Forum Tour Heads to California in April

American Booksellers Association staff will be in San Francisco and Huntington Beach in early April for a Booksellers Forum and Education Program in conjunction with the Northern California Independent Booksellers Association's (NCIBA) Spring Gathering and the Southern California Booksellers Association (SCBA) Spring Meeting, respectively. All members of ABA and the regional associations are invited to attend.

NCIBA

On Sunday, April 2, the Spring Gathering will be held from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. at the Fort Mason Center, not far from NCIBA's offices. The day begins with a continental breakfast and Michael Pollan, author of Botany of Desire, who will discuss and then sign his new book, The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals (Pengiun Press).

Following the signing, at 9:45 a.m., ABA will debut its education session "Handselling: Customer Service With Results." Handselling is the key customer service strategy differentiating independent bookstores from their competitors. At this session, booksellers will learn how to use, or improve, customer service strategies to grow a store's reputation, energize staff, and increase sales. The focus will be on attracting and training good handsellers, integrating handselling into a store's marketing efforts, and ensuring that customers walk away with a unique and positive shopping experience.

At noon, a buffet lunch will be served, and then NCIBA Board and staff members will offer updates on several of the regional's new programs, including the Peer Eye bookstore review, Books By the Bay literacy grants, and a series of bookstore tours.

At 12:45 p.m., Ayelet Waldman will talk about her new novel, Love and Other Impossible Pursuits (Doubleday), and then autograph a copy for each attendee.

ABA's Booksellers Forum, at 1:30 p.m., is the place for the discussion of national and regional issues affecting independent booksellers. Over the years, these forums have provided ABA with very constructive member input that has been indispensable in shaping future programs and initiatives. The forum will be facilitated by ABA CEO Avin Mark Domnitz, COO Oren Teicher, and BookSense.com Director Len Vlahos. ABA Board member Michael Tucker of Books Inc. in San Francisco will also be in attendance.

At 3:00 p.m., NCIBA will present "Web-Based Marketing: How to Do It Better Than You're Doing It Now," with Jerry Hart, CEO of Hart Creative Marketing, Inc. This session will provide can-do action items for booksellers to take back to their stores.

The day will conclude with wine and cheese at NCIBA's offices.

SCBA

On Tuesday, April 4, Domnitz, Teicher, and Vlahos will be at the Hilton Waterfront Hotel in Huntington Beach for SCBA's Spring Meeting. ABA's program will include a Booksellers Forum and the new education session "How to Do a Customer Survey: A Case Study," presented by Domnitz.

SCBA Executive Director Jennifer Bigelow told BTW, "After the success of the Winter Institute, booksellers should definitely attend the ABA forum and education session. The information they will learn will be invaluable."

As an added incentive, Bigelow noted, the program's location -- the Hilton Waterfront Hotel -- is a beautiful oceanside hotel, featuring dining outside near the surf and sand.

Among SCBA's offerings at the Spring Meeting are a Social/Light Continental Breakfast beginning at 8:00 a.m., followed by "Promote Your Store," a how-to session with sample press releases, a Southern California media list, information about the Spoken Word radio program, and more.

ABA's Booksellers Forum will begin at 10:15 a.m. This is an opportunity for booksellers to address their comments and concerns to ABA staff. Bookseller input at the forums is instrumental in helping the association plan future programming and initiatives. In addition, Domnitz, Teicher, and Vlahos will provide updates on current programming and advocacy issues.

A noontime lunch hosted by PartnersWest will feature an author presentation.

Lunch will be followed by ABA's session "How to Do a Customer Survey." In this session, booksellers will find out how to create and execute customer surveys that will enable them to learn more about their customers and then develop more effective strategies to meet customers' needs. Topics to be covered include the "nuts-and-bolts" of how to do customer surveys -- how to frame questions, administer the survey in the store and online, and analyze results -- through a case study of an independent bookstore that successfully used customer surveys to get results.

Watch for more details about SCBA programming in an upcoming edition of BTW.