MBA supports our MIDWEST CONNECTIONS regional marketing program in these ways:

• We customize an Excel spreadsheet of MBA bookstores best suited to promoting a book, hosting events for the author, etc. This Excel file of  information is given to the publisher as part of our program.
• MBA’s Advance Access program gets reading copies to selected booksellers and collects written recommendations and quotes from those booksellers to use in promoting the book.
• MBA assists in coordinating author events, book club and other events, and informal author visits with booksellers at MBA stores. MBA also can help arrange for authors to sign stock at our office to be shipped to MBA bookstores.
• MBA’s Excel format “Bookstore Events & Media Guide” is available to the publisher to help publicize the book. Local assistance from bookstores helps publicize the book and events in stores.  Please contact Susan Walker at the MBA office for a copy of this file.
• Each MIDWEST CONNECTIONS PICK title receives its own web page as part of the MIDWEST CONNECTIONS program.  Information and downloadable promotional materials are available on the book’s page.
• Free banner ads for MIDWEST CONNECTIONS books are featured on the MBA website, www.midwestbooksellers.org. Midwest Connections web pages feature the chosen books and authors.
• Sell sheets, shelf-talkers, ads, and other materials are produced by MBA for stores to use.
• In the Fall, MIDWEST CONNECTIONS titles can be advertised by their publishers in the MBA Catalog for the lower regional title rate. MIDWEST CONNECTIONS titles may appear on the front cover of the MBA Catalog for maximum visibility, without paying the cover rate.
• In the Fall, MIDWEST CONNECTIONS authors are featured at the MBA Trade Show as speakers or prominent participants.  Their books are highlighted as MIDWEST CONNECTIONS Picks in the Trade Show Exhibit and throughout the show.  A special MIDWEST CONNECTIONS workshop and other events give MBA booksellers and these authors an opportunity to meet and talk.
• In the Spring, MIDWEST CONNECTIONS authors and titles are featured at MBA’s Spring Meetings for booksellers. They have an opportunity to meet MBA booksellers one-on-one and talk about their books in a small group setting.
• MIDWEST CONNECTIONS can lead to books being nominated for our annual Midwest Booksellers’ Choice Awards - and winning! SIX of our 2008 MIDWEST CONNECTIONS PICKS books became our 2008 Award Winners or Honor Books: LITTLE HEATHENS; THE FLORIST’S DAUGHTER; WHISTLING IN THE DARK; SO BRAVE, YOUNG, AND HANDSOME; LITTLE KLEIN and THE GOLLYWHOPPER GAMES. This is over half of the eleven books which were chosen as winners by our booksellers.