I Put My Book on a Times Square Billboard — But That’s Not What Drove Sales. Here’s What Did.

The comments started flooding in: “Congratulations!” “OMG! That’s amazing,” arsenic they saw my 8-year-old boy and maine beaming pinch pridefulness arsenic our 2nd book debuted, 40 feet gangly connected a New York Times Square billboard. Little did they know, I was testing a mobility astir authors ne'er deliberation to ask: Does the advertisement really waste the book, aliases does thing else?

After my book, Make Every Podcast Want You, was featured connected a Times Square advertisement arsenic 1 of the “Top Books to Change Your Life successful 2024,” authors started reaching retired to me. Fiction writers and children’s book authors were asking really they could execute the aforesaid occurrence and really to amended position their books erstwhile they weren’t straight contributing to business growth. They wanted to understand the mechanics of the billboard.

I had already seen really podcasts and PR could waste a nonfiction book and skyrocket it to an Amazon bestseller. But I wanted to cognize thing much specific: How galore income could really travel successful straight from the advertisement itself, abstracted from everything else?

So I decided to trial it.

For our adjacent book, I picked thing vastly different — a children’s book I had written 8 years ago, erstwhile my boy was a baby, called It’s Just a Fart. It’s wholly uncorrelated to immoderate different business entity I run. No people to upsell beyond the book purchase. No elaborate funnel, conscionable a elemental email opt-in connected the book’s website. I made it alongside 2 different moms — illustrator Amanda Swift and formatter Arlene Soto. My 2 boys served arsenic consultants connected the project, weighing successful connected which drawings were funniest.

I put the book up successful Times Square. The messages came flooding in. The property picked it up. Then I waited to spot what would really hap to sales.

The advertisement didn’t waste the book. The communicative did.

Here’s what I learned: The advertisement only drove income aft the property turned it into a story. The ecosystem astir promoting the book made the advertisement an event, and that arena boosted book sales.

The advertisement unsocial didn’t convert. The communicative astir it did.

Most group stepping done Times Square connected immoderate fixed time aren’t expecting to bargain a children’s book astir farts. And they didn’t. The advertisement generated attention, photos and congratulations — but not an contiguous spike successful pre-order sales. The momentum came later, erstwhile the advertisement became portion of a larger communicative shared crossed social media.

That’s wherever group learned why the book existed: a solo travel I took pinch my son, who served arsenic 1 of its astir enthusiastic consultants. He weighed successful connected which illustrations were funniest, really to make the babies look moreover sillier, and who, ultimately, inspired the book successful the first place. People weren’t buying because they’d seen a billboard. They were buying because they connected pinch the communicative down it.

The biggest trading correction entrepreneurs make is believing the infinitesimal is the marketing.

The infinitesimal is the catalyst. Marketing is everything you build before, astir and aft it. Without that ecosystem, moreover the astir awesome visibility play becomes a fleeting photograph opportunity alternatively of a meaningful business asset.

A advertisement is simply a positioning tool. It tells the world: this exists, this matters capable to beryllium here. But positioning isn’t the aforesaid arsenic connection, and relationship is what really moves a alien to propulsion retired their wallet for a book they’ve ne'er heard of, written by personification they don’t know, astir a taxable that’s objectively silly.

What really built the sales

A advertisement says, “Look astatine this.” An acquisition says, “Here’s thing to beryllium a portion of.” One is ego. The different turns attraction into participation. Belonging creates resonance, and resonance creates sales.

If you’re an writer aliases laminitis considering a high-visibility positioning play for illustration this, here’s what I’d show you, having now tally this trial doubly pinch 2 very different books:

A New York Times Square advertisement is simply a phenomenal positioning tool. It is not, connected its own, a income tool. Treat it arsenic 1 hit successful a larger story, not the full story. Before you book the billboard, build the acquisition that will unrecorded astir it. What could beryllium the specific, personal, somewhat inconvenient item that makes a alien consciousness for illustration they’re portion of thing bigger?

What communicative are you creating astir the communicative of your book?

I saw the aforesaid rule play retired pinch 1 of my clients, memoirist Whitney Joy, writer of Seven Blank Pages. Rather than build her motorboat astir simply announcing that her book was available, we built it astir a visibility infinitesimal that reflected the bosom of her story. On motorboat day, 7 copies of her memoir were intentionally group free to recreation from scholar to reader, each pinch a trackable QR code, mirroring her book’s themes of connection, treatment and shared humanity woven throughout.

Readers weren’t conscionable buying a memoir. They were becoming portion of the story.

The visibility infinitesimal gave group thing meaningful to participate in, and information is acold much powerful than plain aged PR promotion. Ask yourself: What communicative are you creating astir what you’ve made? Sales travel a story, not the different measurement around.

Don’t correction the congratulations for conversion. Too galore founders put successful the visible infinitesimal while neglecting the story, distribution and follow-up that really create momentum. Visibility is the spark. The ecosystem you build astir it is what catches fire. And the communicative is its gas.

The comments started flooding in: “Congratulations!” “OMG! That’s amazing,” arsenic they saw my 8-year-old boy and maine beaming pinch pridefulness arsenic our 2nd book debuted, 40 feet gangly connected a New York Times Square billboard. Little did they know, I was testing a mobility astir authors ne'er deliberation to ask: Does the advertisement really waste the book, aliases does thing else?

After my book, Make Every Podcast Want You, was featured connected a Times Square advertisement arsenic 1 of the “Top Books to Change Your Life successful 2024,” authors started reaching retired to me. Fiction writers and children’s book authors were asking really they could execute the aforesaid occurrence and really to amended position their books erstwhile they weren’t straight contributing to business growth. They wanted to understand the mechanics of the billboard.

I had already seen really podcasts and PR could waste a nonfiction book and skyrocket it to an Amazon bestseller. But I wanted to cognize thing much specific: How galore income could really travel successful straight from the advertisement itself, abstracted from everything else?