Schiffer Publishing, Ltd. (Atglen, PA) is a family-owned publisher with more than 5,700 titles in print and a broad catalog of books, including non-fiction books on art, decorative arts, architecture, design, antiques, military history, maritime subjects, photography, fashion, house and garden, food, history, crafts, woodworking, regional topics, and more. Located on the Schiffer Book Farm near the Chester/Lancaster county line, we are two miles from the Parkesburg station on Amtrak's Keystone Line.
Marketing Lead
The Marketing Lead achieves results through creating and executing creative marketing strategies for the company, imprints, and publications that create discoverability and sales. A strong initiative, competitive drive, excellent communication skills, deep industry knowledge, and the ability to stay results focused when market conditions change are all essential.
The leader of the marketing team is focused on developing and implementing practical, timely solutions, and utilizing tools and strategies that have proven results. Making prudent decisions on a variety of activities that enable messages to stay on point and in front of the audience is key. Self-assurance and innovation are critical to purposefully drive results. Problem solving and engaging the commitment of others is essential.
Fostering a strong collaboration between the internal marketing team and our authors to align the marketing plan with the audience and the author, leveraging and/or developing their platforms to successfully launch and support their publication.
Lead the marketing team to achieve goals through proactively motivating, teaching, and engaging the team. Through outgoing, poised and persuasive communication, the Marketing Lead will build rapport within the company, the authors, and relationships with industry and subject matter influencers. Due to the nature of the work and evolving market, effective delegation and the ability to quickly and thoroughly digest information is critical. Proactive outward facing coordination and relationship development with Authors to engage and direct them through their work to market their publication to their audience.
The Marketing Lead must act independently and collaboratively. This position requires confidence and flexibility to handle a variety of challenges with a sense of urgency. A full commitment to the success of the organization and a devotion to high standards are expected in this role. The employment of effective systems through and with people will achieve desired results.
Role and Responsibilities
- Responsible for leading the marketing team and providing strategy and execution of companies marketing.
- Provide direction to the company and members of the marketing team to optimize discoverability of publications, categories of publications, imprints, and company to both B2B and B2C.and ensure a positive ROI
- Oversight for all marketing activities across imprints including but not limited to: digital marketing, email, social media, publicity, advertising, ecommerce platforms, trade shows
- Align and implement marketing programs to create discoverability, generate interest and demand
- Work closely with Sales, Editorial, and Imprint teams and authors on campaigns, events, and digital marketing
- Develop skills of the marketing team to ensure they are utilizing necessary tools and strategy effectively.
- Ensure all publications have a comprehensive marketing plan that will launch and connect to core audience
- Overarching Marketing Strategy
- Actively participate in company strategic planning, operations, and leadership meetings
- Oversight of company branding strategy, brand messaging, industry/trade communications, direct-to-consumer communications, digital marketing outreach.
- Manage individual title strategy and key author relationships as needed
- Outreach to both new and current markets.
- Identify and communicate trends, provide continuing education for team and evaluate marketing systems and tools, identify potential pitfalls and troubleshoot solutions
- Foster strong connections between marketing team and industry contacts to ensure messaging is consistent
- Develop and nurture relationships with media and journalists, arranging and attending in-person meetings to pitch titles as applicable
- Manage departmental budgets, including but not limited to advertising, digital boosts, promotional (swag), travel, show, departmental subscriptions & resources
- Collaborate with Sales Team to develop strategies seasonal front-list marketing to align with sales initiatives in line with top-line company goals
- Lead, manage, and develop the marketing team including title assignments, advising on author engagement, troubleshooting, and serving as an advocate, supporter and mentor for the team.
- Manage strategy for marketing corporate and industry relationships and serve as point-of-contact (i.e. Co-Ops, PW, Book Riot, etc.)
- Collaborate with department heads to accomplish monthly, quarterly and annual goals
- Attend industry and category specific shows
Qualifications and Education Requirements
- Bachelor’s Degree
- Minimum 5+ years of book marketing experience
Preferred Skills
- Leader and team motivator
- Strategic-thinker bringing creativity to a diverse range of marketing initiatives
- Confident; able to make effective decisions quickly on an independent basis or with minimal feedback from Publisher
- Strong problem solving and conflict resolution skills, able to constructively level-set expectations comfortably
- Solid understanding Schiffer company policies and individual team roles across company
- Core understanding of what information needs to be communicated to ensure business continues uninterrupted
- Engaging personality and strong interpersonal communication and skills
- Social; active listener; open-door policy
- Comfortable working under pressure; enjoys trouble-shooting problems
- Capable problem-solver and actively thinks outside the box
- Strong time management skills and ability to prioritize tasks independently and effectively
- Able to see goals through the tyranny of urgency to prioritize important tasks. Unafraid to ask for clarity when goals are hazy.
- Willingness to learn and accept feedback
- Tolerant of change and uncertainty
- Understand ROI and KPI metrics to inform projects and resource allocation
- Good sense of humor and ability to have fun while staying on task
- Enjoys working independently as well as with the team
Author Engagement Marketer
The Author Engagement Manager (AEM) coordinates marketing and sales leads from the author with those of the company to create a comprehensive launch plan for the publication to its target audience. This person is the primary connection between the author and publishing company for the marketing of their book. The AEM is responsible for working directly with the authors and independently in the development, coordination, and execution of the marketing plan with both internal and external contacts for new releases and trending categories of publications.
The goal of the AEM is to work with and through the author to create discoverability for the new publication by providing direction and resources to proactively engage with the publicity contacts, influencers/follower/audience engagement and other related connections in before the launch to garner reviews, articles, support for the publication and pre orders. Sharing information with both the internal team and proactively engaging with external contacts to extend the reach of the publication through managing the outreach for continued connection after the launch is complete.
As the primary contact for the authors the AEM, aligns, educates, and prepares the author and marketing outreach for the release of the book to market and to advocate for the books successful launch into the market and continued promotion to the audience. The AEM is the point of contact, internal champion, and quarterback for new title marketing and media contact for publicity requests for both new releases and currently available titles. For publications where the marketing team is fully responsible for the marketing launch the AEM is responsible for creating and successfully launching the marketing plan with the guidance of the internal team.
This position requires a highly curious and motivated communicator with a results-driven work ethic and excellent written and persuasive verbal skills. The AEM should be able to work independently as well as collaboratively across departments, with outside contacts, and operate with a sense of urgency regarding deadlines and deliverables and be comfortable managing the multiple projects and responsibilities that comes from working in an entrepreneurial environment.
Role and Responsibilities
- Point of contact for Authors engagement for the marketing and sales related to the release and continued support of the new publication.
- Communicating proactively, answering questions, and evaluating requests in a timely method by telephone, video conference, email, and in person.
- Creating comprehensive marketing plans for the launch of new publications
- Writing marketing copy for press releases, media kits, posts, and related descriptive copy.
- Champion the publications marketing through guiding the marketing preparation and launch, teaching relevant skills to developing authors, and advocating for the author and publication for a successful launch and market fit
- Level setting expectations, teaching author marketing fundamentals, and options for what creates a successful launch and discoverability.
- Developing and implementing successful publicity plans and acting as the media point of contact for reviews and communication with external contacts.
- and marketing strategy, descriptive listings, and engagement campaigns for new publications, relevant/trending backlist, coordination of team and author engagement
- Identifying and connecting the publication to its intended audience for both B2B and B2B
- Create targeted pitches, and direct the distribution of review copies (both print and digital) to reach the intended readers/reviewers and influences.
- Write and distribute descriptive press and promotional materials, including listing, pitch and galley letters, press releases, and customizing content to stay relevant as needed for the title’s success.
- Develop and maintain relationships with national, regional, and topical media contacts, bloggers, and other influencers, including promptly responding to media requests and follow-up as needed on requests.
- Remain current on trends and actively seeking out and researching new media outlets.
- Research, collaborate, brainstorm, and proactively seek new and creative ways to publicize titles.
- Work both independently and with authors to create and align the publicity and marketing plan to the audience.
- Serve as in-house resource for author publicity questions, help coach authors on best practices to connect with their audience and other media questions as needed.
- Coordinate the execution of the publicity and marketing plans through working closely across departments with editorial, marketing, and sales as well as outside resources as needed.
- Coordinating creation of prepublication print and digital galleys and managing distribution to reviewers
- Manage and coordinate award submissions and nominations for new publications.
- Create messaging and coordinate publicity outreach to audience through email and social media platforms.
- Creation of a summary of publicity highlights/media placements—which can be shared with the company including sales network (internal and external reps) and international distributors. Responsible for communicating major media placement to distributors.
- Other projects and tasks related to the publicity and marketing of the company as assigned.
Qualifications and Requirements
- Bachelor’s Degree, in communications or related field preferred
- 2-4 years relevant work experience
- Able to work in a fast-paced environment and meet tight deadlines.
- Strategic thinker and excellent time management
- Ability to manage multiple priorities successfully.
- Possess extensive knowledge of the media and marketplace
- Experience working industry shows and book festivals a plus
- An ability to generate creative angles and media pitches
- Strong computer skills in MS Office: Word, Excel required as well as a familiarity with Adobe InDesign, Photoshop, Cision, Mailchimp, and Canva desired
- Basic graphic design skills and ability to create flyers, posters, postcards, and other collateral a strongly desired
Additional Skills
Strong interpersonal communication skills
Comfortable working under pressure; enjoys trouble-shooting problems
Capable problem-solver and actively thinks outside the box
Strong time management skills and ability to prioritize tasks independently and effectively
Able to see goals through the tyranny of urgent to prioritize important tasks.
Willingness to learn and accept feedback
Tolerant of change and uncertainty
Understand ROI and KPI metrics to inform projects and resource allocation
Good sense of humor; enjoys being goofy and able to have fun while staying on task
Enjoys working independently as well as with the team
