Writers in the Storm

I can hear you saying, Noooooo! Not another thing I have to do to build a platform! I'm already on FB, Twitter, Pinterest, I Blog, have a website, Instagram, Google Plus , Linkdin, Goodreads . . . Okay, I'll stop, because I'm depressing myself, but just know that I could go on.

But what if there was a passive marketing tool? One that you create, send it out into the webverse, and forget it? Like a satellite, it goes into orbit, and does it's thing, without any maintenance? Would you be willing to try it then?  What if it gave your creative side a facial and a relaxing massage at the same time?

Impossible?

Nope.

Enter:

 

Oh, you say, the software that makes cat memes? Well, yes. But I'll bet that you pass on those cute memes every day on social media. Come on, admit it. Cute cats, funny sayings, or, in Orly and my case, coffee, goats, horses, mini pigs, squirrels with purses, and an occasional ostrich.

But wait, there's a lot more to it than cat memes!

If the meme links to something - a website, an article or other info, I sometimes click on it, don't you? Even if I don't, when I share it, all my followers see it, and I get up to 30 shares on a typical day.  Many of those people have friends that share too. On and on. Social media is The Force.

All you need is an eye-catching photo, and something to say. Hey, we're authors. We have LOTS to say!  Some of you know that I'm a quoteaholic. I post a Cowboy quote and an Author quote every morning on Twitter (@PBRWriter). I have books full of them. Universal truths are universal for a reason; they touch everyone. Hello, shareability! And, if the quote says something about the books you write, all the better!

PHOTOS:  They're free on many sites. My favorite is Photopin, but Morguefile, Gratisography and many others are good, too. Or, you can use your own personal photos. The main thing to remember (besides giving credit to the photographer or the site), is that you want a lot of blank space. Preferably monotone, so lettering shows up well.

I love the one below - it goes perfectly with the saying - but the saying is hard to read because  of the color shift.

 

 

 

 

Don't forget to put your info on it!!!! I refer to my website.

Canva has tons of layouts, a good choice of fonts, and you can use their backgrounds and photos if you'd like. Some are free, some are cheap. And it's EASY to USE!

 

                   

But wait, there's more!

You can use Canva to make memes for your books as well. The saying? Your logline, or a great line from your blurb. Or a great line from a review. Something compelling that will make readers want to pick it up.

Here are two I made for my recent release.

I post these everywhere: Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, my website . . . every platform I have. If I were into swag, I'd have postcards made.

Here are some tips that may help you dive into Canva:

• There are many sizes to choose from for posts - horizontal, vertical orientations, even ones that fit FB, etc. perfectly. Or, you can make one that's a custom size.
• You can upload your photo, or buy one for $1 from Canva.
• There is a section called 'Elements' that give you the option to put 'shapes' (squares, elipticals, etc) into your design.
  
  OR
• You can choose one of their custom layouts (most cost, but they are very nice).
• You can choose from custom backgrounds - either colors, or textures. The nice ones are $.99
• Text - they have quite a few fonts and sizes to choose from, and you can use any color you can think of. Or they have custom ones (for cost).
• When you're done, I'd suggest downloading your design to your computer, and posting from there. The ones that come straight from Canva have their ads on your post.

This may seem overwhelming, but it's not, I promise. If I know what I want to do, I can create a design in a half hour or less.

So what do you think? Have I convinced you that Canva is worth your time? Oh come on, you know you want to go create a cat meme!

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About Laura

Laura Drake is a city girl who never grew out of her tomboy ways, or a serious cowboy crush. She writes both Women's Fiction and Romance.

She sold her Sweet on a Cowboy series, romances set in the world of professional bull riding, to Grand Central.  The Sweet Spot won the 2014 Romance Writers of America^®   RITA^® award in the Best First Book category.

Her 'biker-chick' novel, Her Road Home, sold to Harlequin's Superomance line (August, 2013) and has expanded to three more stories set in the same small town.

In January, Laura released her first Women's Fiction, Days Made of Glass.

In 2014, Laura realized a lifelong dream of becoming a Texan and is currently working on her accent. She gave up the corporate CFO gig to write full time. She's a wife, grandmother, and motorcycle chick in the remaining waking hours.

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Jamie Raintree

When we first start writing, it's only natural to start with...well, writing. I remember when I first imagined the idea of writing a book. It was an absolutely ridiculous thought. Me? Write a book? Wasn't that reserved for the elite of the world? Was there some kind of qualification process someone made you go through before you were "allowed" to attempt such a thing?

I tentatively dipped my toe in for the first few years, not even thinking about whether pursuing publication made sense for me until I was 5 years into this lofty experiment. Up until then, it was mostly one project at a time, one draft at a time, one day at a time.

When I signed with my agent, though, it (or something that rhymes with it) got real. I was suddenly facing my writing "career" becoming an actual "thing" and I realized I had no idea what that meant for me or my future. I knew that if I wanted to do what was necessary to have a career, I couldn't keep thinking of my writing as a hobby that I did when I had free time. And even more than that, if I wanted to be successful, I needed to have some vision for my writing future.

GETTING CLEAR ON THE BIG PICTURE

So I did what I do whenever I'm freaking out--I organized. (I may have been compared to Monica Geller once or twice in my life.) More specifically, I created a Career Plan for myself. In truth, I was still pretty unsure about how things would unfold for me and my book--I'm still not sure--but I knew that if I could at least start to put my vague thoughts on paper, they would eventually bloom and unfold into something that made sense.

Maybe you have some experience with that?

I wrote out my first writing career plan two years ago. A couple of weeks ago, I decided to update it and while I was surprised by how much had changed, I was also surprised my how much had stayed the same. My ambitions for my career have certainly grown as I've gotten more in tune with who I am and what my strengths are, but the heart of my dreams have remained steady. The goals that have evolved did so because of the quick progress I've made by having a clear vision for my career in the first place.

In the beginning, we must start from the bottom, with the daily tasks. We have to figure out if this writing thing is really for us anyway, right? It makes sense to be sure that you can dedicate enough time and heart to make a real go of it.

Once you've decided on the path of publishing, though, the path can be a lot smoother if you take a big picture look at your career and where you'd like it go. After all, you may need the support of an agent and/or publisher to get your book out into the world, but when it comes down to it, you will always be the driving force of your career. Your career plan is your map.

THE BENEFITS OF HAVING A CAREER PLAN

Here are some reasons I believe it's important to have even a vague and elementary career plan:

• Knowing what career goals and values are will help you make in-the-moment decisions. It will be easier to stay in line with what's important to you if you have it written out in black and white.
• Once your big goals are determined, you can break those down into smaller tasks that you can make progress on every day or every week. No longer will months or years pass without real progress.
• You will feel more in control of your career. You may not be able to control whether or not an agent or editor says yes to your work, or how long from signing to book release you have to wait, but if you know what your goals are, there will always be a next step that YOU can take.
• You will be able to see what skills you need to learn and who you need to make connections with in order to move forward.

HOW TO CREATE YOUR OWN CAREER PLAN

To create your own career plan, here are some questions you can ask yourself:

• What is my purpose in creating a writing career? i.e. Creating an income? Leaving a legacy? Entertaining readers? Sharing my message?
• Whose careers, skills, books, and values do I admire? In short, who are my role models that I can model my career and myself after?
• What genre(s) do I intend to write? Will there be a common theme or message throughout my books? What impact do I hope to make on readers?
• What will the breadth of my career be? i.e. Books--fiction and/or non-fiction? Short stories, freelancing articles, and/or blogging? Speaking or teaching? Movies and screenplays? Editing?
• What do I want my professional presence to be? Will I be highly available to my readers or do I prefer to keep a respectful artistic distance? How much time will I spend networking with other writers and industry professionals? How do I want to be viewed in the writing and reading communities?
• How will writing fit into and support my overall lifestyle? What will my work/life balance look like? How will my writing income and lifestyle support my life goals?
• How do I want to feel in my writing career and in my life life?

Have you created a career plan for your writing? Do you have any answers to the questions above that you'd like to share?

Also, if you'd like a free downloadable and customizable template based on my career plan, you can get it by subscribing to my newsletter here.

WITS Announcement: The two class winners from Laurie Schnebly Campbell's Friday post are Lyn Brittan and Janet Kerr. Please see the comments section in the post for instructions.

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About Jamie

Jamie Raintree is a writer, a writing business and productivity instructor, and the creator of the Writing & Revision Tracker. She is represented by Regal Literary and is currently working on her second novel. Subscribe to her newsletter for more blogs, workshops, and book news. To find out more, visit her website below.

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Women’s Fiction & Romance Writer
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Kathryn Craft
Turning Whine Into Gold

The euphoria and self-respect of finally being paid for years of hard work will still be fresh on a debut author’s face when requests for her generosity will start to pour in. Never mind that the math may work out to less than a penny per hour invested. Once you are a published author, people will assume you are rich.

You too might now believe your life is rich—with meaning—even while struggling beneath the weight of marketing costs you hadn’t planned for, such as graphic design or video services, travel for a book tour, or an independent publicist.

I like to believe that being a published author is not simply a hobby for the independently wealthy, but I’ve seen financial ruin (sometimes stated as “quitting the day job too soon”) cited as the #1 reason authors leave the industry. They simply can’t afford to keep on.

If you fail to set clear boundaries about what you are willing to give away from the start, you could become one of them.

This issue is confusing because we want any chance to get our book out into the world— even if we are still struggling to survive while launching our careers. We want to be charitable; we are humanitarians who are sensitive to those in need. We want to use the platform that publication confers to make a difference. Yet in doing so we can forget that “tax deductible” does not equal “free.”

When such requests catch us off-guard, we are liable to whine, "Why do people keep asking me for more free stuff?"

Analyze your career goals and set reasonable boundaries

The only way we can negotiate this potentially emotional minefield is to draw firm boundaries ahead of time, so that saying no is a quiet defense rather than a reactionary blowout. We can start by deciding in advance:

• Will this request help me fulfill my career goals?
• How much can I afford to give away?

Have you ever thought in terms of budgeting your generosity? If you have limited resources, doing so can help you stay positive about your career. Here are a few suggestions about how to handle requests.

1. Will you donate books?

Consider purchasing a stash of books that represents what you can afford to give away each year. This physical representation of your budget will help you weigh decisions about its use.

If this is a charitable cause, is it relevant to your subject matter? If a giveaway, will it substantially increase exposure for your book? If your publication and marketing goals are supported, go ahead and send the books—out of the stack you have set aside for this purpose.

Once those books are gone for the year, your answer is a clear and easy “not this time.” If this sounds miserly, remember that early career growth is crucial to allowing more charity in the future.

2. Will you speak to our group for free?

I adore public speaking, so I’m a sucker for this one. My novels allow me a platform to talk about subjects that are important to me and have the potential to impact lives. But I have learned to say no.

Most lecture series and writers’ groups have a budget for such presentations, and I expect fair compensation. I do want to support libraries with free programming when I can, but it can’t cost me. I always ask for a modest honorarium to cover time and travel. No one has ever yet said no. For underfunded groups you can always weigh the exposure and the likelihood of selling a decent number of books against the cost of speaking for free.

3. Will you send our book club signed bookmarks?

Would I rather you had allowed me to offer them out of the goodness of my heart? Yes, but I’m not going to refuse the request. Of course I’ll send them. That’s one reason I had them made.

4. Will you write a series on our blog for free?

(Coincidentally, that one rang in while I was writing this post.) It takes me at least a half-day to write a cogent, polished blog post. Or, I could draft 2K words on my work-in-progress. You must convince me the exposure is worth it.

There is no one “right” answer to any of these requests. But it is the authors who have a clear vision for the distribution of their book income who will make the most difference with it, and who will not be thrown into a defensive stance when time after time they are asked for another donation.

Aspiring writers: Have you thought about this aspect of your author career yet, and can you see the benefits of giving it advance thought?

Authors: Where are your boundaries? What requests do you think are unreasonable?

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About Kathryn

Kathryn Craft is the author of two novels from Sourcebooks: The Art of Falling, and The Far End of Happy.

Her work as a developmental editor at Writing-Partner.com, specializing in storytelling structure and writing craft, follows a nineteen-year career as a dance critic. Long a leader in the southeastern Pennsylvania writing scene, she hosts lakeside writing retreats for women in northern New York State, leads workshops, and speaks often about writing.

Kathryn lives with her husband in Bucks County, PA.

Twitter: @kcraftwriter
FB: KathrynCraftAuthor

 

Top photo credit: 182/365 Sparkle (+2) via photopin (license)