Jennifer Mattern Before the launch of her e-book, The Publishing Primer: A Blueprint for an Author’s Success, Dee Power sent me a review copy, and I featured the e-book on the All Freelance Writing blog. I wanted to share this resource with my readers here as well, so you can find my original review below: The following is a brief review of a new e-book, The Publishing
The new year is approaching faster than I’d like to think, so this week’s writing challenge is about getting your affairs in order to more effectively grow your business next year. It’s time to evaluate your progress and rethink your freelance writing rates. Has your freelance writing career been growing satisfactorily, or are you still not earning as much as you’d like? Are you working
In a forum discussion today, the issue of a freelance writers’ rate per hour came up. To summarize, the potential buyer’s thought was this: They earn $20 per hour in their position (where they wear multiple hats, including the current writing), so in their mind a freelance writer charging more than that is “excessive.” I have a few thoughts on that (not meaning any disrespect
Time really is money when it comes to choosing the best time to publish your book or e-book. If you time your book’s release well, you can get more publicity and build more sales. Here are some of the reasons why the timing of your book or e-book’s release can be important in your book marketing efforts: You can take advantage of industry issues in
Kristen Fischer, self-published author of Creatively Self-Employed, is one of the more effective authors that I’ve come across when it comes to using blogs as a marketing and PR tool to promote a book. Find out how she embraces the DIY style of book marketing with CSE and her upcoming book through Super College LLC. What can you tell us about Creatively Self-Employed to give
Dee Power is the co-author of several projects from traditionally-published books to self-published books to e-books. I’ve interviewed Dee during a live interview on my old BlogTalkRadio show on the subject of writing and marketing e-books, but in this interview I had a chance to pick her brain about marketing all three of these types of publications. Find out how she does it and what
I had the opportunity to talk to Hannah Stone, the self-published author of two books on pregnancy loss, Forever Our Angels and Remembering Our Angels, about marketing her books. Hannah’s insights give you a look not only into promoting self-published books, but also how to market to a narrower niche audience and how to build interest and confidence in your work before your book is
If you’re an author, you really can’t afford to be absent from the blogosphere. Writing and managing a blog isn’t always easy (especially if you’re determined to do it well), but the benefits of blogging for authors make it well worth it. 10 Reasons to Launch an Author Blog Here are ten reasons you should consider launching an author blog if you haven’t already. Blogs
I’ve been itching to respond to Jennifer’s post at CatalystBlogger: Five Reasons to Embrace the Humble Keyword Article Gig for a few days now, after seeing it mentioned at Anne Wayman’s blog. So here are some of my reasons as to why most freelance writers should reject these keyword article gigs (and for the record, my comments aren’t meant to be an attack on Jennifer
When should you send a press release about your book to the media? When (and why) will they care? In this Digital Age, it’s relatively easy for anyone to write up a basic press release and publish it online inexpensively. However, that doesn’t mean that you should just because you can. One of my biggest pet peeves as a PR professional is the way the
Working in PR, I’m constantly exposed to the misconception of a lot of people that marketing and PR are essentially the same thing. Others will mistakenly tell you that PR is a component of marketing, which is also wrong. While marketing and PR often work towards similar goals, and sometimes make use of similar tools, they’re actually two entirely different disciplines. Book publicity would be
Article marketing is a pretty popular form of Internet marketing, including with authors. Yet most authors marketing their books through article marketing aren’t doing it as effectively as they could. To understand why, we need to take a look at traditional article marketing. What is Traditional Article Marketing? An author will write one or more articles in their niche. They’ll include a short paragraph or
For our first book marketing author interview, I talked with author / blogger / jewelry guru Tammy Powley about her now somewhat unusual experience with book marketing: publishers who do the bulk of the work. While publishers increasingly expect authors to be more hands-on with their book publicity and marketing efforts, they do still play an important role with many authors (even if just trying
As an independent professional, do you respond to everyone who contacts you? I don’t. I had a comment left publicly for me on a forum today because I didn’t respond to someone’s contact through the forum’s private message system. While a part of me understands their frustration (I struggle to reach colleagues that I know personally half of the time because of their busy schedules),
Today I’m going to tackle one of my own areas of expertise: press release writing (not sure why it took me so long). If you’re interested in PR writing (public relations writing), knowing how to write a press release is essential. Use these press release resources to help you learn how to write effective press releases for your clients (or yourself!) – please note, most
I was tagged by Misti Sandefur of Life of a Writer to offer seven little pearls of blogging wisdom on what not to do as a blogger if you want to keep your readers, subscribers, and fellow bloggers in your network happy. So here you go… seven reasons I won’t read your blog: 1. Your font choice makes my eyes bleed. I’m still a sweet
It’s easy to get stuck in a certain way of working. Sometimes our methods can become stale and negatively affect our productivity as writers. So this week’s challenge is about scheduling, and how mixing it up once in a while can keep your work fresh. If you think you’re already working as productively as you possibly can, there’s no need to take part in this
This week’s reader question comes from Mariella on the writing forums, regarding a request she recently received for copywriting services through a forum private message system: “I’m guessing someone referred him to me, I just can’t get it out of him because he barely speaks English. If I’d ever ask a question for your blog Jenn, it would be how to deal with such clients.”
While a marketing calendar can be an important tool in book marketing, it can also help writers of all kinds promote their work more efficiently. What is a Marketing Calendar? A marketing calendar is a calendar (you can choose whether to make it monthly, weekly, or daily), where you lay out your planned marketing activities based on events throughout the year. How to Create Your
This week’s writing challenge is for fiction writers, and aimed to help you create more authentic settings for your stories, using a free and easily-accessible tool. My “guy” and I have been thinking about buying a house this coming Spring. Because of that, we’ve been keeping our eye on the market pretty closely. We’re also both interested in older houses with character as opposed to
Press releases can be an important component of a book publicity campaign. Here is a free sample press release template which you can use to announce the launch of a new book. Each section of the book launch press release template offers an explanation of the type of content or information you should include. Enjoy! FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Your Press Release Heading / Title Here
Advertising your writing services on writing forums may seem like a natural marketing activity to bring in freelance writing clients, but it probably won’t be the most effective way to harness forum postings to bring in gigs. Here’s why: A forum for writers to network won’t necessarily be overflowing with clients looking to hire within your niche. A writing forum is going to very likely
It can be a common misconception that being a freelance writer is an “anyone can do it” kind of career. I’d imagine most of you reading this blog know that’s simply not true. A successful career as a writer means that you have to do a lot more than just dream about being a famous novelist or enjoying a “cushy” career in your pajamas writing
If you’re a writer of any kind, it’s likely that you’re familiar with article marketing. But are you using it effectively? Here’s what article marketing can do for you if you go about it the right way: It can help you sell your book. It can bring in clients for custom work. It can attract readers to your blog or website where you then promote
Writing a letter to the editor of a publication (newspaper, magazine, or even online publication) can have several benefits: Direct exposure / publicity Helps build your reputation as an authority source or expert on a subject Provides a networking opportunity between you and editors This week’s writing challenge is to start using this often-neglected publicity tool by submitting at least one letter to the editor
Latoya had a third great question for this week’s reader question set: Question “Anytime I’ve worked with clients for more than a few months, I noticed the relationship gets kind of stale. It becomes a very robotic process of receiving assignments, returning the work, and then receiving payment. So, do you have any advice for relationship building when you work with someone strictly via email?”
Here’s another question from Latoya of Writers Brew: Question What tips do you have for creating a referral system using existing clients? Answer I can’t say that I’ve ever set up a referral “system” with my existing clients. I’m a big believer in natural referrals whenever possible… they just carry more weight. My clients are happy with my work, and they refer me to their
This question comes from Latoya of Writers Brew: Question What’s the most professional way to deal with bossy clients? Those who like to dictate every aspect of your work as if they were your employer. Answer I’m sure plenty of writers are going to disagree with me on this one, and perhaps my mindset on this issue stems from my primary role as a consultant
White papers can be a very lucrative field for freelance business writers. If it’s something you’re interested in pursuing, the following resources may help you learn a thing or two about writing white papers: Articles on Writing White Papers: How to Write a White Paper (my article on a client’s blog) Getting Off the Starting Block: Practical Tips to Starting a White Paper How to
I see a question asked repeatedly by writers and webmasters… “How can I market my e-book?” Well for starters, that’s something you should have thought about before writing it, now isn’t it? But OK… you’ll see the same responses surface each time: Launch an affiliate program. Write a long sales letter. Get testimonials. Submit to article directories. Start a newsletter. Use pay-per-click ads or other