Cooking Up a Good Agent for Your Cookbook

Five years ago, I was browsing through the Sams Warehouse Club, members magazine. they featured an interesting article about a woman who wrote a cookbook to raise money for her husbands steep medical costs battling with Cancer. The Sams Club manager put her in contact with all the right people to not only publish her book but for it to be sold in Sams Clubs and Walmarts throughout the nation. The key recipe here is that she had an important cause and a mission and she went to the source of where she wanted to see her books sold.

My advice to all of those writing cookbooks is to go to the source. Where do you want to see your cookbook sold? Do you want to see it in Target, on QVC, on Amazon?
Where ever you want to see it sold you need to go to the source. Speak to the book buyer and find out who the distributor is, speak to the distributor and ask them about their relationships with both mainstream and independent publishers. Speak to the publisher and ask them for agent recommendations.
Why should you go out of the way to market and sell your book when Writers Directories publish lists of agents and contact information each year?

These agents are inundated with inquiries from want to be writers. But if you received information on an agent from Sam at ABC distribution who told you to call because he really thinks they are the right person to deal with. You have a better foot in the door than Joe Smith who slapped together a query letter and mailed them off the list.

You can also find the best agents from other cookbook authors you admire. Each cookbook lists names of editors and contact information of key people involved in putting together a project. You can do a web search back to the publishers website and find the contact information for the person listed. You can call or email the person listed and ask them for a recommendation of an agent they enjoy dealing with. Then search online for information about the agent. You can contact other authors they have represented and find out their experience working with them.

Many people view authors as people that are hard to reach. Actually, many authors enjoy hearing from people about their work and will be open to discussing their experiences in a professional way. Do not ask the author, how did you do it? be specific with questions, such as, " I heard about Jane Williams through your publisher, I just wanted to ask you about your experience with her as an agent."

Take on the attitude that you are looking for the right home for your book, not that you are looking for an agent to like you.

Be confident and do not be afraid to make calls and ask questions. Its all there in published cookbooks and in the stores that sell them.