Tuesday's Writer's Tip - Promotion - From Idea To Finished Book #MFRWauthor #Books We Love LTD #Promotion

Once you have a contract for your book, even though the book won't be out for months, the time to start promotion is now. There are many ways to do this. Tweet about the book. Share the coming book on Facebook and the other social medias you frequent. Let your friends, neighbors and family know.

Until you have the cover, the only thing you can do is talk about the book any place you can. The cover is sent to you. Have a cover release on the various venues. Find some blogs to visit and talk about your coming book. Plan for a release.

If your publisher puts the book up for pre-order advertise this. People can buy the emectronic version and have it delivered when it's released.

Look at promotional materials that can be used as giveaways. There are hundreds out there. Pens are always good but something unusual that suits your book can always be helpful. Use your imagination. Perhaps make book marks or have parts of your book to use as teasers printed and turned into a booklet.

Don't just sit back and wait for the readers to discover you.

MY PLACES:

 https://www.facebook.com/janet.l.walters.3?v=wall&story_f

bid=113639528680724

 http://bookswelove.net/

 http://wwweclecticwriter.blogspot.com

BUY MARK

http://bookswelove.net/authors/walters-janet-lane-romance-fantasy-suspense-medical/

Tuesday - The Writer's Life - Promotion #MFRWauthor #Promotion

No matter what kind of publisher puts your book before the public, promotion done by you is a must. There are many avenues you can explore. Some are free and some are costly.

There are advertisements in magazines like RT that readers like to browse and see what new books are available. There is often a review of your story to accompany the book.

There are places like BookBub where you can promote a book that generally you have put on sale. This kind of promo can be costly but many people feel the promo bit is well worth the money spent.

There are blog tours, often run by a company who sends you to other blogs where you can promote your book and also garner reviews.

There are reviewers, both pain and unpaid who can help give your book the spotlight for a time.

You can offer a prize, often a gift card or a copy of your book.

You can find people who will give you space on their blog. These are often free.

There are lists to join where you are permitted to talk about your books.

You can create a news letter to spotlight your book.

Sounds like there's a lot to do. That is very true but unless you get the word out about your book, few people will read what you've written.

For me I take a day and do what promotion I find. I also have a blog and feature one of my books every week and send word to the many lists I have on Facebook, Twitter and other social sites. Though you may hate to put yourself out there, you must grin and begin to find people who want to read your books.

Tuesday's Inspiration - Inspired by Bird by Bird - Publication #MFRWauthor #inspiration

I chuckled when I read the first sentence of Anne Lamott's essay. "Publication is not going to change your life or solve your problems." How right she is though it sort of changes your life. Suddenly you add a new hat to the ones you're wearing. Idea finder, writer, typist, submitter. Promoter comes to mind and promoting is something you must do. If not the only people who will buy your book will be the few friends and relatives who make the purchase to support you. Then you have to find ways to stir the interest of other people. There's social networking, there are book signings and other fun and not so fun things. Getting your name out there and showing others that your book is an interesting event. Take this slow and easy and learn as you go. There are ads you can buy and they may work or not work. You can hope people will review your books and say glowing words. All this is part of promotion.

So take courage and send yourself into the fray and hope selling your book gives you confidence - probably won't since you don't want to be a one book wonder. Selling that book won't change your appearance and it probably won't make you rich, though that does sometimes happen but usually not with the first book. So ease into tis world and accept the role of promoter. You may find this takes too much time but it's what you have to do.

Meadering on Monday with Janet Lane Walters #MFRWauthor #BooksWeLove

Meander 1 - Promotional woes. It's not that I don't promote but I do. It's just sometimes I think I've published too many books. I'm trying to get my books up on a site and I'm doing them one at a time since each one takes time from my writing. I'm up to 4 but from just the publisher I'm doing them from, I have 22 books and I've just sent them another and have one being edited. Perhaps by May I'll catch up. Keep your fingers crossed for me. Plus one I still have to update and the one I'm writing.

Meander 2 - Time warp. Every day at least two of my hours are involved in driving to see my husband who is undergoing rehab from major surgery. Not that I mind visiting him. I just wish he was next door.

Meander 3 - My writing. I'm moving slowly with Divided Dreams partly because there are two more rights back books I want to complete. They also cause me a dilemma since the third in the series is already up with a cover and all. Will I be able to make the changes needed to bring this book into the series? This I don't know. Means a new cover and a change of title for the book. Will have to see what the publisher thinks. I'd really like a new cover but the title may be a problem. Will see what happens when I finish the two books and I make my confession.

Meandering on Monday with Janet Lane Walters

Meander 1 - About Reviews. Lately I've been doing some reviews for books I have read. There's a star system for these reads and I've come to some conclusion. I can't review books I haven't loved. Writers need to know when their books are a success. For me that's where it's at. When I read a book I don't like I can't find anything to say about it. I also can't give a book the highest score unless it blows me out of the water. There are few that do that. Those are the books I re-read. In the last few years, there have been few of them. There have been a number of books that are okay. I don't review them. I would rather not find fault with these stories. So if I do review a book, I have to either love it or really love it. I am not the greatest reviewer in the world.

Meander 2 - About promotion. I really don't like to do promotion, but there are few writers who do like this but I've been pushing myself to put my books up where they may be seen by other people. I had a lot of books go to countdown and I did promote them. I also talked to one of my publishers about putting some of the books on sale for a limited amount of time. Perhaps this will do something to these books and perhaps drive others to the series of which they are a part of. I need to do this to another publisher and so I will see what I can do. I actually have too many books out there making this a time intensive chore. Working on this.

Meader 3 - My own writing. I am finishing the final draft of Melodic Dreams and then comes the draft where I go page by page, checking for errors and changing words. This is always a fun one to do. Then I must get the book ready to send to the publisher. That is always a time consuming chore. The life of a writer means a lot of solitary time but I wouldn't have it any other way. Once this one is sent off I'll begin on Toth's Priest, a story that I had to redesign the outline. This one will involve magic of a sort.

Meandering On Monday with Janet Lane Walters

Meander 1 Am doing something I should have done before. I forgot one of my publishers set me a page on Maniac Readers until another publisher reminded me. I've been working to get the rest of my books up and this will take me the rest of the month. I've finished doing three publishers but this has also given me an interesting other thing by using a resource at Amazon Kindle where all my books but one are up now, I can get a short link that will send readers to my stories. Doing 2 things at once can save me some time as I promote the books. No more strings of letters now. That's good especially since a lot of my books are going on special sale. Now there are three. Healwoman, The doctor's Dilemma, and Escape. Maybe a fourth later today.

Meander 2 I've decided my hand is really connected to my brain. I write my stories and type them, I've tried not using a pen and paper but for me the thinking doesn't really work. So I will be a writer not a typer ( maybe not a word) but it's what I am and will remain. I might be able to work with a voice thing that types the words but I'd really like a program that would give me a screen with lines I could write on and the words would appear on the screen. Maybe someday there will be one. I can only hope.

As to my writing. Moving rapidly ahead with Melodic Dreams. Both Rekindled Dreams and Amber Chronicles are off at the publishers. Perhaps I should announce them one day as sales and will once I see a cover for the second. Think I did for the first. Now thinking of a Title for the fourth of the Moonchild series, which pits a Gemini hero against the Cancer heroine. I have an idea about the hero but the heroine hasn't appeared yet but there's time since I'll need to work on Toth's Priest after the current dream is finished.

Meandering on Monday with Janet Lane Walters #amwriting

This is a new year and let's see where I meander today. The first is anonymous posters to the blog. I am getting tired of someone trying to sell medicine on the blog but I also don't want to amke things hard for the real readers and writers who want to post without giving their names. Not sure why they do this. Would I hunt them down and try a hard sell on them. No. I rather go for the soft sell and for showing the work of other authors on the blog. So give me a break. If you're pushing medicines, don't do it on my blog.

Yesterday was 12th night and my Christmas tree did not come down. I'm not sure why. Probably because I'll need a day to pack all the decorations away. Also because it's pretty. Maybe it's because I like the tree. I finally put the Christmas music CDs to rest and am now entering the classical phase of my music listening while I write. But sometimes I write to silence. That's especially true when I'm doing a rough draft.

As to my writing. Today I will finish chapter 8 of a rough draft of a novella expected to finish at between 30 to 40 thousand words. Odd thing is that I know the title of the series but I've been toying with a title for the book. I usually have the title before I begin a story. Sometimes it's the title that brings on the creative juices for the story. There will be 12 stories here with Moon Child as the main title. I have an idea of what I want to do with the series but that will wait until I have at least three of them written and a fourth planned.

As to the Goddesses of Er. Had to go back and type in the missing chapters. They may be in my computer somewhere but I couldn't find them. So glad I print out each chapter when it's finished. Once I catch up on typing chapters 7 and 8, I'll be finished with the rough draft and can type that while I work on some nore chapters in the Goddesses.

The last thing I'll meander on is that I must start doing some promo things. I always hate to take time away writing to do this but I will take at least an hour a day to find some blogs for a post other than my own or do some other sort of thing. One promotes their name as well as an individual book.

3 Blog Visit Sunday

http://4rvreading-writingnewsletter.blogspot.com/ triberr

http://nancyjcohen.wordpress.com/  promotion

http://www.business2community.com/trends-news/fan-protests-new-front-in-the-copyright-wars-0222932#hf5AqVmli3xFI2tg.01  While not a blog this is full of very good information.

3 Blog Visit Sunday

http://kriswrites.com/2012/06/06/the-business-rusch-the-end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it/


http://www.mediabistro.com/galleycat/free-ebook-promotion_b52130

http://www.heartsthroughhistory.com/the-victorian-honeymoon-with-niagara-falls/http://starboundlovers