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Are You a Rehabber?
Here's a test to see if you've got what it takes to be a rehabber. Just be honest and rest assured nobody's going to rap you over the knuckles for your answers!
- Are you a problem solver?
- Do you relish a project...I mean one that can occupy...
Discover what good writing is all about
Writing is a form of preserved talk, talk that has been pinned
down on paper so the words can be heard again. The basic
principles of good writing, apart, from grammatical correctness,
might be presented as follows:
1) written sentences...
HOW TO GIVE YOUR BUSINESS WRITING A TWIST OF THE NOSE
What happens when you twist someone's nose? To begin with, you get their full attention. No distractions. No mind wandering. That's why it's important to put a nose-twist into your own 'important' business communications. HERE'S HOW...
Journaling Experiences and Events
How did you spend your day yesterday? When was the last time you went to see a movie? Can you remember the plot line? What did you do on your last vacation? Did you enjoy a particular meal, or visit a special tourist site that meant something...
Promote your work: Get your book reviewed
So you've written your first novel, short story, comic book or other work and it's good. You have now also got a publisher interested or you are going down one of the many self-publishing roots (such as ebooks/e-books or we-publish.com as examples)....
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Offline Promotion And Persistence Pay Off Big For Self-Published Authors
Face it, writing and printing your self-published book are relatively easy tasks, compared with all the other requirements for marketing it successfully. The selling process can be so daunting, you need to be sure first whether you are even cut out to be a self-publisher.
So most importantly, ask yourself: honestly, what is your real reason for publishing a book? Is it to make a lot of money, or for public recognition, ego gratification, a need to communicate an important message?
Identifying your motivation up front can either dissuade you from taking the plunge or help you enormously to succeed. The emotional and creative satisfaction of producing your own book can be uniquely satisfying, so long as one realizes in advance what the process entails.
Expect it to involve five serious factors:
1. commitment
2. time
3. money
4. selling
5. persistence
Any self-publisher who simply goes to a neighborhood printer with a manuscript in hand to get a book produced is in for a long and arduous experience. That way, the hapless author must be prepared to do virtually everything for him or her self; all the design, editing, and proof-reading before, as well as the sales promotion afterwards.
A slightly easier route is via the better known print-on-demand service companies like Xlibris and FirstBooks, or the 100s of other POD publishing service firms on line. Even they are still technically not publishers; being actually just printers, producers, and distributors of writers' works. It is their author-customers themselves who must still perform every one of the necessary steps that a conventional publishing house provides for its authors.
The marketing of a self-published book is such a drawn out and complicated process, it can virtually take over an author's entire everyday life for a while, so it demands a very strong commitment. You alone will be responsible for every step -- print quality control, buying copies, inventory, storage, publicity, selling, processing orders, accounting, packing, shipping, mailing, handling returns, invoicing, and bill collecting. Whew! Small wonder that many author-publishers commonly put in 80-hour work weeks.
As for hopes of making pots of money, the brutal fact is very few, if any, first time author-publishers even break even. And all the hyped dreams of easily tapping the Internet for huge book sales on-line with minimum effort are just that - dreams - and seldom materialize without the author getting out there to personally SELL.
Unless you are a "name" author, significant royalty profits from printed books are no more likely to occur on Web sites than in bricks and mortar stores. For instance, even a major POD player like Xlibris is reported
to have never exceeded sales of 2000 copies for any individual title.
So, as all sales depend on you, modestly scuffing your toe in the dust has no place in a self-publisher's style. Unabashed publicity and aggressive promotion are vital to your book's success. By necessity, you'll soon learn how to blow your own horn, mainly because nobody else will do it for you. Study the sort of people who are your most likely prospective readers, and devise publicity that will appeal to them.
Pave your way by writing brief half-page news releases about your masterpiece and distribute them to appropriate media. Offer to speak on radio call-in shows, and try to arrange readings at local bookstores and libraries. You'll likely be pleasantly surprised at your own ingenuity and the receptiveness of people you approach for free publicity.
For some other useful hints about low-cost promotion, read John Kremer's excellent "1001 Ways To Market Your Books," or Jay Conrad Levinson's "Guerilla Marketing" series.
Nevertheless, in-person direct selling is about the only reliable method you have to get your books onto store shelves. Which means making personal sales-calls on bookstores. And be aware in advance that many bookstores have an inherent reluctance to accept self-published titles -- sight-unseen.
But encourage yourself by remembering that long before anybody ever heard of him, mega-bestselling author John Grisham started out selling copies of his self-published first novel from the trunk of his car. Be equally determined and imaginative. Always offer to leave batches of books on consignment, to be paid for after discerning customers buy them.
Keep up your personal selling efforts, come what may. Persistence is the one quality that every author needs more than anything else. It's what gets the manuscript completed in the first place, and stick-to-it-iveness continues to be the only thing that builds your self-published book's final success.
-- Sidney Allinson.
About the Author: Sidney Allinson is a professional author, with over 30 years' experience as an ad copywriter, and was creative director at Ogilvy & Mather Advertising. He is author of six published books, countless advertisements and direct mail campaigns. Now, Sidney operates several Web sites, including: http://www.info-merchant.com
and may be contacted direct at: sidneya@shaw.ca This copyrighted article may be freely distributed, providing it is reproduced with full attribution, including author's contact details.
Source: www.isnare.com
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