Writing and Publishing News from

July 18, 2012

How Authors Prepare Creative Works for Commercial Success

Filed under: Authorship,Book Promotion,Publishing — Patricia @ 5:17 am

This week, I finished filling out my Author’s Questionnaire for Allworth Press related to my upcoming book, Talk Up Your Book. This is something that goes out to authors from the publishing house publicity department. The purpose is to help staff with their publicity efforts.

Not all Author’s Questionnaires are the same, but most are much like putting together a book proposal. The publicist want to know about the author’s background, education, affiliations, awards and so forth. What other books has the author produced? What are his/her sales and marketing leads and media connections? What is this book’s competition and what makes this book different? I was asked to list potential markets outside of the traditional for this book and regions where this book could be promoted. They also ask you to describe the book and write your bio.

Sounds something like a book proposal, doesn’t it?

When filling one of these out, you must do so always with promotion in mind. If you didn’t understand before how important it is to know your audience and how to reach them, you will once you start addressing the questions on an Author’s Questionnaire. And you might if you would sit down and write a complete book proposal before you even start writing your book—especially for nonfiction.

I present an excellent online book proposal course. If you are considering writing or are in the beginning stages of writing a nonfiction book, you might want to sign up for this course and get some one-on-one guidance through the process. The questions you must respond to for a book proposal can give you incredibly more insight into the commercial potential for your nonfiction book. The process of writing a book proposal might motivate you to change the focus of the book in order to make it more salable. I’ve known many authors to do so. One of them, after submitting her newly altered book proposal to Houghton Mifflin, landed a publishing contract.

You can write a book proposal for fiction or a children’s book, too. And I recommend it. The book proposal for fiction looks different than the book proposal for nonfiction, but it is as important.

You may be thinking creative thoughts as you write your fiction or nonfiction book. But if you have commercial success in mind, you’d better start looking at your project from a marketing standpoint and writing a book proposal is a smart way to do this.

Sign up for my book proposal course this week and I’ll send you a FREE copy of my book, How to Write a Successful Book Proposal http://www.matilijapress.com/course_bookproposal.htm

The course is $200 for 8-weeks. It is all done via email. Learn more about how it works here:
http://matilijapress.com/course_howwork.htm

We’ll have a guest blogger this week. I’ll be introducing Hope Clark who will talk about her journey as a successful working writer during the day and a fiction author by night. How in the world does she organize her time? That was my question. Hope has some remarkable and inspiring answers. Stay tuned—her blog will be posted sometime this week.

July 17, 2012

Do You Plan to Publish? Here’s What You Need to Know!

Filed under: Publishing — Patricia @ 7:10 am

Are you in the writing stages of a book? Thousands—maybe millions—of people are. Are you doing your homework along the way? Are you well-informed as to what steps you need to take with your book project next? Are you staying ahead of the game so you are less likely to make some of the most common (and uncommon) mistakes even during the writing stages of your project?

If you’re like most first-time authors, you are enjoying the process of writing your book, but you haven’t given much thought to what comes next. Many authors see the next step as being published without much knowledge as to how to make it happen. If this describes you, let me interject here that:

78 percent of all authors sell fewer than 100 books total. In other words, they fail in their attempt to succeed even to a minimal degree.

And I would say that 99.9 percent of these authors either did not know much about the publishing industry, the process of publishing and book promotion OR they didn’t believe what they were learning about publishing—didn’t think it applied to them—and chose to ignore it.

I write books and articles, produce this daily blog and go out and speak in an attempt to educate hopeful authors about the publishing industry so they know what to expect when it comes time to publish and market their books, how to go about it and so they know what is expected of them.

Do you plan to publish the book you are writing? Do you have high hopes for it? Are you well-versed on your publishing options? Do you understand how the publishing industry works and what your responsibilities within it are? Are you aware of the tremendous competition for authors in nearly every category of books? Do you know what it takes to make your book stand out? Are you approaching the process of writing a book for publication as a businesswo/man producing a product that is wanted/needed rather than an artist writing something just because you want to write it?

Step number one for any author who hopes to successfully publish his or her book is to study the publishing industry. Learn as much as you can about the process of publishing, what it takes to produce a viable product, how to get your book (product) into the hands of your readers and so forth.

It is not an art, it is a business. When you decide to publish, you are not as much a writer or an artist as you are the CEO of your product.

Start the process of preparing for publication by reading the book I wrote expressly for YOU! Publish Your Book, Proven Strategies and Resources for the Enterprising Author. Order your copy at my website—link below—or from Amazon.com or most any other online or downtown bookstore. http://www.matilijapress.com

If you haven’t received your copy of my ebooklet, 50 Reasons Why You Should Write That Book, it is now available at my website (link above) for $3.95.

Questions—concerns? Contact me: PLFry620@yahoo.com

July 16, 2012

FREE Chapter Download From Patricia Fry’s Latest Book for Authors

Filed under: Publishing — Patricia @ 4:33 am

News flash!! You can now download Chapter One and the Table of Contents for Publish Your Book, Proven Strategies and Resources for the Enterprising Author FREE from my website:
http://www.matilijapress.com/PublishYourBook.html

Scroll about halfway down the page and click on the link.

Publish Your Book: Proven Strategies and Resources for the Enterprising Author is a professional guide to publishing success for the new and struggling author. With insider tips, up-to-date marketing strategies, timelines, and other resources, this book offers a comprehensive tour of the world of book publishing to help authors successfully navigate the industry.

Whether you write fiction or nonfiction, this book will help you write your book for a target audience, build promotion into your book, write a successful query letter and book proposal, choose the right publishing option for your book, establish or strengthen your platform, get your book into bookstores, and successfully promote and sell your book. Authors and publishers in any genre and at any stage of the publishing process will benefit from this comprehensive resource.

New Ebooklet for Authors
Also, you can now purchase the revised version of my ebooklet: 50 Reasons Why You Should Write That Book at
http://www.matilijapress.com
It’s $3.95.

If you aren’t sure whether you should write and publish the book that’s been rolling around in your head or your heart, read this ebooklet. It will help you to determine if this is the right book and if you are the right person to write and produce it. Throughout these pages, you’ll discover what it takes to develop a book idea and what steps are necessary if publishing is your goal. Let this ebook be your guide and you’ll make the right choices on behalf of your book project from start to finish.

What will you learn from this ebook:
• How to write the right book for the right audience.
• Whether this book is truly a good idea.
• Your responsibilities as a published author.
• Exactly what it takes to succeed as a published author.
• Why so many authors fail in the marketplace.

And more…

July 15, 2012

Your Next Book

Filed under: Authorship,Book Promotion — Patricia @ 5:24 am

So you’ve produced a book. Have you put any thought into your next one?

You’ve heard/read me suggest that you should produce a spin-off product or book related to your initial book project. This is a marketing idea designed to increase book sales. You can use each book (or other item) to promote both. You might publish a book on writing poetry to compliment your book of poetry; a booklet featuring recipes to go with your book on children’s parties or a booklet of little known Civil War fact to accompany your novel set in that period.

If you want to get right to work on a new book, make sure it is similar to the one you have published—a sequel to your novel, a companion to your grammar book, another children’s book in the series, for example. In other words, write your next book for the same audience as your first book. Why?

It is easier and more effective to promote two books to the same audience than trying to promote to two different audiences on two different topics or even genres.

Someone who buys and enjoys one of your books will surely be interested in purchasing another one. That’s why we use articles, blogs and free reports to entice readers for our books. Those who are interested in the topic/genre, who find you credible in your field or a good writer in your genre, will be more likely to purchase your book on the same topic or in the same genre.

So what will your next book be about? I recommend, if you plan to stay in the authorship game and if your first book has a solid audience, that you continue writing in this vein. Write another Western adventure novel, children’s how-to book or family budgeting book so you can use the same venues and tactics in promoting your books to the same audience.

For additional tips, techniques, perspective and solid advice, purchase my books, Publish Your Book and Promote Your Book. Amazon is bundling them right now. You can purchase them at most online and downtown bookstores as well as at http://www.matilijapress.com Both books are on Kindle, Nook and other e-readers.

July 14, 2012

Personality Sells Ebooks

Filed under: Book Promotion,E-Books — Patricia @ 4:41 am

This is number 17 in my new ebooklet, 50 Ways to Promote Your Ebook. It’s FREE at http://www.patriciafry.com

Go out and talk about your ebook. Now here’s the ebook promotion suggestion you didn’t expect to see here—the one you have been avoiding, you say, “for obvious reasons.” Yes, I’m suggesting that you make public appearances with your ebook. Book speaking engagements at venues where your audience congregates.

So how does the author sell ebooks in the back-of-the-room after presenting a workshop or after entertaining an audience with stories from his fiction ebook? More and more people carry their electronic readers with them and may actually be able to purchase and download your ebook from your website or from Amazon on the spot. How cool is that?

For those who are not prepared to make a purchase now, provide professional take-aways. Design bookmarks or postcards with your amazing book cover on one side and a description of the ebook content or story and ordering information on the other. Can you see why it is important to have a professional quality cover designed?

So where would you speak? For fiction, how about at book club meetings, libraries and college campuses? Some civic groups might welcome you to entertain members. Book presentations for club meetings or conferences related to your topic/expertise/genre. There are conferences and clubs formed around the themes of writing, art, ecology, pets, gardening, foods/cooking, auto, fashion, business management and so much more. Locate conferences on your topic or in your genre through these sites:
http://shawguides.com
http://www.allconferences.com
http://www.bvents.com

Or do an Internet search to locate a conference or event near you by using keywords, “conference” and “your home town” for example.

Locate clubs and organizations that hold events and/or meet regularly through the local Chamber of Commerce or the city/county website. Contact their program chairpersons. You’ll find clubs and events listed in the calendar section of your newspaper. Some phone books list clubs and organizations in the front pages.

For additional information and support related to public speaking for authors, read my book, Talk Up Your Book, How to Sell Your Book Through Public Speaking, Interviews, Signings, Festivals, Conferences and More (Allworth Press, scheduled for release fall/winter 2012).

Consider the advantages of doing personal appearances for an ebook.
• You don’t have books to cart around.
• You can concentrate solely on promoting your book—no sales or autographing to distract you. No making change.
• You don’t have to worry about theft. Yes, people will occasionally walk off with a book without paying.

For a greater understanding of the publishing industry and how to navigate it with your wonderful book project, read my book, Publish Your Book, Proven Strategies and Resources for the Enterprising Author. It’s available at Amazon and most other online and downtown bookstores. Also at http://www.matilijapress.com

I’m in between editing jobs. Good time to contact me for a free sample edit and estimate. PLFry620@yahoo.com

July 13, 2012

The Author Questionnaire

Filed under: Authorship,Publishing — Patricia @ 4:41 am

When your traditional publisher is close to finishing up your book, he/she will likely ask you to fill out an Author Questionnaire. This is another reason why you need a solid and varied platform before you become a published author.

The publisher will use the information you provide on the questionnaire for the initial promotion blast. In fact, if you don’t believe me and other professionals in the field when we stress to you how much the publisher relies on his/her authors to promote the book, the questions on this document should bring that truth home to you. In fact, there’s often a note on the questionnaire I just received explaining that they want the author to respond to every question as thoroughly as possible as this information will be referred to again and again by their editors, sales people and publicists. Here are some of the questions you’ll find on a typical Author Questionnaire:

They want to know about your education, occupation, affiliations and honors, citations, prizes and awards and what other books you have authored. They request a 50-word biography to be used in their marketing efforts and then they go into some pretty detailed questions such as:

1: Have you ever been interviewed on TV/radio or in print? List interviews, send copies of clippings, video tapes, etc.

2: Do you have personal contacts in the media, TV/radio, newspapers, magazines, websites. They want any leads to your connections and they want to know about your experiences.

3: List media outlets that might be interested in reviewing this book.

4: Do you have contacts in the book trade—please list.

5: What about special sales—contacts for specialty retailers, for example.

6: What cities would the author recommend this book be promoted?

7: Is your book suitable as a textbook—expand on this concept.

8: Is it suitable for foreign markets?

9: They also want other suggestions where this book can be marketed.

10: They need you to write a summary describing the book, a list of the most important features, etc.

11: And they want to know about any competing books and how yours is better/different.
Obviously, if you’ve written a book proposal, you have a leg up on the task of filling out this questionnaire. If not, you’ll need to roll up your sleeves, begin to think like your audience and spend, potentially, several hours providing the information your publishing team needs in order to more successfully promote your book.

Can you guess, one of my tasks today is filling out an Author Questionnaire for my publisher related to my upcoming book, Talk Up Your Book.

In the meantime, if you benefit from this blog and if you’ve learned lots from my free reports and articles published in the magazines and newsletters your study, you will definitely benefit from the books I write for you. The two I recommend now are:

Publish Your Book, Proven Strategies and Resources for the Enterprising Author and
Promote Your Book, Over 250 Proven, Low-Cost Tips and Techniques for the Enterprising Author. They are available at Amazon.com and most other online and downtown bookstores. They are both on Kindle, Nook and other readers. And Amazon is bundling them at a special price now. For additional information about these books, visit my website: http://www.matilijapress.com

For a free ebooklet, “50 Ways to Promote Your Ebook,” go to: http://www.patriciafry.com

July 12, 2012

Authors, Expand on Your Presentation Topics

Filed under: Public Speaking — Patricia @ 4:56 am

I’m preparing for a presentation Saturday and have been lining up talks for my 2013 calendar. In the process, I noticed that my list of possible presentation ideas was kind of sparse. I decided it was time to add to my repertoire. So I came up with around ten new, hopefully, intriguing speech titles. Once my webmaster posts them at my website, I’ll have approximately 20 speech topics program chairpersons and conference directors can choose from.

Do you have trouble coming up with speech themes related to your book? Remember, if you are promoting a book, live presentations are among the best promotional activities for most people. Why? Because personality sells books.

If your book is nonfiction—a how-to, self-help, informational, reference book, you should be able to come up with dozens of speech topics. Presumably, each chapter represents a subject you could talk about and maybe even each heading within each chapter. Additionally, you can consider new information on the topic of your book, angles and perspectives that occur to you or that are presented by others, new experiences within the realm of this subject and so forth. You can also glean presentation ideas from the articles you write on the topic and your blog posts.

For example, you know I write books, articles and this blog on writing, publishing and book promotion. Here are some of my speech titles:

• The Psychology of the Book Proposal
• Book Marketing for the Reluctant Fiction Author
• How to Be CEO of Your Book
• How to Prepare for the Business of Authorship
• How to Sell More Books at Your Next Book Event
• Is Your Book Really a Good Idea?
• 10 Book Promotion Activities You Must Pursue and Why
• 25 Reasons Why You Should Write That Book
• A Dozen Surprising Ways to Successfully Promote Your Ebook
• Platform-Building Tips and Techniques for the Author

For fiction, you may want to tell part of the story in your book, talk about what led up to writing the book, some of your experiences while conducting research for your book, some of your characters and how you developed them, how the characters in your historical novel might react to technology or language or communication in today’s world. You might present some trivia related to the theme of your novel, have audience members participate in acting out part of your story or discuss an aspect of one of your nonfiction hooks.

What is a nonfiction hook? This is an aspect of your book that you can use to promote it, such as the fact that one character is autistic, the period or region where the story is set, the industry involved, a character’s hobby, etc.

If you want to speak on behalf of your book—and you should—spend some time fleshing out at least three possible programs you could present. Add more as you go along. Not only will this get you invited back to speak to the same group more often, but it will widen the horizons of speaking possibilities for you.

July 11, 2012

Make Promoting Your Book a Habit

Filed under: Book Promotion — Patricia @ 5:43 am

How do you approach the task of book promotion? Do you have a method? A plan? Do you spend every day promoting or do you promote in between other duties? Perhaps you just promote when you feel like it—“I have a few minutes today, I’ll stop in at a local bookstore and see if they’ll carry my book,” or “I’ll look around for a speaking opportunity,” or “I’ll send a press release, post to my blog, etc.”

How’s that working for you?

I’d like to suggest that you take book promotion more seriously and participate more fully on a more regular basis. The following suggestions are NOT embraced by the 76 percent of authors who fail. If you don’t want to be among this statistic, pay attention:

1: Make a plan. List the book promotion activities you definitely can do and want to do. Below that, list those that you should be doing, could be doing, don’t particularly want to do. And then list those things you probably won’t ever get around to doing. But don’t label them as such. You may not want to do any public speaking. Write it down, anyway. You may get used to the idea and eventually give it a try. I highly recommend that you do, by the way. Remember, personality sells books.

2: Give these activities legs. In other words, prepare a loose schedule—promise to spend Monday mornings seeking out bookselling opportunities, take a few hours each week to research book reviewers, blog daily with regard to the topic or genre of your book, contact ten individuals or company/organization leaders every week with a soft pitch for your book, keep your finger on the pulse of your community—be open to the opportunities, for example.

3: Change something about your website every few weeks—offer something related to your book for free, create a challenge for web visitors, post a book trailer, etc.

4: Start some new method of communicating with your audience—through webinars or podcasts, a newsletter, an interactive blog, face-to-face workshops, and so forth.

5: Carry your book with you wherever you go and hand out promotional material.

6: Create spin-offs. That is, booklets, ebooklets, games or an item related to your book.

7: Devise a contest to bring attention to your book.

8: Seek out conferences in your topic of genre where you can give workshops.

9: Sign up for book festivals where you can promote your book.

10: Post comments at other blog sites, ask to be a guest blogger, launch a virtual blog tour.

Are you doing these things? When is the last time you did anything toward promoting your book? If you want to sell more copies this summer and fall, take a close look at these ten suggestions. Pick a few or several of them to pursue. Add to this list—there’s so much more you can be doing. Study books like mine: Promote Your Book, Over 250 Proven, Low-Cost Tips and Techniques for the Enterprising Author, and you will sell more books.

This book is available at Amazon.com and most other online and downtown bookstores. You can also purchase it at http://www.matilijapress.com

July 10, 2012

More Resources for Ebook Authors

Filed under: E-Books — Patricia @ 5:15 am

Dozens of people have downloaded my freebie, 50 Ways to Promote Your Ebook from http://www.patriciafry.com

Obviously, there is an interest in promoting ebooks. So I thought you might like some of these resources. Here’s a site that lists several free sites where you can promote your ebook.
http://www.mediabistro.com/galleycat/free-ebook-promotion_b52130

It includes Indie Books List, Flurries of Words, Free Booksey, Addicted to Ebooks, Author Marketing Club, eReading Today, Author Marketing Club and others.

Here’s another site promising help for promoting your ebook—it appears that this one provides mostly online ideas: http://www.ebooksubmit.com

One thing all busy authors of e-or print books have trouble with is finding time to promote our books and making good use of our time. Tomorrow, I will address this through a blog on how to make book promotion a habit.

In the meantime, order your copy of my books, Publish Your Book and Promote Your Book. Amazon is bundling them—quite a savings for you. These are books that will enlighten, inform and educate you when you read them from cover to cover and continue to serve you when you use them as references throughout the writing, publishing and book promotion stages of your book project.

July 9, 2012

50 Ways to Promote Your Ebook

Filed under: Book Promotion,E-Books — Patricia @ 4:16 am

Have you downloaded your FREE copy of 50 Ways to Promote Your Ebook, yet? You’ll find it at http://www.patriciafry.com

You may be surprised at some of the promotional activities I’ve included in this ebooklet. I notice that authors of ebooks are either at a loss as to how to promote them, don’t believe they need to promote them or have adopted a couple of promotional activities designed strictly for the ebook. How’s that working for you?

Most ebook authors are stunned to think that there are as many as 50 ways one could promote their ebooks. If they’re enterprising, they might be using a couple of ideas. But it is an ebook, after all, how could there be more than a handful of ways to market it? It’s not like you can carry it around with you to show people you meet or go out and speak publicly about it.

I beg to differ. Why can’t you carry a print prototype of your ebook? Why can’t you speak to groups on behalf of your ebook? Is there any reason why you can’t get your ebook reviewed many times over, promote it at your website, find an array of distributors for it and so forth?

If you are stuck for ideas to promote your fiction or nonfiction ebook, download your FREE copy of 50 Ways to Promote Your Ebook today.
http://www.patriciafry.com

If you are working on an ebook or print book and you are to the point where you need to have it edited, contact me at PLFry620@yahoo.com. I’ll give you a free sample of my editing style and an estimate. If you have not considered hiring an editor, please reconsider. Learn more about me and my editorial work here: http://www.patriciafry.com

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