Mickey Mikkelson What Can a Publicist Do For You? Creative-Edge Publicity Founder Explains I was getting other author opportunities and decided that there was perhaps a market for this. Lo and behold, Creative Edge was formed.
Q1. What made you decide that being a publicist was a career that would work for you? I didn’t decide that this was a career to strive for. It fell into my lap as I was helping out a friend who had written a book. I previously worked at Chapters as an events coordinator, and the friend who had written a novel, asked me to get her a couple of signings. Well, two signings turned into eight signings, and she essentially ended up conducting a full Alberta tour which resulted in her book becoming national with Indigo. News got out, and the word spread, and very soon, 28
Q2. How did you get started? Formation of Creative Edge? How did you develop your client base? (I ask because writers and others have trouble approaching people). Working at Chapters, I developed a strong relationship with many authors in Alberta. Years later, when I realized I had a passion for publicity, I was able to leverage a number of those relationships as my first clients. That was when I decided to form Creative Edge, which today has over 100 clients, representing three N.Y. Times Bestsellers, six USA Today Bestsellers, six publishers, and contacts with media internationally in T.V., Radio, and Print Media, as well as reviewers, podcasts, and bloggers. My client base was originally
built through word of mouth and networking through a variety of writing events such as ‘When Words Collide,’ which is a prominent literary festival in Western Canada. Western Canada was definitely where everything started, and we have been able to branch out from there now, internationally. We have worked with book festivals such as the South Dakota Festival of Books, and the Imaginarium Festival in Washington D.C. . Ultimately, our client base is about forty percent Canadian, forty percent American, and twenty percent from other countries like the U.K. and Australia. Q3. You have an excellent client list that includes Robert J. Sawyer. People might remember him as the author behind the television series FLASH FORWARD a few years back, based on his book of the same name. With all his successes, how much more complex are your efforts with him? How did you and Robert connect,
Books ‘N Pieces Magazine — JUNE 2022 — www.BooksNPieces.com
