Bring Your Knowledge to the Classroom Virtually with Nepris

Happy Thursday, everyone! Today, I'm talking about a way you can interact with students via a platform that lets you do it all from the comfort of your office. That's right, you can go to classrooms virtually and share all the amazing knowledge you have stuffed in your head. I'm gonna start off by talking about my experience, why I think Nepris is so awesome, and how it works before we jump into links. Ready? Get those clicking fingers ready and let's get going!

***DISCLAIMER: No, I don't make money for referring you, that isn't how my blog works. I recommend things based on my own experience and appreciation. I only talk about things I've tried, good or bad.***

My first experience with Nepris was last school year (November, 2014), and I spoke to a classroom full of third and fourth grade readers. Our objective was to get the children excited about their upcoming project: creating a book of their very own!

I was nervous, of course, but the kids were so enthusiastic and wonderful. They weren't afraid to ask questions or jump in and talk about books and writing. It was something I'll never forget, and I sent them each a copy of book one of The Abigale Chronicles (my middle grade series). Not being a huge class, it wasn't a stretch to send them a keepsake to remember the session. It only took about an hour from beginning to end, and I felt like they learned a lot about the publishing and creation process.

It's awesome because these kids get to meet real-world people who are in the industry they're interested in. They find out, first hand, how things work and learn stuff they couldn't otherwise. Plus, they get to say they met someone in the industry and know that's the avenue of study they want to pursue. Pretty cool, huh?

No, you don't get paid for your appearance/talk, but you're doing something that's bigger than that. These kids are the next generation of adults, and this is just one more way you can pay it forward. Your compensation? Knowing you made a difference and helped educate the youth of today, to make more knowledgeable adults tomorrow.

It's not just for authors! It's for anyone with knowledge of a topic.

How it works:
You use your computer's built-in camera and mic, and you sit down and talk. If you've ever had a Skype session with anyone, you'll understand the process. Log in to Nepris on the day of your session and get to talking. The teacher who sets up the meeting will have the ability to communicate with you on the Nepris platform prior, so he or she can ask any questions and help you prepare. Easy peasy!

What you can do to get involved:
Go to the Nepris homepage here and sign up (it's FREE).
Create a profile, add your expertise, and search for a requested session (there are a TON).
Like the Nepris Facebook page here.
Follow Nepris on Twitter here.

I do hope you'll all take part in this amazing venture.

Did you know about this website? Did you join?

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

Creating Your Own Blog Tour - Step Two - Creating Promotional Materials and HTML

Happy Thursday, good people of the blogosphere! Woohoo! Tomorrow is Friday! My excitement cannot be contained. If you were with me on Tuesday, you got the first taste of this little series on blog tours. Today is all about the graphics and the HTML, baby! I'll give you a list of posts with links, and we'll move on to the awesome stuff. Grab those pens and notebooks and let's get going!

In this series:
How to Sign up Bloggers
Creating Promotional Materials and HTML
Finding Reviewers
Creating a Thunderclap Campaign
Throwing a Facebook Launch Party

I'll update the links on all the posts each day so you can find your way around. Time for the gravy!

First of all, if you don't have a way to create teaser images, you'll need to get one. Many, many people just use a book cover, and that's fine and dandy. But, if you want to look a little snazzier, here are a couple of tools you can use:

FREE
Gimp (there's a learning curve. Tutorials can be found here -- I also suggest downloading directly)
PicMonkey (the ever awesome Sarra Cannon has a tutorial on how to use it here)
Tagxedo - Word Cloud Maker
Canva

PAID
Adobe Photoshop (there's a learning curve here, too)

Gimp is close a close sister to Photoshop, so I'll give you a little walkthrough here in a minute. Right now, you need to go grab a photo to use. Please don't use photographs illegally! There are a couple of great sites with FREE public use images, and a couple that aren't too expensive to purchase digital rights to. Please, don't get you or your bloggers sued. Here's a list:

FREE
Free Use Photos on Flickr
Morguefile
Free for Commercial Use

PAID
Dreamstime
123rf
RedBubble
Bigstock
Dollar Photo Club

Remember, when buying or downloading an image for a teaser, you usually want the smaller version so it's not a webspace/loadtime hog.

Now you may want to get a new font that fits the look and feel of your book, yeah? Here are some free font sites (please look at the licensing on EACH font you plan to use):

Dafont
Fontsquirrel (these are 100% free for commercial use)

Of course, free fonts come with their own issues (like not being very clean), but I'm trying to do this on a budget here. If you think you may want to purchase a font, do a search for buy fonts. You'll be overwhelmed quickly.

Now, let's get into creation! I'm gonna use a teaser I already created, but my screen will look a little different because I'm in Photoshop.

Be sure you've installed any fonts you downloaded before you begin, and your images are somewhere you can locate them quickly.

Open Gimp and choose file--open.

Find your image and open it.

Look for a good place to put the text. I darkened the bottom a little with the burn tool.

Select the type tool and choose your font, then set the color.

Click anywhere on the image (you can drag the type once you add it), and type in your text.

Position the text and add some little colored bits to make some of the words stand out (play with it--don't be skeered)!

Add the book title somewhere!

Save that puppy in a folder titled "blogtour_titleofbook_documents" and name it "titleofbook_tourpackage_teaserimage"

You're ready to rock and roll!

Now, some people will want plain text while others want HTML. This is easy to do! Follow these steps:

• Type out your entire text in a new blog post (leave out links for now).
• Hit Ctrl+a, then Ctrl+c.
• Open a notepad or Word document.
• Hit Ctrl+v.
• Type in your links where they go.
• Save the text document in your tour folder as "titleofbook_tourpackage_plaintext" and close it.
• Add your images (book cover and teaser you just created) and your hyperlinks to your blog post.
• If you're using Blogger, click the HTML button on the top, left-hand side.
• Hit Ctrl+a, then Ctrl+c.
• Open a NEW Word or notepad document.
• Hit Ctrl+v.
• Save it in your tour folder as "titleofbook_tourpackage_HTML" and close it.

You're all done! Now you can send your package to the bloggers, and they can create magic.

How easy was that?

Don't worry, I know it seems like a lot right now, but soon you'll be an old hand at this. Tomorrow I'll go into how to find reviewers for your book.

Was this helpful? What didn't you already know?

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

Creating Your Own Blog Tour - Step One - Signing up Bloggers

Happy Tuesday, everyone! Today, I'm talking about how to create your own blog tour. This will be a series of posts that will include how to sign up bloggers (today), how to create your promo materials (including HTML posts), how to find reviewers, how to create a Thunderclap campaign, and how to throw a Facebook launch party. If you've ever wanted (or needed) to do some (or all) of the things yourself, strap in, grab a pen and a notebook, and let's get going!

In this series:
How to Sign up Bloggers
Creating Promotional Materials and HTML
Finding Reviewers
Creating a Thunderclap Campaign
Throwing a Facebook Launch Party

If you all remember my post a while back about blog tour companies, you'll know why I'm about to tell you how to set up your own. It takes a lot more work from you to do it yourself, but that doesn't mean it's impossible.

To start off, you need to head over to The Paisley Reader and learn how to set up a Google Form. Yes, it's about pre-orders, but it all works the same way, so it's relevant.

Here's something to think about: What kind of blog tour do you want to do? Options include:

• Cover Reveals
• Book Reviews
• Promo Blast
• Release Day Blast
• Author Interviews
• Meet the Character(s)
• Excerpt Blast
• Combo of Above

There are also things you can offer the blog's followers to increase signups. Maybe you'd like to give away a copy of your book or a gift card (or both). Yes, those things matter on two fronts!

One: You offer something to the bloggers for agreeing to handle your content.
Two: You offer value to the readers of the blog(s) for checking out your stuff.

Remember the rule of a great giveaway: What does everyone need or want?

Go with that and your click rate will increase tenfold.

You need to start this process a good two weeks ahead of time unless you want reviews. If you're doing a review tour, you'll want to start a month out.

So, decide if you want to have an enticement, and go create your form now. Once you're done, come back and we'll go into where to post the signup link.

Questions that should be on your form:

• Name
• Blog or other URL where you plan to share
• E-mail address
• Date you can post/share (you usually have dates in mind, checkboxes matter here).
• PLAIN TEXT OR HTML. We'll get into why this matters in the next post. 

Ready? Let's continue.

Places to ask folks to sign up:

• Street Team - If you have a street team (those folks who tirelessly promote your books everywhere), you'll want to start there. After all, they're already fans of your work and have agreed to share.
• Facebook Author Groups - Chances are, you're a member of an author group where writers of your genre go to collaborate. Many authors have a blog, and many of them will be willing to share your content with a copy/paste option.
• Facebook Reader Groups - Again, chances are, you're a member of a reader group where readers of your genre hang out. With an incentive, they'll likely sign up, too!
• Goodreads Groups - Authors or readers, this is a great place to increase signups!

Good rule of thumb: Don't be annoying! Post once and leave it alone.

Plan to take responses for at least a week (include a weekend). Now, in your Drive, you'll have a "responses" document that'll give you the hot info! If you want, print it out once you're done signing people up and have turned the form off.

You're all set! Hold on to that piece of paper or document in Drive so you can follow along with the rest of the series. This is just the beginning, but once you do it a couple of times, you'll be an old hat.

What do you think? Helpful? Anything not in the lineup that you'd like to see added?

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

Your Books on Amazon Author Central

Happy Tuesday! I can see you made it through Monday, so that's promising. Today, we're going to dive further into Amazon Author Central. I'll give you some neat tips about your book(s) page(s) you may not have known about before, too. If you missed the first two posts on setting up an account and pimping your profile, check those out now. Ready? Grab those pens and notebooks and let's get going!

Go ahead and log into Author Central.

Navigate to the Books tab and click on a title to get to the book's page. You should have something that looks like this:

Yours won't have the green arrows, but I put those there so you know where I'm at on the page. Be sure you're on the Kindle edition of your book (see top, right-hand corner), because we'll get to the paperback here in a few, and I don't want you to be confused.

Let's go over a little bit of what you see at the top before we move on. There on the left, you'll see details about your book. These include the cover, title, ASIN, average review number, and sales rank. There's also a little, clickable link that'll take you to the book's Amazon page.

Right under the book are two tabs:

Be sure you're on Editorial Reviews, please. The other tab is just details. Feel free to click and look, but come right back afterward.

Since I want you to see what I see, scroll down until your page looks like this:

I haven't done anything with this book yet, so I'll be updating stuff as we move along today. Let's start with Editorial Reviews. This is a section for snippets of professional reviews you've gotten. Amazon doesn't allow those reviews to be posted to the book's page, so you have to go in and add them manually. You can also add reviews or pieces of reviews from folks you asked to read the book. M doesn't have any, so I'll be skipping that for now. If you want to add one (or more), click Add and put your info in the popup. Be sure and click preview and save!

Now we'll move on to Product Description. Here's a fun fact: If you update the product description on your Amazon Author page, the one on the book's KDP page becomes obsolete (doesn't show). So, a lot of folks put the description on Author Central, then go back and keyword stuff the description on KDP. I did it with I, Zombie, and I can verify the KDP page has no bearing on the book once the stuff is changed in Author Central. Anyway, fill this part out and save it.

From the Author is all about why you wrote the book or any research you did. It also could be a little personal note for your readers. Anything you want to say about your novel goes here. Be sure and save!

From the Inside Flap is what you'd expect to find on a hardcover. This can be an addition to the blurb, the blurb itself, or something about one of the characters. Your choice! I'm gonna talk about the theme a little bit. Be sure and save!

From the Back Cover is any testimonial you may have from other people, too. You can also put your blurb here if you haven't put it in the Product description above. I did a little expose on my status and put a short list of my available titles. Be sure and save!

About the Author is your bio. Fill it out! Be sure and save!

Now, go to the paperback version and do it all again. You can copy/paste content over if you like.

Here's my completed page:

Remember, anything you do here overrides anything you've done anywhere else. This is the holy grail of editing spots.

So, what do you think? Did you fill it out? What was yours missing?

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

Publishing Your Blog to Kindle

Good morning, and happy Monday, everyone! Yeah, it's the beginning of a whole new week, but that means more opportunities to do all the things writerly. Today, my post is for bloggers. You're gonna find out all kinds of neat stuff about Kindle you may not have known. So grab those pens and notebooks and let's get going!

Welcome to Kindle Publishing for Blogs! Did any of you even know this feature existed? Well, you're about to get a crash course. Screenshots will accompany. If you want to see one live, here's my blog's page on Amazon.

Start by going here to the Kindle Publishing for Blogs homepage. Click on Create a New Account and follow the prompts to do so:

I'm gonna click sign in, and walk you through adding a blog. Click the button:

You'll be on a screen now that looks like this:

We're gonna set up your RSS feed. Go here if you're using Blogger and copy the second string. This one:

Replace the words blogname with your blog's name, and copy it again. Paste it into the form on Kindle Publishing for Blogs here:

Validate, please.

Now, fill out the next four boxes:

You need a screenshot of your blog, and you can get it by using the snipping tool. Be sure it's under 1MB in size (there is no dimension restriction). Save it as a JPEG or GIF. Upload it.

If you don't have your blog's banner, you can use the snipping tool in Windows to capture it, too. Be sure it's only 50px high by 430px wide and no more than 1MB in size. Save it as a JPEG or GIF. Upload it.

Next, enter your blog's web address, select a language, pick the categories you fit into, fill out your keywords, and select your posting frequency:

You're all done and ready to publish your blog to Kindle! Click zee button! You should be live within 48 hours. Be sure and fill out your account information so you can get paid when people subscribe.

Did you know this option was out there? Will you use it?

Come on back tomorrow for more on the Amazon Author Central page and what you can do there.

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

Amazon Author Central and You - Take Two

Happy Fridayyyyy! Wow, it's the weekend, you guys! Two days of no work. Whatever will we do with ourselves? Well, you could spend the time snazzing up your Amazon Author Central page. Yesterday's post was all about how to create an account and add books. Today, we're going into some of the clicky things you can modify. So you can take the info you find here and get to work making everything fabulous. Ready? Grab those pens and notebooks and let's get going!

I'm just gonna jump right in here. Login to Author Central here so you can follow along. Be sure you're on this tab and have your bio all filled out:

After your biography, you need to set your author page URL. As you can see, mine's already done (amazon.com/author/jomichaels). Amazon lets you set this to whatever you choose, but you only get one shot, so choose wisely! It's here:

Next, you'll want to upload a photo of yourself. Click the add photo button here:

Browse through your pictures, choose an image, click the box saying you have permission to use the photo, and click Upload Photo:

You can do this more than one time so you can change your picture up now and then. When you click manage photos, you get a couple of options:

Delete or rearrange at will. First one in the row is your profile picture! The Add Video button works the exact same way as the Add Photo one. NOTE: You must have the video available on your computer to upload. You can't link or add one from YouTube. Twitter add is pretty self explanatory, too, so I won't bog you down with images for all that.

Now, you'll want to add your blog feed. If your blog isn't pushing to a feed, here's how to find it for Blogger, and how to find it for Wordpress. Write it down and keep it handy, you'll need it for Monday's post. *wink* Once you have your feed address, click here:

It'll open a popup where you can type in your feed URL. Do it and click Add.

Let's go add an event, shall we? Click here:

You'll get a popup window like this:

Yeah, that's a lot of information to fill out, but Amazon will do most of it for you. Add a description first, then click on the location and start typing the name of a venue. I've added Utopia Con. If you're going, too, start by typing Millennium Max, then choose the hotel name from the list that populates underneath. Boom! Amazon fills in all the cool details like this:

Then, choose a book (yeah, just one), and a start date and time. I chose the date fans will be allowed into the conference. Click Add. Your profile should look something like this:

You're all done for today. Monday, I'm going to show you something amazing you can do with Amazon if you have a blog. Tuesday, we'll go into the various sections on the book tabs (hopefully, your books will be listed by then if they aren't already).

Did you create one? Leave us a link so we can take a peek!

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

Using Groupon for Book Sales

Happy Wednesday, good people of the blogosphere! Wow, do I have an awesome idea for you all today. Strap yourselves in and grab a cup of coffee, because this is gonna be one wild ride!

As I often do, I was thinking of new and innovative ways to sell/market books. I have a friend named Eva Pohler (find her on Facebook here), and this idea comes from a little snafu she hit a little while back with Barnes & Noble booksellers. No, this doesn't trash B&N (I love that store!); it's just information about what happened with her books. Plus, if you've encountered this particular problem, it might be information about how to unload books.

I'm gonna start with Eva's story, and work my way up from there. Stay with me, folks!

So, Eva wanted to have her book in a brick and mortar store (don't we all?), and she decided that was her goal for 2015. Please understand, when Eva goes after something, she goes after it; nothing gets in her way. Gosh, I admire that. Anywhoooo... So, she speaks with someone from B&N and they tell her, in order to stock her books, those titles need to be returnable.

Quick aside: Books are the only (yes, only) retail merchandise that's returnable for a 100% refund. How crazy is that? Okay, back to the story!

In order to make a self-published book returnable, you must go through a company like Lightning Source. Eva did that, made the book returnable, and B&N ordered a great number of copies of her titles.

Needless to say, she came home one day to find boxes and boxes of her books sitting on her doorstep. This is where my idea begins. I only told you enough about Eva's tale to give you an idea of what we're dealing with: tons of books sitting in your living room that you have no way to sell.

For the rest of Eva's story, check out the interview she did with S. M. Boyce here. It's a long video, but it might save you some money someday, I suggest you check it out.

Moving on!

I started thinking: How the heck is she gonna sell all those books? Marketing is difficult enough without a crapload of inventory sitting in your house. If Amazon can't sell them, how can you?

Enter Groupon. Why this never occurred to me before, I have no idea. But it's been a growing platform for sales for years. If you find yourself in a position like Eva did, why not create a Groupon to help move that stock?

I did a little digging before I started this post, and creating a Groupon is free.

But how the hell does Groupon make money, Jo? I know they charge you something! And how can I guarantee they won't oversell my stuff and me end up scrabbling to get more?

Great questions! I asked them, too. From their site: Groupon charges a marketing fee that's a percentage of the revenue from sales. You can set the number of items available, and they'll only sell that many Groupons. For answers to other questions, check out the FAQ here.

Now, the big question here is (you totally knew I'd look this up, right?): How many people actually buy Groupons? Here's an article from 2011 that gives a pretty good rundown of the numbers then. The projected growth is off the charts (no pun intended). Yes, that's billions with a B.

Can you imagine your book in front of that many people?

It's a huge marketing opportunity, and we Indies have to always be looking for the new idea in marketing. I love my iPhone, and I have Groupon. My husband and I use it often (browsing there created this idea). But I never looked at it as a market for books until now.

*face/palm*

Has my head been up my arse all this time? Or have I just never thought of it because it hasn't been done by anyone else? Either way, it's time to try something new, don't you think?

You may start here. Good luck!

What do you think? Will you try it?

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

YouTube for Bloggers and Authors

Happy Tuesday, good people of the blogosphere! Today, I'm gonna talk a little bit about You Tube and how bloggers and authors can use it to their advantage. Ready? Grab those pens and notebooks and let's get going!

You Tube. I bet most of you have watched a video or two hundreds of videos from this little channel, either via your Facebook feed or by browsing for something you were interested in, right?

Well, I invite you today to expand your horizons and look beyond browsing and watching; let's go into making.

If you've never made a video, you're not alone. There are hundreds of thousands of people just like you in the world who either don't have time or have no idea how to get started. So, first, I'm gonna walk you through a quick lesson on creating and uploading that video, then we'll get to how you can use the platform to your advantage (what you might consider recording to share).

You'll (possibly) need the following equipment:

• Something to record yourself with (this can be an iPhone, iPad, computer camera, or other camera that captures video)
• A video editing tool (on Windows, you have Movie Maker - FREE, and I'm not sure about Mac, but I believe they come with something similar)
• An image editing tool (Paint will do fine)
• A noise cancelling microphone or headset (if you plan to only speak)
• This link for music (if you want to add some beats - these are FREE for YouTube use)

Now that you have those things, we're ready to create an awesome video. Here are the steps:

1. Create a script (this is what you want to say once you're on camera) so you aren't stumbling all over the place
2. Set up your recording device on a stable surface so there isn't a ton of camera shake (if you're only doing audio, this is where you strap on your headset or affix your freestanding mic to something)
3. Get your screen grabs (if you're doing a walk-through to show someone how to do something, you'll want to go step-by-step through the screens - Use Ctrl+PrtScr then open Paint and use Ctrl+V to paste the shot in - be sure to save them with labels like Screenshot1_tutorial1, Screenshot2_tutorial1, etc...) You can skip this step if you plan to record yourself talking.
4. Get to recording. Lay down all audio and video tracks now
5. Open Movie Maker and create an intro section (it's pretty self-explanatory), then drop in the other images you plan to use and set their run times.
6. Add your audio where you want it and tweak the video where necessary. Be sure and save your project often in case of a crash.
7. Render it (again, it kinda walks you through it), and save to your hard drive.
8. Go create a YouTube Channel.
9. Upload your video, add tags, and click publish.

You're done!

I bet you're thinking: That's awesome, Jo, but what the hell do I have to record that people will give two craps about?

Everyone has a skill, and most people know something they can share with or teach others. If all else fails, read a portion of your novel so people can have a taste of it, or do a book review. You can also create a cool book trailer. Once you graduate from Movie Maker, you can get into more technical editors that might cost a little money, but produce studio grade results. But cut your teeth on something easy to use first.

Here are a couple of little videos I did with Movie Maker:




So, you can see the possibilities are there. Crafts, books, technology, marketing, allathat and more!

What are you waiting for? Get going!

Do you have a YouTube channel? Share the link!

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

BookBub and Favorite Authors

Happy Wednesday, good people of the blogosphere! Today, I'm gonna talk about something I got in my e-mail yesterday that might just flip the way BookBub does things on its head. If you're ready, grab those pens and notebooks and let's get going!

Are you a subscriber to BookBub? If not, why is that?

It's been said that one BookBub ad can launch you from zero to hero overnight. But they're picky about the authors/genres that get featured. I know authors who've taken this route, and they say it changed their career.

Now, it seems as though there's yet another way to get "in" if you haven't already.

I'll get to that in a moment; first, I'm gonna tell you what BookBub is if you haven't heard of it.

If you like free and discounted books that have great Amazon reviews and an author with a strong backlist of titles, BookBub delivers that to your inbox once a day.

Readers can find e-books like Prey by Michael Crichton (I've read this and it's an awesome book), for just $0.99 rather than the $9.99 it usually costs, without having to hunt those deals down or make guesses, with a free subscription. This is one of the deals I saw on the site today. You tell BookBub your favorite genres, and they tailor your e-mail to your tastes.

Authors can be included in the daily e-mail for a fee, after they submit the book and get approval by the BookBub team.

Here's the link to sign up as a reader: Join BookBub.

A team of folks at BookBub research every book submitted to see if it'll be an excellent fit for their reader base. If yes, they notify the author and the book is included in the ad. If no, they decline the offer and move to the next title on the list.

But what if an author has a huge fan following on the site? Don't you think that might just influence those folks doing the choosing one way or the other?

Now, you can follow your favorite authors on BookBub. There's a simple search and follow system (I sought out a number of Indies to see if they were on the list, and I found them with relative ease).

You see where I'm going with this, don't you?

If you're considering a BookBub ad, you might want to cinch the deal by having your fans (who are subscribers to the daily list) go add you as a favorite author. Why? Well...

Say I have a novel that's usually $3.99 on Amazon, and I want to discount it to $0.99 for three days. I've published twenty books to date and most have at least ten reviews above three stars. But another author who has the exact same deal and backlist stats also submits a book to be included in the ad.

How do the folks doing the picking make a decision between the two?

If I have two hundred people who've added me to a favorite author list, and the other submitter has only fifty, which author do you think will win that tossup?

Yeah...

So, it may behoove you to ask people to add you to their BookBub favorite authors list. Now. Before the site is flooded by others doing the same.

Here's an easy, step-by-step list to share on your own blog or social media that can help you guide your readers to listing you as a favorite author (feel free to share this snippet, and shoot a link back to this post for your author friends):

• Sign up for BookBub here
• Decide your preferences
• Go here and add your favorite authors
• Click save

Did you add your favorite authors yet?

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

Publishing News Hubs

Happy Tuesday, good people of the blogosphere! I'm stepping outside the box a little today and giving you all some insight to where people go to find their publishing news. Perhaps you'll want to check them out! Grab your pens and notebooks and let's get going!

I got the following numbers by running a little poll on Facebook. Sixteen people answered (myself included), so the data isn't great, but it's something to go on. These results might surprise you.

First and foremost, with a whopping twelve votes:

Now, this isn't limited to the newsfeed, though that was specified by one person. It's author groups, pages, and whatnot that top the list.

Second, we have printed or digital publications such as:

InD'tale Magazine (1)
Publisher's Weekly (2)
USA Today BOOKS section/Thursday edition (1)
Writer's Digest (2)
The Writer magazine (1)
Digital Book World (1)

Amazon Newsletter (1)
Galleycat (1)

Coming in third, there's blog subscriptions.

Five people said they get their publishing news from blogs they found on Google, subscriptions, or the ones on popular sites like Writer's Digest.com.

With two votes each, e-mail and Twitter come in fourth.

Lastly, there were three items with singular votes:

word-of-mouth
forums like Absolutewrite
Createspace's page

So, what does this tell you?

For me, it says I might be marketing wrong. I do plenty on Facebook, but I need to branch out into printed publications.

Where do you get your publishing news? Are these numbers a surprise?

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

Book Backmatter

Happy Tuesday, everyone! Today, I'm gonna talk a little about what you need to do in your book's backmatter. Yeah, that stuff that comes after the novel ends. So, grab your pens and notebooks and let's get going!

Open up that document that contains your book. Pan over until you get to the end. What do you see?

For most authors, you probably see something that looks like this:
About the Author:
K. Littlegross is...

Then maybe social media links.

After that...?

How about we change the way you think about your book's backmatter. Everything that comes after the last page of the story is considered backmatter. If someone just read all the way through your book, chances are they like your writing. If they didn't, they would've quit reading a long time ago (unless they're just one of those people who can't stand not finishing something they started).

Let's use that to your advantage, shall we?

On the FIRST page after your book ends, try adding something like this:

"Thank you for reading my (novel/short story/serial/etc...). I hope you enjoyed it. If you wouldn't mind, would you kindly leave a review? Not only does it help others gauge the book's worth, it also helps me know what I did right and what I might be able to do better. Readers are the reason I write! I love hearing from fans."

Give them a way to subscribe to your newsletter and tell them why they should. Do you do exclusive giveaways in your newsletters? Mention it! Or, ask them to like your amazon author page. Don't forget the LINK!


Now, here are a couple of other things to include before your About the Author page:

• An excerpt from another work of yours (don't forget the sales page link at the end!).
• An excerpt from a fellow author in the same genre (don't forget the sales page link at the end!).
• Acknowledgements (I suggest putting this in the back so it doesn't interfere with the sample percentage).

These are things to include on your About the Author page:

• Your author photo (resize to small [72dpi], please)
• Your bio
• Your bibliography (don't forget to link them to the sales page!)
• Perhaps a review quote or two
• One synopsis from a book in a similar genre you've written
• Awards you've won for writing
• How to find you on social media
• Another request for that review

Why should these things be in this order? Because a reader will get bored wading through author "stuff" unless they've become super fans.

You'd be surprised at how much difference these little things make. Remember to update past books when you publish something new. It isn't difficult, and it'll keep your fans coming back for more.

How many of the above do you implement now? Were you aware of what you could do with the back of your book? Tell me about it!

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

Marketing Plans

Happy Tuesday, everyone! I know you've probably heard the term Marketing Plan a billion times, but do you really know what it means to have one? Do you even know what a marketing plan is? Well, today I'm gonna do my best to lay it all out there. Heck, you might even get a handy checklist by the time it's over. Grab those pens and notebooks and let's get going!

Definition of Marketing Plan (from Wikipedia):
Marketing strategy is the goal of increasing sales and achieving a sustainable competitive advantage. Marketing strategy includes all basic and long-term activities in the field of marketing that deal with the analysis of the strategic initial situation of a company and the formulation, evaluation and selection of market-oriented strategies and therefore contribute to the goals of the company and its marketing objectives.

In author layman's terms: Marketing Plans are goals you set for the launch or publication of a novel, and it includes details on how you'll keep it selling long term.

You need a marketing plan so you don't just throw your book out in the world and hope it hits someone who might enjoy it. Yeah, I've done this. I imagine you have, too.

So, let's go over the things you need to think about when you're halfway through your novel and the things you need to answer once it's off to the editor. You can do these things while you work on your book!

Grab a sheet of paper (if you haven't already) and write down the following questions:

1. What's my book about?
2. What genre is my book?
3. What age is my target audience (Don't write all - be specific)?
4. Will more males or females enjoy my book?
5. What other books will they have read?

Now that we have those questions down, let's go into some channel specific stuff. Next:

1. Where does my target audience hang out?
2. What social media do they use most often?
3. What activities do they enjoy?
4. Who would they most likely get a book recommendation from?

Let's say my book is about a young skater boy trying to escape the oppressive dictatorship his family has endured for hundreds of years. Genre is young adult urban fiction. Target audience are males between the age of thirteen and seventeen who've read Outsiders. They hang out at skate parks, hip coffee shops, and restaurants like McDonald's after school. They'll read books suggested by friends or forced by teachers.

Make a list of things you can do to get your book in front of those readers. Be detailed. Examples:

Advertisement:  I'll put an ad on my car that appeals to skateboarders and go to McDonald's every day for an hour to have a coffee and write for an hour. My car will be parked in the lot in a highly visible area. I'll put free bookmarks at every hip coffee shop within a fifty mile radius of my house and replenish them weekly. I'll put an ad on the local teen radio station with my blurb.

Social Media: I'll post images of skateboarders doing cool tricks with a link to my book and a twenty-five word blurb every week on Instagram. I'll use Twitter to increase hits by having my photos auto-tweet.

And so on. Also, write down what you'll do with folks you know. E-mail list, friends and family, etc...

After you've done all of the above, create your launch plan. Start four to six months out. It should look something like this:

24 Weeks out -

• Schedule author interviews with blogs
• Start posting to social media about what's coming
• Blog about writing the book

16 Weeks out -

• Finalize list of bloggers willing to help (yeah, they schedule way ahead of time)
• Add the book to Goodreads with a release date

8 Weeks out -

• Have cover designed
• Order swag and vehicle imagery
• Contact radio station

6 Weeks out -

• Send book to beta readers
• Ask for ARC reviewers

4 Weeks out -

• Send book to editor
• Schedule Facebook party and collect giveaways

and so on.

As you can see, it's a long and arduous process to properly launch a book.

I found a couple of apps that may help you along the way! They're all about creating a business plan.

Get them here for iPad and Android. They're called: MyBizPlan and MarketMyBiz

How do you plan for a launch? Share!

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

Facebook Pages Gives You Insights to Your Fans

Happy Tuesday, everyone! What I have for you today is gonna make you jump up and down and squeal. While poking around Facebook one day, something interesting caught my eye. You may know how it works, and you may not. I know I'd never even paid attention to it. Well, you can bet I'll be looking a lot more closely now. Grab a cup of coffee and let's delve into this thing called Facebook Page Insights.

You know those e-mails you get each week with your page stats? Yeah, the ones your eyes glaze over when you open and you promptly delete? You're aware it's great information, but who has time to care? Well, those are insight snippets. It's a tiny look into some of the data Facebook is collecting about the folks who interact with your page, and you need to care. But they give you oh so much more if you know where to look.

Open Facebook to your main news feed and look on the right-hand side:

See that thing titled Recent Posts? Look at the bottom. Here:

Click it, click it! You'll get something that looks like this:

Oh, but wait! Our fun is just getting started! Look at the bottom again where it says See All:

Yeah! Now, click that one and be amazed at what you get. Should look something like this:

Holy Information Overload, Batman! Wait! Don't get your knickers in a twist and start crying just yet. I know it's a lot to take in, but let's get to the juicy stuff so your brain doesn't seize up. Scroll down to where your posts are displayed and look at one that's performed well. You can tell by the length of the pinkish bar under the Engagement heading. Mine is a post on Rachael Brownell.

Click the post text, and you'll get this. Yours won't have Rachael's smiling face, but we can't all be cool!:

Look at all the tasty information your brain has to analyze on the right side! As you can see, that post got 12 likes, comments, and shares. It even goes as far as telling you exactly how the post was engaged with. Wow. Let's look at another one where I did a flash giveaway:

As you can see, this post did way better. Most fans will engage if there's something in it for them. I gave away two copies of Fractured Glass. It kinda went bananas. Let's go back to the Rachael post and click Boost Post. Here's where you can use Facebook ads if you see a certain post is doing well and think more people might enjoy it.

But, that's just a quick foray into the world of Facebook Page Insights. Once you close the popup window, take a look at the top of the page and go bananas with your clicking finger. Check out all the tabs!

This lesson only went over the Posts tab. Can you imagine what secrets the others hold?

What are you waiting for? Go find out!

Did you know about this nifty feature? If you did, how do you use it?

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo