Target Audience

Okay, I’ll admit I watched the Eclipse trailer Thursday morning at 9:01am. I wasn’t counting down or anything, but I did run over, like the rest of the women in my office, when my co-worker announced she had it on her screen. While the men in the office rolled their eyes, I realized that the hype surrounding this movie is not unusual. In fact, I’ve been the victim of far too many hyped movies that I would not have seen otherwise and often wished I hadn’t – Transformers comes to mind. But that hype, more so than the quality of the film, can make a movie into a blockbuster – once again, Transformers comes to mind - while films of merit that do not have the same budget fall under the radar and sadly go unseen.
This marketed hype is now becoming applicable when it comes to books. Hype used to be either generated by the author’s previous success or word of mouth. While it was no guarantee that you would like the book, your chances were increased if you already enjoyed an author’s previous work or your best friend told you that "you have to read this book right now, the vampire is so hot". That’s changing though. Advertising books through print ads in newspapers and magazines is morphing into movie-like trailers during commercials of prime time television, especially for YA books – or maybe that just says something about the type of shows I’m watching. Still, more and more fiction is reaching out to its intended audience through television and websites. With the Kindle, iPad, iPhone apps and nook it is easier than ever to have instant literary satisfaction; see the ad, buy the novel and start reading chapter one in less than a minute.
All of this sounds great, but unlike movies whose target audience is often obvious - Murder & big explosions? Advertise during a game. Love story with a hot guy? Buy commercial space during Grey’s Anatomy. Twisting plot? Lost has the audience for you - books can be harder to categorize. Where would you advertise say… Dan Brown’s Lost Symbol? It’s got murder and big explosions, plot twists and in your mind’s eye if you replace Tom Hanks with, say, George Clooney (depending on your preference of course), then your audience is spread throughout primetime television. And how do you reach those who are interested in conspiracy theories, who perhaps don’t watch TV for fear of being brainwashed? Books don’t always have the kind of target audience a movie does. Nor do they have the “my wife dragged me to see this” excuse that a chick-flick gives a guy who wants to be swept up in a little romance. How do you find your reader when they could be anywhere?