On Thursday, August 22, at 11:00 a.m. EDT, the American Booksellers Association will present a Marketing Meetup focusing on holiday marketing strategies. Booksellers can sign up now to participate in any upcoming Marketing Meetup [7].

With local supermarkets already displaying Halloween candy, the holiday season is fast approaching. In fact, according to Facebook’s holiday shopping survey, one in five U.S. consumers will likely be making their first holiday purchases in October — or earlier — so booksellers should get their holiday marketing plans underway as soon as possible.

In this meetup, attendees will hear from fellow booksellers about when they start planning for the holiday shopping season, how they decide which books and gifts to promote, what platforms they take their marketing campaigns to, and more.

Guest speakers for this meetup will include Len Vlahos from Tattered Cover Book Store [8] in Denver; Jessica Stockton Bagnulo of Greenlight Bookstore [9] in Brooklyn, New York; and Cassie Clemans of Roundabout Books [10] in Bend, Oregon.

ABA now offers two opportunities for live online education [11]: the twice-monthly Marketing Meetup, plus a monthly Technology Meetup. All member booksellers are invited to participate in these online discussions; subscribe to the mailing list here [11] to receive invitations for the Technology Meetups, Marketing Meetups, or both.

Booksellers must register to attend the Marketing or Technology Meetups; to attend both types of meetups, booksellers will need to register for each. Booksellers who sign up through Zoom will be added to ABA’s Marketing and/or Technology Meetup mailing list.