Selling Info Products to the Military - - Part 1

The armed services represent an often-overlooked segment in which you can sell fiction and non-fiction titles in almost any genre and topic. It is a large niche of potential buyers made up of active duty personnel and their families, reservists, disabled veterans, civilians working for the Department of Defense and retired service people.

The place to start selling to the military is to search the “Selling to the Military Handbook” located at www.acq.osd.mil/sadbu/publications/selling/index.html. Here you will find complete details on how to get started, department of defense contracting principles and practices, types of contracts, small business advisors and just about everything you need to sell to this market. Anyone who wishes to sell to the Department of Defense must be registered in the Central Contractor Registration database. For a guide to walk you through the registration process, go to www.growusapress.com or contact Sher Valenzuela at valenz@intercom.net.

Titles sought by military buyers are those selling well on the commercial market. In addition, there is an opportunity for creative, self-promotion. Find a niche in which information is lacking and then to develop the "how-to" book for that particular need. Discounting in the military also replicates that which occurs in the commercial world. However, you have some additional negotiating leeway with government buyers by providing an extra enticement for accelerated payment, custom books or cooperative marketing programs.

Reaching buyers for custom or existing titles becomes easier if you segment the military market into its unique purchasing opportunities. For instance, you may have titles that can be sold domestically or overseas, through base exchanges, to military libraries, Department of Defense Dependent Schools, onboard ships, and to military museums, book clubs, catalogs, bookstores and associations.

Selling to exchanges
The largest buyers of books of all types for the military market are the exchange services—Army & Air Force Exchange Service, Coast Guard Exchange, Navy Exchange, Marine Corps Exchange.

The Army and Air Force Exchange Service (AAFES) provides merchandise and services to active duty military, Guard and Reserve members, military retirees, and family members. You can download the entire AAFES Suppliers Handbook (pdf file - 3.22mb) at http://www.aafes.com/pa/selling/index.html.

US Coast Guard Exchange System Headquarters may be found at http://www.cg-exchange.com/. For an updated, complete list of Coast Guard Exchanges including addresses and phone numbers go to: http://www.cgaux.org/cgauxweb/memtable.shtml

While you can contact the exchange services directly, local distributors supply the exchanges with most books and publications. The list of current distributors and their points of contact may be found at http://www.aafes.com/pa/selling/books.html.

(c) 2003 Brian Jud

B Brian Jud is an author, seminar leader, book-marketing consultant, author of “Beyond the Bookstore” and “The Marketing Wizard CD.” Contact Brian brianjud@bookmarketingworks.com or visit http://www.bookmarketingworks.com or http://www.premiumbookcompany.com

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What titles do you have that the military people would enjoy for their spare time or to learn a new skill? This could be an entire new market you never considered.

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Until next time,
Paulette - reminded that there are so many more markets out there to tap into

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