Most of the best-selling books that mix religion and politics have come from the religious right. But that reign was challenged last month when “God’s Politics, a New Vision for Faith and Politics in America,” entered the New York Times bestseller list at No. 11.
Written by Jim Tillis, the executive publisher of Sojourners magazine, the book is clearly a product of the religious left. What’s more, it was driven onto the bestseller list by an e-mail campaign urging readers to make it a bestseller, according to publisher Tucker Ball.
Why focus on the bestseller list? Because the listing would draw attention to progressive faith movement and get wider distribution for the book, said Ball, speaking at the Direct Marketing Association’s Nonprofit Conference in Washington, DC.
But it wasn’t going to be easy. Sojourners expected that it had to sell 10,000 books in one week on Amazon.com to make the Times list.
And the metrics weren’t good. Sojourners, a progressive faith magazine started in 1971, has 145,000 readers. Its e-mails generate a 40% average open rate and a 6% clickthrough rate. The conversion rate is 30% for donation solicitations and 70% for calls to action. Based on those averages, it could expect to sell far less than 10,000 books.
So starting on Jan. 10, it sent out a series of almost daily e-mails, asking readers to help it make history by driving the book onto the list. Each one included a thumbnail image from the site, and links to Amazon.com for ordering. In addition, recipients were informed of the book’s progress throughout the week. (One subject line said: “Success: God’s Politics on Amazon.com’s best-seller.”) Readers who opened the e-mail but did not click through were sent a follow-up. The book was also hyped in Sojomail, Sojourners’s weekly e-mail newsletter that was started in 1999.
On Friday, though, Sojourners had only 75% of the clicks it needed. So it sent out an action alert message, urging people to buy from independent booksellers, and to request the magazine while they were at it. The last e-mail in the timeframe focused on upcoming media appearances, including an unlikely guest slot by Rev. Tillis on Comedy Central.
Then came the happy follow-up. Readers learned the following week that the book had not only made the Times list, but that it was no. 2 on Amazon, No. 3 on Barnes & Noble.com, and No. 1 on the Barnes & Noble religion list. In addition, it had drawn several thousand subscriptions and 8,000 new signups for the newsletter.
Sojourners had similar success during the recent Presidential campaign (despite the fact that the favorite of the religious right won the election). It informed readers that it had to raise $70,000 to put an ad in the New York Times during the Republication National Convention in New York.
The message of the ad and the preceding campaign?
That Christians were not obliged to vote for George W. Bush, and that there were other issues besides abortion and gay marriage — i.e., poverty, the environment and the war. The headline: “God is Not a Republican. Or a Democrat.”
Bush won the election. But Sojourners raised almost $500,000, persuaded 125,000 people to sign an online petition and then had the burden of living up to its promise that it would spend every dollar it raised over the $70,000 on ads in local papers (including those in Jerry Falwell’s and Pat Robertson’s hometowns).
“We were floored,” Ball joked. “It created about two months worth of work.”
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