tips from a literary agent

How to write a book that sells: a literary agent on how to find and research a book idea that can sell.

In my house, I have one big white bookshelf where I keep all the books I’ve ever worked on, either as a literary agent or an editor. Some have sold well; some haven’t sold well.

My greatest wish? That they were all bestsellers.

Each of those books took 2+ years of my life to work on, and I know that the time and energy and love I put into them is only a tiny fraction of what the author put into them. So with all that hard work, shouldn’t they all have found their perfect readership? Should every author be able to write a book that sells?

It’s heartbreaking, but the truth is: most books don’t find their perfect readership. And most don’t sell as much as they could.

There’s no magic bullet to fix this–in the nearly 10 years I’ve been working on books, I haven’t figured out the perfect algorithm to spit bestsellers out every time. (If you have it, send it to ME @ sell all the books .com.)

But one thing I’ve noticed…

The one thing I have noticed is that there are all kinds of ways–big and small–to inch your book closer to that zone of bestsellerdom. And so very many of them happen before one word is ever written. They happen before I sign an author, or a publisher offers a book deal, or a marketing team brainstorms a campaign.

They happen at the idea phase and at the platform phase. When you’re deciding “what is my book?” and “who am I as an author?” Those are questions no agent, editor, or publisher can answer for you, but those are the answers that will fuel each action you’ll need to write a book that sells.

So where do I tell my authors to start?

At the bookstore.

Nine times out of ten when I’m chatting with a potential author, I ask them to take a field trip to a bookstore and see what’s happening in their category or genre. I do this, too, when I’m researching a book idea or trying to help an author with positioning their book.

So today I’m sharing exactly how I research a book idea and how I tell my authors to research their own book ideas so they can write a book that sells.

How to write a book that sells: the 7 things to research

Ready to go to the bookstore to research your idea so you can write a book that sells? Here’s exactly how I go about it:

1. Breathe in that bookstore smell.

Sigh it out happily. It’s bliss, isn’t it?

2. Beeline for the bestseller shelves.

And also look at the front tables with new releases and featured titles. What’s new out there? What’s popular these days? What’s the overall composition of the book market? What are the big hits in both fiction and nonfiction? If you’re not sure exactly how much a book is selling, look at its Amazon ranking.

You can also research the bestsellers in your category by finding your category or genre on Amazon and sorting by sales rank. But I highly recommend using Amazon research as a supplemental tool to your bookstore research.

3. Head to the shelves for your category/genre.

These are the shelves where your book would be placed on publication. Do an ocular assessment: what’s face out on the shelf? What’s prominently displayed? What are the category killers (those books that sell and sell, no matter how long ago they were released)? For books that are not facing out, what spines are jumping out to you? Why?

4. Start pulling down books.

Find a handful of books that are similar to yours and sit down with them. How is the packaging of the book positioning it? Look at everything from the format (paperback or hardcover?) to the title, to subtitle, to cover art, to fonts, to paper, to back cover copy, to endorsements, to the author bio. Every single detail on a book’s package is a clue about how to position and market yourself and your book, so soak it all up.

5. Home in on the author bio.

What does it say? What doesn’t it say? Who is the author, and why are they the person who’s writing this book? Write down the name of several authors who know how to write a book that sells, i.e. they have a current, successful book out (check the Amazon ranking to get a sense of sales). When you get home, stalk them shamelessly. What did their path to authorship look like? What’s their background, education, and credentials? What else do they do aside from write books? What’s their online presence like?

If the book came out recently, do a deep dive into how the author is marketing his/her book. Are they doing tons of interviews or hosting giveaway contests on their websites? Are they on a book tour or rallying their fans through social media? How are readers responding? Look at online reviews (on both Amazon and Goodreads), as well as any online interactions with fans.

6. Read the acknowledgments.

Who’s the literary agent on the book? Who’s the editor? Who’s the publisher? Who else was involved in the making of the book? Research every one of those people, too. What other books have they done? How big or small are they in terms of market share in your category? What are they doing on their own channels to promote the book? How successful are their books overall?

7. Buy the ones that you most admire.

Or, at the very least, check them out from your local library! Then read them cover-to-cover. And when I say cover-to-cover, I mean cover-to-cover. Every last word. Read the copyright page to see when it was published; to see if special permissions were needed for certain things; to see who photographed it; to see how it’s being categorized by the Library of Congress.

Read every last word of the book itself, even if it’s a cookbook. Note the format, structure, tone, content. Mark it up and underline anything that hits you where the feels are. Read it multiple times if you have to, until you’ve soaked it up and can feel the vibe of it in your bones.

Then keep this stack of books prominently displayed in your workspace (unless you borrowed them from the library…return those before the fines become felonious!).

And when you get discouraged, sit down with these old friends and remember that they were once deep in the struggle too. But right now, they’re quietly chanting: keep going, keep going.

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