by Lynne | Aug 25, 2015 | Uncategorized
Writing is not what it used to be. You’ve heard this many times from many different sources. Writing must include marketing, in one form or another, even if you’re a traditionally published author.
A good deal of “free” marketing is done on social media and it works – hmm, reasonably well for the cost. So here’s a tip that may help you stay out in front of the crowd: Google Alerts. Here are two ways I use them:
- Visibility
I set Google Alerts for any topic or key words related to my books. Example: Civil War photography, digital photography, lost art, stolen art, Triangle Factory fire, labor disputes, Salem witches, witchcraft, hunt for missing Van Gogh, WWII plunder, etc., etc.
Almost every day some article from around the country (world) comes in related to one or more of these topics. Sometimes they’re far afield, for instance, for the Triangle Factory fire, I kept getting stories of a new musical created around the story of the fire. Or for the Salem witch trials, a new trailer on a movie called The Witch, kept popping up.
I don’t ignore these simply because they’re not directly on topic. In fact, I send them out to the social media groups that would find anything on the topic interesting. Believe it or not, I get many comments and likes in response. On The Witch trailer, I got close to 100 likes and/or comments within a few hours.
So what’s the point? Whenever you send something out, there is the chance that one of the readers will click on your name and mosey over to your website.
Also, because the blog or alert is online, anyone out there in the universe may chance upon it by entering those keywords. In fact, try Googling: “Hunt for missing Van Gogh.” You should find a link to my website.
- Promotion
I also send out book promos to my FB, Linked-In, Google + and Twitter fans regularly. Here’s one I sent yesterday: “A 1940’s photograph leads a digital photographer on a hunt for a missing Van Gogh.” I later Googled “missing Van Gogh” and the link to my website came right up. If I Googled “Hunt for missing Van Gogh,” I’m even higher up in the search results.
Two days ago, I sent this out: “Were the Salem Witch Trials rooted in a deadly conspiracy of greed and malice?” When I later Googled “Salem Witch Trials” my site popped right up. Sometimes in a search, I use Google key words closer to those in my promo ie: “Salem witch trials conspiracy and greed.” Then the link appears higher up in search results.
As time goes by, the link moves further down the list. Still, it’s there for anyone seriously searching. Pretty sweet, I say.
A caveat, however. The key here is Google +. My blogs and posts on Google + (not Facebook or Twitter) seem to lead directly to Google. Duh. Also, the same key words don’t come up as often or consistently on Bing or Firefox as they do on Google. Double duh.
Writers, consider posting on Google +.
The bottom line is: Google Alerts can help in your marketing efforts. Give them a try.
Ideas welcome as always.
by Lynne | Aug 18, 2015 | Uncategorized
Writing a good book is the first step. The most important one. Publishing it so it looks professional is step two. The third–marketing.
I’ve read books on Indie marketing and ideas range from developing a top-notch website, creating YouTubes, or audiobooks, and taking advantage of free social media, or paying for advertising, both digital and in print. So far, I’ve got a really good website. No YouTubes or audiobooks, yet. I use social media a great deal, but not paid advertising.
What I did do, however, on one of my books, was write a press release. But I didn’t write the release about my book per se. I took a concept from my book and capitalized on that. I found a “hook,” that I thought would be of interest to a wide audience.
DEADLY PROVENANCE is about the Nazi confiscation of art and a missing Van Gogh painting. It is actually still missing so I decided to go on a hunt for it. Seemed like a good angle: “Mystery Writer on Hunt for Missing Van Gogh.” Now what?
I created a press release, weaving my book concept into this “hook” so it didn’t appear to be just a “buy my book” message. Now, what do I do with it? I can send it to local papers and news stations. Not too hard. Find the feature editors, senior editors, etc. But what about a more widespread release? Throughout the city, state, country?
I investigated some marketing companies. I found one called PRWeb.com and decided to go with them. For under $500, they helped me tune up my release, target my audience, and release it on a certain date to many thousands of publications around the country. They also followed up with analytics to show who picked it up, how many hits, impressions, interactives (forwards, prints, etc.) took place.
How did I do? I was somewhat disappointed in the results. Most of the sites that picked up the story were online journals and digital newsletters. Certainly not the New York Times. A couple of biggies did pick it up: Miami Herald and the Boston Globe. But when I clicked on the sites and tried to find the article, they didn’t show up. Hmmm. Using Google and Google Alerts, I tried to find who picked up my press release. Still not a clear picture. Maybe I’m just tech-challenged.
My next step was to take the release and blast it to local press avenues. There I had more success. I snagged a radio interview at KPBS and astoundingly, landed on the front page of the San Diego Union Tribune. Terrific story by an excellent columnist who took my press release, interviewed me and then wrote his own article. I was flying high. Although anyone who knows San Diego’s U/T would probably laugh.
Then it was over. In one day, I was no longer a cover story. I was back to being one author amongst many. What now? Peddle the press release along with my one day of fame, to new sites or repeat sites? Write a new press release? Or do I hire a publicist who knows the appropriate next steps?
At this point, I have focused on writing the best books I could: delving into the research, creating new plots and interesting characters, and using social media to market. I’m not a New York Times bestselling author yet, but I’ve done pretty well. More important–I’ve enjoyed the entire process!
Ideas welcome!
by Lynne | Aug 11, 2015 | Uncategorized
I’ve heard that when writing fiction, anything goes. You can kill a character off in one book, bring him back in another. You can change locations, character occupations, family history, personality traits, hair color and even their choice of Ben and Jerry’s, from one page to another. Easy.
But what happens when you take (inconvenient) historic events and twist them to fit your story? Unless you explain your deviation from fact as an afterword to your book, you might engender reader outrage.
Anne Perry writes mysteries of Victorian England in which the Pitts, a policeman and his wife, a clever sleuth in her own right, solve crimes. Perry makes it clear that the wife, Charlotte, must face myriad obstacles to insert her ideas into the case. After all, except for the society columns, women weren’t even allowed to read the newspapers. Perry gives us a true picture of the attitudes of the times.
Several other books come to mind that portray history authentically. The Sharon Kay Penman Justin De Quincy series of mysteries is well-researched (like her other historical novels) and you get a true, albeit, grim sense of the medieval English times.
In my own mysteries, I used actual events in real times to create a fictional story. In TIME EXPOSURE, I fashioned a tale woven around Civil War photography. The characters were real, the battles were real, the locations were real. The killer was not. Plus, I created an alternative ending to history as we know it. I did add an author’s note at the end, however, to own up to my fiction vs. fact.
Authentic history can lend atmosphere, suspense, and incredibly interesting real characters to a novel. It can give readers a feeling for the time, a revelatory understanding of people of the time, and a sense of how we’ve come to be who we are as a culture today. This is why some books do us a disservice in this area. They portray a time period as something other than it was. I know some of you will be horrified by my suggestion here, but, to me, GONE WITH THE WIND, is just such a book.
GONE WITH THE WIND, while in some ways, an engrossing read, is not the true story of the Civil War. First of all, less than one percent of the southerners portrayed owned plantations. Even fewer than that treated their slaves as depicted (all one big happy family). There were other inconsistencies with historical fact that I will not go into here, but I was sadly discouraged when I got a note from a reader on a Civil War site in which he claimed that he learned everything he knew about the Civil War from Margaret Mitchell’s book.
When I talk about twisting history in a novel, I’m not referring to fantasy books like the OUTLANDER series, or ABE LINCOLN, VAMPIRE SLAYER. These books, while they may use history as a backdrop, have a more fantastical story to tell.
Nor am I thinking of books like THE DAVINCI CODE, or NATIONAL TREASURE. These are thrillers that use bits and pieces of history (true or not) to build a suspenseful, action-packed story that makes a great movie.
Novels can give us an authentic feel for the past. Here are a few great books that I believe stay true to history: PILLARS OF THE EARTH, LONESOME DOVE, THE OTHER BOLYN GIRL, and COLD MOUNTAIN. Please share others. Ideas always welcome.
by Lynne | Aug 4, 2015 | Uncategorized
This is a reprint of an earlier blog of mine that hit a nerve with many writers. The dilemma of spending time marketing your books vs. writing your books clearly resonated and drew lots of responses. I’ve tried to practice what I preached in that post and have cut down my time on social media. Some. Yet, here I am writing something that is not my next book. How effective is this use of my time?
There are two sides to this new dilemma of blogging. Both sides take time from writing your book. The first is writing blogs. The second is reading them — other writers’ blogs, that is. Writing them takes a great deal more time. Is it worth it? Actually, yes. It’s difficult to know whether my blogs drive sales, but I do know it drives people to my web site. I can measure the number of hits on the actual blog. That’s a good thing.
The other positive about writing blogs is that I actually learn from my own blogs. When I write about characters or scene or POV, I am focusing on the good, the bad and the mediocre. I am reading and re-reading other writers’ to see what works and what doesn’t, which characters shine and which fall flat, which scenes and settings have atmosphere or how point of view affects the story.
One of my blogs was about how to use animals to give your characters character. The topic forced me to think about my animals. How does my character interact with her dog or his parrot? What does it say about them if they leave them alone for days at a time, or if they are constantly worried about them? Great device for character development.
Another blog dealt with the forensics of fire. The fire took place in 1911. What was arson forensics like then? The blog helped me organize the details of my research so I could determine what was missing in the mystery.
So, the answer to the first side of this dilemma, is yes, writing blogs can be very valuable to the writer. After all, it is writing. However, I have no hard evidence that it drives book sales. As to the second part of the conundrum, reading blogs can also be a valuable use of time. There are some blogs I find extremely helpful. A good blog has a message that is of particular interest to me as a writer. I probably won’t read a blog about cookbook recipes, auto mechanics or pit bull fighting.
I will definitely read blogs on forensics, crime-solving, digital photography, art, and many historical subjects. Once the topic is of interest to me, I will take the time to read a well-written blog (yes, that’s important), and hopefully, one with a sense of humor. I will often share those with writer friends. Here are a few I can share right now:
http://barbararogan.com/blog/?p=711#! Specifically on how to create a good scene.
http://writersforensicsblog.wordpress.com/ Great, knowledgeable forensics Q&A and more.
http://www.blogher.com/bloggers-beware-you-can-get-sued-using-photos-your-blog-my-story – How not to get sued as a writer using photographs. Handy info.
For the moment my dilemma is solved. I’ll keep writing weekly blogs as long as folks keep reading them. I’ll keep reading blogs that can help me write better. In the end, I hope both of these activities will help drive book sales.
A good deal of “free” marketing is done on social media and it works – hmm, reasonably well for the cost. So here’s a tip that may help you stay out in front of the crowd: Google Alerts. Here are two ways I use them:
Two days ago, I sent this out: “Were the Salem Witch Trials rooted in a deadly conspiracy of greed and malice?” When I later Googled “Salem Witch Trials” my site popped right up. Sometimes in a search, I use Google key words closer to those in my promo ie: “Salem witch trials conspiracy and greed.” Then the link appears higher up in search results.
