Archives for May 2011

3 Steps to Organizing Your Book Marketing Strategy

I’m in the throes of marketing my indie book Second Death. If you have a book, you should be in the throes of marketing yours. If not, get to it!

Easier said than done, right? The problem I have with marketing my book is the plethora of choices. Good advice on marketing is everywhere on the net. I’m getting overwhelmed just thinking about it. Here are some ideas that help me when the embarrassment of riches threatens to unhinge my mind.

  1. Stroll through the web and find good ideas. Don’t worry about implementing them right now. One place to start is my StumbleUpon list. Save the links to the sites that seem promising. Personally I need something to jog my memory, so print off one page of the site.
  2. Organize what you’ve found. I sort the printed out pages into categories–blogs, communities, services, etc.
  3. Create your marketing plan. I debated about making a formal plan, but in the end, what’s most useful to me is a list. I listed all the sites and services, and what I needed to do at them. Then I indicated how often I needed to do each step. Blog at this site once a week, drop in on that community daily for 15 minutes, freshen my Amazon author page monthly, for example. I transfer these items to a calendar so I know what to do when.

Try it and see if it reduces marketing head-spin. Let me know how your efforts work out!

If ever anything did go up and stay up

According to Monthly Weather Review, May 1878, a barn and a horse were “carried completely away” in a Wisconsin tornado on May 23, 1878. Neither the horse nor the barn, the report says, were ever found, either in whole or in part.

–Charles Fort, The Book of the Damned, p. 88-89 (The Complete Books of Charles Fort, Dover, c1974).

5 Ways to Reinvent Yourself at Age 51 (or Any Age)

In the interests of full disclosure, I turned 51 in January of this year. As I’ve written elsewhere, I experienced a big emotional change in my life that’s prompting me to reexamine my outlook. Lately I’m thinking often about reinvention. Here’s some ways to do it that make sense to me:

1. Express yourself.

Starting a blog is a good way to do this. Write about your own outlook on life. Write from the perspective of the person you wish you were. Share your own unique wisdom and perspective.
If you aren’t confident about your writing abilities, try posting photos are meaningful to you. Draw pictures and scan them. Sing songs and record them and post them.

2. Renew a relationship.

We’re defined to a large extent by our relationships. Improve them, and you’ll improve yourself. Get closer to a parent, reconnect with the brother you haven’t seen in years, call up the sister you always fought with.

3. Get serious about a hobby.

Invest the time, money and effort in something you really love, and get better at it.

4. Define yourself as something other than your job.

We spend so much time at work, we often see ourselves chiefly through that lens. If you’re fortunate enough to be employed, that’s wonderful, but don’t let it sap your soul. How do you do that? See #3 above for a suggestion.

5. Do something new for your physical, mental and spiritual health.

Join a gym, see a psychologist, take up meditation, deepen your prayer life. Concern yourself with the plight of the poor, the needy, the friendless, the outcast. Change your eating habits–eat one new thing a week that you’ve never eaten before.

I’d love to hear from you. Let me know how you’re reinventing yourself, no matter what your age.

Donna

Beginning Again, or Multiple Ways Through the Aether

Welcome to a new iteration of my Aether Excursions blog. Over the coming weeks I plan to migrate my posts from Live Journal (the interesting ones, anyway) here. I’ll blog about my writing, RPG gaming, and a topic that recently begun to interest me, reinventing yourself. You never know what you’ll find in the aether, so join me on my journey!

Donna

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