On the mediabistro membership site, an anonymous editor made a startling confession regarding why books fail and who gets the blame:
"Nine times out of ten the author is blamed for poor sales... As an editor I can assure you that I have too many books to edit and there are too many books to promote. Why is it a safe bet to blame the author? Because we all want to keep our jobs, that's why... The bottom line is this: When sales are good we all pat ourselves on the back and take credit, but when sales are bad, we find fault with the author, when in fact many times the poor results are our own fault!"
Of course there are many reasons why a book fails or succeeds. A big factor is how many copies the sales force can get book stores to order the first time around. My newest book, "Focus: the power of targeted thinking" is doing very well, partly because W.H. Smith travel outlets placed a big initial order and then they and the publisher promoted it as the W. H. Smith Business Book of the Month the first month it was out. Another book store promotion is being discussed with another chain of bookshops at the moment. The book has not had much attention in the press yet we've been selling an average of 700 a week, so it's clear how important book store placement is (of course I also like to think it's a good book...)
