A couple of years ago, I set out to create something special. I wanted to create a writers conference that wasn’t focused on learning how to write a book but instead focused on how to sell the book, and the Novel Marketing Conference was born.
I’ve been speaking at writers’ events for fifteen years. I’ve spoken to writers all around the world. During those years, I had a lot of ideas.
So when we hosted the first Novel Marketing Conference, we tried a lot of cool, innovative ideas. Some worked, some didn’t. Each year, we surveyed the attendees and refined the conference based on that feedback.
I am happy to announce that tickets for the 2026 Novel Marketing Conference (January 30-31, 2026) are now on sale!
How is the Novel Marketing conference different?
No Recordings, No Streaming
At most writers conferences, everything is recorded. In my experience, recording the conference reduces the quality of the live experience and makes for a low-quality recording. The recording constrains the experience and the interactivity.
Once all the recordings are turned off, the experience totally changes. Attendees show up on time, take notes, and the presentations become much more interactive. In that interactivity, people are more comfortable speaking openly.
The presence of a recording pushes most of the value of the conference from the recorded sessions into the unrecorded hallway. People come to conferences to confer, and microphones make conferring unnecessarily scary.
Plus, the recorded lectures were never very appealing. Typically, only the speaker has a microphone, and viewers can’t see the slides or hear the interaction between the speaker and students. Attendees would buy the recordings, promise themselves they would listen later, and then never get around to it.
So at Author Media, we let live be live and recorded be recorded. The Novel Marketing Podcast is professionally pre-recorded, and the Novel Marketing Conference is 100% live. If you miss it, you miss out.
Make a Big Conference Small
The most important thing about attending a conference is who you connect with. To facilitate connection, we have purposefully embedded features to help you connect.
The first, and by far the most popular, is the writers groups. We place each author in a writers group they’re with for the duration of the conference. This is the group you will workshop with and share your ideas with. The goal is to foster deeper connections and make the conference less overwhelming.
Previous attendees have loved being in a group with similar authors.
But we also want to give you a chance to connect with everyone, if you want to, so we have a 15-minute coffee break after every session. This gives everyone time to breathe.
At lunch, we provide some themed topic tables so you can sit at a table where the discussion will focus on one topic, such as podcasting, cover design, or crowdfunding. You’ll meet new people who are interested and focused on that topic.
Workbook
Each attendee gets an old-school paper workbook. The workbook will become your personally customized companion to the content we present. Each session is interactive, and you’ll have a section in your workbook to take notes, fill in blanks, answer questions, ask yourself questions, and outline your own marketing plan. At the end of the conference, you’ll have a 100-page strategy guide packed with next steps and tips for supercharging your book sales.
Cost Effective
Hollywood has shown us that spending more money doesn’t necessarily make something good, and being cheap doesn’t necessarily make it bad. This conference is built around cost-effectiveness.
No Appointment Room
Writers conferences are incredibly expensive to host. It only takes one bad year for a conference to go out of business. The biggest costs are the facilities and faculty. Agents and editors are a big draw for a beginning author, but just because someone is a talented agent or editor doesn’t mean they are a good teacher. Some are good agents and teachers, but you rarely find both of those skill sets in the same person.
Editors and agents attend conferences mainly to take appointments. This creates a conference within a conference. The regular conference has presentations and lectures, and the “speed dating room” has agents and editors meeting with authors. Flying in enough faculty to fill the speed dating room is very expensive. Plus, established authors and indie authors often have no reason to go to the appointment room.
The appointment room primarily appeals to authors at the beginning of their careers.
Since so many agents and editors are already there for appointments, they tend to teach most of the workshops. For that reason, those conferences tend to have a traditional publishing focus, despite the fact that most attendees end up going indie. For indie authors, the pitch room adds cost without adding value.
Some people think the Novel Marketing Conference is for indie authors, but the conference is for both indie and traditional authors. However, if you are an indie, you won’t feel overcharged, excluded, or underestimated.
No Breakouts
For the Novel Marketing Conference, I only book speakers who are great teachers on the topic they’re presenting. I don’t book anyone I haven’t personally vetted through a podcast interview or by listening to them present.
I personally choose the topics, vet the presenters, and work with them on refining their presentations. I want every session to be keynote-level quality, and because they are, all of the presentations are worthy of happening in the big room.
With just one big room, there is no three-ring circus of breakout sessions, appointments, and distractions from people coming and going. We want sessions to be so good that you don’t want them to stop, and you don’t want to get up and leave. We want to encourage “Aha!” moments that you don’t want to miss.
Now, to be clear, I’m not against appointment rooms. If you are just getting started and looking for an agent, an appointment room is exactly what you want. But this is our opportunity to zig where other conferences are zagging. We want a conference that still appeals to advanced authors. If you are just getting started with your writing, you are welcome to attend the Novel Marketing Conference. Just realize that you will be surrounded by professionals, which is also part of the appeal.
No Opulence
The third thing that makes writers conferences expensive to host is the venue. Hosting conferences at 5-star hotels is expensive. The kind of hotel with conference space tends to be a 4- or 5-star hotel where rooms are $300+ a night and Wi-Fi and breakfast cost extra. Plus, the hotel typically insists you purchase their catering, which adds additional unnecessary cost.
Our venue is the Fickett Center in Austin, TX. It is nice, but it isn’t opulent. It’s across the parking lot from a Marriott Springhill Suites, which is a 3-star hotel that provides a suite, breakfast, and Wi-Fi for $100 per night. The suites can comfortably hold two or three people.
Could we pick a more opulent venue for three times the cost? Sure. Would it improve the quality of what you learned at the conference? No. Would it improve the quality of the attendees? I doubt it.
No Busy Season
One reason we get such a good rate for the hotel is that we host the conference in January, the slow season for conferences. Austin, Texas, is often sunny and pleasant in January, but it is still a slow season for events. This makes airfare cheap as well.
But I see January as the best month to host a conference because it can double as a planning retreat. I recommend booking an extra night at the hotel to be alone, review your notes, thumb through your workbook, and plan for the year. You might even do some writing with all the inspiration you just received at the conference.
Springhill Suites have a desk area that is perfect for focused, undistracted work. Some authors book a hotel room just to get away from distractions, and a bit of silence and planning could make all the difference for you in the upcoming year.
Flexible Conference
With such a good rate on the lodging, how much is the conference? Well, that depends. We have three kinds of tickets: Super Tickets, Standard Tickets, and Gallery Tickets.
Standard Ticket: Comes with lunch, a seat at a table, and placement with a writers group. This is the most popular ticket.
Gallery Ticket: Comes with lunch and a seat in the back of the room. There is no table in the back, and you will not be placed in a writers group. This is the cheapest ticket.
Super Ticket: This is the standard ticket (table, writers group, lunch) plus the pre-conference website workshop.
The pre-conference workshop extends the conference from a two-day conference to a three-day conference. During the pre-conference website workshop, you will work on your website all day with our help. I will be there reviewing websites and giving feedback, and you will open your laptop and implement that feedback.
If you need help or get stuck, just raise your hand, and I or another webmaster will help get you unstuck.
One intense day of work is often enough to make an author’s website shine, especially if you have expert assistance. The first time we did this, a couple of authors built a website from scratch during the pre-conference workshop. While you could do that, I recommend going through my free course on building author websites before the workshop to get the most out of it.
Patrons, who got early access to the tickets, have already started snatching them up. As I record this, only 16 Super Tickets are left.
How Much Does the Conference Cost?
Standard Pricing
- Super Tickets: $999
- Standard Tickets: $599
- Gallery Tickets: $399
Early Bird Pricing (Ends September 30, 2025):
- Super Tickets: $899
- Standard Tickets: $499
- Gallery Tickets: $299
If you register now, you can attend the Novel Marketing Conference for as little as $299 if you get an early bird gallery seat. You could also spend as much as $999 if any Super Tickets are left when the early bird window closes at the end of September.
Regardless of which ticket you choose, during checkout, you will have the opportunity to buy my course Author Email Academy for 80% off. The Author Email Academy course normally costs $500. So, if you have been thinking about signing up, you could get a Gallery Ticket and the discounted course for less than the cost of the course alone.
Going through the Author Email Academy is also a great way to prepare for the conference ahead of time.
What is the Schedule?
Now, let’s talk about the schedule, which leads us to another conference innovation.
Red Years & Blue Years
The conference now has two versions: blue and red. Even years are blue, odd years are red. There are no repeat sessions from one year to the next. If you attend a blue year, the next year will be a red year, and all sessions will be new.
If you come back for a third year, it would be a blue year again, and some of the topics would repeat. Marketing is constantly changing, and every session is updated every year, but there is a difference between an updated session you’ve heard before and a session that is 100% new.
2026 is a blue year, and all the guest speakers are new.
We continue to tweak the schedule, and you can find the most up-to-date schedule at NovelMarketingConference.com.
2026 Novel Marketing Tentative Schedule
Thursday, January 29, 2026 (Pre-Conference/ Super Ticket Only)
- 9:00 AM: Pre-Conference Website Workshop for Super Ticket Holders Begins
- Noon: Lunch
- 5:00 PM: Pre-Conference Workshop Ends
- 7:00 PM: Patrons-Only Ice Cream Social
Friday, January 30, 2026
- 8:15 AM: Registration Opens
- 9:15 AM: Opening Keynote (TBA)
- 10:00–10:15: Coffee Break
- 10:15 AM: Crafting an Irresistible Author Brand (Thomas Umstattd Jr.)
- 11:00–11:15: Coffee Break
- 11:15 AM: Branding Writers Group Breakout (Thomas Umstattd Jr.)
- Noon: Lunch (Table Themes)
- 1:15 PM: How to Spend Less Time on Marketing (Thomas Umstattd Jr.)
- 2:00–2:15: Coffee Break
- 2:15 PM: Marketing Strategy Writers Group Breakout (Thomas Umstattd Jr.)
- 3:00 PM: Coffee Break
- 3:15 PM: Amazon Book Page Optimization (Jonathan Shuerger)
- 4:00 PM: Coffee Break
- 4:15 PM: Faculty Q&A Panel OR Live Episode of Author Update
Saturday, January 31, 2026
- 8:15 AM: Coffee & Networking
- 9:00 AM: Bestselling Book Covers (Jamie Foley)
- 9:45 AM: Coffee Break
- 10:00 AM: The Art of a Parking Lot Podcast Interview (Zackary Russell)
- 10:45 AM: Coffee Break
- 11:00 AM: Podcast Guesting Workshop (Thomas Umstattd Jr.)
- Noon: Lunch
- 1:15 PM: Session #11: TBA (TBA)
- 2:00 PM: Coffee Break
- 2:15 PM: Grow Your Email List with Reader Super Magnets (Laurie Christine)
- 3:00 PM: Coffee Break
- 3:30 PM: Faculty Panel Q&A
- 4:00 PM: Coffee Break
- 4:15 PM: Session #14: AI-Powered Productivity in 2026 (Thomas Umstattd Jr.)
- 5:15 PM: Closing (Thomas Umstattd Jr.)
There is something special about meeting in person.
In this world of online everything, it is easy to forget the importance of in-person connection. Sharing a meal with fellow authors is a powerful and transformative act. If success were just about what you knew, listening to this podcast would be all you need.
But success is also about who you know, and the best place to make new friends is in the real world. We send out a survey after every conference, and last year, 100% of the respondents said they were glad they came to the conference.
Here is one testimonial from Suzanne Delzio:
“The Novel Marketing Conference drilled down to exactly what works in marketing both independently and traditionally published books. Thomas and the other speakers have the experience to share what works in the hyper-competitive book business in the AI Age. It’s changing fast, and the Novel Marketing team is current with every crazy change. It was great to meet other writers and hear about what’s worked and what hasn’t for them. This is a reasonably priced conference that punches above its weight, led by people who research every recommendation and trend.”
If you’re still deciding whether to attend the Novel Marketing Conference, ask someone who has already been. Find out what they thought and whether they think it’s a good fit for you.
Reserve your ticket to the 2026 Novel Marketing Conference at NovelMarketingConference.com.
