Blog

A street team is the ultimate set of super readers. I’m looking for people who’ve read all my books, and love my characters, and are eager for my next fictional journey! A street team helps spread the word about an author’s books– online, in person, and IN SPACE.

The Rusk University Street Team (aka “The Carmcats”) was absolutely invaluable to me during the lead up and release week of All Lined Up and All Broke Down. Like… they redefined invaluable. Seriously.

The former teams have done everything from making graphics, designing the Rusk logo, hosting giveaways, brainstorming marketing ideas, and spreading the word about my books like a plague (a plague of AWESOMENESS). They went above and beyond to host the release day Facebook parties, and basically kept me from losing my mind during a (very exciting, but still very) stressful time.  And they are some of the funniest, kindest, most generous, most encouraging people I have ever met – I want to carry each and everyone one of them with me everywhere I go. Seriously… I cannot sing their praises enough. Because beyond all the awesome things they did for the book, the team means a great deal to me personally. By keeping the team small and requiring people to apply instead of just join a Facebook group, we’ve been able to foster a sense of family within the group. We talk about much more than my books. We talk about other books we love. We talk about our lives– the good and the bad. We talk about the delirious and weird things that come up when we’re all staying up way too late.

And that’s the most important thing I want to maintain as we say goodbye to some old members of the team and add new members. I want to make sure the new members feel welcome, and that this is the absolutely coolest street team around. So with that in mind, we’ve decided to do something different this time. Half of the All Played Out team will consist of former members of the team. And each of them will have a new Carmcat that they mentor. Sort of the Big/Little scenarios you see with sororities and other groups. We think this will help the group become even closer, faster, and really make for the best team yet!

Interested? Here’s some more details:

• Exclusive giveaways ONLY for street team members. ARCs, swag, signed copies, and other special stuff. Your odds of winning are MUCH better than when competing with the masses.
• Exclusive content and news. When a new book is releasing or I’m writing a new project, you guys will be the first to hear about it! You’ll also be the first people I torture tease with excerpts!
• Swag for you! Swag for your friends! Swag for strangers you bombard on the street! You shall be the swag queens (or kings… I’m looking at you, rare and exotic male fan. We’ve already had one dude reader on the team, here’s hoping for more).
• Every active street team member’s name will appear in the acknowledgments of my books. Show all your friends how important and beloved you are! Plus, I sometimes steal street team members names when I’m creating characters. Just saying. 🙂
• Membership in the exclusive street team Facebook group! Here you can chat with other team members, brainstorm promotional ideas, and hang out with me! I’ll pop in for exclusive street team chats and hang outs (and by pop in, I mean I spend entirely too much time procrastinating there). Not to mention I might pick your brain about books and characters you’d like to see. 😉
• ***One extra lucky Street Team member will get to join me as my assistant at an upcoming signing in 2015 or 2016! I’ll take care of your flight and hotel, and we’ll just hang out, meet book people, and bask in our awkward goodness.

• Talk the books up and share promo material with friends, family, co-workers, and book clubs. You can even drop off promo materials at bookstores, libraries, coffee shops, etc. 
• Buy my books the first week of release, which helps it get more visibility, thereby selling more books
• Ask your local library to order my books. Give the librarians the title, name and publisher of each book. In the same vein, ask your local bookstore to stock my books if they don’t already. 

If you need a little more persuading, check out this video that my street team made for the All Broke Down Street Team recruitment (just pretend it says “All Played Out”, lol.)

And I realize that some of you have applied for the team before, and not made the cut. Believe me when I say that choosing these street teams are the HARDEST thing I have to do as an author. I always reach a point where I can’t narrow it down anymore because I love everyone, and I have to bring in other people from my publicity team to help make the final few decisions. And those decisions are often very strategic. We’ve turned away some AMAZING applications because we were just looking for something different. We don’t always just look for the biggest following. We try to diversify the team as much as possible. Some Carmcats are more heavily involved on Facebook, some on Tumblr, some on Twitter, some on Pinterest. Some of you have been so close to making the cut… both times! But for one reason or another, it didn’t work out. I hope that you will consider re-applying again this time. I can’t promise that you’ll make the team, but I can say that I’ll be paying special attention to those who have applied in the past, and are still eager to join the team. I’m so grateful for everyone who cares enough to fill out the application and put themselves out there.

Thank you all so much for your continued support and love! I adore you!