Using And Adding Contacts

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    All CI authors have access to our staff Contacts Database of over 40,000 publishing contacts to be used for their own book promotion.

    How to search for a contact

    • Click on Contacts on the left-hand side.
    • Click on Contact Search.
    • Click on Search Contacts on the yellow bar at the top.
    • You can search by Organization, Name, City, County, State, Website, Created by or Type.
    • Click Search.
    • If you have made a search, and want to try a brand new one, hit the Reset button to clear the search criteria.

    How to refine your search results

    You can reorder your search by clicking on the search results headers: Contact Name, State, County, Created By and Score.

    • Click once and a downward arrow will appear next to the header. This means the contacts are sorted with the lowest number at the top/by alphabetical order.
    • Click again and an upwards arrow will appear next to the header. This means the contacts are sorted with the highest number at the top/reverse alphabetical order.

    What is the Contact Score?

    The Contact Score is an algorithmically created rating which reflects how often we have interactions with a specific contact, and gives you an indication of how active/useful this contact has been to us.

    Higher is better. A contact with a score of 80–100 is probably one that is in regular contact with us.

    How to save a search

    You can save your searches for the future.

    • Scroll to the bottom of your search results.
    • Click on With these results choose an action.
    • Click on Save this search.
    • Add a name for the search and click Submit.
    • These searches will remain in your My Contacts list until you decide to Delete them.

    How to link a Contact to a Marketing Activity

    Marketing Activities are the way we record your marketing. Both you and your publicist are expected to use them to record the work you do.

    • Navigate to Marketing Activities on your book’s page.
    • Click +add an activity.
    • Record: Type; Status; Notes & Comments.
    • Link to the relevant Contact. You can search by Last Name, First Name, Organization, City, Category, Type. Most of the time, searching by Last Name or Organization will be enough for you to find who you need.
    • Click Save.

    How to add a contact

    Sometimes when you add a Marketing Activity the contact you need won’t be on the system, and you will need to add it yourself.

    Make sure you’ve searched for a contact before entering it. Duplicate contacts are confusing and take up valuable system space. When you add a new contact, the system will also check the database and give you a warning message if it thinks it has spotted a duplicate. This is a useful safeguard, but it's better to check first so you don't waste your time adding something that's already there.

    Each new contact is invited to subscribe to our newsletter and sent the following email: We have just learnt that you may be interested in our books. In our newsletter, booksellers, editors, producers, fans and reviewers discover our books and find details of offers, book launches, podcasts and articles. We invite you to subscribe. To subscribe, click here or go to https://www.collectiveinkbooks.com/ . If you do not wish to subscribe, it is not necessary to take any further action. You will not receive any further emails from us.

    • Click on Contacts on the left-hand side.
    • Click on New Contact.
    • If the person you are adding works for an organization such as a newspaper, website, or company (and the organization is not already on the database) you will have to enter a record twice. First click Add an Organization and add the organization details. Once you are done, click on New Contact again, choose Add a person and as you fill out their details make sure you link them to the Organization.
    • If the person you are adding is not affiliated with any organization, or the organization is already on the database, then click Add a person.

    Adding an Organization

    • Fill out the Organization Name box.
    • Fill out the Location box.
    • Fill out the Online box. It's most important to fill the Primary Email and Website fields. These are most useful to everyone. Add Twitter and Facebook details etc. if you feel they are important.
    • Fill out the Phone box.
    • Fill out the Description box. This is an important place to add vital miscellaneous info, e.g. if it is a reviewer, you can add some important info about their tastes, or the best way to contact them, or their review policy etc.
    • Fill out the Contact Type box. Tick the most relevant box(es) for your contact. Some contacts will fit more than one contact type. For example, someone may be a freelance journalist and a radio presenter. Don’t tick loads – choose the most important, most descriptive boxes.
    • Fill out the Contact Categories box. Here you can drill down and select which category of book the contact is relevant to. If you click the + next to a category, you will be presented with all the available sub-categories. Be as specific as possible. Sometimes it is impossible to be completely accurate here. Do the best you can.
    • Set the Contact Status.
    • Click Save Contact.

    Adding a Contact

    • Fill out the Name box.
    • Fill out the Organization box. If the person works for an Organization, type it in Organization Name. If the Organization is on the system, it will appear as an option to select. Click on it to link the Person contact with the Organization contact. If the Organization is not on the system, then you will need to add the Organization yourself as a separate Contact, and then come back and link the person to it later. If the person is not connected to an Organization, then leave this box blank.
    • Fill out the Location box. Tick Contact address is the same as the organization's address if the person is linked to an organization and the organization address is the best place to send physical correspondence to the contact. If not, untick it, and add the relevant address
    • Fill out the Online box. It's most important to fill the Primary Email and Website fields. These are most useful to everyone. Add Twitter and Facebook details etc. if you feel they are important.
    • Fill out the Phone box.
    • Fill out the Description box. This is an important place to add vital miscellaneous info, e.g. if it is a reviewer, you can add some important info about their tastes, or the best way to contact them, or their review policy etc.
    • Fill out the Contact Type box. Tick the most relevant box(es) for your contact. Some contacts will fit more than one contact type. For example, someone may be a freelance journalist and a radio presenter. Don’t tick loads – choose the most important, most descriptive boxes.
    • Fill out the Contact Categories box. Here you can drill down and select which category of book the contact is relevant to. If you click the + next to a category, you will be presented with all the available sub-categories. Be as specific as possible. Sometimes it is impossible to be completely accurate here. Do the best you can.
    • Set the Contact Status.
    • Click Save Contact.

    Help! There are so many fields. I cannot add them all

    We think the most important fields to add are:

    • Name
    • Email address
    • Website
    • Any particular information in Notes like the review policy if it is a blogger.
    • The most accurate Type and Category you can do,

    Help! Adding contacts is very time consuming

    We know! We hear you, and we are working to make the process easier. If you have a lot of contacts to add, and you are overwhelmed or struggling, please drop us a line on the Marketing Forum.

    How to create a contact list

    You can create your own personal lists of contacts. This is a great way of keeping an up-to-date record of your most valuable contacts. You add a Marketing Activity to a whole list, which can make adding Marketing Activities much more efficient.

    You can add contacts to lists from the Contact Search results page, or after you have entered or edited a contact.

    Create a contact list from the contact search results page

    • Click on With these results – choose an action.
    • Click on Add selected items to list.
    • Create a new list or add them to a list that already exists.

    Create a contact list after you have saved a new contact:

    • Click Close edit form.
    • Click Add contact to saved list (which will also give you an option to create a new list).

    How to access your saved searches and lists

    To view, edit, and amend your Saved Searches and Lists:

    • Click on Contacts on the left-hand menu.
    • Click on My Contacts.

    From there you can:

    • View, create and edit your contact lists.
    • View your saved searches.

    How to edit a contact

    • Search for the Contact you want.
    • To edit a contact, click on Edit This Contact in the right-hand panel.

    How to delete a contact

    You can delete contacts that you have entered, but not those entered by other people. If you do come across a contact that is no longer in existence, but you cannot delete, please put a note in in the Description box to say so. An admin user can then delete them as they come across them.

    • Search for the Contact you want.
    • Click on delete this contact.

    How to download a search to Excel

    • Perform your search.
    • Click on With these results – choose an action.
    • Click on Download list to Excel.

    How to download a list to Excel

    • Click on Contacts on the left-hand side.
    • Click on My contacts.
    • Run your list.
    • Click on With these results – choose an action.
    • Click on Download list to Excel.

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