“Don’t believe everything you think.”
- Wayne Dyer
In This Issue:
Never Smile at Strangers – Prologue
THE BOY OPENED his eyes and turned to the window. It was late, and the screen door to the back of the house had just slammed shut.
Thunder rumbled and raindrops struck the glass in loud, maddening beats. He clutched the wool army blanket that reeked of urine, and brought it closer to his body; then, wide-eyed, watched the downpour through his tiny bedroom window.
A burst of lightning streaked across the sky, illuminating the branches and the Spanish moss that clung to them. As quickly as it arrived, the beam disappeared, and the world grew pitch black.
A branch from the giant oak outside scraped the dingy glass, and the screen door to the back of the house banged shut a second time. A restless energy filled him. Something wasn’t right, and it wasn’t the door or the storm.
Filed under Never Smile at Strangers
WB Weekly Update: 3 New Facebook Features for Better Social Media Marketing
“People often say that motivation doesn’t last. Well, neither does bathing – that’s why we recommend it daily.”
- Zig Ziglar
In This Issue:
Filed under Weekly Update
Q&A with Horror Novelist Eric S. Brown
With Halloween quickly approaching, I thought it would be fitting to interview a horror novelist, so I dropped a line to the king of zombies himself, horror novelist Eric S. Brown.
Brown is the author of the cult hit, “Bigfoot War,” as well as over 30 other titles, including “War of the Worlds Plus Blood Guts and Zombies” (Simon and Schuster).
I wanted to know how Brown approached writing, how he marketed himself and what advice he had to share with aspiring and new novelists.
Here’s what he had to tell me.
Filed under Interviews with Novelists
Tips from Robert Ludlum on Writing a Compelling Thriller
Guest Post by Hal Gieseking
[This Q&A is based] on a two-hour interview with the late Robert Ludlum, author of some of the world’s best selling novels of international intrigue.
Filed under Interviews with Novelists, Writing Fiction
Key Steps in Marketing Your Web Content
Guest Post by James Beswick
Developing high-quality original content is the first step to developing a loyal following on your blog or web site.
But building content isn’t enough — the distribution methods involved are the difference between attracting well-targeted new visitors and letting the content age unnoticed.
Here are some of the key ways to start accessing ever-elusive traffic.
Filed under Marketing Your Writing
WB Weekly Update: How to Get Your Book Published Online for Free
“Nothing will work unless you do.”
- Maya Angelou
In This Issue:
Filed under Weekly Update
How to Get Your Book Published Online for Free
Guest Post By Carol Wilson
For some writers, putting a good plot, great dialogue and strong character development to paper is the easy part—the huge battle is actually getting their book published.
If you have recently finished your book but are struggling finding a publisher to get your work out in the public, you may still be able to get your book in the hands of millions of readers.
How?
Filed under eBooks, Self Publishing
Simple Grammar Errors: Your-You’re, Lose-Loose, Its-It’s
Guest Post by Cias Hart
With the advent of blogging and social media, we have found ourselves in a very different world these days as far as how we communicate.
Filed under Grammar
WB Weekly Update: 5 Ways to Monetize Your Blog Without Banner Ads
“Nobody realizes that some people expend tremendous energy merely to be normal.”
- Albert Camus
In This Issue:
Filed under Weekly Update
Guest Post: How to Self-Publish Your Ebook
by Gary McLaren
Every day I receive multiple requests from authors around the world who are looking for assistance or more information on how to self-publish an ebook.
And the answer today is very different than when our Publish Your Own Ebooks website started back in 2003.
Then, your best option was to get your ebook into PDF and start selling it from your own web site. While you can and should still do that today, if you want to be taken seriously as an independent author then you must also make your ebooks available at mainstream ebook stores.
Guest Post: Why Anchor Text Could Be The Most Important Aspect Of SEO
by Lee Dobbins
Getting backlinks to your site is great, but if you aren’t using anchor text properly, you may not be able to rank for your keywords.
But anchor text isn’t just important for getting you ranked, it’s also possibly the most important element to look at when analyzing your competition.
Filed under Blogging
WB Weekly Update: Why Novelist Barry Eisler Turned Down $500,000 to Self Publish
“Write even when you don’t want to, don’t much like what you are writing, and aren’t writing particularly well.”
- Agatha Christie
In This Issue:
- Novelist Barry Eisler Tells Me Why He Turned Down $500,000 to Self Publish
- 7 Simple Steps to Book Marketing
- How to Use “Myself” and Other Reflexive Pronouns
- Fiction Writing: How to Develop Your Characters
- Fiction Writing: Plot Like a Bestseller: 8 Things You Should Know
- Use Long-Tail Key Phrases to Get A High Page Rank
Filed under Marketing Your Writing
Guest Post: 7 Simple Steps to Book Marketing
By Ginger Marks
So, you’ve taken the plunge and written your book. Now what?
Have YOUR signs up?
It is time for editing, cover graphic and layout; then off to the printer or digital converter. If you have already done so, good for you.
If not, then those next steps are critical to the success of your book. Be sure your title, cover and layout are strong enough to effectively grab the eye of your reading public. But, if you already have your book or eBook ready for distribution what do you do next?
MARKET!
Oh, but of course. I hear you thinking perhaps even out loud, “Easy for you to say, but how do I do it?”
Filed under Marketing Your Writing
Guest Post: Use Long-Tail Key Phrases to Get a High Page Rank
By James Beswick
Although most website owners strive to reach page one on Google’s search engine results, it’s important to realize that any web page can only rank highly for a limited number of keyword phrases.
Consequently, targeting the most effective keyword phrase has a significant impact on your page’s ability to rank well. Additionally, since Google ranks pages and not entire sites, it’s possible to use different pages to rank for separate sets of keywords.
Guest Post: Several Ways You Can Make Money from Your Website (Or Blog)
by James Beswick
There are a variety of ways to make money from the traffic on your website, which can be divided into direct and indirect methods.
Direct methods include:
- Subscriptions: sites that provide specialized content, expert advice or niche services (such as dating) frequently charge visitors a monthly or annual membership fee to generate revenue.
- Sales: many e-commerce sites, like Amazon, monetize their online presence by generating product sales which are marked up to make a profit.
- Donations and Tip Jars: visitors are encouraged to make voluntary donations if they like a site’s content, an increasingly popular idea on busy blogs.
- Premium content: in this model, a reasonable portion of a website is provided freely to visitors, and premium or exclusive content is available to paid subscribers. In some cases, forums, marketplaces, additional software and job boards may be offered for a premium.
- Selling the site: some webmasters use domains to develop content and traffic, boosting the visitor traffic and PageRank, and then sell the entire site to monetize their work.
Filed under Blogging
Guest Post: How Important Are PageRank and Nofollow When Building Backlinks?
by James Beswick
Building inbound links to your site is a major part of search engine optimization.
This is largely due to the weight that Google places on not just the number but the quality of sites linking to yours.
Filed under Marketing Your Writing
Progress Report for Month #2 (Traffic, Content & Financial Progress)
So, here it is. My second progress report since re-launching www.WritersBreak.com and launching www.ProjectJennifer.com.
A SHORT RECAP
My focus for the first 6+ months is on content generation and building targeted traffic. For example, the target audience for WritersBreak.com is writers who want to learn more about marketing and selling their work.
Whereas the target audience for ProjectJennifer.com is parents who are interested in health-related topics, want to feed their children more whole foods and design healthier households for their families.
Btw, if you just joined this blog series and have no idea what I’m talking about–but want to know–you’ll want to visit THIS page.
Two very different audiences. (However, I am finding a little overlap.)
This progress report is divided into 2 parts. In Part I, I’ll go over traffic and subscriptions. In Part 2, I’ll talk financial performance.
Filed under ePublishing Blog
Guest Post: Writing Articles Sells Books
by Judy Cullins
Are you a reluctant marketer for your book? Do you avoid the social and selling aspects of self-publishing and promotion?
Discover the easy and free way to promote your book. It’s still the number one top way–writing and submitting articles to other ezines and Web sites.
Filed under Marketing Your Writing
Guest Post: Traits That Google Looks for In a Good Website
by James Beswick
Google has an automated crawling process called GoogleBot which travels from site to site, following the links it finds, and uses a proprietary algorithm to determine the importance of any given page.
Once web pages are indexed, these are then served in search results, depending upon a range of factors such as the search terms used and the location of the user.
Filed under Blogging
