The more things change, the more things stay the same: that was the heart of the message at a panel titled Anatomy of a Bestseller, held at this year’s in-person and virtual US Book Show. What has not changed in the bestseller equation: word of mouth. What has changed: where word of mouth happens and whose words are effective.
The panel was moderated by literary agent Cherise Fisher of Wendy Sherman Associates and included four editors. Two editors were from independent houses, and two were from the Big Five: Arthur Levine of Levine Querido, Cindy Spiegel of Spiegel & Grau, Karen Rinaldi of HarperWave (HarperCollins), and Sally Kim of Putnam (PRH). All have been working in the publishing industry for decades and offered a long view on the business.
First things first: Everyone agreed there is no tried-and-true method for launching a bestseller. And there never has been. Especially today, with the media landscape shifting all the time, the buttons or levers that worked for one book may not even be around for the next. “There are no guarantees,” Rinaldi said. “The business is hard. Discoverability is hard. Books are hard.” She said—to unanimous agreement—“How many times have we heard [from people outside the industry], Why don’t you just publish bestsellers? Which is the most hilarious thing. … If we knew how to do it, we would apply it all the time. I’m also a writer, and I know everything [about the business]. I couldn’t make my book sell, honestly!”
However, the path to bestsellerdom has shifted. For example, in 2000, Rinaldi was the editor who brought to market Anthony Bourdain’s memoir Kitchen Confidential, which became an instant New York Times bestseller. At the time, nobody knew who he was, and the first printing was only 11,000 copies. Bourdain was an author without a platform who broke out big and unexpectedly. “That’s just not happening really anymore.” When asked at the time by another editor how she made that happen, Rinaldi could only say, “I have no f–g idea.”
Kim said if the same panel were held 10 or even five years ago, a different conversation would be unfolding, because the formula (if there is one at all) is constantly changing. “Readers are curating their own lists now. They don’t necessarily only buy the books that are on the cover of the New York Times Book Review, or only the books that are on the bestseller shelf in the market that they go to.” They’re talking amongst themselves, sometimes listening to celebrities, and they ultimately care little about who the fancy publisher is or what any professional critic says. That in turn makes it a lot harder for a publisher to predict a path to success for any book.
A bestselling book is the result of many things going right, not merely about drafting a good marketing plan. Kim said success goes beyond getting retailers or bookstores on board or having readers spread word of mouth. It’s about good editing, good publicity—plus of course you need all those other things too. For that reason, Kim said she bristles when she’s asked for a marketing campaign during book auctions held by agents. “Sure, we can provide one. It’ll be very generic. It’ll point to the very broad strokes.” But it won’t account for how the landscape will look in a few years and how a book is a living, breathing thing that develops over time. To help take that book to a bigger place, “You take the in-house reads, the [energy] swell that happens around that book, you look at what the market is doing at that time, you look at trends, you look at certain opportunities, new social media assets,” Kim said.
Word of mouth is the biggest driver of success, said Spiegel, and she argued that everyone on the panel would agree with that. At the very least, no one disagreed, and it’s a long-held tenet of all book marketers and publicists. Of course, word of mouth can be sparked by anyone—including Twitter accounts that go by the name of Bigolas Dickolas—at any time these days. “In the olden days, it used to be reviews” that drove bestsellers, she said, but that’s not really the case any longer. “Now we’re sending books to influencers, we’re using social media. A lot of it is online marketing.” She added that what’s great about today’s moment is that it’s easier to identify specific readerships and target marketing to them, but that’s still about spreading word of mouth. “Once you connect readers with a book that they need, you have a much easier time in spreading the word and creating sales.”
Both small publishers and big publishers have a shot at developing or launching bestsellers. But bestsellerdom does carry varying definitions. Some publishers’ definition of a bestseller is hitting the New York Times list or another major print list. For others, it’s a book that sells consistently for 20 years or becomes a backlist gem. Regardless of what qualifies, though, Levine argued that each publisher offers unique advantages and disadvantages in accomplishing these sales goals. Editors at independent houses have more control over how much time and resources they spend on a book, while an editor at a conglomerate has to learn how to marshal the forces of a corporate team of players.
One request was made of agents specifically: Don’t have your authors run after things they can’t really do. Rinaldi voiced frustration with authors who make promises like “I’m going to start tweeting now when I’ve never tweeted in my life” and/or who hire a social media consultant or do whatever is trending in the year prior to the book’s launch. “It’s just not going to make any damn bit of difference,” she said, unless you already have your following in place at the time you pitch or sign the contract. “As soon as you start looking over your shoulder and trying to do what somebody else is doing, it’s not going to work,” Rinaldi said. Instead, authors must do what is authentic to them and how they want to reach or engage with their readership. Rinaldi suggested that agents work toward “helping authors focus where their efforts are going to be most effective, not chasing their friend.”
Bottom line: Kim offered perhaps the best summary of what authors need to know about becoming a bestseller: “The editor, the publishing house, the agent, and the author need to be able to go after that in the same direction,” she said. “Being able to be transparent and clear with the author and agent is part of the formula for success.”
Jane Friedman has spent her entire career working in the publishing industry, with a focus on business reporting and author education. Established in 2015, her newsletter The Bottom Line provides nuanced market intelligence to thousands of authors and industry professionals; in 2023, she was named Publishing Commentator of the Year by Digital Book World.
Jane’s expertise regularly features in major media outlets such as The New York Times, The Atlantic, NPR, The Today Show, Wired, The Guardian, Fox News, and BBC. Her book, The Business of Being a Writer, Second Edition (The University of Chicago Press), is used as a classroom text by many writing and publishing degree programs. She reaches thousands through speaking engagements and workshops at diverse venues worldwide, including NYU’s Advanced Publishing Institute, Frankfurt Book Fair, and numerous MFA programs.
