A Smarter Author Platform for the Digital Era of Publishing

Please welcome former WU contributor Jane Friedman back to WU today! Jane has 20 years of experience in the publishing industry, with expertise in business strategy for authors and publishers. She’s the co-founder (with WU’s Porter Anderson) of The Hot Sheet, the essential industry newsletter for authors, and has previously worked for F+W Media (home to Writer’s Digest) and the Virginia Quarterly Review.

Jane’s newest book is The Business of Being a Writer (University of Chicago Press); Publishers Weekly wrote that it is “destined to become a staple reference book for writers and those interested in publishing careers.”

In addition to being a professor with The Great Courses, Jane has delivered keynotes and workshops on the digital era of authorship at worldwide industry events, including the Writer’s Digest annual conference, San Miguel Writers Conference, The Muse & The Marketplace, Frankfurt Book Fair, BookExpo America, LitFlow Berlin, and Digital Book World. Find out more at janefriedman.com.

A Smarter Author Platform for the Digital Era of Publishing

read more http://writerunboxed.com/2018/04/02/a-smarter-author-platform-for-the-digital-era-of-publishing/

Writing for children can be one of the most rewarding things to publish – but it can also be one of the most challenging.

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You can’t market direct to your readers, you are competing with some huge, established names from traditional publishing, and it’s more expensive to commission illustration and print color books.In today’s article, Darcy Pattison gives some tips for successfully self-publishing a children’s picture book.

At some point, many successful writers want to try writing and publishing a children’s picture book. There are many reasons: their own children inspire a story, they fondly remember a childhood event, or their muse gives them a story that doesn’t seem right for their usual genre.

Writers often tell themselves that they are professionals and can switch to this new genre without problems. There are indeed many similarities to publishing a children’s book. Let’s cover them.

How Children’s Books are Similar to Publishing for Adults

read more  https://www.thecreativepenn.com/2018/04/28/how-to-successfully-self-publish-a-childrens-picture-book/

by Anne R. Allen

“The one with the biggest email list wins” is the current mantra of pretty much every book marketer on the planet. The author newsletter is supposed to be the most important weapon in your book marketing arsenal.

Marketing experts tell authors their #1 goal should be to collect as many email addresses as possible for the purpose of sending our victims fans weekly or even daily doses of our spam news.

This week Kristine Katherine Rusch wrote a great in-depth post on newsletters. She pointed out there are two types of newsletters that authors are using today: the old school, chatty  letter that reads like the newsy Christmas letter you get from Aunt Susie. Those newsletters appeal to your established fans who know your characters, and want to know what’s coming up and what’s going on with you personally.

Then there’s the newer type of newsletter which is like an advertising circular that aims at getting new customers. It’s all about marketing.

read more http://annerallen.com/2017/04/author-newsletter-vs-author-blog/

By Frances Caballo

Facebook can be a downright drag. No, I’m not talking about the Cambridge Analytica firestorm or Mark Zuckerberg’s appearance before a Senate hearing, which, by the way, was a real snoozer.

No, I’m talking about Facebook business pages, known among writers as Facebook author pages.

Eons ago, like maybe six years ago in reality, if you wrote a status update on your Facebook author page you could rest assured that about 36% of your fans would see what you’d posted.

Each year since then brought new tweaks to Facebook’s algorithm to the point now that you’re lucky if 1% of your updates make it into your fans’ newsfeeds.

Like I said, a real drag.

Mark Zuckerberg says he changed the algorithm so that people with Facebook profiles could see more of what they want to see, posts from friends and family members.

I, of course, think the reason is more nefarious. Zuckerberg has to monetize Facebook and how can he do that? With ads of course. So, if you want more than 1% of your fans to see your posts, guess what? Yep, you have to buy advertising.

There is a way around this, you know. What? Facebook groups. More and more romance authors are using groups instead of Facebook author pages or in conjunction with them. Actually, a lot of experts who run courses also offer Facebook groups as a benefit of a buying a course.

If you’d like to see a Facebook group in action, here’s a link to 20 of them. But if you want to know how to set up a Facebook group of your own, keep reading.

How to Set Up a Facebook Group

read more https://www.thebookdesigner.com/2018/04/10-ways-authors-can-grow-a-facebook-group/

When writers are trying to build platform—in order to land a book deal—they often ask me questions like:

• How many Twitter followers do I need?
• How many Facebook likes should I have?
• How many website or blog visits are required?
• How many people need to be on my email newsletter list?

Every agent or publisher will throw out a different number to such questions, and usually, that number is made up.

read more  https://www.janefriedman.com/building-a-strong-author-platform/