Category: My Job in 5

Suzanne Kennedy has the spotlight this week as she details what it’s like to be Deputy Sales & Marketing Director at Floris Books.

1. Describe your role.
   I manage a cracking team of three marketers and am currently recruiting for a Marketing Manager. I oversee their campaign work, head up the season planning, budget tightly, liaise with our US distributors, key accounts and reps and input into acquisition meetings and product decisions. I love it!

2. What do you like best about your role?
   The variety and the people – no day is ever the same. The job is both reactive and proactive and intensively planned with much speedy firefighting. The Floris Books team are highly motivated, professional and passionate, all wanting to do the best by our authors and illustrators and their readers.

3. Which new projects or titles are you working on at the moment?
   On my desk today are marketing materials for our new partnership with Historic Environment Scotland, drafts of AIs, a direct mailing and finalising LBF details. We’re launching the fabulous Guardians of the Wild Unicorns this week and starting work on an autumn lead Victoria Williamson’s Boy with the Butterfly Mind.

4. What skills do you need for your role?
   Prioritisation and the ability to re-prioritise when something unexpected lands in the day. Great communication internally and externally. Recognition of your own weaknesses and playing to the strengths of others. Spotting opportunities when they arise and ferreting them out when they don’t.

5. What advice would you give to those looking to work in the industry?
   Know what’s going on in the marketplace. Have a favourite campaign, cover, author, bookshop, short list. Be kind, tenacious, hard working and prepared to network like mad. It’s a small industry. Your peers in your first job may well be your peers for your entire career.

Discover marketing (including jobs like deputy sales & marketing director) roles here.

Doorman Filipe Teixeira from Porto’s most beautiful bookshop Livraria Lello takes over My Job in 5 this week.

1. I provide a warm welcome to all the visitors that pass by the world’s most beautiful bookshop. Our team also provides entry vouchers that deliver our customer’s discount on books in the store. We are also happy to provide our guests with little-known facts and curiosities in the bookshop and tips for our beautiful city of Porto.

2. I love the possibility of meeting people from all over the world and creating meaningful connections. These connections make for great memories! I am a sociable person so I can say it’s probably the job that I have most enjoyed ever having.

3. Our team tries daily to improve by learning new languages and typical expressions from around the world. This can get us closer to our guests that have come from far away and still make them feel welcome. At Livraria Lello, it’s our mission to ensure people feel cosy and at home.

4. We need to be comfortable with hundreds of persons around every day, all day. The ability to be flexible in switching languages is also important since numerous questions are asked simultaneously—sometimes three or four languages at the same time! You have to manage the number of people inside, the entry rows, and always care for individualized needs. We have to be able to have managing skills, be self-confident and funny.

5. I don’t many bookshops that have a team of doormen to give a warm welcome to all our book lovers. We need to be confident and comfortable to be able to create the Livraria Lello experience. You must want to share yourself and take an interest in our wonderful guests.

Discover more unique roles within the book trade, such as bookshop doorman, here.

Francesca Baker, Marketing Communications Manager from Spread the Word takes the helm of My Job in 5 this week, sharing with The Bookseller what it is like to provide well-rounded support to London’s burgeoning writing community.

1. Describe your role

As Marketing Communications Manager at Spread the Word my role is basically that – spreading the word about all the awesome work that we do. Our role is to provide support and opportunities for London’s writers and enable them to get their work out there, with a particular focus on championing writers from backgrounds that are underrepresented in publishing. So I have to tell everyone about this. This includes social media, updating web content, writing articles, interviewing authors for the blog, writing and sending out press releases, liaising with other media outlets, contacting relevant organisations…it’s quite varied and busy!

2. What do you like best about your role?

It’s really nice when I get to talk to an author who has worked with Spread the Word in the past, such as by receiving some mentoring or winning a prize, who then goes on to get a book deal or run a workshop for us. I often interview people like this for the blog, and it’s so nice to see the clear and tangible difference that Spread the Word makes to a writer’s craft and career. It’s also great when events and workshops sell out, and I can see the impact that some social media campaign or outreach to local organisations has had. This means we’re reaching the right people.

3. Which new projects or titles are you working on at the moment?

Spread the Word’s biggest project at the moment is the London Writers Awards. This is a new annual development programme for talented London writers and gives thirty writers from across genres a nine-month programme of mentoring, workshops, critical feedback groups, masterclasses and WritersLabs. My job is to capture some of the great impact that the scheme is having and share it.

We run two Prizes each year – the London Short Story Prize and Life Writing Prize (this one is currently open for entries until February 1st). I love encouraging people to enter, announcing the winner, and enjoying the prize-giving events. It’s so nice to see the excitement that people have when their hard work and talent is recognised.

4. What skills do you need for your role?

You have to be creative, and be able to see opportunities for marketing beyond the obvious. We’ve got a lot going on at Spread the Word, so the ability to be able to manage multiple different projects is key. The ability to write is key – I write event descriptions, interviews, articles, social media posts, press releases…lots of writing! Really, it’s about being a storyteller – finding stories and communicating them in a way that connects with the audience.

5. What advice would you give to those looking to work in the industry?

Have an active social media presence yourself, so you can learn about what works and how to maximise the channels, and can apply that learning to any organisation you work with. Look out for good and bad examples of marketing and think about what you liked or disliked about them, and what worked or didn’t work for you. Write as much as you can. Get in touch with organisations that you would like to work with, and tell them about your skills and what you can offer – even if they are not currently advertising a position. You’ll be front of mind should they start looking.

Discover marketing roles, including marketing communications manager roles here.

Kate Beal, MD and Publisher of Muswell Press, takes the reins of My Job in 5 this week.

1. Describe your role

I am the joint MD and Publisher with my sister Sarah Beal at Muswell Press. After many years of working for some of the best and biggest independent publishing companies in the UK we decided to be our own bosses and have the freedom to publish exactly what we want and the books we love that match our values, purpose and creativity. We work very closely with our authors and with a brilliant, small but committed team of freelancers on design, editorial and publicity. So running a small Independent with a full-time team of two means that my role is really varied and covers all aspects of the publishing business. A typical day starts with looking at sales figures and then I am thrown into whatever needs to be done, from writing and sending material to our sales team in the UK and Export, reading new submissions, catching up with our authors, re-writing our five-year plan, organising ebook promotions, updating Nielsen, to running to the Post Office to send off yet more proofs.

2. What do you like best about your role?

Flexibility. We publish books that some of the larger publishers wouldn’t look at with their decisions made by committees. We just publish the type of books we love to read and the type of books we know will have a market, and it is a pleasure to work on these books and to work with the authors across all the traditional publishing departments. The worst thing about my role is the challenge of creating thinking time to plan for mid and long-term issues. But the very best bit is when the finished copies arrive and look great – that makes all the hard work worthwhile.

3. Which new projects or titles are you working on at the moment?

We are currently working on our Autumn 2019 publication schedule; acquiring new titles and commissioning a new Biography/Travel series. The two titles I am mainly working on at present is our recently published A Beer in the Loire, having just reprinted I am looking at new sales, marketing and publicity opportunities. The other book is Close to the Edge, a brilliant new thriller by Toby Faber that we are publishing in April 2019, where we are working on the marketing materials and PR plan for the UK and Export markets.

4. What skills do you need for your role?

Experience and calmness. We have to problem-solve as we go along. It is easy for us to be creative and innovative but we have also had to create a good structure and critical path to allow us that freedom. Communication skills are also vital as is the ability to work quickly. Finally, you need to have no shame and be prepared to ask for advice when you need it. Publishing is a generous industry and friends and colleagues are always happy to help.

5. What advice would you give to those looking to work in the industry?

Don’t think you need an MA in publishing to get into the industry. Apply for internships at publishers that pay a fair wage and try to experience work in all departments to see what suits you best and what you are best at. Work in the sales department will show you the harsh reality of the industry and work in the editorial department will teach you where some of the magic is made. Work hard, ask questions and be vocal. The industry wants new talent and is in my experience a nurturing environment.

Discover publisher roles here.

Lily Mac Mahon, Editorial Assistant of Classical Studies and Archaeology at Bloomsbury Publishing, shares all about her new role.

1. Describe your role

I am the editorial assistant of Classical Studies and Archaeology at Bloomsbury Publishing. My main job is to oversee the publishing schedule of each book from the initial drawing up of the contract, to overseeing the progression of the manuscript, and finally to preparing it for production. A normal day generally involves responding to emails from authors, proofreading manuscripts, sending out books for review, building a website, and various other tasks which come my way.

2. What do you like best about your role?

Professionally, the best part of my job is working in editorial with books I really enjoy reading, as I studied Classics at university. On a more personal level, I feel very fortunate to work with such lively and intelligent people. This is not just true of my colleagues, but also of the authors I get to work with.

3. Which new projects or titles are you working on at the moment?

Our list at Bloomsbury is ever-expanding, especially with the recent acquisition of I.B.Tauris Publishers. I’m always excited to see new manuscripts come in which are part of our Classical Reception series, as they generally have such a fresh approach to the subject. For example, we recently published a volume of essays on Frankenstein and Its Classics which looks at the influence of Greek and Roman literature on Shelley’s work. Also, I’ve just been working on the manuscript for Looking at Ajax (edited by David Stuttard) – it is a privilege to work on titles that have such an excellent level of scholarship.

4. What skills do you need for your role?

As an editorial assistant, I think you have need to be highly organised, have a good eye for detail and an ability to learn quickly. One skill which is often overlooked in editorial is the ability to relate to people. Most of my day involves being in contact with authors and as an editorial assistant, it is also your responsibility to cultivate harmonious relationships.

5. What advice would you give to those looking to work in the industry?

If you’re looking to get into the industry, the key is to get some publishing-related experience on your CV. Volunteering at organisations is just as good as doing internships, especially since the latter are quite difficult to get. Network as much as you can, join societies and make sure to attend literary events where you’ll meet other publishing professionals. And lastly, persevere!

Discover editorial assistant roles here.