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 Netter Report Vol 8 2nd Edition ~ The way to the top is build a bottom.

Netter Report: March 10, 2008 from the desk of Damian Walsh

Oh no, you seem to have found me down here at the bottom. Don't worry, even though I may not be able to see the top, I know there is one, and I'm going back up there. I was just here helping my new referrals. If you have a downline, you should be here too. Making sure that you have offered your help to all those who come after you. Taking the time to meet and greet the bottom, means you'll always stay at the top.

Zippy.