NIGEL J. YORWERTH
President, Yorwerth Associates

The world of books is anything but orderly. Forget the image of a library. Quiet. Airless. A place of calm and decorum.

It’s a jungle. Or a crowded city street. Or a bazaar, alive with the electricity of a multiplicity of tongues and merchants hawking their wares. In this chaotic environment, where every year millions of new books find their way into print, it’s hard to get published, harder still to get your book noticed if it does get published and, well, I’ll leave it to you to figure out just how hard it is to create the distribution and promotion necessary for respectable sales. Hint: it’s very hard.

Unless, of course, you happen to have Nigel J. Yorwerth in your corner. When it comes to the world of books—and the arcane arts of strategizing, packaging, promoting and selling—Nigel is a man for all seasons.

Whether you are getting ready to launch a national best-seller regarding the cure for addiction, something hot on nutrition, a documentary film on the yogis of Tibet, Nigel is the go-to guy who can take an unknown book to a glutted and suspicious market and make it fly.

But don’t take our word for it. Go to the Olympus of the publishing world and listen to the voices there. Start with George Greller, a buyer at Barnes & Noble’s headquarters in New York. When it comes to salesmen, pitching books to the nation’s largest and most powerful book-selling operation, Greller has seen it all. And of all the salesmen he has seen, Greller says Nigel is in the “top rank.”

Greller’s colleague at Barnes & Noble, Jules Herbert, the New Age buyer, uses words like “professional,” “enthusiastic,” “conscientious.” Herbert says, “When Nigel sells me a book, I know what I’m buying.” Edward Ash-Milby, Barnes & Noble’s senior buyer, a man who knows books, says “Nigel is aces in my book.” Cathy Lashinsky, a former buyer at Borders, says that Nigel is a team player and an ideal coworker.

But it’s not just the huge mega chains that think Nigel has the right stuff. Ronald Ted Smith, president of the Bookworld Companies, a house of book distributors, says that Nigel is “a legendary sales person” who is known throughout the industry for his sales abilities and results.

And check in with specialty superstores like the Bodhi Tree in Los Angeles, a place that is also something of a legend, where store owner Stanley Madson waxes eloquent on Nigel’s “exceptional knowledge of publishing” and “strong interest in market research.” Madson talks about Nigel’s ability to see what products will make it and why, even if they are not yet on anybody’s radar. “Nigel demonstrates outstanding abilities in the development, design and marketing of books and related material, such as audio and video,” he says.

How does he do it? “Intuition” is one thing that people sense. But there is more. He has an uncanny ability to sense the soul of the market, figure out the latent needs as well as what current buyers are clamoring for, and then develop the content, title, marketing position, strategy, cover design, communication and marketing campaign, get the book into the chains, through the distribution channels and, finally, into the hands of customers.

That’s why Ann Louise Gittleman, New York Times best-selling author of The Fat- Flush Plan, says, “I have worked with many other publishing coaches. I can honestly say that Nigel is at the top of his profession.”

That’s a long way from where Nigel started, years ago, in a small town in Wales. His personal path brought him to the United States, where he learned sales from the bottom up, selling ice cream from a Good Humor truck and then, after graduating from Bucknell University, working for a Madison Avenue ad agency selling wine. It was clear early on that he had nearly supernatural powers at selling and soon gravitated to his first love, the printed word. It was there he made his mark, working with the best in the industry and helping people with great ideas make it to the top of a complex and competitive industry.

To do that, he reaches out with his feelings, senses the soul of the market, combines his intuitive read with his marketing and sales skills and creates a plan for success. In the end, people such as Phil Borack, executive producer of the Jehm Films documentary hit “The Yogis of Tibet” are happy. “Nigel can make a huge difference for your product,” says Borack. “He has for mine.”

Nigel Yorwerth coaches individuals, publishers, and corporate clients on how to successfully package, market and sell their books and products. Nigel is a publishing, marketing, and sales expert with a focus on the increasingly popular Personal Growth (Self-Help), Health, and Mind/Body/Spirit arenas and he assists authors and publishers in a wide range of other genres. He is also a literary agent and a foreign rights agent for publishers and authors. He recently authored a chapter on foreign rights in the new book Get Published Today!

Nigel has worked as vice president of sales for two leading national book distribution companies, where he sold to bookstore chains, major wholesalers and independents in the book and natural foods markets. He has experience as a director of sales and marketing for a successful publishing house and as an executive for Ted Bates, a major New York advertising agency. He also held positions in sales and marketing in the brandy, wine and vitamin industries.