Book: The Mummy's Tunnel
Synopsis: Teenager Jonathon Bradford accompanies his father on a research trip to Peru. There he hears the ancient legend of hidden tunnels connecting Machu Picchu to Lima. The Incas supposedly escaped the Spaniards by disappearing through the tunnels with their gold and sacred mummies. Jonathon doesn't believe the stories until a wrong step plunges him into the hidden labyrinth. There he finds the Inca mummies and the Lost Inca Gold. He also becomes a hostage in a deadly game where terrorists will kill to obtain the lost Inca treasures. I remember this from a previous contest, I think. Good idea. Hope you finish and submit the book somewhere.
Promo: Everyone loves chocolate, right? At the checkout counters of bookstores, set up ceramic pottery decorated with Inca symbols. Fill them with chocolate coins wrapped in foil. On one side of each coin have stamped or embossed, "Lost Inca gold found!" On the other side have the book's title and release date. (You can order customized chocolate coins for 10-12 cents each.) Good idea, but not financially practical. Promo items should cost maybe a penny a piece and there needs to be some control over who gets them--like, you only get one if you buy the book. Chocolate could also melt during shipping and then it would be a mess. Some bookstores like having things at their counter, but the like it most when it encourages customers to BUY things. This doesn't force the customer to act. Bookmarks are a good thing to have free at the counter because when a customer takes them home, they have them as a continual reminder to buy the book. But once they ate the chocolate, that reminder would be gone.
Shirley Bahlmann did something like this with one of her books, but the books came shrink-wrapped with a coin included with purchase, and it was metal, not chocolate. I hesitate to shrink-wrap a book because a lot of people like to flip through it before they buy.
Anyway, the chocolate idea would be a good one if we did something like this--have a pot of these candies as a virtual buried treasure. Visitors to your website would click to get an online treasure map that would have lots of promotional teasers and clues connected to the book. If they "found" the treasure by a certain date, they would be entered in a free drawing to win the pot of chocolate gold.
2 comments:
Great promo idea.
Is this a book that's been written or in the process? I'd be interested in reading it.
What's the promo budget? Chocolate (which goes like hot cakes) at 12 cents apiece, at the checkout, where anyone can grab it -- that's going to cost a lot.
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