7 TIPS FROM A SOCIAL MEDIA STRATEGIST FOR STRENGTHENING YOUR ONLINE PRESENCE

  Reprinted with permission from The Greatest Escapist. "I'm a proud Clevelander, an incurable writer, an unabashed liberal, a neurotic Jew, & a chronic, unapologetic oversharer. I've been sharing my stories here since 2007." I love when people think that writing is my full-time job, but alas, it isn't. I work a 9-to-5 (OK, more like …

CAVEAT EMPTOR: DON’T BECOME A VICTIM TO PREDATORS

There may be more predators lurking in the dark corners of the writing and publishing world than there are in any other industry. No required education or certification process separates outstanding professional editors, agents and publishers from villains. Either you find the villain before you sign a contract, or they make easy money from you in return for... nothing.

Author Platform: Reaching Readers and Gaining a Competitive Advantage

"The author is the brand. Your job as the author is to build awareness of your brand, and to build, earn and deserve positive desire for your brand. Awareness plus desire create demand for your product. This is why platform will become more important than ever in 2014. "

25 Tips on How to Impress a Book Publisher by Cheryl Tardif

25 tips that will help you impress publishers and distinguish you and your work from the slush piles.

8 Unexpected Lessons From Working with a Literary Agent by Brian Klems

With self-publishing becoming more widely accepted and Amazon waging wars with publishers, more and more I get the sense from aspiring authors that they don’t think landing an agent means as much as it used to. ____________________________________________________________________________ Writers' Digest Guest post by Bethany Neal, who writes young-adult novels with a little dark side and a …

Agent Queries and Publisher Proposals – Why You Should Use Links, Not Attachments

Contacting an agent or a publisher is not simple or free of risk. As your author platform constitutes everything positive about you as an author, the way you deliver that platform is absolutely critical. In essence, you have a few sentences to sell yourself.

Fraud Artists: Scamming Authors

We read every day about one company or another scamming novice authors, stealing their hard-earned money for a vague promise and delivering nothing in return except misery. Often the new author who pays the most to an alleged "publisher' can least afford to lose that money. Yet, every day, hundreds, if not thousands of novice …

Proposal Power: What Publishers Desire in a Proposal

"As resume writing is a path to a successful career, the publishing proposal is a gateway for being published, especially for fiction. Publishing proposal writing is a science and an art form. It must contain, at a minimum, one section each on: the author, a concise synopsis, a market analysis, a competitive analysis, promotional and marketing concepts, a chapter outline; and sample chapters. Explain how you are creating an author platform that will be increasingly valuable to that particular small publisher. If the publisher has some interest in your book, they will be more willing to finance its publication. And if the publisher believes that more of those high quality books in the same genre are on the way, they will be more likely to donate several thousand dollars to print your first book."

Book Marketing 101

Book Marketing 101. Everything you need to know about author marketing!

The Best Way to Publish Fiction

I have been trade-published and self-published several times. I now have a talented literary agent. Although I have self-published three books, I feel more comfortable publishing fiction with a traditional publisher, especially a large, distinguished publisher. I realize that this is not an author decision. Publishers require talent and a marketable book. If you have …

What I Learned about Book Publishing and Marketing

The next stage of my life was devoted to learning everything that I could about publishers, book publishing proposals contacting publishers, agent queries and author book marketing.

Book Marketing 101

Congratulations! You have found a publisher well suited to your book. The contract has been signed. You are a published author! What’s next? What will your publisher do? What should you do to enhance the publisher’s efforts? Because of the changing nature of the publishing world and the revolution in electronic book purchasing, someone needs to market your book throughout the Internet world. Because this work is extremely labor-intensive and detail-oriented, few publishers have the time, workers and enthusiasm to make it happen. This is where the author must step in, with the motivation to work hard on behalf of his or her book.