I continue to get a ton of traffic to this site, but am no longer blogging here. Feel free to trawl through the archives, then come and join me over at 30 Day Books.com –> http://www.30DayBooks.com/blog and see what all the fuss is about! 
Author Archives:
Combining Self Publishing with Traditional: A new publishing hybrid.
There has been much debate over the future of publishing and a divide in opinions over which is better for authors – the traditional or self-publishing route. I propose that combining the best of both worlds might, in some cases, be a good answer to solving the issues of:
1. Authors with a great book that NEARLY gets signed by a big publishing house, but can’t cross the final hurdle. Author is left exhausted by querying process & all the disappointment but is resistant to self-publishing.
and
2. The difficulties faced by an author with no background in marketing, no time, resources or desire to market and promote their book (essential for sales) yet intrigued by the freedom and opportunity that self-publishing allows for.
A little backstory
Yesterday I told you the inspiring story of Kathy Lynn Harris’s 10 year road to publication. In case you missed it, in short, Kathy spent 8 years querying her book to big NYC publishing houses and *almost* sold her book on several occasions. When it never quite happened, she put it away to gather dust, and then 2 years later decided to self-publish it. Three months later an indie publisher bought the rights to it.
Today I want to admit that that indie publisher is me.
Yes little old me.
Read the rest of this post on 30 Day Books…
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Hi lovely readers, please note that I am now blogging more and more at 30 Day Books.com. I’ll still post here on occasion, but for free book marketing and promotional advice head over here!
Your Author WebSite’s Media Page: 14 Items to Include
Above is an example of a media page from author Kathy Lynn Harris’s website. So do you need a media page (also known as a media kit?)
If you are considering a blog tour, are contacting reviewers, want to be featured on blogs, websites or your local or national newspaper/ magazine, a media page is a killer resource to have. It makes reporters and bloggers owners’ lives a ton easier (trust me I know all about this!) and this in turn means that they will be more likely to feature you.
If all the information about yourself and your book is in one place, it’s just so much easier to whip up a short post or feature. This is the aim of the media page, to cater to the media folk, so keep them in mind when building the most intuitive and informative media page possible.
Here is a list of 14 useful things you can include on it.
1. A summary of your press attention to date. This can be images and links to PR you have already received to show off a little.
2. Author Bio for Press. This is a professional yet fun summary that doesn’t include your whole life story. Keep it to under 150-300 words and make sure it’s interesting!
3. A Book Description. Short and interesting enough to be lifted and used in it’s entirety on another site or article.
4. Author Photo: Upload or attach a link to a professional, high resolution headshot. Not you at dinner with your other half or hanging out on the sofa in your Christmas sweater!
5. Book Info: The vital statistics – title, subtitle, genre, ISBN, no. of pages, formats available, publisher and release date.
6. Reviews and endorsements: This can be sentences lifted from Amazon.com reviews, or endorsements from professional reviewers or other authors/ celebrities (blurbs) if available.
7. Press releases, if any.
8. Buying information: Links to the relevant retailers.
9. Contact information. Your email address or that of a publicity rep, Twitter handle if you have one.
10. Interview topic ideas that are relevant to your book. Give the reviewer/ reporter/ site owner some food for thought.
11. News pegs. How does the book ties into contemporary issues, politics, news? Even if your book is a fiction, you can be considered an “expert” in the topics and issues presented in your story. Your personal story is bound to influence your writing, so if you’re not shy present your own experiences in relation to your book, too.
12. Sample chapter/ excerpt: (A link to) Don’t go overboard or include anything with spoilers! Enough text to pique interest is all that is needed here.
13. Book trailer/ audio file (interview)
14. Info on your target readers: Who reads and buys your books? Why? This info helps a journalist, blogger, or other potential reviewer know if you appeal to their own target audience.
And there you have it, a Media-friendly press page! It might take you a few hours to get all of this information together, but the content will be useful for ALL of your promotional efforts, and will help you get the media attention you deserve by putting you a cut above the rest.
See my example for my book Wow! Glowing Bride in 30 Days here. See an example put together by 30 Day Books for the author Kathy Lynn Harris here.
Awesome Tools & Resources for Writers (Mainly Free) Part 4: Promoting & Marketing a Book
*This is Part 4 in the series, and is cross posted from my other site Ladies Who Critique.com*
4. Promoting a Book: 10 Sites You Can Use in Your Promotions
Image Courtesy of sellingbooks.com
*This is part 4 in the series Awesome Tools & Resources for Writers (Mostly Free). Find part 1, Writing a Book here. Part 2, Querying a Book here. Part 3: Producing a Book (for self-publishers) here.*
1. Amazon Author Central Be sure to fill out your Amazon author central profile, claim your books, import your blog and Twitter feed in order to make the most of the free profile Amazon offers you.
2. Vistaprint Create marketing materials such as bookmarks, business cards, Tshirts, pens & fliers for a low cost at Vistaprint.com.
3. CafePress- Merchandise can be designed and ordered in a print on demand fashion, at CafePress. This can help with offline PR efforts, and is a lot of fun too! For example, here is the CafePress Ladies Who Critique shop.
4. YouTube: Make a video blog (vlog) or book trailer and upload it to a YouTube channel for free. Make it interesting or entertaining and it might just go viral.
5. Quibblo: Quibblo online quizzes are a great way to introduce your characters and story to potential readers. Create character quizzes, fun surveys, polls & personality quizzes. Make your own quiz for your blog or Facebook.
6. HARO.com - Help a Reporter Out – “No such thing as free PR? Over 50000 journalists use HARO to locate experts for on-air interviews, article quotes and more.” If your book is non-fiction, or has some non-fiction PR angles, be sure to read the HARO emails each day where journalists and other media peops send out requests for experts or people with knowledge in a certain field to quote. That could well be you!
7. Animoto.com: Animoto is a slide show software that allows you to add pictures and music – a great, low budget way of making book trailers. It’s free for up to 30 seconds, longer videos are available for a low cost.
See an example book trailer made with Animoto.com.
8. Blogging platforms: WordPress is my platform of choice (very customizable and flexible – Ladies Who Critique is hosted on WordPress), Blogger is also a popular (and free) option.
If you want a great resource to learn how and what to blog about in order to create a successful blog, I suggest Kristen Lamb’s Are You There Blog, It’s Me Writer.
9. Email marketing services: Mailchimp/ Constant Contact are both great services for emailing several people at once; perfect for author newsletters or for spreading news about your writing/ books and keeping a complete list of subscribers. Mailchimp is my fave, plus it’s free up to 2000 contacts.
Here is an article from Joanna Penn of the Creative Penn on building an email list for author marketing.
10. Reddit: Users add news links, but these don’t really have to be “news” in the traditional sense. You can upload links to your latest blogpost, photos, or anything that might be of interest. Votes by other users promote stories to the front page (but you can also be voted down so be sure to add something of value!) Great for promoting your own articles and news. As a writer, be sure to join these groups: writing, nanowrimo, selfpublish, books, literature.
The next post in this series will cover social media sites you can use in your promotions: stay tuned post-Thanksgiving!
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Awesome Tools & Resources for Writers (Mostly Free) | Part 3: Producing & Creating – Self-Publishing – a Book
*This is part 3 in the series Awesome Tools & Resources for Writers (Mostly Free) and is cross posted from my site Ladies Who Critique.com. Find part 1, Writing a Book here. Part 2, Querying a Book here.*
3. Producing a Book (for independent & self-published wannabes)
The independence that self-publishing has created is wonderful. Many companies and services have jumped on the bandwagon trying to sell their services and help converting and producing printed books and eBooks. While there is some merit (and certainly convenience) in these services it is possible for those on a tight budget to produce both paperback and digital formats. Here are some great links to get you started:
1. Print on Demand Companies: (e.g. Createspace, Lulu, Lightning Source) Print on Demand (POD) services allow you to print as many or as few copies of your book as you like, have it dropshipped and therefore eliminate the need for a publisher or physical stock. The most common and well regarded companies are:
- Createspace (My preferred POD company)
Great How-To: How to Publish a Book Using Createspace, by Karen McQuestion
2. eBook Conversion:
Sigil: “Sigil is a multi-platform WYSIWYG ebook editor. It is designed to edit books in ePub format” For Kindle, and it’s FREE!
eBookburn: “eBookBurn.com is a full-featured eBook creation tool that’s also simple to use. Sign Up Now! It’s Free! No Programming Required”
Kindleprocessor: Kindle formatting conversion for 99 cents.
3. Book Cover Design: I strongly suggest hiring a fantastic book cover designer to produce a cover that looks as professional and pleasing as possible. For great tips on what this involves, get familiar with Joel Friedlanders site, The Book Designer. For those who have some graphic designer skills and/or really cannot afford a professional’s help, royalty -free/ low cost images are available from:
The Library of Congress Prints & Photographs Online Catalog
4. Publishing Digitally
- Publishing on the Amazon Kindle: https://kdp.amazon.com/self-publishing/signin
- How to Publish on Kindle (by Amazon) You Tube Video
- Publishing on Barnes & Noble Nook: www.pubit.com
- Smashwords: For publishing on other eBook retailers and platforms (Kobo, iStore, Sony and more) I suggest converting your manuscript for Smashwords (the infamous meatgrinder is notoriously difficult to format for, but please see below for “easier” guidelines) http://www.smashwords.com
- The Official Smashwords Style Guide – http://www.smashwords.com/books/download/52/1/latest/0/0/smashwords-style-guide.pdf
- The Shorter, Easier, Non-Migraine Inducing Version of Smashwords Style Guide (by Catherine Ryan Howard) http://catherineryanhoward.com/2010/09/06/how-to-format-your-e-book-the-non-migraine-inducing-way/
- Catherine Ryan Howard An eBook Checklist – amazing! – http://catherineryanhoward.files.wordpress.com/2011/01/ebook-checklist.pdf
As always, let me know if I missed anything!
Awesome Tools & Resources for Writers (Mostly Free) | Part 2: Querying a Book
*This is part two in the series Awesome Tools & Resources for Writers (Mostly Free) and is cross posted from my other site, LadiesWhoCritique.com. Find part 1, Writing a Book here.*
2. Querying a Book
The best way to become familiar with what it is agents & publishers are looking at is to get the inside scoop, and these links are a great place to start. Bookmark these sites and blogs!!!
- Nathan Bransford Nathan is a former literary agent turned author and his site still has a ton of resources for authors seeking literary agents – where does he find the time?
- Query Shark Read about queries being critiqued and never make the same mistake again!
- Writer’s Digest’s Guide to Literary Agents Find literary agents and what they’re looking for here.
- Ask Daphne KT Literary’s very own Daphne answers readers query questions.
- Miss Snark’s First Victim This mystery blogger was the former query-critiquing queen, Miss Snark’s, fist victim! Now she took all that good advice and critiques excerpts and queries.
- The Public Query Slushpile Have your query letter critiqued by the public – there is no literary agent on this site, it’s up to visitors to comment, hence the “public” query slushpile.
- QueryTracker A list of 9000+ authors and the literary agents who represent them, or who have represented them in the past.
Articles about QueryingHow to write a Query Letter: by Gary Smailes
How to write a Book Proposal: by Gary Smailes
How Do I find an Agent? by Gary Smailes
Ten Factors to Consider When Writing Book ProposalsA list of successful query letters from different authors. Thanks to Matthew MacNish of the QQQE for putting this together!
As always, don’t forget to share any tools or resources about querying that you have found of use in the comments below. Muchos gracias!
Awesome Tools & Resources for Writers | Part 1: Writing a Book
Image Courtesy of maryloukayser.com
One of my aims when I started Ladies Who Critique was to help empower writers to understand the latest technology and keep up with the current trends. With new resources and services popping up each day, it’s hard to stay on top of it all.
Just this morning I spoke to a retired writer who was feeling overwhelmed by the current technology and Internet tools that he hears about and reads about, but doesn’t truly understand or see the value in.
Over the next few days I am going to give an overview of some of the online tools, resources and sites that as a writer I use regularly and find incredibly helpful in my writing, publishing and promoting. I will cover each one briefly, including links to the best explanations I can find on how to use them effectively.
If you are ever feeling unsure on how to use one of these resources and wish to learn more, please don’t hesitate to get in touch and I’ll help you out where and when I can. Here are the blogposts scheduled for the next week or so:
1. Writing a Book: 11/17
2. Querying a Book: 11/18
3. Producing a Book: 11/19
4. Promoting a Book: 11/21
5. Social Media: 11/22
6. Monitoring Sales: 11/23
1. Writing a Book
If you are struggling to write each day, 750 words.com might be just the accountability you need. It’s super cute, fun and if you are competitive, it might help that there is a leader board to egg you on.
Log on first thing in the morning, and get writing. You can even join one of the 10 day or 1 month challenges and receive a badge of honor when you are done.
750words.com/
2. Online Cloud Storage
Some people are diligent enough to back up their writing and work on an external hard drive or USB pen. For the rest of us, online cloud storage such as Dropbox and Google docs allows us not only to back up our work in case of any computer disasters, but also to retrieve the documents from any computing device, anywhere in the world. No longer do you have to juggle multiple copies of the same file; just work with one master file and edit it from anywhere. (Oh yeah, you can also use it to collaborate with others – perfect!)
Links:
Google Docs (1GB free)
iCloud is also available for those using Apple products.
Jot down notes wherever you are! Evernote is a free note taking system that is great for us writers to sketch out outlines and jot down ideas for later use. Use it on your smartphone or computer, on the go or mulling over a cup of coffee at you local coffee house.
Writespace (for Windows) is a fullscreen writing environment which creates a distraction-free environment in order for you to focus on your words and not get sidetracked by facebook & so on. It has a built in spell check as well, yay! If you use a Mac, Write Room is a similar program. Download the software for free and enjoy the peace and quiet.
Grammar queen Mignon Fogarty provides “quick and dirty tips” for better writing over on grammar.quickanddirtytips.com. Even the best writers make common grammar mistakes that only a fantastic editor will catch. Learn what they are here.
If you are in need of a prompt or two to get you started, Story Starter.com can help!
p.s. If you want have children to keep entertained over the holidays, there is even a StoryStarter for Kids…
On Visuwords, look up words to find their meanings and associations with other words and concepts. Visual diagrams show you how the connections and associations are made, helping you to expand your vocabulary, fast.
8. Ladies Who Critique!
Well I may be a teeny bit biased but… in all seriousness a good critique partner is essential for better writing. In fact I wrote a post for NovelPublicity.com this week about that very thing (Does My Manuscript Look Fat in This?) If Ladies Who Critique is not for you (and please remember that men are ALWAYS welcome!), here are some other critiquing sites that are out there;
How about you? Do you have any great tools or resources for writing a book to share that we could all benefit from?
Stay tuned for tomorrow’s post: Awesome Tools & Resources for Writers | Part 2: Querying a Book
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A Little Linked In Tip! | Customizing URLs on Profile
If you are using Linked In, here’s a small tip you can utilize to make the links in your profile more enticing.
On your profile there is the option to add the URLs to your personal and company websites:
If you click ‘Edit’, you can add in your own URLs.
The options you have for filling these out are: Personal Website, Company Website, Blog, RSS Feed, Portfolio or ‘Other’.
If you want to customize the title of your website to make it more enticing than ‘personal website’ or ‘blog’, click on ‘Other’ and you will then have the option to add in the name of your site (middle box), as well as the URL (end box).
On your profile, your websites will then be displayed by their name:
Voila! Easy wasn’t it?
The Kindle’s ‘Before You Go’ Feature
The latest generation Kindle now brings up a Before You Go… screen on the last page of all books, which can be a great way of spreading the word about your book through social media, as well as garnering reviews on Amazon.com. That’s two fantastic promotional opportunities!
The Before You Go… feature invites the reader to share with their Twitter and Facebook followers/ friends that they’ve finished the book. They are also able to give it a rating and write an Amazon review.
The page also links to other titles by the same author, as well as a list of books that “Customers who bought this book also bought…”. This is great news for authors with more than one title.
Key Points: Before You Go
1. Before You Go is a built-in feature and it’s only built into the latest generation. Neither the Kindle owner nor the book publisher has to turn it on, it’s naturally there.
2. Readers do need to enter their Twitter and Facebook account details into their Kindle in order to share what they have read.
3. The only real thing you need to know as a publisher: the Before You Go… page is a very useful way of getting reviews on the spot since many people will forget to write them later. And as we all know reviews drive sales. So you want as many people as possible to see this page.
What you do not want therefore is a ton of backmatter between the last word of your book and before the Before You Go screen. When formatting your book, be sure to make sure the Before You Go screen comes soon after the book finishes.
Traditionally there might be acknowledgements, references, book club questions and prompts after the last word. I would argue that it is more important to have readers see this screen than include this information. Important acknowledgements (brief ones at least) can come at the beginning of the book, and other information can be found on your website, which you can leave a link to at the end of the book.
The only backmatter exception I can see worth having, is a chapter excerpt for another of your titles at the end of your book. If readers enjoyed the book they just finished they will most likely want to read your excerpt and be drawn into your other title this way.
What are your thoughts and experiences with the Before You Go… screen? How will you handle not leaving the traditional pages and pages of acknowledgements? Do you think that spreading the word through social media in this instance drives sales?
