All praises be to Allah, Lord of all Universe. Praises be to Prophet Muhammad saw, his family and his companions.
Yesterday while our crew was at the Islamic Book Fair at Masjid Kassim we bump into a friend who shared with us a thought.
Why aren’t there that many people at the Book Festival? I replied back, “Perhaps its a week day…”
Then he began to make comparison between those book fairs in EXPO and at Suntec City. Why are these places crowded when they have fairs then even on weekdays? Furthermore its the holiday period.
And so I began to ponder on how we can improve it. Let’s not talk about pre-marketing events because it has already passed. Let’s talk about now and how we can help to create more awareness about this.
And so I took my Iphone and uploaded a picture of the Book I bought.. See below.
and then I took out my camera and began taking more shots..
By just pushing up a few images on Facebook, instantaneously people are getting the buzz about the book fair. I have already had people commenting about the books and asking where to get them. And some giving testimonials to the books they have read.
So what do you think? How can we help them get more buzz about the event?
Get more details of the book fair here
Your kind thoughts are appreciated. Please comment below.
Feel free to comment
Assalamuailakum wrwb.
First and foremost, jazakallah khayran brothers for sharing the pictures of the available books at the Book Fair.
As to any ideas on how you can create more awareness on similar book fairs, have you explored Twitter ie. micro-blogging?
I believe in the reach that Twitter has as I have personally launched a charity drive in Ramadhan last year and through Twitter alone, we managed to have a successful event.
This is just my humble thought, insyaallah other readers will be able to contribute other ideas and suggestions.
As for me, I am surely going to make a trip down to the Book Fair! 🙂
salaam
Ruzanna Abdullah
Salam fadzuli,
good that u brought this up. I am a fan of book fairs n i will usually make time to go down.
There are many factors which have not motivated me to go for the past 2 years.
1. Location- i live in the west n work in the central.
2. What’s selling- there is no info except for andalus n muslimedia i think who adavertised abt what they are selling. There is also lack of info on new items n especially items for kids learning. And when they do have new ones, the prices can be very expensive. I rememember some years ago when there was this series of quran stories for kids, mahal lah.. And i am comparing it to chinese story books of genres e.g spot, barbie etc that they popular bookshops can sell at $3-5. Maybe it is an unfair comparison, but really how do u encpurage our ummah to read if children paperbacks cost more than $8 per piece.
3. Because of the price factor too, many would rather buy malay books from johore. N for the fact that i may not find the titles i want here. Or maybe this is a misconception on my part.
4. I think the islamic book culture lacks colour i.e variation of reads n av materials… And perhaps this is the challenge for the whole ummah.
Thanks for taking photos of the fair, that does spark some interest in me.
Salam Fadzuli,
I couldn’t agree more with Yanis. Those are all the factors why I didn’t go for the book fair. I always wonder why the book fair cannot be loacted at a more covenient places like shopping centres or libraries whereby there will be a big crowd especially during school holidays.
Maybe, another way is to join with other annual book fairs that we usually have at suntec or singapore expo. Need more marketing as well, those books that shown in the Berita Harian does not really spark my attention unlike those pictures that was taken by you, the titles are more interesting especially for those books and items for the juniors. As it is, Singaporeans parents do not mind spending more for their kids benefits, therefore its more likely for the fair to work if the marketing is focus on the kids items. It will be great too if all those book could be available online just like the 3D VCD Solat.
Hope the organiser take into consideration all these factors and hopefully will have a better turn up in future.
Wassalam.
Do what you have done. Circulate the pictures of the books that are going to be sold at the fair. List down the top (perhaps) 50 bestsellers and their pictures. You could include free gifts or door gifts for the visitors. You can also set aside a corner for books or items below $5 (cheap corner). Most of all, the pictures of the items/books. Circulate them and let people keep asking where the books can be gotten from (that goes to show that your approach is working). As for the time of doing this book fair, you could probably do it days after the English (non-Islamic) book fair that is usually held at Expo, or during auspicious periods like maulud nabi, ramadhan etc. I hope this helps. Salaam.
ASkm..
Another area to look into is the seller or the person being engage to station at each particular booth. They just sit there doing their own stuff… how to sell or create interest of the passerby? when we do like computer fair or other fair we mist know that we have only certain days to make the sale and create interest. But sadly these people just wanna put up the booth and sit and wait …sit and wait…Maybe I can conduct this course for them? another idea 🙂
I came to know of the Book Fair from ‘Berita Harian’.
What if I had missed it? Most of us Malays read and write
in English. Let us also be informed, even the non Malays
of the Book Fair say, in ‘Today’/’New Paper’. Maybe they
will be aware and would come?
Wassalam
Salaam all,
I agree with most of the points brought up here.
The Book Fair could also perhaps have been organised in conjunction with established or well-thronged events to make it better known to the public.
And perhaps to prove Fadzuli’s theory right (or wrong), why not take a look at the Book Fair this weekend?
=)