Even though public speaking–like marketing, in general–can make you uncomfortable, it will help your writing career immensely.  Here are some of the different venues you can speak at, in order to promote your book:

By focusing your swag strategy, you will get cool items into the hands of more than the random person. You will get those items into the hands of your target audience. Your creative promotional items will plant the seed of your author brand into the minds of readers who will seek out your books in the future. And get readers talking to generate that magical force we call “word of mouth.”

Writer beware! FOCUS ON WRITING FIRST. How many of us have jumped on Facebook for “just a minute” and it turns into an hour? Social media can become a black hole, so don’t allow it to suck away all of your writing time.

As always, your social media outlets are spokes on the hub of your overall marketing strategy. Your social media should point readers to your website. 

This week’s marketing tool, a blog, can be a part of your website or its own separate entity. As a reminder, your website is the hub of your marketing efforts, so if you decide to have a blog in lieu of a website, you still need to include the elements of a successful website in your blog.

So how can blogging benefit you as a writer? Read on...

In a previous post, I gave the top five general guidelines for your book marketing strategy. So today we’re going to talk about the hub of your marketing presence, your website. Some author websites genuinely reek. After searching some really big names (which I will not name here because I don’t want to burn bridges) I was like, “Wow! If I hadn’t heard about this person through word of mouth I would not read their books based on their website.” THEY have the luxury of being uber-bestselling authors who can have ugly websites. If you’re not quite there yet, I’ll teach you the essentials of a damn good website.

In this post, I’ll share a few general pointers about marketing strategy. In following weeks, I’ll mention the individual pieces of my marketing plan, including: website, blogging, social media, print materials and swag, live events, launch parties, and PR. So let’s get started with the general principles behind your marketing strategy.

My son is seven, smack dab in that magical age where the world still shines. He doesn’t judge people based on their outward appearance. He makes judgments based on if they are “mean” or “nice.” But he is growing and we have conversations about the gray areas.

“Sometimes kids have a difficult life at home,” I try to explain when he is being bullied on the playground.Sometimes people are just born bad. I may think that but I don’t tell him that yet, because I want to preserve his innocence for as long as I can. Before life shows him that lesson.

In 2009 I went through an existential crisis. My son was 18 months old, I had an adjunct teaching job, and I was driving myself nuts trying to care for him all day while teaching freshman Comp classes at night. If I’d had a full-time teaching job (including that much fuller paycheck), I’d probably have stuck it out, but my course load had dwindled to one class per semester so I was making a pittance. To me, this situation spelled F-A-I-L-U-R-E.

Voodoo Butterfly is about a woman who unexpectedly inherits a New Orleans voodoo shop. Along with the shop, she inherits the power to change evil people good. The only problem? She knows nothing about voodoo or her secret power. 

Funny enough, Sophie's story came to me in a dream when I was actually visiting New Orleans with my family. I dreamt of this woman who had the power to change evil people good.