The Year of the Author

The Year of the Author

This year is turning out to be just like they said it would. Literary agents, publishers, and even authors have noticed that wherever they look, there is a new writer working or an experienced author writing more. Connect this trend with the explosion of social media and an American economic slump, there are more writers working from home offices than ever before.

Just ask Nathan Bransford what is different this year than past years, and he'll tell you that there are more queries being sent into publishers and agents than ever before. The reason is simple and it gives authors hope that if it continues they can make a good living creating stories and taking notes of facts about what people on the internet are looking for. Content is King and content marketing is the prince that will carry on the lineage of quality writing pays when it is produced "on demand" and has a following ready to read and rate it's quality. The signs were there all year long, National Writing Month set the ball in motion, and now the best time to prepare a great work of fiction for the internet is right now.

If you're a writer but you are a new writer I can tell you that I know you, you and me are alike. I am a writer who started writing because my reality changed and I agreed to change with it. I am not just another sheep in the crowd though, I am the black sheep. "Here's how I plan on getting myself heard through all the baaaaing."

#1 Write More (How to, Revenue Share, Website content, tagging, categorizing, novels, links, blog)
#2 Social More
Facebook
Twitter
Website
New options
#3 Bookmark More (Social Marker)
#4 Talk More (Blog Radio)
#5 Record More (NHRA, New Fiction)
#6 Organize More (Calendar, Schedules, Meetings)

These are all difficult and time consuming tasks. Each one has it's rewards and by following along a schedule of activity that is effective, you can become as good as you want to be, or purport to be, or are. The internet has not offered more opportunity to the lowly writer than right now. I am leading the way with my marketing as I get the content rolling out that will make the most residual income over the long haul.

Royalties will allow me to pursue the rest of my dreams, and writing about what I dream about is a great place to start earning money from the things I love to do.

- FD Walsh

The Newest Domain from Powerfitz Publishing

Novelists

I'm scouring the internet for news on the publishing world. What was common place just five years ago is now taboo. It seems that one good thing that came out of the economic down turn is there were more new novelists born in 2009 than any other year on record. Now that the books that were written last year, including the thousands of titles written in November for National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo).

The changes don't stop there. "Publishing is not the same".

Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Walden Books are just a few of the big names in book selling. They were supplied by publishers from around the world, new authors fell under the spell of their first literary agent, the manuscript was sold and printed and available from these mega book dealers.

Today the landscape has changed for publishers, retailers, wholesalers, and writers. "Writers have more options than ever before to bring a book to market." They have those choices because the consumer is changing their buying habits when it comes to the purchase of original works, books that is. The consumer is driving more content into digital format because it is cheaper to buy, easier to buy, comes from one platform, and an impulse to buy makes it more profitable for the writers who self publish. There are more pay to edit publishers than ever before and the numbers of new release titles will skyrocket for the foreseeable future.

My own first work is available to be read (at least a good portion of it) right from its fan page on Facebook. "Marketing has come to the author in a big way."

Before the internet, at least before amazon, writer's who have to go from bookstore to bookstore pushing their words. Conventions and speaking engagements gave writer's a place to market themselves and their books. Now, Facebook, and Twitter dominate. It's like a virtual convention whenever you turn on the computer. If you don;t have at least 50 friends to tell your story to, then you haven't met the internet lately, and as an author, you are doing yourself a disservice. Get your name, your title, your story online and you might be able to stop worrying about what publisher is going to pick up your next work. Maybe you can do a better job of promoting yourself and your book and now you really have the tools to do just that.

Facebook

"I'm not going to tell you how to use Facebook but I will tell you that you can do more with that site than make your own personal profile page. There are fan pages that you can make for each title you have, or make a collection page that people can come and follow. Pay for adverts that will bring in more followers and readers will follow that information to your point of sale.

"Now where is your point of sale?"

"Put it on your own website and sell it to your network." Do it like that and you keep everything. While publishers will cut you a royalty percentage, imagine if you could market yourself well enough to drive traffic into your own site, sell the digital copy through email or digital reading script, .pdf, or bound and covered through the mail. You get the best returns but you have to be the one driving sales.

"You can have your cake and eat it to with the right combination of virtual publishing and marketing combined with in store sales of your titles in bookstores like Barnes & Noble, Amazon.com, and the other popular book stores. Online and off, you can get a bigger return on investment when you do as much of the work yourself. It ensures you of the best percentages, you get to keep the most rights to your works, and you will be able to see a future in royalties with the digital text industry booming into 2015.

So, write a damn book if you're out of work. Publish it yourself if you're so inclined. Get the story down on paper and then turn it digital to take your earnings into the future with every new title you write.

The Social Bookmarker

The Internet is still run by users. I'm a user. You're a user. What we do when we are "using" continues to be influenced by the latest trends in search results and what others are using when they go online. If you asked me five years ago how to find things online, I would tell you to insert a phrase into Yahoo's search engine, and pick through the results. Not any more.

I wonder how long it would take for me to say the word "social" when talking about the Internet today? Not because I like the word, but because the Internet has suddenly become a viral social environment where everything is "suggested" and "recommended" rather than "resulted". The good ole days of search engine dominance is going away, and you can see that in the multiplying numbers of online social networks and social network "users".

You want users. I want users. We just don't want to be used. That paradigm is how search engines are going to be less relied on when consumers go looking for information online. Search engine results are only results. It takes more than a good web designer to turn visitors into clients because these new clients want your designer to be available when they need them. Not only should you be prepared to describe your message statically, but your message now needs a life of its own to be truly a viable product.

The average online session is increasing while the time spent on business or shopping sites is down. This is a direct result of social networks that are retaining the dominant percentage of time spent at one location, while the number of links to outside sources from social sites is increasing dramatically. What this statistic shows is that while people spend more time on the social site, they are clicking through and making sales using recommended links offered through their network of friends on social and bookmarking sites whose networks have exploded in numbers in 2008.

One way to give your message a voice is by presenting your message socially. If you are not going to develop this now, you will have to in the future. Where the online community goes, so goes all the business that can be retained from those users who continue to alter the way they interact with the Internet. It is our experience that more online visitors will be using social sites to communicate with friends and colleagues while they click through recommended information linked to the network through social bookmarks.

Now that you know a little more about where the Internet is going, we hope that it has helped show how you should be taking advantage of this trend. That sounds simple right? It actually is, but for many website owners, the use of social bookmarks is not being utilized after an investment has been made to create on online information source from which to spread a personal or business message. Beginning to get your business profiles created and updated is as easy as leaving us a comment on this blog or by email at powerfitz@powerfitz.com

We will create your business profiles in over 50 social networks and social bookmarking sites before you have to pay us anything. Choose your level of involvement, and begin to see regular updates and connections being made from the top social networks. Facebook, MySpace, Symbaloo, Propeller, Digg, Diggit, Googlebookmarks, Ask.com, Ask.Jeeves, plus, plus, plus!

Average cost per profile created $1
Average cost for news submission $.50
Average cost for unique content article (300 words) $5

Facebook friends (5 per day)
Myspace friends (20 per day)

Things you will need:

email address (we can create one for you if needed)
Profile Picture (we can insert one for you)
Birth date
City

Things we will do:
Use your existing website or blog to link to.
Create a website or blog to link to.

Discuss themes and design of profiles after initial profile has been created.
Average cost of theme work $5

You can always go to http://www.powerfitz.com to see how we are utilizing some of these tools directly from our home page.

A.W.E. Houston
Francis Walsh
832-830-6487
awewriter@gmail.com

The New is Definitely NOT the old!

http://www.designer-daily.com/

Monday, October 27th caused me to interact with designer-daily, so I took the opportunity to write a post about my favorite new design.

It is not the old standby that gets my emotions and creative juices flowing anymore. Internet design is something else though. My natural attraction to visual stimulus is easily placated, but my need for updated information controls the impulse to whittle away hours on useless sites. The internet is not new to me.

Back then I created a pack of carshows to give myself something to write about. Something my fans would need to plan their schedules, something to get them there. Not anymore. Now my visitors will dive into my information for exactly what they want. They'll even bring it with them if I recommend that the best way to get something back, is to become involved. And we don't even have to be friends.

Now it seems I'm just so many seconds behind my friend who just posted something online. But this is about design is it not? What design is my favorite? where you can find me duplicating and visualizing what excites me about that present form of information. Am I interacting, am I reading, am I finding out something new...new..new..new?

It's like sending out a scout plane to search for new land masses from which to grow a new base. My empire is only as big as the land I build. Tools of expansion? Words. I may use less voice but my words are growing into streams of information. Take the best features of design and build something to put words into or pull out of, and the new design of the internet is old again. My new design features excellent writing with instant interaction while traveling around to various locations online. Stop into The Internet Buddy System and pick up a friend to surf with. Recommend together. That's my new, I wonder how long it will be before it's not just and idea anymore?

Now that I've given myself a moment to write a random thought down, I'll tell you what my new favorite design is. It's the shared desktop Symbaloo. I found it on a scouting mission to Social Marker. A new landmass from which I can place all my new news. Do you Symbaloo? Fully integrated shareable desktops perfect for my attraction to visual aspects of great design features. Because I need to access quality information to digest and report on, I will have plenty of reasons to discover if this recommendation is warranted.

Report Card

The Netter Report report card September 2008: Good News and More News.

The construction of recent additions to the Powerfitz.com network continues. From the inclusion of increased free bandwith arms of the promotional program, Seasonal visits are up dramatically due to classified advertising that is fee-free based. Conversions have occured, and the trend for more sales is forcasted to occur until Halloween week from the 4Seasons Costume Shoppe activity. The addition of new advertising and successful promotions from The Holiday Netter, costume sales have averaged $1.00 per 1000 impressions of affiliate banners for the sale of Halloween costumes. This represents a milestone in The Netter's progression into branding the 4Seasons name.

Interested members of the blogging community who cannot afford to wait any longer for monies to begin to be deposited in accounts that bear their company name, should pay close attention to the techniques that are being used by The Netter. They have proven themselves in the past for great production in the parts distributor business, and now will be developing an entirely passive income source from scratch. The program includes training for followers of the Netter who want to know more about the time it took to complete all the tasks that were completed before the thought of money was at hand. Now that it is happening, it is important to realize that this "seasonal" sales event will need to be replaced with a non-cyclical sales program to be promoted in the same manner.

What can be found here will be something that anyone can duplicate. For FREE. Outside of some of the hosted sites, The Netter contends that this whole program can be replicated on an entirely free host. While the current Terms of Service at most free servers restrict what you can and cannot do with their bandwith, there are still opportunities to advertise and host a completely passive revenue source for free. The importance of costless services for the new web promoter means that with the right time investment, any new developer can see some fast results after a limited amount of time has transpired.

We look to enhance our current unique visitor, impression, and click through rate by tracking different advertisements. We will show the results of our efforts as new milestones are reached so that you can see that this information is crusial to you and your hopes of making money online with a website, blog, and affiliate programs that work.

Constructive Criticism

The Netter will be developing this list of things to do, and things that were already done for the development of our Blog Mall hosted at Powerfitz.com.

The goals we want to achieve are numerous. Beginning with the construction and linking of all blogs and websites, Powerfitz.com is now ready to develop the best methods to acquire new customers and readers who look to Powerfitz Blog Mall for their informational and product needs from the directory of products and services we are best known for.

Blogging
Drag Racing
Costumes
Holidays
Affiliate Programs
Commission Junction
Coin Collecting
Nitrous Oxide
Shopping
Social Networks
SEO
Keywords
Linking

These are some of the subjects that can be found to have great information posted from the Netter on all the blogs and sites that the Netter is responsible for developing.

In order to achieve some of the results that are needed to be successful, the smart blogger will now what they can understand, and what they cannot. The best way to start is for free. The Netter began in 1998 with free Yahoo Geocities sites to develop a program of news and announcements for a successful autoparts and auto show company. The use of the internet was for marketing and sales leads. Through the beneficial ranking of Yahoo, the business grew, and The Netter was successful.

In 2008, an new program of marketing and product information from Powerfitz.com was established in partnership with Houston Banquet Planner.com. These two companies are operated by A.W.E. Enterprises in Houston Texas. The Netter comes from a team of internet gurus who are bringing success to the new endeavors that have become the Powerfitz Blog Mall.

The long list of blogs and sites that are updated daily by The Netter is growing. The need for concise messaging and news from The Netter shows how a complete linked package of news, information, affiliate programs, and great internet reports on the subjects we love drives the future productivity.