MONDAY MADNESS

The Business of Writing

We’ve talked about marketing so much that I hate to bore you again, but it is important. Marketing is how you get people to recognize you and buy your books. There are many things you can do, so I’ll only mention a few.

Blogs and building your blog network is important. It has been proven that more people will read an email (a blog) than they will a Facebook or Twitter. The most important thing is to build your fan base. Ask people to sign up for your blog and give them a link where they can. Post daily on Facebook. Don’t talk about your book all the time, but maybe put snippets of your book in a Facebook post occasionally. I try to ask some kind of a question each day. Sometimes I get busy and don’t, but most of the time I do. Believe it or not, but since I started doing that, I’ve gained book sales. Since I write under a pen name it’s hard sometimes for people to find my books. This will change with my next book. I’ll probably use the pen name for the historical books I write, but I’m using my own name for my contemporary books.

The best thing in marketing is to get out where people can find you. It takes time, but to be successful, you need to take that time. There are other posts about marketing in the archives. Please take advantage of them.

What software do authors use? Most authors use Microsoft Word. In fact this is the best to send to a publisher. Set up your word program to the specifics in our Submissions page. Indent .5 inches, don’t tab over or space over. Set it up on the computer to automatically indent that amount each time you start a paragraph. Don’t enter at the end of each line. The computer does that, so keep on typing until you end a paragraph, then hit enter.

Scrivener was invented for writers. When it first came out it was for Mac’s. Now you can get it for a PC. It is different from Word, and you have a learning curve. I’m still learning. I do like it better than I thought I would. It has a place for everything you want. Take your time to learn to use it.

We’ll talk about conferences next time.