forward with it.

Question: what do you do or what have you seen in global marketing that the average writer can use to promote and sell their books?

“A scientific breakthrough of such magnitude it could radically alter the future of humanity—for better or worse—is in the wrong hands”

Stephen Tremp, author of the BREAKTHROUGH Series, has a B.A. in information systems and an MBA degree in global management. Stephen has a background in information systems, management, and finance and draws from this varied and complex experiential knowledge to write one-of-a-kind thrillers.
His novels are enhanced by current events at the European Organisation for Nuclear research (CERN) and other scientific research facilities around the world. These potential advances have the ability to change the way we perceive our universe and our place in it!

         





















You can visit Stephen Tremp at Breakthrough Blogs. OPENING can be downloaded at:


Amazon for  $1.99
Smashwords for $1.99


Thank you Stephen for this insightful post. We all wish you lots of publishing success. If you have any questions for Stephen, he will be glad to answer them.



29 comments:

  1. Like Stephen's ideas about selling books. Quite an amazing writer he is. Thanks for this wonderful guest post, Stephen and Rachna.

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  2. Very informative post providing a different perspective! Thanks Stephen and Rachna..

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  3. Hi Rachna and Stephen - great post about global prospects .. I'm sure there's a huge opportunity for books of historical origins ...

    You've certainly given us food for thought about opening doors for your sales - I admire your gung-ho attitude - and why not translate your book into Japanese .. sounds an excellent idea. There must be someone locally to you who could do it .. good luck.

    Cheers - lots of food for thought .. Hilary

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  4. Awww love the little doggie wanting to buy some Stephen Tremp books! Yay!

    Hello Rachna, hello Stephen!! Good luck with going global!! The world is truly your oyster!

    Take care
    x

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  5. Thank you Rachna for hosting me today. This is one of my favorite topics to discuss. Our world is indeed shrinking and this is something we can take advantage of as writers to reach new markets that only ten years ago would be nearly impossible.

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  6. Some excellent ideas, I struggle to find the next outlet for my books.

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  7. Selling on the street! Brave man. We reach a global market just by blogging. My book is only in English but I know it's available in dozens of foreign countries.

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  8. Neat post and great insights into the marketing of English-speaking books in the modern world:)

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  9. Great ideas for expanding your reach to readers, Stephen!

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  10. Hi Friends..I am amazed by all that Stephen does to market his books. Its been great getting insights into his marketing technique.

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  11. Awesome post!

    And I love the idea of street sales--you never know what readers you might find that way.

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  12. Good to see Stephen here, thanks for hosting him, Rachna. Wishing Stephen much success!

    Have a great week, all!

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  13. I got the idea of street selling from seeing the local artists selling their paintings along the walkway of Balboa Island. So I gave it a shot. So far so good. The softbound version of OPENING will be available tomorrow (in addition to the eBook) so I'll have two books to sell. This will be a great feeling to have two books for sale. Number three is coming out this fall!

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  14. Interesting ideas, Stephen. Our airport is so tiny, we just recently got them to sell water beyond the security checkpoint.

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  15. Fantastic post. I like Stephen's marketing ideas. I never thought about taking to the airports or streets with my book.

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  16. Very cool idea! Chicago has some very touristy areas I'm sure I could set up shot at.

    It is very important to reach the rest of the planet with my stories. That's very intriguing about tranlating your work into Japanises. I've always wanted to try something like that.

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  17. How wonderful to see Stephen over here, Rachna. I really do wish this man loads of success. Thank you for hosting him.

    Love his ideas on marketing. Fascinating!

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  18. It's nice to read about others' marketing attempts--we learn so much from each other!

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  19. Airports are a gold. That last minute - oh I forgot to get a book to read on my long fight.

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  20. Hey, Stephen. I love the idea of writing globally and am intrigued by books with global or at least unusual settings. And what a great tip about airport bookstores! I hadn't even thought of that....
    The thing about translations is, they're more expensive than you expect because the really good translators will work to get not only the literal meaning of your words, but translate the more subtle nuances/double and hidden meanings, etc. Think of how hard you worked to imply something without saying it. An inexperienced translator will be more likely to just say it, losing your work's subtly and polish. For quality translations, I'd really try to find a professional book translator.

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  21. Thanks everyone for the awesome comments! i'll stop by your blogs and say hello. And I'll do some more Twitter blasts too. Thanks Rachna for the FB post too!

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  22. Fun post! I would love to see my book in an airport bookstore someday/. :)

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  23. Stephen has some great marketing ideas. I hope they bring great success to his sequel.

    :-)

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  24. Stephen, these are such great ideas! I never even thought about airport bookstores, probably because I don't travel by plane very much. So, so clever.

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  25. Because Australia is such a small market, I try to aim my stories for the international market. It's relatively easy to do with speculative fiction too. Fab post with some great tips!

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  26. Thanks for the well wishes everyone! Its fun to hear what others are doing too. Times sure have changed from five years ago when self publishing and social networking were still in their infancy.

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  27. To develop characters that are from different parts of the world one has to travel...with an ear for nuance and an eye for subtleties.
    Lovely insight.

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  28. Great post Stephen and Rachna. Global characters should be well researched as mistakes car jar with the native readers as I have already discovered just reading American novels that have British characters who fail to behave and speak as a native British person might.
    Having a novel translated, now that sounds awesome.
    Good luck Stephen.

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  29. Interesting post. That is so cool that people from all over the world are reading your books.

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