AVANT PUNK ARMY

PUNK POINT MANUAL

This manual is provided as a guide for things you can do to help promote Bizarro. We prefer if you promote the authors that are involved with the Avant Punk Army. Those authors are Carlton Mellick III, Kevin L. Donihe, D. Harlan Wilson and very soon John Edward Lawson and Gina Ranalli. Other authors are expected to join. You can also promote any Bizarro author published by Eraserhead Press, Raw Dog Screaming Press or Afterbirth Books, but points may not be scored as highly.

AMAZON.COM

REVIEWS (5-10 points)
If you write an online review you will be awarded with 5-10 points, depending on the quality of the review. A lengthy in-depth review will be 8-10 points, but a short quick three sentence praise will only give 5 points. If you write professional quality reviews you will be treated as a professional reviewer and can get free Bizarro review copies from the publisher. Check out this link on how to write a good book review.
Proof: submit a link to your review

LISTMANIA (5-10 points)
One of the best and easiest ways to promote is to create a Listmania List on amazon.com. The benefit of creating a listmania list is that it connects my books with other books on amazon.com, so the lists with the most variety will have the most power (and get the most points). But they should only link to things that would interest readers of Bizarro books. Most people will list Bizarro books with other like-minded authors or books. But they don't have to be books. Bizarro books probably appeal more to fans of weird/cult movies or crazy music than they do books. So the lists can have any number of products in them, just as long as some (don't need to do all) of the Bizarro books are on the top of the list. More points will be given to lists with descriptions, but the best lists will be the ones that attract the most people. Check out all the lists on amazon to get ideas. Pay attention to the ones that get the most hits. Unlike the reviews, you can do as many listmania lists as you want.
Proof: submit a link to your list.

GUIDES (5-10 points)
The guides on amazon are pretty much the same as the listmania lists, but they require at least some writing. You can make as many guides as you want.
Proof: submit a link to your guide.

TIPS ON GETTING HIGHER POINTS
Besides quality, you can also get higher points by writing reviews where reviews need to be written (or creating listmania lists where needed). Examples: books that don't have many reviews or many good reviews, books that are new, books on amazon.co.uk (which are in serious need of listmania lists and reviews), books that aren't ranked very well, and books that have recently gotten bashed by Christians or bitter hatemongers who leave bad reviews without even reading the books. You'll also get higher points if you verify your "real name" or if you happen to be a "top reviewer."

STREET TACTICS

LIBRARIES (5-10 points)
You can gain 5-10 points by getting books written by Bizarro authors into your local library. For libraries, just ask them. Many library websites have purchase request forms where you just have to enter the title and they'll order the book for you once they have the money to do so. With this method you could get over 100 points for doing 10 minutes worth of work, depending on how many books you ask them to order. Here's a list of Bizarro books. The points will be given once the books are on the shelves. 5 points will be for small libraries that only order one copy. 10 points will be for large library systems that order more than one copy. Bonus points might be given for any number of reasons, like if the books become popular items or if the library orders several copies of each title.
Proof: If your library catalogue is online just send in a link. If they don't have an online catalogue we'll need pictures of the books at the library showing their call numbers.

BOOKSTORES (5 points)
If you can contact bookstores (either in person or online) and convince them to order Bizarro books, you'd get 5 points per copy they order. If they order 2 copies of 10 different titles, that would be 100 points right there. We might have catalogues and publicity packets that you can download and print to bring to bookstores, making the job much easier. You can tell them you are a sales representative for Avant Punk/Eraserhead Press. Have them contact Rose O'Keefe at publisher@eraserheadpress.com
Proof: Just let us know you have sent an interested bookstore our way and once they contact us you'll get the points based on how many copies they order.

FLIERS (0.1 - 0.2 points)
You can post or pass out fliers for points. We can't reimburse you for the cost of fliers, sadly, so this would be best for the person who has access to a copy machine, works at Kinkos, or can print several pages from a computer. Great places to pass out fliers: On a high school or college campus, at punk shows (or whatever concerts you go to), at parties, raves, festivals/fairs (depending on the crowd), art shows, or any hangout for subversive avant-punk types. Great places to post fliers: subways, coffee shops, any college campus, outside of your dorm room door if you live in a dorm, pretty much any common place you find fliers posted for local shows. Great places to leave fliers: at indie music stores & indie bookstores, any indie store where you can find a flier rack, they usually have flier/promo tables at all conventions and film festivals, you can leave fliers on car windshields outside of punk shows, or my favorite ... go to a library or bookstore and place fliers within books of like-minded popular authors such as Kathy Acker, Steve Aylett, Chuck Palahniuk, Kurt Vonnegut, Mark Danielewski Jonathan Lethem, Stewart Home or any punk authors, pretty much any books that you like in addition to avant punk books...or put fliers in dvd cases of cult films at your video store. Those two would probably be the most beneficial ways to use the fliers. You only get 1 point for every 5-10 fliers you make, but that can add up pretty quickly. The point difference depends on where the fliers go and how you prove it.
Proof: This is kind of up in the air. You have to give us a story of what you did with the fliers for starters. If you did pay for the fliers, you can just give us a receipt from the copy shop. Or you can take pictures of places you posted/left fliers. This is pretty easy to do if you have a digital camera. You probably don't want to pay for film to be developed but that would work as well. Though if you have a few spots leftover from a roll of film you can just take a picture of all the fliers spread out on the floor, and then a couple pictures of them in public. That shouldn't be a big deal. Ask us if you have another idea for flier proof.

TOURS/EVENTS (10-100 points)
There's a chance that Bizarro authors might do tours on a regular basis. We would need people to help us organize events in their area and promote them. Perhaps even give us a floor to crash on. Authors will post to the newsgroup whenever a tour or event is in the works.

MEDIA
Points for media projects can give you any number of points. From 5 points to over a thousand points. Below we list the point range, but really the range is endless. If you get David Lynch interested in a Bizarro book for instance, you'd get as many points as we could possibly give you. But it is possible to get a ton of points for hooking us up with media exposure.

INTERVIEWS (5-500 points)
If you can hook up an interview for any of the Avant Punk authors, or get an article written about us, you'll get points. 5 points is for your usual indie home-produced zine. 500 points would be given for interviews in major international publications.

ARTICLES (5-500 points)
If you send out press releases to newspapers you'll get points. Anything from book releases to public appearances to any accomplishment worthy of the media. Again, the bigger the publication and the better the article, the more points will be given.

CRAZY PUBLICITY STUNTS (5 - 1000 points)
Are you somewhat insane? Perhaps you'd be interested in doing crazy publicity stunts in order to promote avant punk books. Like creating a mountain of hotdogs in the shape of CM3's head or doing anything strange and contacting the media about it (TV and newspapers) ... they'll probably want to know all about avant punk books and your crazy drive to do what you do. You can also call live tv and radio shows pretending to discuss their topics and then turn it around and promote avant punk books instead. If you are willing to do something crazy that will give us media attention, let's brainstorm some ideas. Even if you don't know what to do, if you are willing we'll help you come up with something and help you get the media involved. The stunt will have to be documented in someway for proof, but that will depend on what you do.

CONTACTS (5-500 points)
If you can contact famous authors, actors, film makers, musicians, or any celebrities who are loved by our audience and get them to give a back cover praise for one of our books that would just plain rock. Perhaps you'll run into them at cons or signings, just tell them you're an avant punk representative and would like a blurb for an avant punk book. Get the contact info and together we'll work on the person.

MOVIES (10 - 10000 points)
Getting a director interested in making one of our books into a film or working with any of us in any way would give you a lot of points. Sure this isn't likely, but you never know. If you ever meet somebody like Stuart Gordon at a convention and hand him one of our books or fliers for our books and we hear back from him. You'll get all the points you need. Unknown indie directors and zero budget movie makers would be good too, but wouldn't give you as many points.

OTHER STUFF
Well, there's tons of things I'm sure are not on this list. If you can put our books in the background of films you make or are working on, wear avant punk t shirts if you're ever in the news or in front of an audience (performing or speaking), if you ever happen to be on a reality tv show or game show or something like that and promote our books. You can go on Elimidate wearing an avant punk t-shirt and make fun of everyone while praising Bizarro. Anything you can think of. We'll figure out a way to give you points for it.

MAKING STUFF & NON-MARKETING WORK

MERCH (0 - 100 points)
If you make avant punk army merchandise (stickers, t-shirts, posters, etc) this would be great. You can even open a store and sell our merchandise, making money at the same time. You can also design merchandise but first get in contact with people who are interested in making it so you don't waste your time. However, bad merchandise can be worse than no merchandise at all. It would be best to design the merch first and see what others in the army think about it before getting it made.

PROMOTIONAL MATERIAL (0-100 points)
If you design or create/produce promotional fliers, cards, bookmarks, or whatever you can think of you'll get points. Fliers are very important but they should be as attractive and informative as possible. It is something that should be discussed in the group.

PRESS RELEASES (0-100 points)
If you know how to write a press release, you can get points for writing them for any of our books.

SALES PACKETS/CATALOGUES (0-100 points)
If you design publicity packets and book catalogues that people can print out to give to bookstores, you would get points. They should be created in color, even if they end up getting printed in B&W.

NEWSLETTERS (0-100 points)
If you wanted to write the avant punk email newsletter to send out to people, you'd get points for each one. This would probably be a regular job and you'd get a regular income of points. (Probably won't be 100 at a time (most likely 10-20) unless it becomes a powerful marketing tool.)

COPY EDITING (10-50 points)
If you'd ever want to proofread/copy edit any avant punk books, you would get some points. This depends on your skills as a proofreader and the author's willingness to let you edit their work.

BOOK DESIGN (50-100 points)
If you for some reason want to get into book designing, we can get you set up and you can design books for us. This is something you can easily learn but takes time to master. Only recommended to those interested in learning the art of book design.

SPECIAL MISSIONS