Publicist Interview: Via Justine De Fant
- Kealani Netane
- May 9, 2024
- 1 min read
Today, we are thrilled to be interviewing Via Justine De Fant, a Publicist and Project Manager at the University of Guam Press. You can learn more about Via on her website and Instagram.
We started this book publishing professionals blog series to spotlight book publishing professionals for Asian and Pacific Islander month. Our hope is that this series will inspire other Pacific Islanders interested in pursuing a career in traditional publishing. There are only a handful of Pacific Islanders in the publishing industry and we hope to see that number increase.
Thank you for joining us!
Book Publicist Responsibilities
Could you introduce yourself for our audience?
My name is Via Justine De Fant. I am the Publicist and a Project Manager at the University of Guam Press. I am an emerging Filipina writer and avid reader raised on Guam who also holds a deep love and respect for literacy and the literary arts.
What does a book publicist do?
A book publicist promotes an author's work by creating and executing marketing strategies to increase visibility and sales. I arrange media appearances, interviews, book signings, book launches and community outreach events that center UOG Press’s publications and our authors and artists. I also oversee various projects and initiatives that center our publications and find creative ways to share them with our community.
In my day-to-day I oversee and create partnerships with local, regional, and international vendors and organizations in an effort to share the value of our titles with the rest of the world. I craft press releases and collaborate with a talented creative visual team to craft engaging graphics and marketing assets for promotion. My goal is to maximize exposure of UOG Press publications and promote a positive image for our authors and artists as part of UOG Press’s mission to advance regional scholarship, develop cultural literacy, and expand accessibility to knowledge about Micronesia.
Share with us how you became a publicist. What were the steps you took to get to your position?
I applied to UOG Press in June 2021 where I was hired shortly after. I’ve always had a passion and love for literary arts, so I made sure to include relevant experiences in my resume to show my strengths in writing, publishing, research, and communications or marketing. Knowing what I love and what I wanted to do at a young age, which is to be around books, informed the opportunities I went after as I curated by resume. In high school, I was a youth journalist for the Pacific Daily News. I was a writing tutor in college, a research analyst for the Guam Legislature, a freelance writer for various local businesses, and a workshop facilitator for poetry. I also graduated with my BA (2018) and MA (2021) in English Literature. It’s not mandatory to have a degree, but it’s helps to have a strong familiarity with marketing, communications, English or a related field to separate yourself from a pool of applicants. I firmly believe my background helped me get to where I am today.
UOG Press is small publishing house that relies on grant funds and book sales. To sustain all the positions and projects here, it’s important to be creative in the ways we secure funding. Larger publishing houses may not have to worry as much about funding as smaller ones do, but I think our unique situation keeps us highly dynamic, creative, and adaptable to the needs of our press.
Career Advice
What advice do you have for someone who wants to get into book publicity as a career?
While it’s great to have a strong background in marketing, it’s even more important to be personable and to believe in the mission of the publishing house you are a part of. For book publicity to be effective, a publicist should understand and believe in the publications they are sharing with the world and should establish trust and a good working relationship with their authors and artists. It’s important to stay abreast of latest reading trends, best practices, and innovative approaches in publishing and open access resources and of course tailoring those findings to best serve your community.
It’s also a great idea to get to know the publishing house you are interested in working with before you actually start working with them. This can be achieved by going to their events and meeting their authors and staff. Having a familiarity with the books they publish is also a great step in that direction.
What are your top three pieces of advice for Pacific Islander authors coming from a publicity standpoint?
Embrace Your Cultural Identity: Highlight and celebrate your unique culture in your publicity efforts. There are too many voices telling us that we are “too small” or unimportant and there are systems geared towards the erasure of our Pacific Island cultures and perspectives that we shouldn’t allow them cage us in or diminish our voices. Being mindful, however, that your unique identity isn’t a tool to tokenize but should be a part of your own the lived experiences and beliefs.
Engage with the community you’re from and writing for: Have a strong connection within your community. Collaborate with other local or regional readers, bloggers, media outlets, and businesses or organizations that share your values so that you can amplify your reach and connect with your audience authentically.
Don’t be afraid of social media! Leverage social media platforms, author websites, and online book communities to promote your work. A publishing house does the initial groundwork when it comes to marketing, but for your book to maintain a steady presence in literary spaces, authors should also believe in and promote their work just as much as its publisher, if not more. Share engaging content, behind-the-scenes insights, and participate in conversations that showcase your book's relevance and appeal to readers interested in the genre you’re writing under. Pacific Island literature shouldn’t be a niche subject. With our long history of colonization and the presence of our diasporic communities, our voices should be a part of the literary canon and classrooms nationally and internationally. Social media is just one of the ways we can break those geographical barriers.
What advice do you see others giving to authors that you think is great and what advice do you see that isn’t helpful?
For the most part, I don’t think there should be rules in writing or censorship. Write what you know and write what you love. A caveat: I think misrepresentation can still be damaging if coming from an author who is writing from the perspective of a community they are not from. In a similar vein, I also don’t think we shouldn’t feel boxed into writing in a specific genre or specific way. Awareness of your subject and approach is key, especially if you’d like to go through a publishing house. UOG Press does not publish works that are misaligned with our vision and goal to enlighten the world about Micronesia and enrich the literary world with voices from our region. That being said, manuscript submissions that can be damaging towards those efforts aren’t accepted.
Lastly, books have power, otherwise we wouldn’t bother banning them. So, be intentional with what you write and believe in it.
Marketing to the Pacific Island Community
What marketing is expected for the author to do on their own?
UOG Press handles the initial promotion that leads up to a book’s launch. This includes various outreach events leading up to the official release of a title like book readings, creative conversations in various community spaces, media interviews, and presentations. Our authors are also able to facilitate their own writing workshops, which they are compensated for. This isn’t always the case with other publishing houses, but we want to ensure we provide the best possible resources and support for our authors.
Marketing for specific titles primarily becomes the author’s responsibility after their book’s launch, although UOG Press features specific titles and authors periodically on our platforms. Authors can do their part in marketing by being active on their social media or personal blogs, teasing excerpts of their books, coordinating readings and book-signings, and engaging with readers on their various platforms. Being in physical spaces and talking to readers is a great way for authors to share more about themselves and to get to know about the readers they are writing for.
What type of publicity should authors be prioritizing?
Authors should prioritize publicity that aligns with their own values and their target audience, genre, and goals.
Do you think book festivals are effective in promoting books? If so, do you recommend any in particular?
I think all types of promotion can be useful depending on how the author or publisher markets their books or makes their presence known. As with many things, you get what you give. If you are at a festival, but aren’t excited in the books on your table, you may not yield as fruitful results as someone who is engaging with readers who stop by. Because Guahån is geographically far from many places, we don’t often have the resources to attend larger book festivals. The ones we do attend, like the Micronesian Island Fair or conferences like the Marianas History Conference, have been very successful.
When it comes to promoting a Pacific Islander book, what have you seen are the best ways to promote our books?
As with all publicity and marketing strategies, it’s vital to understand the community our books will be serving. Leveraging the unique qualities that set Pacific Islands apart from other places and incorporating our values into our promotional efforts is vital.
Incorporate your island’s rich cultural identity, language, cultures and history in promotional graphics so audiences have context for the titles they are reading.
Collaborate with locally owned and ethical businesses and organizations to support your local economy and promote our historically underserved communities.
Diversify your platforms and use a mix of traditional and digital media to show the ways traditional practices can be synthesized in the technology and platforms of this day and age.
When we think of tradition, some people may think of the word “outdated”, but traditions are rooted in values. They are pillars of our Pacific Island communities that have upheld our identities despite colonial erasure from the colonization. Creating promotional materials and curating spaces that are respectful towards our pacific island homes is not only possible, but crucial. One of my favorite examples of this was during the second launch of Ocean Mother by Arielle Taitano Lowe. Arielle had a second book launch in Hawai’i where she began the launch by first recognizing and thanking both her CHamoru ancestors and the Hawaiian ancestors of the land for allowing us (herself and her audience) to share in this space with them.
How can we get our books into the hands of people from our own communities?
Sometimes it’s as simple are reaching out to readers, vendors, or organizations from your community. In my experience, some people from our region aren’t even aware that UOG Press publishes books written by local authors, so it often begins with a conversation and from there interest sparks. It’s also important to be active or have a presence in spaces where conversations about Pacific Island literature are being held and being an advocate for our books in those places.
Follow publishing houses and collaborate with book reviewers who support pacific island communities and uplift their voices. Some of my favorites:
