Marketing Yourself: Strategies to promote your editorial business

by Sara Hulse (London: SfEP, 2nd ed. 2013): 18pp (pbk), £5.50 (inc p&p), ISBN 978 0 9563164 7 9.

Reviewed by Michèle Clarke

This guide, previously issued as Developing a Marketing Strategy: Cost-effective ways to market your editorial business, was reviewed jointly with Editor and Client: Building a professional relationship.

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These two booklets have been added to SfEP's new stable of publications. I know we dabbled in publishing way back in our first years and found it too expensive to continue with professionally designed and printed books. With the ease of short-run printing these days, it is good to know we are trying again. Of course, it is difficult to review books from one's own society – one tends to be biased! So, with my rose-tinted glasses on, I got to grips with the subject matter, style and printing, and hoped I could be disinterested.

Sara's booklet is as wide-ranging as Anne's, covering:

  • objectives
  • developing your message
  • deciding on methods
  • building client relations
  • planning your strategy.

Good references and resources are also included – websites, mailshots, networking, advertising, cold calling.

Good introductions

Both booklets are good introductions to their subjects and will be of great help to someone trying to get their freelance business off the ground, or good reminders to some of us who think we have been there and done that!

It is always difficult to write perfectly when you are fronting a society such as ours. People's eyes tend to be just that bit more critical, but reviewers mustn't shirk from the job, drop standards or be too kind. So I shall make a couple of comments. One is purely on the production side – they do look very 'bookletty' and home-produced, with a card cover scarcely covering the inside stapled A4 pages (but this is not too much of a problem if the aim is to sell just to members). Second is the question of whether our writing should be as informal as it is. Should rules be relaxed to allow, for example, 'who' as an object rather than 'whom'? Petty comments possibly. I can't fault the subject matter.

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