Tag Archives: author platform

Articles, Blog, Craft, Opinion, Writing and Publishing

About This Writing Stuff…

This month, we begin with Rebecca Jennings’s article from Vox on the importance of TikTok to a creative’s chances of success followed by a rebuttal from publishing industry expert Jane Friedman.

From Good Story Company, Kristen Overman challenges us to try journaling as a route to a solid first draft and Amy Wilson shows us how to describe emotions through action, dialogue, and deep POV.

Speaking of deep POV, Lisa Hall-Wilson at Writers in the Storm expands on that topic while Lynette M. Burrows explains the differences between tension, suspense, and conflict.

On Anne R. Allen’s blog, guest Jodie Hurst addresses the pros and cons of that 800-pound digital gorilla in the room—artificial intelligence.

All that and a little more. Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

Want to sell a book or release an album? Better start a TikTok by Rebecca Jennings

Author Platform is Not a Requirement to Sell Your Novel or Children’s Book by Jane Friedman

How to Describe Emotion by Amy Wilson

Journaling to Productive First Drafts by Kristen Overman

After Your First Draft: The Search for Meaning by Patti Callahan Henry

Beguile Your Readers with Tension, Suspense, and Conflict by Lynette M. Burrows

How to Remove the Author Voice for Deep Point of View by Lisa Hall-Wilson

Don’t Kill Your Darlings by Philip Athans

Substack is Both Great and Terrible for Authors by Jane Friedman

How to Make Your Writing More Sensitive – and Why it Matters by Melissa Haun

It’s the Age of AI: How to Survive and Thrive as a Writer by Jodie Hurst via Anne R. Allen

 

 

 

Articles, Blog, Opinion, Promotion

Endless Self-Promotion? No Thanks.

This article from Vox speaks to a concern I’ve had for several years about promoting your “brand” as an independent author or creator of any kind. The TL;DR version is that you need to be ubiquitous on social media, especially on TikTok, if you want to build an audience and sell your product.
I don’t know about anyone else, but I cannot carve out time to make an endless stream of videos and still manage a writing schedule, high-stress FT job, marriage, a home, my health, and soon caring for an aging parent. I’m only one person already stretched thin across five or six social media platforms, maintaining a website and a YouTube channel that I can barely keep current.
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From the article:
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“The labor of making TikToks — and if you want to reach the most people in the shortest amount of time, TikTok is pretty much the only place to go — requires both tedium and skill. You’ve got to get used to the app’s ever-evolving editing features, understand the culture of the platform, make yourself look presentable but not too presentable or risk coming off as inauthentic, prepare for and practice what you’re going to say, but again, not too much. And you’ve got to do it again and again and again, because according to every single influencer ever, the key to growing your audience is posting consistently.
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More than that, you’ve got to actually spend your time doing this stuff on the off chance that the algorithm picks it up and people care about what you have to say. You’ve got to spend your time doing this even though it’s corny and cringe and your friends from high school or college will probably laugh as you “try to become an influencer.” You’ve got to do it even when you feel like you have absolutely nothing to say, because the algorithm demands you post anyway…
You’ve got to offer your content to the hellish, overstuffed, harassment-laden, uber-competitive attention economy because otherwise no one will know who you are.”
It’s discouraging and demoralizing to know that even if you produce high quality books, art, or music, it means nothing unless you work yourself to exhaustion clamoring for attention on the shitshow dumpster fire that is social media.  Good luck to us all.
Blog, Book Signings, Writing and Publishing

Book Review: Rise of the Machines by Kristen Lamb

There was once a time when an author’s only true concern was producing the best quality manuscript.

Over the last decade, that has changed drastically with the advent of social media and blogging. Now, writers are expected to have a platform—including a strong online presence—well before their first book is published.

What’s more, unless you’re of the stature of Stephen King or J.K. Rowling, no longer can published authors simply sit back and let others do the work of promotion and marketing. These days, the onus is ON US.

Enter Kristen Lamb, social media Jedi and author of Rise of the Machines: Human Authors in a Digital World. I had the pleasure of hosting Kristen as the keynote at the 2015 Write Stuff writers conference in Allentown, PA where I purchased her book. I was curious to learn more about how to properly leverage social media and my blog to bolster my platform.

In her book, Kristen divides her lessons into five sections, providing a brief history of the publishing industry, the changes that have occurred (and are still occurring), and fascinating insights into human psychology and communication. She also explains why the traditional marketing methods are no longer effective today.

Before delving into specifics about social media sites, Kristen leads the reader through very focused chapters and sections about identifying your short term and long term goals, creating your writers platform, creating your brand, the types of friends and followers who will help writers with these efforts, and what it means to “go viral.”

With those concepts understood, we then delve into specifics about a few of the hottest social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter. In addition to providing advice on how to manage your time and content, Kristen also offers tips on social media etiquette, how to avoid conflict and potentially sensitive topics, and handling internet “trolls” who insult and harass rather than politely disagreeing with something you post.

Along the way Kristen’s humor and anecdotes provide entertainment along with education that held my attention and prevented the material from becoming “dry”.

Although I have worked in the IT industry for over 20 years and have a solid grasp of technology, and although I am a published author who is active on social media, I came away from Kristen’s book with insights on how and where I need to improve my approach, especially to blogging.

I only wish I had known about Kristen before I published my first novel in 2009!

 

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