Taking Stock

The end of the year is upon us. Where did our time go? What happened to our goals? Our dreams?

All too often our ability to procrastinate has a way of getting us off track. All too soon the new year will be here, so now is a great time to review 2015 - and prepare for 2016.

If you had established goals last January, dig them out. If your goals were specific, you should have no difficulty determining how well you did. If they are more general, the answer may be more unclear, but it will provide guidance for next year's goal setting.

Review each goal and give your self a grade, then grade your work overall.

If you did not set goals last year, you can still review 2015. How did you do specifically in the following categories:

1. Writing:
     a. New work: Did you start at least one new long project? Many short projects each month?
     b. Editing: Did you work on editing your latest novel? Did you spend significant time editing your short pieces?
     c. Submitting/Publishing: Did you submit to magazines, agents, publishers your finished work(s)?

2. Marketing:
     a. Social Media: Did you work to keep your fans updated on your work on a regular basis? Posting to a variety of social media sites?
     b. Did you explore and develop places to share your writing in person? Local bookstores, libraries, or coffee shops?
     c. Did you keep your author's portfolio updated?

December is a great time to complete some of your unfinished projects and clear away the old to get ready for January and the new. Happy Holidays to all of you,

____________________________________

D. Jean Quarles is a writer of Women's Fiction and a co-author of a Young Adult Science Fiction Series. Her latest book, House of Glass, Book 2 of The Exodus Serieswas written with coauthor, Austine Etcheverry.

D. Jean loves to tell stories of personal growth – where success has nothing to do with money or fame, but of living life to the fullest. She is also the author of the novels: Rocky's Mountains, Fire in the Hole, and Perception.The Mermaid, an award winning short story was published in the anthology, Tales from a Sweltering City.

She is a wife, mother, grandmother and business coach. In her free time . . . ha! ha! ha! Anyway, you can find more about D. Jean Quarles, her writing and her books at her website at www.djeanquarles.com

You can also follower her at www.djeanquarles.blogspot.com or on Facebook.

Writers - Start the Day Off Right!

I often tell my coaching clients that the most important thing in life is that they are happy.

After all, it doesn't really matter how much money you make, how many books you write, or how many clients you have if you're miserable.

The good news is, it's probably easier to be happy than you might think.

In fact, you simply need to decide to be happy, then train yourself to be happy, no matter what.

To do this, set up little rituals that help you start the day right.

Create a gratitude journal, and every morning, first thing, list at least a dozen things you're grateful for. You may not think you'll have 12 things to be grateful for every morning, but you will. For example, if you slept well the night before and woke up feeling good, that is something to be grateful for.

Besides your gratitude journal, look for other morning rituals to help you begin your day in a happy, grateful, productive state of mind.

Take your morning coffee outside (weather permitting) and enjoy the sunrise.

Go for a walk with your pet, your spouse, or by yourself.

Something else you might start doing is making a habit of watching The Morning Nudge on youtube each morning.

The upbeat music, beautiful scenes of the sea, and the words of encouragement should help you get in the right frame of mind as you start your work day. Here's a sample Nudge to watch:



Once you train yourself to start the day in a happy state of mind, you'll probably find that your entire day goes much better and your writing seems to flow.

Try it!

Suzanne Lieurance is a fulltime freelance writer, writing coach, certified life coach, and the author of over 30 published books. Visit her website at www.suzannelieurance-author.com.

10 Goals for Your Blog

The beginning of the year means a clean slate. Even if you fell off the blog-wagon sometime this year, you will be able to start anew in just a few short weeks. Here are 10 goals to set your blog up for success in 2016.

1. Stay on Theme. Most people use blogging to illustrate their expertise. However it’s easy to get off topic and sway from your focus. This year, make a goal to always blog in tune to your mission statement, theme or tag line. Don’t have a tag line? Write one. What short phrase describes your blog? Come up with about 20 ideas and pick the best one. Then, whenever you start to write a blog post, you can ask yourself if it fits your tag. If it does, perfect. If it doesn’t, figure out a way so it’s in-line with your blog or save it for a later writing project.

2. Blog Consistently. Decide on how often you want to post a new blog, and then stay on schedule. Pick one or two days a week. (Note they should be the same day or days.) Then stick to your schedule. Set up an expectation for your audience, so they know what days to come to your blog to read a new post. And don’t let them down.

3. Write Complete Content. All blog posts should have a beginning, a middle, and an end. Make sure you adhere to some sort of structure and that your thoughts are complete, so the content you create is valuable and easy to understand. Don’t forget to add a call to action to comment or share at the end of each post.

4. Edit Posts. Nothing gives a hit to your credibility quite like spelling and grammatical errors. Before hitting publish, take a little time to review your posts. Run spell check, read it out loud, read it backwards (that’s a fun trick for finding errors). Or do all of the above. Properly edited posts look professional and are an awesome reflection on you!

5. Add Images. You probably already know that every post should have an image to illustrate your point and draw in readers. If you want, use a site like Canva or PicMonkey to create a custom image with your blog post title. You can use this at the top of your articles and to promote it on social media sites.

6. Categorize and Tag Content. Whenever you create content, put it in the relevant category on your blog – it’s an excellent way to keep your posts organized. Also, add tags (keywords) to make your article easy to find when people search.

7. Keep Ahead of Schedule. Notice I said “ahead of” not “on” schedule, though that’s important too. If you find you have some extra time, write a few blog posts in advance. Try to have articles that are due, ready to go a week in advance. That way you are not constantly struggling to make deadline. Plus, it will help with goal #2: Blog Consistently.

8. Share. Share each post on all your social networks. People can’t read your posts if they do not know about them.

9. Step It Up. You know that big interview you’ve been wanting to purse? Or that article you keep meaning to write, but put off because it’s “so much work”? How about your decision to start a podcast or do video interviews? Well, stop talking about it and start doing it. This is your year. Do what you can to add extra value, multimedia and/or oomph to your blog. You’ve reached goals 1 – 8. You’ve got this. Now, step it up!

10. Enjoy Your Blog. This is something I find myself saying regularly: Everything you work on should be at least a little bit (if not a lot) fun for you. If you are not enjoying the content you write, write something else. You can’t expect your audience to become invested in it … or in you as a writer … if you are not enthusiastic about your material. It’s your blog, you created it for a reason. Have fun with it!

Post your blog link in the comments, so we can all enjoy your writing too! Happy Blogging!

Note: I employed nearly all of these tactics in writing this post. Still working on #7: once a writer on deadline, always a writer on deadline ...

* * *

Debra Eckerling is a writer, editor and project catalyst, as well as founder of Guided Goals and Write On Online, a live and online writers’ support group. 

She is the host of the Guided Goals Podcast and author of Purple Pencil Adventures: Writing Prompts for Kids of All Ages. 

She is an editor at Social Media Examiner and a speaker/moderator on the subjects of writing, networking, goal-setting, and social media.

Secrets to Getting Your Book into University Libraries, Bookstores and More

Q&A A La Ann Landers

Getting Your Book into Campus Libraries and More!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

QUESTION

Re university bookstores:
 I know that Random House had my book in their catalog targeting educational sellers. Is there more than that I can do? How would I 

1. identify them and

2. approach them?

             

ANSWER

I'm going to use my husband's experience with his What Foreigners Need to Know About America from A to Z as an example because he was so successful with it. 

He put together a form letter (which he tweaks) depending on who he is sending it to. He goes online and finds areas on campus that could use his book. That includes 

1. Libraries

2. International Student Programs 

3. International Student Course Teachers 

4. Campus Bookstore Buyers

5. ESL classes through extension

He spends about 30 minutes a day sending the letter to the correct person when possible. Sometimes that's only one contact. Some days, when research goes well, it's three or four.  He's had some amazing successes like having his book chosen as gifts/recommendations by the university that hosts the Fulbright Scholars in the US each summer. There is a cost to it beyond time. He offers a free book to those influencers who show an interest, but these most often don't result in single book sales, either. The top sale we could trace to his letters (it's sometimes easier for self-published authors to trace sales to a specific effort) was 59 copies. 

Be aware, that if you find an instructor who recommends your book or uses is at class reading, the bookstore often stocks the book automatically. But not always. It doesn’t hurt to mention in a separate query or phone call that your book was ordered for a specific class or that Professor X showed an interest in your book.  

One more secret. He keeps at it. 

Here’s an alternative that isn't as frugal and not as effective because the contact is not personal (but it’s a lot less time-consuming!):

 IBPA (Independent Book Publishers Association) had a catalog that they send out to libraries, a separate one to university libraries and one to reviewers.  I've used that program. It can be good...or not. Depending on the title. 

-----

Carolyn Howard-Johnson brings her experience as a publicist, journalist, marketer, and retailer to the advice she gives in her HowToDoItFrugally series of books for writers and the many classes she taught for nearly a decade as instructor for UCLA Extension’s world-renown Writers’ Program. All her books for writers are multi award winners including the first edition of The Frugal Book Promoter published in 2003. Her The Frugal Editor, now in its second edition, won awards from USA Book News, Readers’ Views Literary Award, the marketing award from Next Generation Indie Books and others including the coveted Irwin award.

Howard-Johnson is the recipient of the California Legislature’s Woman of the Year in Arts and Entertainment Award, and her community’s Character and Ethics award for her work promoting tolerance with her writing. She was also named to Pasadena Weekly’s list of “Fourteen San Gabriel Valley women who make life happen” and was given her community’s Diamond Award for Achievement in the Arts. 

The author loves to travel. She has visited eighty-nine countries and has studied writing at Cambridge University in the United Kingdom; Herzen University in St. Petersburg, Russia; and Charles University, Prague. She admits to carrying a pen and journal wherever she goes. Her Web site is www.howtodoitfrugally.com.

The Magic of Word-Count Graphs

I am not generally a particularly fast writer.  But in November, which is National (or International) Novel Writing Month, I can consistently pump out 50,000-60,000 words in 30 days.  This is my sixth year accomplishing this feat, and despite the high word count, it's always been good-quality draft.  I have never been able to write so much in any other month at any other time of my life.  So I got to thinking about why.

Part of it's the togetherness of it, the belonging to a group of people with like goals, the support from the organization and friends who are doing the same thing. 

But another big factor, for me, is one simple thing:  the word-count graph.  On Nanowrimo's website, you can update your word count as often as you want (and I often do it more than once a day).  It shows your progress on a nice little bar graph and calculates how far behind or ahead you are.  It's magic for me, this visual representation of concrete progress on a concrete goal.  So I thought:  why not try to apply the same thing when it's not November? 

I did an internet search and found an application I'm going to try:  pacemaker.press.  It lets you set goals by word count, by scene count, and various other measurements.  You can also set different pace styles:  steady, front-loaded, increasing, random, etc.  You can set it for higher workload on weekends or other days.  It tracks your progress with graphs.  It seems like it might be a great tool for me.

So I'm going to test it this month and report next month.  In Nanowrimo, the goal is words.  I got my words in November:  58,000 of them.  But I didn't quite finish the novel.  I calculate there are about 15 more scenes I need to write.  So I'm going to try pacemaker by scene count, and finish by Christmas.  We'll see how it works. 

If any of you know of similar word count trackers you've used and like, please add them in the comments below.  Happy writing!

Update, 1-3-16:  See my report here:  Pacemaker Press--A Word Count Graph

Melinda Brasher currently teaches English as a second language in the beautiful Czech Republic.  She loves the sound of glaciers calving and the smell of old books.  Her travel articles and short fiction appear in Go Nomad, International Living, Electric Spec, Intergalactic Medicine Show, and others.  For an e-book collection of some of her favorite published pieces, check out Leaving Home.  For something a little more medieval, read her YA fantasy novel, Far-Knowing. Visit her online at http://www.melindabrasher.com.

What is Your Email’s Lifespan and What's the Best Day to Send

Email marketing is a must. It’s the only way to develop a relationship with your audience. It’s like visiting each one of your subscribers daily, once a week, or monthly. You visit however many times you and your subscribers feel is right.

This marketing strategy builds trust.

Now, although you may be sending your emails faithfully, are they being opened?

If not, that relationship becomes that of an acquaintance. You don’t really have the opportunity to build that trust. There’s no personal connection, all because you’re not getting to visit.

The importance of getting your email opened within 24 hours is critical.

According to a study by GetResponse.com (1):

23.8% of emails are opened within the first hour of delivery
After 24 hours, the chance of an email being opened is less than 1%

So, your email’s lifespan is short – it’s fleeting - barely one day.

Knowing this, it’s essential to know the best days and times to send your emails so they have the best chance of seeing the light of day. This should be the focus of your email marketing strategy.

What Hours Work Best

According to Campaign Monitor (2), 53% of emails were opened during work hours, 9AM to 5PM. The peak hours seem to be 9AM to 4PM, with a drop around 1PM (lunchtime).

Thinking about it, I can see that most employees would open their emails during work hours. Most people have too much to do after work to stop and get online after working all day.

Side note: some businesses are creating open floor plans for employees to discourage internet browsing and emailing during work hours.

One important and interesting note: Mobile devices seem to have the opposite relationship. Emails on the iPhone, Android, and other mobile devices are opened on off-work time – going to and from work, lunch hours, breaks, and so on.

Going back to the GetResponse analysis, 4-5PM saw the most email renderings. What I could gather is ‘renderings’ means ‘seen,’ whether glanced at or fully opened.

What Days Work Best

According to most statistics, as of last year, most emails were sent on Wednesday. Saturday saw the least emails sent.

However, in October 2014, GetResponse analyzed over 300 million customers’ emails and found “Tuesday won for best open rates, while Fridays got the highest click-through rate.”

The theory for Friday getting the highest CTR is possibly Friday emails also get read over the weekend.

Is your head spinning yet?

Test the Waters

Okay, it’s easy to see that email marketing needs to be tested. Aside from the fact that these statistics are from last year, every subscriber list is different. This means you need to find the days and times that work best for you.

Maybe you’re marketing to stay-at-home moms. The workday results won’t cut it with this audience. Or, maybe your list is retirees. Or, maybe, maybe, maybe.

As with everything else is marketing, strategies and what works is always changing and always need to be tested for your particular audience.

I’ve changed my email sends to Tuesday. Wednesdays were okay, but I want to see if changing the day will make a difference. After Tuesday, I’ll check out Saturday or Sunday.

Another note: From just about all the analysis going on, Mondays don’t work well because it’s the beginning of the work week and on Fridays people are thinking about the weekend.

Oh, well. That’s why testing is the only way to go.

References:

(1) http://blog.getresponse.com/whats-best-time-day-send-email.html
(2) https://www.campaignmonitor.com/blog/post/4207/best-time-to-send-email-campaigns-by-device

MORE ON MARKETING

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Wanna Learn More About Email Marketing and other essentials to book marketing?

Check out BUILD YOUR AUTHOR/WRITER PLATFORM. It's a four-week e-class through WOW! Women on Writing.

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Critique Groups Do's and Don't's

Take the Leap
 

The purpose of a critique is to sift out what's wrong. Showcased is your polished masterpiece, ready for publication. Explore your options until you find the most effective, longest lasting way to vet your work.

While working as a freelance writer, my family moved frequently. Luckily, through membership with organizations such as SCBWI, I found a writing group at each juncture. The information gathered here comes from my own membership in different types of groups.

Join a Critique Group or Start your Own

Gather interested prospective members. Make sure each writer is:

• Serious: willing to devote time studying her craft while practicing it.
• Dependable: can be counted on to come to meetings and review members' work.
• Honest: willing to let members know where she stands, as a beginner, intermediate or advanced writer.
• Open: lets members know ahead of time what type of writing she would like to have reviewed.
• Communicative: gives her input on everything from critiquing to helping to run the group.

Rules that Work

• Establish a leader.
• Decide how many members are desired.
• Decide the type of writing preferred, if any. For example:   
• Open Group: Allows all kinds of writing at any level. The advantages are many.               The variety of different types of writing gives the group widely varying points of view. One of the groups I belonged to had a poet, three article writers, and an adult novelist. The group expanded my world.
• Closed Group: Offers members who write only in your genre and are at about the same level. Advantages include powerful know-how in your genre. Potential for longer critiques is possible. Partnering among members is possible for more frequent and indepth critiques. Also, members can help each other stay abreast of conferences, webinars, informational books, etc. When I wrote biosketches for Biography Today, I had deadlines which weren't easy to keep because of my daughters' activities. My writing partner spent one entire day helping me crank out one of my assignments so I could meet the deadline. Whew!
• Agree on one of the following:
• No Homework: a writer brings a chapter, a section or a few pages of a work to be read on the spot. The writer can read her own work or ask another member to read it. During the reading, each member takes notes on a separate piece of paper. After the reading the members go round- robin to share their notes then give their note paper to the writer to take home.
• Homework: each piece of writing is emailed to members by an agreed-upon date, no exceptions. Members critique the work at home and share their results at the meeting. Members' copies are then given to the writer to take home. Writer brings her own copy of her work so she can follow along during the critiques. Critiquer is given a specified amount of time to explain her critique and the writer is given a specific amount of time to ask questions or comments. I've belonged to both types of groups and really have no preference. I found both Open and Closed Groups effective as long as they were run productively.
• A timer: members agree on the amount of time given to each critiquer. Enough time is given so that no one feels rushed. There can be exceptions, along as everyone agrees, if a writer needs more time. However, this is an important rule, especially if the group is large. Everyone deserves a critique. There is nothing worse than having one person take up so much time that the meeting either lasts too long (and everyone gets exhausted, which can weaken enthusiasm), or there isn't enough time for everyone to share their work.
• Cut the Chit Chat: be firm about saving chit chat for later because it's easy to fall into this trap and lose the main purpose for meeting.
• Food or No Food: meet at a public place, if possible, such as a room at the library. Meeting in people's homes can be way too comfortable. These kinds of meetings can incur a serious loss of productivity. One of my favorite groups solved this by having two pot luck meetings a year, summer and winter, at lunchtime. We still worked but relaxed and visited. We even brought white elephant gifts for our winter get-together (in someone's home) during the holidays.

Parting Words of Wisdom

Here is a sprinkling of "focus" notes I keep on my bulletin board as reminders of what I am about as a writer.

• Show, don't tell: spend one (or more) entire revision sit-downs combing your ms for "telling" statements. Turn those into "showing" your readers what's going on.
• Nonfiction articles: one editor's advice was simple. Answer the W's in the first two (or three) paragraphs. Then the rest of your article is the How.
• Nonfiction articles and books: Before embarking on your idea (and spending time on it), make sure you have acquired the photos.
• Write it plain, then make it pretty: I heard this during an editor's talk and have followed it ever since. It's a great tool. The first time(s) "getting it down" you can't possibly expect your writing to shine. All you're doing is pouring your soul onto paper. After you're sure you've written everything you want to say, put your ms for a rest. When you pick it up again, make your writing more interesting; splather your personality all over the page; give it your all.
• Entertain your reader: Just like being a host at a party; if you're having fun, your reader will have fun.
• When in doubt, research: if you're stuck (have writer's block) it might mean that you need to do more research. Fiction and nonfiction alike both have to be accurate, so perhaps you need to spend some time looking something up to learn more about it. If you're stuck on a non-research-type problem, then you might need to rest a bit and do a THINK. One of my writing instructors talked about BIG THINKS a lot. We all keep pen and paper with us at all times. Who knows, you might solve the problem by suggesting what you need before you go to sleep at night. The problem could be solved in the morning or in a few days, depending on the size of the problem. If you can identify the problem as a plot problem, a characterization problem, etc., then study the area in question. You might find your answer there. I think we all know, too, that often our answers come while we're sewing, doing a flower arrangement, or on a walk. So sometimes it's best to do something else that's creative to relax your mind. It often kickstarts your imagination into doing wondrous things.
• Sit your reader down across the table: and talk to him. Tell him your story. You can try this out loud if you've come to a snag.
• Write while sitting on the edge of your seat: that's how you want your reader to be, so engrossed in your story that their eyes light up and their super excited about your story.
• Remember this wisdom from Robert Frost: No tears in the writer, no tears in the reader. No surprise in the writer, no surprise in the reader.

Watch for next month's post: "You, the Writer; You the Critiquer."
Photo: Courtesy of the U.S. Navy

Linda Wilson, a former elementary teacher and ICL graduate, has published over 100 articles for adults and children, and six short stories for children. Recently, she completed Joyce Sweeney's online fiction courses, picture book course and mystery and suspense course. She is currently working on several projects for children. Follow Linda on Facebook.