1. RESOURCES FOR AUTHORS: POD AND SELF-PUBLISHING Have a Plan Have Patience Be Persistent

2. TAG, YOU’RE … WHAT? Self-Published eBooks: a viable entre into the world of publishing Ownership of the process from A(uthor) to B(estseller) Ownership=responsibility for the entire process POD-print on demand Bottom-line: writing the book was the easy part Vanity Presses Service providers for publishing your work Complete/partial packages: editing, formatting, submission to eBook publishers, marketing, distribution, printing, etc Expensive – in the 3 to 5 figure category Lots of room for fraud

3. You Have a Manuscript: What Now? Edit, Edit, Edit And not by ToH, Auntie Mae (that’s nice, dear), or friends You need, you deserve, a real editor who will examine your work critically, not just for typos, or the occasional lax bit of continuity Find a Critique group, make a new BFF or three Budget for a professional to look at the MS, the blurb, the synopsis, and the (gasp) Query Letter

4. REJECTION …is not a dirty word. …is a learning tool. …is a way to hone your skills. …is a good way to fine tune your market(s) …is the catalyst for the decision to dive into those shark-infested waters

5. I’m An eBook Author Now! Smashwords Pay close attention to formatting rules Make sure you get Premium status Distribution channels- more variation than with Kindle Lots of looky-loos to site, sales spotty Amazon Kindle Industry standard Reasonably user-friendly Use HTML/ePub format when submitting MS Have a killer book cover and abide by formatting rules Optional $39 distribution add-on + royalty booster

6. eBook or POD: Getting Noticed Book Cover: if you are expert at PhotoShop, great. If not hie to your local high school or college and find a graphics designer – this is the first thing a reader sees – make it count Back cover blurb: nothing says ‘read me’ like 2-3 lines of ‘can’t put this one back on the shelf’ First two paragraphs: hook the reader, hook them fast, hook them hard

7. Getting the Word Out Face Book: yours, friends’, a dedicated ‘Like’ page Twitter: personal, dedicated-to-book MySpace: a lot of kids still use this so if you write YA it is useful LinkedIn – set up contacts with industry professionals Local Book Clubs, Writers Groups, Newspapers

8. Must-Have Tools Website: personal Blog Marketing Plan: target your market and pursue aggressively Networking Right mindset: no false modesty, persistence, reciprocity and good manners (‘thank you’ goes a long way in customer relations)

9. The Website(s) What you see when it opens (without scrolling up or down) is the critical area – make it count Pictures: readers love visuals Keep it short, keep it pertinent Share, don’t sell Be generous Be positive, upbeat

10. Blogging: Pros Can be integrated with the personal site or separate Site should be active with new material offered several times a week Educate, illuminate, ruminate, cogitate – invite comments & interaction, have a dialog with the reader to build a fan base Offer glimpses of your work

11. Blogging: Cons Time intensive Requires attention to ‘political correctness’ – you don’t want to offend & drive off your customer base Tend to attract a small following that can devolve into a clique – this puts new people off and sends them seeking friendlier waters Requires sophisticated tools to determine impact

12. Blogging Templates WORDPRESS Elegant, tons of options Relatively easy to use Text management a challenge Superior SEO tools for site evaluation Stable site Free WEEBLY Not so elegant but enough options to play with Very easy to use Text management … sighs Minimal SEO tools Offers optional upgrade – little bang for the buck Site can be squirrelly Free

13. Sites to Help you Publicize PolkaDotBanner: run by Saloff Enterprises Authors on Show The Indie Spotlight Book Blogs Novel Help Kindle Author Kindle Boards fReado/BookBuzzr

14. Give Them a Taste They’ll Come Back for More? SlushPileReader: independent, vote-to-publish Authonomy: HC-sponsored site Smashwords Amazon Kindle and Amazon books Scribd: full or partial MS Blogs: yours, theirs Face Book: notes, discussion Kindle Nation Bookmato: sell WiP as a serial

15. Professional Help is Available Saloff Enterprises: editing, MS prep, formatting, marketing Jenkins Group: full service from editing to marketing International Titles: marketing to international vendors Write2market Electric Publisher: apps for iPad & iPhone Hudson Group

16. Marketing Options with a Professional Book Fairs: NYC, Library Assoc., London, Dubai, China, Frankfurt, Bologna Press Releases to targeted audiences Newsletters to critics, bloggers, book reviewers Newsletters to Library Associations Newsletters to Independent Booksellers Book Award programs: IPPY, Axiom, Moonbeam

17. Reviews: How to Get Them Strong arm anyone you know who has read your novel to do a review on Amazon, the more, the better Canvas FB pals to read and comment Offer free download to anyone willing to do a review – via blog site, website, etc Canvass the review sites (1000’s out there), read a few and see what the reviewer likes, then submit a proposal (another Q-letter)

18. Interviews FaceBook friends all have blog & websites, all are desperate for content Start the ball rolling: work up a list of generic questions, add something pertaining to their book/interests, i.e. personalize, then ask a few folks if they’d be interested (I haven’t been turned down yet), time it to coincide with their pub-date … smiles all around Make sure to include a book cover image, author image, links to everything, excerpt - gussy it up because ultimately it will reflect on your image as a professional

19. Google Is Your Friend Independent Booksellers: they are out there, find them, pitch them Like-minded bloggers: sign up, sign on, participate in forums Attach yourself to Network Bloggers via FB Twitter: there’s a huge number of indies tweeting away, friend them, start a dialog Use non-traditional venues: CafeMom has a book club!

20. Distribution: the Gorilla in the Room Amazon: Golden but not universal, UK site not up to spec yet, shipping costs can be obscene eBooks: gotta love’em, cheap, easy to disseminate, easy to pirate LSI & the Ingram Content Group: world-wide channels Bookmarket.com lists top indie distributors Baker & Taylor: qualification tough for an indie

21. Are We There Yet? Metrics is the name of the game When I figure it out, I’ll be happy to share Metrics: yes, it is truly higher math, the kind that does not end up in your wallet Metrics: make sure your professionals give you a way to determine whether or not a particular strategy works and/or has legs

22. What Else Can I Do? Organize: learn to use Excel, record everything Got a review? Tag the site, copy the review, the URL, and save in a folder Sent out requests for this ‘n that? Tag, copy, save Make up a calendar: target something for every day if possible, every week for sure, every month Bottom line – no targets, no sales

23. Diane’s Excel Sheet Title ISBN Publication date eBook distribution sites Print book distribution sites Reviews requested, dates, URL of reviewer site Reviews received: URL, copy to doc with running tally, extract pithy snippets for later use List of Promo links Blog mentions: URL, date Book trailer link Interviews: ditto

24. Diane’s Other Docs Book blurb in parts: full synopsis, 3-paragraph, 1- paragraph, 2-3 sentence, single sentence descriptions [trust me, the more you do this, the easier it gets] Reviews: where, when, text, all documentation for citing later Where books are sold by eBook & print: links, discounts currently in use Google yourself and your book title regularly to find where you are in cyberspace, ditto your blog and website titles

25. What About Contests, Giveaways? Dunno, haven’t run any yet There are so many writing ‘contests’ out there that it is overwhelming – I have 3 favorites I like and contribute to on a regular basis (one is a WebZine) WordPress is the better format for running these things although Blogger seems like a reasonable alternative. Weebly doesn’t have sufficient interactivity to make it work without … a LOT of work.

26. Bottom Line Writing the book? Pfft. Piece of cake. It’s a journey. Persist. Keep the faith. Believe in yourself. Don’t ‘sell’. Engage in a dialog with your readers, ‘friend them’. And remember, it’s about 90% luck at the end of the day. Just make sure that when the 10% rolls around, it rolls with you attached.

27. Good afternoon … and Good Luck I will put together links which I will post on my two websites: www.idancewithwords.com www.romancingwords.com

28. And a Call for Submissions Do you like to write erotic romance & erotica? Have you ever tried flash fiction? Do you have a short story in that genre that could be serialized? Submit your work to www.HotFlashes.weebly.com

29. Pfoxmoor Publishing Does YA And we are interested in your action- adventure, romance, coming-of-age, SF, paranormal, urban fantasy YA PfoxPub has Lily, Dragon Academy and Wizards, with more exciting titles due out this spring Submissions currently being accepted, YA only www.pfoxmoorpublishing.com