I do rather enjoy movie trailers, but I still can't quite wrap my mind around the whole book trailer-concept.
Sure, that recent Shteyngart/Franco trailer was amusing enough, but it wouldn't occur to me to get whatever the book they're trying to sell is (I remain unsure whether it's a trailer for Shteyngart's book, or Franco's).
Sadly, it seems that book trailers are now also an international phenomenon, and in The Hindu Arundhati Hazra reports on Well trailer-ed books in India.
Apparently some think they're helpful:
Perhaps more realistically:
I suspect that a rudimentary cost/benefit analysis -- given the usual/expected sales of any title -- makes it obvious that it can't pay to make a trailer really worth watching (or that's even just watchable): production costs would simply dwarf not just any potential additional revenue, but simply any revenue.
Sadly, it seems that book trailers are now also an international phenomenon, and in The Hindu Arundhati Hazra reports on Well trailer-ed books in India.
Apparently some think they're helpful:
Says author Ashwin Sanghi, "A trailer increases a potential reader's awareness of a title and thus makes him or her more likely to purchase it when he or she sees it among several other titles on the racks of a book shop. The trailer I made for my book The Rozabal Line had over 50,000 views in a month. I think the trailer played a vital role in pushing awareness for the book."That trailer -- or the slightly less basic one for Sanghi's Chanakya's Chant -- don't exactly looking cutting-edge (or, indeed, interesting enough to hold-viewer-interest for the duration of the short videos).
Perhaps more realistically:
Mainak Dhar, author of Zombiestan, sounds a note of caution. "To be honest, I don't think a trailer can realistically get lots of new readers on its own -- it has to work with other elements of the marketing plan, The biggest role of a trailer is sometimes to provide a more immersive experience for a potential reader who has seen the book in a shop window or online, so they can get a more multimedia sense of what the book is about."That said, the trailer for Zombiestan is also kind of a let-down -- a story that promises: "It began with tales of undead Taliban" surely could do better than this very limited show-piece.
I suspect that a rudimentary cost/benefit analysis -- given the usual/expected sales of any title -- makes it obvious that it can't pay to make a trailer really worth watching (or that's even just watchable): production costs would simply dwarf not just any potential additional revenue, but simply any revenue.